diligentcircle
Well-Known Member
I'm sort of surprised that there isn't a topic about this here already.
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is going through with a proposal called "Electronic Media Extensions" (EME), which is an attempt to incorporate Digital Restrictions Management (DRM) into HTML itself by standardizing a way to load "Content Decryption Modules" (CDMs), which are nonstandard extensions that would be used to play media files that have DRM.
So, in a nutshell, EME is a standard for loading nonstandard extensions to incorporate DRM.
This will probably not cause a significant change in the Web. The problem with incorporating DRM into HTML itself is that it acts as a rather explicit endorsement by the W3C, which is a standards committee that is supposed to be supporting the free and open web, of technology which deliberately restricts users and hurts interoperability. If corporations want to require proprietary software with DRM for people to play their videos, it should be their responsibility to do it on their own time, with their own money; the W3C should not be helping them.
More information can be found here:
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/03/defend-open-web-keep-drm-out-w3c-standards
https://www.fsf.org/news/world-wide-web-consortium-takes-next-step-with-controversial-drm-proposal-defective-by-design-condemns-decision
http://www.defectivebydesign.org/stepping-it-up-against-the-hollyweb
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is going through with a proposal called "Electronic Media Extensions" (EME), which is an attempt to incorporate Digital Restrictions Management (DRM) into HTML itself by standardizing a way to load "Content Decryption Modules" (CDMs), which are nonstandard extensions that would be used to play media files that have DRM.
So, in a nutshell, EME is a standard for loading nonstandard extensions to incorporate DRM.
This will probably not cause a significant change in the Web. The problem with incorporating DRM into HTML itself is that it acts as a rather explicit endorsement by the W3C, which is a standards committee that is supposed to be supporting the free and open web, of technology which deliberately restricts users and hurts interoperability. If corporations want to require proprietary software with DRM for people to play their videos, it should be their responsibility to do it on their own time, with their own money; the W3C should not be helping them.
More information can be found here:
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/03/defend-open-web-keep-drm-out-w3c-standards
https://www.fsf.org/news/world-wide-web-consortium-takes-next-step-with-controversial-drm-proposal-defective-by-design-condemns-decision
http://www.defectivebydesign.org/stepping-it-up-against-the-hollyweb
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