[Bug 10902] <video> element needs to support some form of DRM solution

http://www.w3.org/Bugs/Public/show_bug.cgi?id=10902

--- Comment #31 from Aryeh Gregor <Simetrical+w3cbug@gmail.com> 2010-10-10 01:06:08 UTC ---
(In reply to comment #30)
> Since HTML5 is supposed to also be defining error handling, can we please know
> how to handle this error? A blue lego block? A blank black box? Can we have
> this standardized please? 

HTML5 doesn't specify UI, so the browser can report the error to the user
however it wants.  For script, this is specified in the loading algorithm --
it's no different from any other case where the UA can't decode the video
correctly.

> Further, if commercial content sites (Hulu?) want to use the <video> element,
> but the owners of their source of content insist on some form of encryption,
> what are they to do?

They should discuss their options with the content sites and try to find a way
to get the content to work that's compatible with how HTML5 works.  If that
requires no spec changes, then they should go ahead and implement it, possibly
in cooperation with browsers or DRM producers or whatnot.  If it requires spec
changes, they should present the details of what spec changes they need, along
with use-cases, same as any desired spec change.

Something as vague as "HTML5 needs to have DRM support" is not actionable -- it
does not describe what spec change is needed precisely enough for anyone to do
it.  I don't think anyone in this discussion has any practical experience with
these DRM schemes, so we can't possibly figure out what spec changes (if any)
are needed by ourselves.  The ones who actually want the feature need to tell
us what changes they want.  Until then, nothing can happen.

In fact, John Harding of YouTube did discuss some details of what he'd like to
see for DRM support:

http://lists.whatwg.org/htdig.cgi/whatwg-whatwg.org/2010-July/026947.html
http://lists.whatwg.org/htdig.cgi/whatwg-whatwg.org/2010-July/027069.html

In the end, it seemed that all he cared about was having a consistent API to do
the player UI in, so they don't need to code one UI in JS for non-DRM video and
another in ActionScript (or whatever) for DRM video.  The most plausible way
for that to happen would be to persuade the DRM people to get their stuff to
work with HTML5's API, which is what he said he'd do in the end.  So it doesn't
look like there's a problem here for us to solve, but if there is, I expect the
content providers will tell us in due course.  Again, we can do nothing until
then, because we don't know what to do.


I observe that if this is escalated, it will not be able to progress further
unless someone writes up a change proposal that includes the exact spec changes
they'd like to see.  It appears to me that no one knows what the exact spec
changes should be here, so I don't think this can progress any further.

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Received on Sunday, 10 October 2010 01:06:12 UTC