Cancel Netflix if you value freedom
fsf.org
fsf.org
It was easy to see the economic reasoning behind many of those decisions, even though on the surface they seemed not to benefit the consumer.
Clearly, DRM is required in order for them to license the shows we want to watch. It's unfortunate, but it is something I am prepared to accept. What upsets me about this particular instance is that they are moving to make DRM a part of what are supposed to be the open standards of the web. It flies in the face of the principles upon which the internet was designed and built, and regardless of what technical hurdles it would help the company to overcome it is also very clearly an anti-consumer move, the scope of which reaches far beyond Netflix itself.
Maybe it's time I dusted off some of the books I've been meaning to read.
Flash and Silverlight are bad programs, but they're better than corrupting the HTML standard itself.
Chrome supports Netflix on a Linux kernel right now. They only allow it to work in ChromeOS on authorized devices that are not "rooted". There are no technical hurdles to supporting Netflix on normal Linux distributions, it simply is not something that they are interested in doing. If you support this stuff being added to the standard because you want to watch Netflix on your MBP running Debian (or similar), then you are misguided.
So, never?
They have "Linux" support: on ChromeOS, Android, Roku, and likely several TVs and other devices. The ChromeOS support in particular is relevant to "regular Linux" support.
They just don't care, they don't have any real pressing reason to care, and frankly I don't think they ever will. The future of general consumer computers is in device/OS combos like Android and ChromeOS. When people flee Windows that is the sort of device they go to.
If Ubuntu Phone or whatever it is called ever takes off, I wager it will only support Netflix as ChromeOS does: works in Ubuntu Phone but not if you are running Ubuntu Phone Edition on "unofficial" hardware.
I expect, though, that it will make it more likely for Netflix to add native Linux support, because providing one decryption plugin should be a lot easier than providing a whole movie playing application.
The issue is policy, not technological.
Maybe they should just go native on all platforms.
This couldn't be further from the truth now more than ever. DRM is required in the sense that their contractual obligations require it, but the technological and social requirement is just not there.
Why should the HTML standard be encumbered by something wholly unrelated? The copyright maximalists (including Netflix) need the web more than the web needs them.
The social requirement is there in that the market wants the product that has contractual obligations. To meet that demand requires a change in technology.
I need the web to work the same way that Netflix needs it to work so that we may both benefit from it.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the suggestion is a unified approach to deal with plugins or extensions, not putting DRM inside HTML itself. If you oppose the idea of a plugin or extension then don't install it and don't use the service that they provide. A service that everyone who uses it voluntarily and willingly agreed to use it under the provider's terms.
Not to say that your other points aren't valid. I'd rather not see anything resembling DRM ever. I just want to point out that a legal obligation such as a contract does make this a valid requirement for Netflix and other digital streaming services.
You are thinking about this way to philosophical. Netflix would love to start using HTML5 today, DRM or no DRM, but the studios just wouldn't allow it. So...should they just close up shop because they can't have their way, and we can't have ours?
They aren't making DRM part of the standard. They are making an interface to interact with DRM part of the web. Actually, its to interact with encrypted media, which is a superset of DRM. I expect there will be people using it for privacy when sharing media with friends and family.
Seriously. My sincerest apologies if this sounds bitter, but this is a completely non-constructive rant. Again.
The FSF's stances are completely untenable to most people.
Aside: Why would someone who makes a principled stand on free software ever have signed up with Netflix in the first place?!
Maybe some people who didn't take a principled stand on software freedom, and therefore signed up for Netflix, can be convinced to take a stand and cancel.
Stop consuming all media produced by the studios who have been driving DRM forward if you value freedom. That means stop going to the movies, stop watching TV, cancel Netflix, don't patronize Redbox, don't even torrent the stuff you want to see. Just completely reject it. Go read a nice paperback book instead. Yes, that means you don't get your entertainment, but you can't have your cake and eat it, too.
Kvetching that Netflix is the Big Bad Bogeyman here is like blaming your grocery store for the nutritional content of the food you buy from them.
Netflix has a hell of a lot more reasons to make their DRM bit work in Linux than Adobe and way, way more reasons than Microsoft.
I mean, I am a Linux user and I give them my money anyway. I expect most others do as well.
How does that help the situation at all?
Either data is DRM-encumbered or it's not. The basic issues of rights of creators vs. rights of distributors vs. rights of consumers are exactly the same.
All you're doing by arguing against a standardised way of using DRM on web sites is leaving lots of little walled gardens. Having all the data you want, in an unencumbered format, in a nice open field where anyone can play, isn't an option that's on the table right now. It won't magically become an option just because you force all the distributors to develop custom schemes for their DRM instead.
Because I like to read it..
The classic argument against DRM is that you don't really own something that you've purchased. But...you aren't purchasing your local news channel's broadcasts. You don't own them, you don't have any claim on them. What's wrong with the owner deciding what can be done with them?
Right now I cannot use Netflix on my primary operating system. I can read the news because without strong incentive to DRM it (as Netflix has, their licensing terms require it) it is not worth implementing DRM.
You appear to have made a poor choice of operating system. Perhaps you should try a better one for your needs? There are lots of choices, and many of them would let you use Netflix if that's what you want to do.
(Furthermore, I am able to watch Netflix videos on other devices. The inability to watch Netflix on my primary computer does not bother me. I don't have that support now, I won't in the future, I never had it and I never expected it.)
No, I'm just explaining why a problem of your own making, which will affect a tiny minority of people interested in viewing content on-line, is not reasonable grounds for undermining standards that would probably be in the interests of the overwhelming majority.
Or is it just something that you find satisfying to say.
Satisfying, no, but it is tiresome to watch people campaign for openness with one breath and then complain with the next that they can't access things that are paid for and only available in the closed world they chose not to participate in.
That does not give me reason to support this proposal.
> in the interests of the overwhelming majority.
It is in the interest of Netflix. Netflix streaming currently "Just Works"(tm) for most consumers, and it will continue to do so. Netflix wants it because it would make their lives easier. I have no reason to support this, and every reason to not.
The only thing that might be worse than the proposal itself is the absurd amount of misinformed Linux users who think that this will allow them to use Netflix or who think that Netflix really just wishes so hard that it could support Linux but is technically incapable of doing so... That is maddening.
"Satisfying, no, but it is tiresome to watch people campaign for openness with one breath and then complain with the next that they can't access things that are paid for and only available in the closed world they chose not to participate in."
I have no complaints with the status quo. I am oppose a proposal that would threaten it in a way that has the strong potential to negatively impact me. "Paid for" has absolutely no place in this equation for me. I pay for and consume many things, some of which I have to use in particular ways. I'm not bothered by this current state of affairs. I've made tradeoffs and I am not complaining about them (unlike many Linux users who refuse to stop complaining about no Netflix on Linux).
Nobody is suggesting a <html drm="true"> change here. We're not talking about enabling broad DRM for all the bytes delivered over HTTP internet. We're talking specifically about extensions to HTMLMediaElement (https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/HTMLMediaEl...) which provide for challenge-response authentication and decryption of a media stream. Nobody has suggested that we should be adding some mechanism to HTML that allows a browser to talk to a webserver if the browser possess the right DRM license.
> not talking about enabling broad DRM for all the bytes delivered over HTTP internet. We're talking specifically about extensions to HTMLMediaElement
Gee, you think news sites may have multimedia? Naaahhh...
I'm quite well aware that binary blobs are required for the CDM. The requirement of a license server and server-side encryption compatible with a client-deployed CDM would still be prohibitive for the "small fish" (after all, if they cared, they could just use Flash or Silverlight like is done today).
It really isn't. It's significant, but for the kinds of royalties the big media guys are trying to protect for a major sports event or a Hollywood blockbuster or smash hit TV show, they'd pay it a dozen times over. The reality is that just means only a few of the most popular platforms will be able to view the DRM-encumbered content, and people on niche platforms will lose out.
I really don't give a shit if Netflix uses DRM. I honestly don't have a problem with them or other "big fish" using it. I am concerned about every fish using it.
This line of reasoning is short-sighted and narrow-minded. Netflix and the iTunes Store flourished just fine with the amount of DRM we have now, why do we need more?
I find this problematic because it would also make it easier for others to do the same. Just imagine if old media websites started using it...
DRM should be a pain in the ass. It should be something you have to dedicate lots of engineer hours to, constantly, so that using it cannot be something you casually decide to do. NPAPI and the like are pretty shitty, and that is the way it should be.
You can either have a standardized way of delivering this content that there is obviously a massive demand for, or you can have everyone that wants to deliver video implement their own shitty browser plugin that will undoubtedly be full of security holes and performance issues and require regular patching. Trading Flash/Silverlight for a proprietary binary plugin per platform sounds genuinely awful to me. It's been a massive uphill battle with Flash/Silverlight - expanding that to a plugin per platform would be a nightmare.
The demand for the product is there. Maybe I'm just more pragmatic than idealistic, but as someone who enjoys these services, I'd really rather than they not suck. My primary complaint with DRM in general is the sucky customer experience, not the DRM itself. For streaming services, the classic issue with DRM ("you don't really own it") doesn't apply, because you already explicitly don't own what you're streaming. As long as it doesn't get in my way, I have no issue with it. Proprietary binaries are a lot more likely to get in my way than a standardized set of HTML5 extensions are.
Exactly.
I do think there is a risk that it simply won't be possible to buy a legal permanent copy of a lot of content in a DRM'd era. More limited library subscription or streaming/rental models are likely to be more financially beneficial to content producers, and if the content is valuable enough, people will still pay for it on those terms.
At the moment, I'm leaning towards saying that's OK if the market will bear it. A reasonably priced service where I can listen to just about any music track I want probably does have more value to me than owning a bunch of little plastic discs with a tiny fraction of the same material on them.
At the same time, copyright is supposed to be a two-way street that motivates the creation and distribution of works for the general good. If the content producers can make a reasonable return much faster thanks to DRM, then it's also fair to say copyright terms should be dramatically shortened in this new environment, and maybe some form of positive obligation to release the content into the public domain should exist. This way, works can be produced and profitable faster for the benefit of creators, and then they can become public faster as well.
Part of the trouble today is that the intent of copyright laws has been so distorted that they really do serve more as a means to lock works up than to motivate their distribution. But this was a problem already, legally speaking, so I don't see much downside to highlighting the issue so there is increased pressure to fix the underlying problem.
There is no negative. What is negative is the fact that people seem to think that netflix should just continue using a closed system made by Microsoft which doesn't work on Linux natively.
That's not to say they're always wrong, but you have to remember to evaluate everything they say through that lens...
This is indeed a complicated issue and could end up badly for the internet as a whole.
This specification does not define a content protection or Digital Rights Management system. Rather, it defines a common API that may be used to discover, select and interact with such systems as well as with simpler content encryption systems. Implementation of Digital Rights Management is not required for compliance with this specification: only the simple clear key system is required to be implemented as a common baseline.
https://dvcs.w3.org/hg/html-media/raw-file/tip/encrypted-med...
The negative is that the new proposal will also not work on Linux. It will also not work on other browsers, because each DRM implementation for EME will be incompatible (there are currently 2, incompatible of course, Google's and Microsoft's).
By all means let them. They can even work with browser vendors to make it "work" on any platform that has their proprietary DRM binary. But there aren't enough ten-foot poles in the world to call that an "HTML5" "standard".
That's fine, nobody is arguing against what Netflix can and should do with their own software and hardware that they distribute -- but the key difference is imposing their business requirements on everybody else.
They have no authority -- be it moral, ethical, or logical -- to impose such a will on everybody.
We encourage users to do their microblogging
with Web sites that do not include nonfree
JavaScript, like identi.ca and other
instances of pump.io. If you prefer Twitter,
you can use the mobile version of the Twitter
site which works with JavaScript turned off,
even on a desktop computer.What on earth is their gripe with Javascript?
Virtually every negative effect the likes of RMS and the FSF have predicted when it comes to not using free software has come true.
There's nothing strange about encouraging people to avoid non-free solutions.
I'm far from a fundamentalist when it comes to free software, but I'm glad someone is still paying attention and reminds me of the consequences.
And yet more people are enjoying more content and more benefits from technology than at any point in human history.
Sometimes content creation industries screw up in how they treat their customers, and it's good to realise that and to fix it when it happens.
Sometimes people take advantage of secrecy, and they should be called on it and punished for it, by market forces or laws or both.
However, the general FSF/RMS/GPL3 "everything must be free" philosophy seems counterproductive to me, because it denies the middle ground where most useful things actually happen and most real progress gets made. They're throwing the baby out with the bathwater, and then the bath after it, and then knocking down the house because it wasn't built with the appropriately sourced bricks and living in a mud hut. How is that going to keep the baby cleaner?
The DRM module itself would probably still be a closed-source, black-box piece of software, but the playing of the video would be handled by the browser natively w/o the need for plugins like Flash or Silverlight (since after decryption you end up with a standard H264/WebM stream in a <video> tag.) Now, sure, you can argue until you're blue in the face that DRM is bad, but the good thing is that you're separating the DRM from the presentation/rendering layer. This is, without a doubt, a step forward.
In theory this would make things even easier for pirates wanting to capture content since now there's a standardized way for the browser to interface with the DRM layer, decrypt the content, and play it.
The FSF's argument here is null and void because Netflix never was a free service to begin with. They never claimed to offer Linux/free software compatibility, and as a private company they have no obligation to.
For a concrete example, look at how deep the content protection system introduced in Windows Vista goes.
http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.html
The proposed Encrypted Media Extensions standard is merely an interface between browsers and systems such as this.
I do think that fighting the inclusion of DRM in future HTML standards is worthwhile, but this isn't going to get me to pick up a sword.
I am curious if asm.js is quick enough to produce code that could decode encrypted full-screen HD video on browsers whose vendors won't support the media extensions.
Pardon me for ignorance on this subject, but is there something about DRM that requires a plugin or component built into the browser itself? Could our answer to Netflix be, "Write the codec yourself using asm.js"?
I don't know whether Hollywood would consider JS DRM secure enough; it probably depends how good a negotiator you are.
It seems to me that quashing tampering or observing of the trusted component is the lynchpin. In JavaScript, there is no way to access unexposed internals of an IIFE, that seems to me to get us half way there.
I wonder if there could be some way to add a "use trusted" pragma to an IIFE such that the browser would not allow debugging or watching the network traffic of that code? There'd have to be some new way to compare a checksum of the trusted code as well. I suppose that that could suffice in a video watermarking scenario, but Netflix could never watermark each and every video transmitted. I think they partner with some ISP's to cache content near to the users as well, so they're not even responsible for broadcasting the last mile of the video.
I know I am sortof commandeering the word "trusted" for something much weaker than what I think industry wants it to be here, I realize that. Maybe using such a term in a weak solution would satisfy the pointy haired bosses of the world. >:)
Seems to me if some rogue binary goes in and tampers with my Firefox or Chrome binary in order to circumvent browser security, then the browsers would know it and fail with an error. Obviously, any browser that builds from source can be directly modified by a developer.
My point is that the standards shouldn't be co-opted to fit every want and need that a transient entity has.
Netflix would like to add DRM to HTML 5 so they can migrate away from Silverlight. Right now there is no way (without Wine) to use Netflix under Linux. So in practice the FSF is campaigning against a more open web in which the #1 FOSS OS can run Netflix out of ideological reasons.
Likewise, Netflix doesn't really care about DRM, and as long as you are paying them monthly, they really don't care what format the content is in. It's the movie and television studios that don't want their content online without DRM.
Netflix is only able to do that deals with these studios if Netflix promises their content will be covered in DRM. No DRM, not content says the big bad studio. So now that Microsoft is sunsetting Silverlight, what are they to do?
But here is the thing that irks me about this. On the server end of things Netflix has been a rather amazing contributor to open source softwares. This boycott seems rather like shooting your self your own foot to stop an intruder.
Netflix are part of the content industry, it's not that they're the best of a bad bunch, they're actively more open than some artists.
Well, I wouldn't, but somebody would.
1. Cheap licensing terms for DRM: http://www.quora.com/When-does-Netflix-use-WideVine-DRM-inst...
2. Strong support for CDNs, enabling lower-cost streaming: http://www.quora.com/Why-does-Netflix-use-Silverlight
Also, I'm seeing a clash of connotation between encryption for DRM and encryption for PRIVACY. Is encryption only good when it is protecting the freedom of the user, not the producer?
Actually, yes. Your computer should only do what you want it to.
It's not clear to me that it makes sense to define Netflix's exact business model as a market. If you look at streaming video in general as the market there are many competitors like Apple, MS, Sony, Hulu, Epix, etc.
Are you talking about the mail-DVD-rentals-to-your-house market or the stream-video-over-the-internet market. Because they've got plenty of fairly direct competition in the latter and currently more significant market (Amazon, Hulu, and Redbox streaming services, among others) as well as plenty of close substitutes (e.g., cable/satellite TV services which include "On Demand" series and movies) , and, if not a lot of direct competiton in the former market, at a minimum a close substitutes in the form of pervasive rental outlets (particularly Redbox).
Is it an impractical position? Totally, of course. DRM is not optional to video content suppliers, so no matter what replaces Silverlight, it will come with DRM.
Without a W3C standard we might get several totally different, incompatible DRM implementations instead of one standard one. To folks who like standards, that will feel like a missed opportunity; but it doesn't seem any worse than what we have now.
Only because our consumer culture places such a high value on entertainment. There are way more important things, though.
And no, I don't have a Netflix subscription; haven't for years. Flirted with Spotify some months ago, but canceled that too.
The EME spec does NOT define a single standard DRM implementation.
The point of EME is to provide a single interface to a DRM module. The DRM modules will be entirely nonstandard, closed-source, and there will be many of them.
Google has its own DRM module, Microsoft has its own. So there are already two, entirely incompatible DRM implementations. And none of them work on other browsers. Even if other browsers implemented EME, the actual DRM implementations would not work on them.
So this is a step backwards, not forwards. It increases fragmentation.
FSF's cries are nothing more than a demand to reduce the freedom of others for their own personal gain. That's not freedom.
Why should the desires of the American entertainment industry have such influence over the standards of the World Wide Web?
Wait, what exactly is the abuse of technology we're talking about here?
http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.html
Sony once tried to implement DRM using a rootkit, remember?
Also, the movie industry pushed SOPA and PIPA.
Sony's rootkit shenanigans were already illegal under numerous laws in numerous jurisdictions, also an example of incompetency.
SOPA and PIPA are examples of abuse on a political level and has little to do with what I'm asking.
What abuse of technology provides what power and control over us when we are discussing DRM in the HTML stack? Even if they did get some type of DRM into the HTML stack (which isn't even happening, we're talking extensions here), you as a consumer still have more power and control by refusing to play their game in the first place.
Again, what abuse of technology are we talking about here?
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6035701
Also, DRM gives companies like Netflix, and the developers of the proprietary platforms that Netflix builds on, the power to be gatekeepers.
Netflix and other similar services stream DRMed video to the browser, and they will continue doing so. Right now they use Silverlight, a proprietary Microsoft plugin whose future is unclear. Traditionally, sites have used Flash for any sort of video playing. Netflix would prefer to stream, play, and control the video using web standards, but as a distributor for Big Media, they need a DRM story. They'd like the story to be that the browser provides a facility for them to decrypt the content on the client.
Don't get me wrong, I'm no fan of DRM, and the whole situation doesn't make sense so I don't believe it will last. Since all DRMed media comes with the decryption key, it's really only laws that make the encryption relevant, coupled with enough technical difficulty that a layperson would have to acquire some (illegal) software to perform the decryption. It sucks that ubiquitous hardware and software media formats come encumbered with restrictions (like "you can only play this DVD in the US" or "you can't skip this trailer") and are subject to patents; that you can't play a movie you bought on a physical disk for $12.99 on whatever computer or device you want in your own house.
However, given the fact that legally, certain types of software are restricted in how they can be used, why not put that software in as small a box as possible? Just because Stallman doesn't want proprietary software on his computer doesn't mean you should have to run a separate runtime from your browser to use it. Let's make DRM a box with a key and a decryption algorithm and a sign that says, "Do not run!" Let's have royalty-free, open-source, standardized DRM, peer-reviewed by the hacker community to ensure that it's unbreakable without the key that you also have, and that there's no button visible to casual users that circumvents the restrictions. Treating DRM the way we treat other software actually weakens the concept by exposing the absurdity.
Let's make it so easy to stream protected content that there's nothing to pay Netflix for, except maybe original content, instead of ending up in a world where we pay $60 a month to Netflix, Hulu, Vudu, and a dozen other services.
The HTML standard is set by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), which this block of corporations has been heavily lobbying as of late. The proposed adoption of EME is disturbing for what it says about the way decisions are made relative to the Web, but what does it mean for you as a free software user?
Surprise, corporations are involved in web standards. Engineers at Google, Microsoft, Apple, Mozilla, and other companies wrote or reviewed many (most?) of the web standards in place today.
DRM and free software don't mix... We'll see an explosion of DRM on the Web -- a growing dark zone inaccessible to free software users.
I don't know if we'll see an "explosion of DRM on the Web" (it seems doubtful, unless it is because putting video on the Web is now more attractive to content-owners), but the decision to define "free software" as not doing any sort of DRM (the whole "doesn't mix" thing) is actually a very controversial part of the GPLv3 license. If a "free software user" is someone whose insistence on "the freedom to study how a program works and change it" threatens to cut them off from parts of the Internet, I wonder how many of these people there really are.
Microsoft has already modified Internet Explorer to start supporting EME for media streaming. Simultaneously, Netflix has begun publicly promoting Internet Explorer, revealing a two-pronged strategy of pushing proprietary browsers while attacking Web standards in the W3C.
Netflix doesn't have a "strategy" for attacking free software. It's not a "two-pronged" assault just because you feel affronted on two counts. Netflix presumably has their own motives, like simplifying their software, improving the experience for users, and supporting more devices. They want to work on Linux. They want to pay lip service to the idea of DRM while minimizing the impact on their service.
Boycotting Netflix and impeding a web standard don't seem like great tactics for fighting DRM to me.
This is exactly what people said about music, until Apple decided to do it, and did.
It's like defending a company that wants to dump toxic waste into our drinking water with the argument "well, they have to leave it somewhere".
Screw that. They want to use DRM, fine. But not at the expense of a free and open web.
This isn't about DRM. This isn't about copyright. This isn't even about greed. This is about power and control.
I'm not aware of any portion of Netflix's proposals that would "break the open web." If the open web isn't broken by what Netflix and thousands of other companies are doing right now, how will "Netflix nefarious scheming" break it?