Re: CfC: to publish Encrypted Media Extensions specification as a First Public Working Draft (FPWD)

On Feb 8, 2013, at 15:26 , Fred Andrews <fredandw@live.com> wrote:

> 
> The objections based on EME being incompatible with open source
> systems are clear enough that you can make a call now to reject it.
> 

Open-source software is a valuable part of the industry, but it's not part of the W3C's mandate or modus operandi.  Indeed, there are many standards bodies that require reference implementations (reference software source code) for all standards.  The W3C doesn't even require that, and doesn't offer a reference implementation of any of its recommendations, as far as I know.

The use of the word 'open' in 'open web' and 'open source' does not make the latter two phrases synonymous, and in fact, it's not clear that the same meaning of 'open' is used either (viz. discussions about beer, speech, and the word 'free').

David Singer
Multimedia and Software Standards, Apple Inc.