

FreedomHTML - dave1010uk
http://freedomhtml.org/

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belorn
While I doubt this will work, at least its a first step before people threaten
to fork the standard. Thus, it gives W3C time and perspective on what the
future could become for HTML.

To run and view DRM content, you must use closed and by extension, proprietary
software. That has always meant increased costs in either price (license) or
performance. If one sufficient popular product refuses to pay that cost, the
web will become splinted into groups of working vs non-working websites for a
subset of users. Given that every company has a incentive to decrease costs,
this is just a matter of time.

Hopefully W3C will realize that this is not a future they wish to have.

~~~
rimantas
You can fork standard till the cows come home, the only thing that matters is
what the browser vendors do. I am not sure about the relevance/importance of
the w3c either, given the history of HTML5 which was born as Web Application
1.0 outside of w3c and partly out of the frustration caused by that
organisation.

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yk
Since no one else is writing the obligatory HN "I like the idea, but it will
not work." comment, here it is.

I really like the general idea of a way to validate websites for privacy
issues. In the best case they should even do this client side. But I think
that they need to figure out two rather hard problems, one economically and
one rather philosophical.

The economical problem is, why should any web site owner use it. I simply do
not see a strong incentive.

And the philosophical is, what is actually meant by freedom? I see a lot of
edge cases besides DRM which are sketchy, like user tracking. But to reliably
stop user tracking, it is likely necessary to ban cookies ( which have of
course a lot legitimate uses). And JS is a different can of worms, it can be
used to spy on the user. The list goes on, iframes and third party content?
Does freedom HTML get tainted by it?

~~~
alipang
Philosophically this is utter hyperbole. Not being able to watch Arrested
Development, or any content, under whatever circumstances you prefer does
_not_ infringe on your freedom.

A content creator has the right to stipulate whatever contractual conditions
she prefers in order for you to partake of the content she's produced. If you
don't like it, don't watch it.

That being said, it's another matter of what actually constitutes good
business, likely there are not really any business advantages to DRM. You
could also definitely make a case for this idea as a good method of consumer
empowerment. I'd just prefer if they didn't pretend that this has anything to
do with "freedom" or liberty.

Bad idea != attack on freedom

~~~
yk
> Philosophically this is utter hyperbole. Not being able to watch Arrested
> Development, or any content, under whatever circumstances you prefer does
> _not_ infringe on your freedom.

But not being allowed to control my own property is. And this is specifically
what DRM is supposed to do, it prevents me to switch the bits in my RAM in the
way I want to.

And this was precisely my point, a important part of the standard depends on
the precise meaning of freedom.

~~~
endtime
I dislike DRM as much as the next HNer, but:

>But not being allowed to control my own property is. And this is specifically
what DRM is supposed to do, it prevents me to switch the bits in my RAM in the
way I want to.

Freedom doesn't mean the right to coerce others. If Netflix offers you a
certain contract (you pay their fee and accept their DRM, and in return they
stream you content) and you want to enforce a different contract on them
without their consent (you refuse the DRM and they still stream you content),
you are not advocating for freedom.

You might as well say, "And this is specifically what murder laws do, they
prevent me from projecting my bullets in the way I want to."

~~~
davorak
Normally when I think of the stereotypical disliked DRM scenario it is
something along the lines of:

    
    
        A publisher offers to sell, I do mean sell not lease or contract,
        you an ebook.  The ebook however comes with DRM.  It is not
        legal, in the US, to break that DRM under most circumstances.
    

This is case where DRM conflicts with the first-sales doctrine [1] and most
people belief that they should be allowed to do pretty much whatever they want
to their own property.

Often publishes advertise something as selling property, but really only want
to lease access rights, which is a different problem, false, dishonest or
deceitful advertising.

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine>

~~~
endtime
The context of this comment thread is Netflix, which no one can reasonably
claim to believe to be selling, rather than streaming, content.

In the case of sales, I absolutely agree with you that DRM sucks and is
misleading (perhaps to the point of being unethical) to the uninformed. And
personally (being informed), I don't buy anything with annoying DRM.

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samwillis
I just don't get this obsession with not letting anything like DRM into an
open spec for HTML. Copyright owners have every right to use DRM and in many
cases thats the only way we are ever going to get access that content without
monstrosities like Flash.

I'm not arguing that DRM works or that we shouldn't be allowed to "remove" it
from media we legitimately own (we should be allowed to) but we shouldn't
decide that DRM is evil because it isn't. Its the legislation around it that
is, DRM is necessary to help prevent capsule mass piracy, we all know it isnt
perfect and never can be but if it lets me watch a film or tv show without
flash or some other junk then I'm all for there being hooks to enable it in
HTML.

~~~
icebraining
_we shouldn't decide that DRM is evil because it isn't_

This isn't exactly an argument.

DRM is software working against its own users. Why should we embrace it?

 _DRM is necessary to help prevent capsule mass piracy_

It doesn't, and even if it did, that end doesn't justify the means.

 _if it lets me watch a film or tv show without flash or some other junk then
I'm all for [it]_

I'd rather those who support DRMed media to be inconvenienced; maybe they'll
actually stop buying crap and funding the companies that try to push terrible
legislation.

And if not, at least I don't get DRM in my software.

~~~
rtpg
>DRM is software working against its own users. Why should we embrace it?

Steam is DRM. Steam enables me to download my games from all over the place,
because their DRM knows that I bought the game at least once.

Not always a hinderance

~~~
networked
>Steam is DRM.

That is a common mischaracterization of Steam but it is technically incorrect.

Steam itself is the distribution platform (authentication/payment system and
package manager). It can be used to deliver both DRMed and DRM-free content
[1]. Valve's own DRM (called "Custom Executable Generation" or "CEG" for
short) is part of the Steamworks framework; many games published on Steam do
use CEG and some games also include third-party DRM on top of or instead of it
[3] but it is not mandatory to use CEG for your game for it to be published on
Steam.

Now, you _could_ argue that Steam encourages the use of DRM but that's a
rather different discussion.

[1]
[http://www.gog.com/forum/general/list_of_drmfree_games_on_st...](http://www.gog.com/forum/general/list_of_drmfree_games_on_steam/page1)

[2] <http://www.steampowered.com/steamworks/>

[3]
[http://pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/The_Big_List_of_3rd_Party_DRM_o...](http://pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/The_Big_List_of_3rd_Party_DRM_on_Steam)

~~~
talmand
As long as you are required to have an active Steam account to play the games
you purchased on Steam, an account that can be revoked if you break the terms
and agreements, then it is a form of rights management. The simplest form of
rights management it has is that it will not allow two simultaneous
connections to the same account, regardless if you have nothing but DRM free
games in the account.

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arcatek
We should not have to label our websites 'FreedomHTML' because we _don't_ use
some APIs. Those are the websites which use these specific features which
should be called 'SomethingElseHTML'.

I really hope that browser vendors will at least require some kind of explicit
opt-in for borderline APIs such as EME.

~~~
lukifer
We manage to do just fine right now with browsers simply opting out of
supporting certain web standards.

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pilif
What I don't get about the DRM issue: If there's no DRM possible with the
video tag, then it's IMHO more likely that big content owners won't use the
video tag than it is likely that they will go DRM free.

Too many workable alternatives to <video> exist. They might not work as well
(not provide as much DOM integration, use more CPU power), but they do work.

So for me the question is: What is more important to us? Getting rid of
plugins that are a hassle to keep up-to-date and open a whole lot of privacy
and security issues? Or being idealists about keeping media free of DRM?

As long as a lot of media is served using plugins, browser vendors can't
disable plugins (just like MS had to back-pedal with cutting plugin support in
Win8), as long as <video> and <audio> don't support DRM, media will be shown
using plugins.

A way to break the cycle and get rid of the plugins (which is a much worse
issue than DRMed content IMHO) is to allow content publishers to use native
browser features and a way to allow them to do that is to allow DRM.

~~~
davorak
One of the great things about the web and it's user interface is that I can
edit it on the fly. I can change the css, I can download an adblock plugin, I
can selectively change pretty much any aspect of it.

If those adds are served through EMR mixed in with content then I can no
longer filter the adds from the content. I can no longer style the content the
way I want either.

> A way to break the cycle and get rid of the plugins (which is a much worse
> issue than DRMed content IMHO) is to allow content publishers to use native
> browser features and a way to allow them to do that is to allow DRM.

What alternative solutions do you see? If there are no other solution what are
the consequences user will face?

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onli
Tell me which doctype to use, add the support into chrome and firefox (which
is basically an "if doctype htmlFree;then do not load drm; fi") and I will use
this tomorrow.

~~~
Zr40
You don't need a special doctype for that. Just don't include any DRM if you
don't want to include any DRM.

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AshleysBrain
What does this achieve? If a _profile_ only _omits_ features, then browsers
that do support EME and other omitted features therefore also support
FreedomHTML. So if Chrome supports EME, they can still say they support 100%
of the FreedomHTML profile.

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lifthrasiir
The website doesn't work at the moment. It wasn't caught by Google's cache
either. Any mirrors?

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TheRubyist
Money will always stop freedom.

~~~
chris_wot
What if I buy my way out of jail? Works in Monopoly. I'm usually the Cannon.

