Re: Encrypted Media proposal (was RE: ISSUE-179: av_param - Chairs Solicit Alternate Proposals or Counter-Proposals)

On 2012-03-07 06:10, Mark Watson wrote:
> On Mar 6, 2012, at 4:42 PM, Lachlan Hunt wrote:
>> Ideally, we should also have the content providers themselves
>> involved in these discussions and for them to be willing to reach a
>> compromise on the level of protection they will accept.  If their
>> only intent, in using you (Netflix, et al) as a proxy, is to
>> dictate exactly what we must provide, then these negotiations are
>> unlikely to go well.
>
> Just for the record, and to be clear, I am not acting as any kind of
> "proxy" for any of our content owner partners and do not represent
> them in any way.

It doesn't matter whether you're here representing them directly or 
indirectly. They are the ones who demand DRM for their content. They are 
the ones with whom you have some contractual requirements to utilise DRM 
on their content that you distribute, and it is those requirements that 
have lead you to try and get DRM supported in HTML <video>. So, yes, you 
absolutely are acting as a proxy for their demands, and it is they with 
whom these discussions really should be taking place, as it is they who 
really have the power to decide what level of protection is appropriate 
for their content.

> I'm not sure what "negotiations" you refer to above, but if you mean
> negotiations of commercial terms with content owners, then a W3C
> working group is probably not the right place for those, especially
> since - as you say - they are not represented here.

I mean these negotiations that are taking place in this thread, 
regarding what kind of DRM we should support in HTML and browsers.  But 
since you're just a middle man, required to meet whatever conditions 
they specify in whatever contracts you've signed with them, it is not 
you with whom we should really be discussing such conditions.  I think 
that's quite clear from the fact that you haven't budged from the 
requirement to support unspecified third-party binary blobs that provide 
protection, rather the trying to find an openly specified and freely 
implementable system.

For real progress in these discussions to be made, we need the major 
content providers to come forward and negotiate about what level of 
protection they are willing to accept vs. what level of protection that 
we browser implementers are willing and able to provide.

That's how progress was made with web fonts, in discussions with the 
font foundries/rights holders, and it's the only way progress can be 
made here.

-- 
Lachlan Hunt - Opera Software
http://lachy.id.au/
http://www.opera.com/

Received on Wednesday, 7 March 2012 09:39:03 UTC