RE: What would we have to demonstrate to change your mind?

Mark Watson wrote:
>
> We would need to agree on what the likely alternatives are.
> I think there are three likely outcomes in the absence of a
> W3C standard:
>
> (1) the status quo of installable native code plugins persists

History has already shown us that many of these plugins will not be offered
to some platforms, either due to failure of the plugin creators to create
them, technical limitations, or due to philosophical positions. 

Content creators choose the lesser of 2 evils to their bottom line. End
users suffer.


> (2) one or more de facto standards emerge

De Facto standards emerge all the time. They often lack any form of input by
all affected communities, and often are not implementable on all platforms,
either due to technical limitations, or philosophical positions. (A case in
point is the widespread USE of .mp3 for audio encoding/delivery. While there
*are* other codecs and wrappers out there - including codecs that *are* Open
Source compatible, the de facto standard for commercial delivery remains
.mp3, and most commercial vendors do not offer other formats.) 

End users [sometimes*] suffer.

(* I also note, with wry irony, that playing .mp3s on the Linux platform,
while in complete contradiction of the 'principles' of Linux and FOSS, is
actually quite simple and easy to do, as millions who have demonstrated by
their actions -
http://linuxpoison.blogspot.com/2011/10/multimedia-mp3-mpeg-4-avi-divx-etc.h
tml Hypocrisy in action!)  


> (3) premium content is available only through native applications

The proliferation of native applications in the mobile space today results
in some applications not being available on many devices. Native
applications will most likely *not* be created for all platforms either due
to technical limitations or philosophical positions. Platforms such as
Firefox OS will have *no options* for providing support, as native
applications on that emergent platform *is* HTML.

The browser wars rage on. Some browsers (and even platforms) are left
holding the bag. End users suffer.

**********

Should those who oppose EME work at the W3C succeed in keeping EME "out of
the W3C", it will then likely be a de facto standard (option 2), as it is
already implemented and working in at least 1 browser, and EME or some
forked variant thereof will also likely see its way into other browsers. In
fact, in the absence of any formal standardization, the likelihood of that
will be quite high, as each vendor works on their "secret" enhanced
version...

Many if not most users will not notice a difference, some Open Source
proponents will still be kept from viewing encrypted Premium Content, while
other Open Source fans *will ignore principles* (as they do today), cobble
together 'something' that attempts to level the playing field for them
(possibly breaking laws in that pursuit), and the web will remain a
fragmented landscape. EME will remain outside of the one place where it
stood to at least have something of a public review, and public feedback.

Progress in the name of "Openness".

JF

Received on Tuesday, 11 June 2013 02:09:48 UTC