
Mozilla Launches a New Firefox Version Without DRM Support - harshabhat86
http://techcrunch.com/2015/05/12/mozilla-launches-a-new-firefox-version-without-drm-support/#.4a6ylb:CFbt
======
mavdi
I remember back in the day people were suggesting moving from Flash video to
HTML5 video will somehow free us from Adobe DRM and DRM in general.

Those were funny days.

------
bsder
Actually, the best way to fight this would be to fund people to break the DRM
blob.

What better way to drive home the uselessness of DRM than to have zillions of
people having an automatic plugin that bypasses DRM everywhere it runs?

~~~
forgottenpass
No, that is just an iteration of a cat and mouse game. It doesn't matter if
the technically-weak position can be overcome when it is used by parties with
exponentially more money and legal power.

Fighting this fight on technical grounds alone is a surefire way to accelerate
the inevitability of locked down computing platforms that restrict what the
owner is capable of.

~~~
slang800
Unless it's easier to break DRM than it is to build a new implementation...
Then we're just causing the companies that invest in DRM to lose more money
than the companies that respect freedom.

I can't say from experience how difficult it is to break and implement the DRM
used on the web, but if it's anything like the DRM used in videogames, it
should be doable in a couple weeks (with enough motivation).

~~~
na85
The end game is that DRM companies aggressively lobby government to pass laws
making it illegal to circumvent a digital lock. Then if you are found to have
bypassed their trivial code they throw the book at you.

No technical solution required.

------
mike-cardwell
And here is the end result of people leaving Firefox for Chrome. You neutered
Mozilla. There is no longer a browser vendor which has both your interests in
heart _and_ sufficient power to direct the evolution of the web.

Who now gets to choose which features are built into the majority of desktop
and mobile browsers? Advertising companies.

~~~
DCKing
Come on. This is the same Mozilla that promoted installing Adobe Flash for
internet video since its very inception. If you're really such a purist, they
should have been your enemy all along.

Nothing has changed, and the conclusion is nowhere near as dramatic as you're
making it sound. The suggestion that Mozilla implemented this for market share
reasons is also incredibly unsubstantiated and ignores the very obvious
practical reasons they will have had: dropping reliance on large propietary
application runtimes (the DRM module is much smaller and has less
functionality), improving user experience, and the fact that it's an _actual
web standard_ (albeit the most controversial one).

~~~
icebraining
I don't disagree that Mozilla was never a purist organization, but I think the
suggestion is well substantiated. From the post announcing it:

 _" With most competing browsers and the content industry embracing the W3C
EME specification, Mozilla has little choice but to implement EME as well so
our users can continue to access all content they want to enjoy. (…) We have
come to the point where Mozilla not implementing the W3C EME specification
means that Firefox users have to switch to other browsers to watch content
restricted by DRM._"

[https://hacks.mozilla.org/2014/05/reconciling-mozillas-
missi...](https://hacks.mozilla.org/2014/05/reconciling-mozillas-mission-
and-w3c-eme/)

~~~
notsony
One could argue Mozilla was quite purist when they ejected Brendan Eich
because his personal beliefs were not shared by fellow employees... but more
on that later.

Perhaps the real reason Brendan Eich was thrown out of Mozilla was because he
didn't embrace DRM and EME? Given his stature as founder of Mozilla and
creator of Javascript, he could have posed a significant roadblock if he had
decided to reject EME's inclusion in Firefox.

If you put on your tinfoil hat, recall that Brendan's donation to Prop 8 was
public information for several years... before it suddenly became an issue.

> _" So long as people want Hollywood movies, and Hollywood is used to getting
> its way, and DRM vendors are pushing to perpetuate this and codify it, and
> put it under a fig leaf from the W3C, we have a real problem."_.

[http://www.computerworlduk.com/blogs/open-
enterprise/brendan...](http://www.computerworlduk.com/blogs/open-
enterprise/brendan-eich-mozillas-cto-on-eme-and-drm-3569430/)

~~~
Karunamon
This is an interesting theory and given what we know how how hollywood works
in the backroom, plausible, but there are no facts to support it.

Eich was not "thrown out of mozilla". The board knew about his donation and
appointed him anyways - the pressure for him to resign came from the community
and Mozilla employees.

Hollywood is great at fomenting outrage, but not that much and not in that way
:)

~~~
notsony
If only company boards listened to their employees and "community" all the
time!

I think it's about opportunism. A situation developed and by simply stoking
the fires of social media outrage, a major obstacle to adoption of DRM in a
popular browser could be eliminated.

Consider the Mozilla position as soon as Brendan had been forced out -
coincidence?

> _" With most competing browsers and the content industry embracing the W3C
> EME specification, Mozilla has little choice but to implement EME as well so
> our users can continue to access all content they want to enjoy. Read on for
> some background on how we got here, and details of our implementation." \-
> Mozilla CTO Andreas Gal, 14 May 2014

"Mozilla will be adding a way to integrate Adobe Access DRM technology for
video and audio into Firefox, via a common specification called Encrypted
Media Extensions (EME)." \- The Mozilla Blog, 14 May 2014_

[http://voxday.blogspot.com/2014/05/why-brendan-eich-had-
to-g...](http://voxday.blogspot.com/2014/05/why-brendan-eich-had-to-go.html)

~~~
Karunamon
Given that Mozilla is a nonprofit, they've got more reason than most to pay
attention.

I don't really buy that narrative that all of Mozilla _really really wanted_
to accept DRM in the browser, but this one guy is such a pain in the ass about
shooting it down that they'll promote him and hope that the outrage machine
takes him out, and thus fulfill their evil plan to ??????! Muahahah!

Ahem. Made-for-TV movie plots aside, it fails occam's razor, it fails basic
logic, and as mentioned _there isn 't a single shred of a fact to support it_.
The actual story is shocking enough without trying to read patterns into it
that don't actually exist.

------
deanclatworthy
I'm curious as to why anyone would want this?

I guess if you consider the new DRM integration a potential attack vector it
removes that possibility.

But, if you're going to install this in the first place you won't be consuming
DRM content - so you probably won't even be visiting the sites that have it
anyway and using the feature.

~~~
schoen
You might worry that you wouldn't notice which sites are using it. Or you
might want to send a message to sites, or to Mozilla, that you think DRM is
bad and that you don't want to have DRM implementations installed.

One of the worst things about each browser vendor's decision to support DRM is
that it makes the choice to require DRM less costly for new web sites that are
considering it. So even if you think Netflix could never have been budged,
random site X might now say "cool, we can control what people can do with
video on our site, at a surprisingly low interoperability cost to us!". If you
want to avoid that outcome as an end-user, you have to do whatever you can to
increase potential DRM adopters' view of the market share they will put at
risk.

~~~
superuser2
This end does not seem to be served by niche browsers which will be used only
by the EFF-card-carrying subset of the tech community, people who are most
able and least ethically inhibited from piracy anyway.

This is a good reason to keep the functionality out of mainstream browsers,
but it doesn't seem to work if it's just us using deliberately hobbled
browsers.

~~~
pdkl95
How typical of the DRM/closed-web subset of the tech community to justify
their collaboration with accusations of piracy at those of us trying to create
a free and open web.

Resisting any type of DRM _from the very beginning_ is important, because the
fight will be a lot harder once there is an established community of users.
Educating people about DRM is hard enough; it is almost impossible when it
_also_ requires convincing people to give up some service (i.e. netflix) that
they have grown accustomed to.

This is the latest battle the ongoing War On General Purpose Computing[1], and
a lot of people that should know better are choosing movies and the dream of
short-term profits over long-term freedom.

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nypRYpVKc5Y](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nypRYpVKc5Y)

------
e12e
Apparently DRM doesn't work on Linux, yet - but either way: how can DRM even
work with Free software? If I can modify the source and build my own version,
surely I can [make a version of the software that] strip out the DRM? Would
that make Mozilla liable as facilitating breach of the DMCA?

Or is the DRM bit really in a binary blob supplied with the gpu/audio driver?
[And support in the browser is just to facilitate shipping the data to the
correct api entry point]

~~~
jumpwah
This is obviously the main issue. The DRM component itself is nonfree,
downloaded from Adobe's servers (iirc).

With this DRM section in the official html specification, it is impossible to
implement a fully html spec compliant, free software browser, which personally
I think is outrageous.

At the end of the day, it's still "just" a spec, but I don't think someone
(like the WHATWG previously) can just come along and "fix" this and get
everyone on their side. At the very least, this almost feels like a betrayal
by the w3c.

The plain truth is that no one cares about free software, even when the
software (a web-standards compliant web browser) is concerning one of the
greatest technological revolutions in human history so far (the internet),
which is just honestly sad in my opinion.

On the topic of firefox though, I hope Mozilla keeps the DRM part of the
browser an opt-in to download, rather than coming directly with the firefox
package itself. Anyone know if this is still the case or not? Also, does
anyone know if this DRM component is in the linux packages? (The article
mentions only windows vista+.)

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pasbesoin
Aside from everything else (NOT that I am happy with the context), I am simply
disgusted that Adobe is being "rewarded" with a role in this.

Not just their ongoing security fiasco, but also having had to deal with their
tremendously incompetent technical support, have left me permanently opposed
to their company.

Yes, the design allows for an arbitrary party -- I guess, although ties to /
use of TPM and whatever mean that, in practice, there will be a much smaller
field of... "mainstream" providers. In practice, though, meet the new evil,
same as the old evil.

------
shmerl
Netflix are hypocrites (and all this is primarily their fault). They claimed
that this DRM garbage in the standard wasn't their desire, and they did it to
oblige obsessed publishers. Yet, where is their own content DRM-free?

~~~
MichaelGG
Yes, it's important to keep in mind that while Netflix is fighting bad people
and we like them for that, many things they do are against consumer interests.
Like Steam. It's just that the alternatives are so worse, we give them a pass.

You're right: Someone should corner them on why "Netflix Original" content
isn't DRM free. (Or why they still restrict access and subtitles based on
region, for "Netflix Original" titles.)

DRM for Netflix is about putting up barriers. Just like Amazon convinced
publishers to go with Kindle DRM, giving Amazon the power in the end. By
encouraging DRM, it's harder to compete as it is one more thing to do that
Netflix already has. It's not _as_ powerful as Kindle's lockin - content
licensing is a bigger deal. Apart from that? Well, Popcorn Time provides a
much better experience than Netflix. (Proper subs, force HD, use better player
to normalize audio ("night mode") or otherwise tweak viewing, no messing with
proxies, etc.) My wife and kids are already starting to use PT, even when the
same content is on Netflix. Yikes. (Torrents + put.io was already pretty
slick, but slightly more difficult (2 apps, one extra click).)

~~~
shmerl
Popcorn Time though goes against the principles of distributed network like
BitTorrent. I.e. it prioritizes first data blocks most and as such it's not
network friendly, since network is built on assumption of equal
prioritization. So while it's an interesting idea in general, it doesn't sound
like the right solution technically.

Anyway, it's going a bit off-topic here, except may be it's a good reminder
that DRM should never be used since it only punishes legitimate customers and
does nothing good.

------
frik
The direct link isn't end-user friendly:
[http://download.cdn.mozilla.net/pub/firefox/releases/38.0/wi...](http://download.cdn.mozilla.net/pub/firefox/releases/38.0/win32-EME-
free/)

Consider a better integration with the download button/page.

~~~
maqr
Would this auto-update if I wanted this version?

I don't want to be off the normal firefox release cycle, but I also don't want
my browser to have DRM.

Why couldn't this be an install option and a preferences setting in the normal
firefox version? It could even be enabled by default. Then people who care
about DRM when they install have the option of disabling it, and people who
care about it later once they realize the evils of DRM could disable it in
their preferences. If someone installed without DRM but wants it later, the
preference could download the DRM at that point instead of automatically.

edit: thanks to cpeterso below: [https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/enable-
drm](https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/enable-drm)

But I still think it would be better as an installer option.

~~~
cpeterso
Yes, the EME-free build of Firefox 38 will auto-update to EME-free builds of
future Firefox versions. The EME-free version is not a one-off build.

------
magicalist
actual mozilla announcement: [https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2015/05/12/update-
on-digital-r...](https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2015/05/12/update-on-digital-
rights-management-and-firefox/)

------
jgord
Do the right thing and make it the default.

------
upofadown
The interesting part of this is the "sandbox" intended to keep the DRM module
out of parts of the system you don't want it messing with. Some general
commentary here:

[https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2015/05/12/update-on-
digital-r...](https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2015/05/12/update-on-digital-
rights-management-and-firefox/)

------
betenoire
Will in-browser DRM prevent someone from running some screencast software? I
dunno... it just seems like if I can see it with my eyes and hear it with my
ears, then software can do that also, DRM or not.

~~~
bigphishy
DRM implmentation into W3 standards and HTML5 won't impede pirates for a
second.

------
shmerl
It's only for the Windows version? In the Linux version that setting in
about:config is enabled by default. I set it to false.

------
JOnAgain
Installer please.

------
shit_parade2
I use Chromium, I wish companies were more honest and gave explicit alerts to
consumers when they choose to use DRM.

------
angersock
Yeah, but at least we managed to get that hateful bigot out of the company!
That's important, right? </sarcasm>

More seriously, we really do have a problem, but it looks like the users just
don't want to be free.

~~~
dec0dedab0de
_but it looks like the users just don 't want to be free._

The users don't care. I have never been able to convince a layperson why DRM
should matter at all to them, have you?.

~~~
therealfoxy
Yep - when they asked why the online service that they bought DRM ridden
content from closed, and now their purchases were lost (they were asking what
to do/how to do it).

~~~
jamespo
What service was that?

~~~
PhantomGremlin
There have been a plethora of these. I don't remember much because I'd _NEVER_
pay for DRMed media that I wasn't sure I couldn't get around. E.g. DVD is OK
since there are plenty of rippers.

Here are a few cases I recall:

Microsoft screwed a bunch of people with PlaysForSure. Even the brown bar of
turd wouldn't play it:

    
    
       The Zune and PlaysForSure music are both
       Certified for Windows Vista, yet the Zune
       cannot play PlaysForSure music purchased
       from the MSN Music Store[1]
    

MLB did the same thing:

    
    
       Some hardcore baseball fans have been left
       stranded on third base by Major League Baseball
       after it decided to change DRM systems. As a
       result, game footage purchased under the old
       DRM scheme are no longer viewable, leaving fans
       with unwatchable footage—and no refunds.[2]
    

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plays_for_sure](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plays_for_sure)
[2] [http://arstechnica.com/uncategorized/2007/11/major-league-
ba...](http://arstechnica.com/uncategorized/2007/11/major-league-baseballs-
drm-change-strikes-out-with-fans/)

