Re: Encrypted Media proposal: Summary of the discussion so far

On Mar 5, 2012, at 11:12 AM, Tab Atkins Jr. wrote:

> On Mon, Mar 5, 2012 at 11:09 AM, Mark Watson <watsonm@netflix.com> wrote:
>> On Mar 5, 2012, at 10:21 AM, Tab Atkins Jr. wrote:
>>> On Mon, Mar 5, 2012 at 10:15 AM, Mark Watson <watsonm@netflix.com> wrote:
>>>> On Mar 5, 2012, at 8:48 AM, Tab Atkins Jr. wrote:
>>>>> As I suggested earlier in this email, the best solution for the web is
>>>>> to wait for the movie distributors to crack and agree to sell videos
>>>>> without DRM.  We can *afford* to wait, after all, since the status quo
>>>>> works.  The falling rate of plugin installation, though, hurts the
>>>>> distributors as long as they insist on using them for DRM.
>>>> 
>>>> What you are proposing is that W3C use its role as steward of the web platform to encourage changes in the terms on which third-party commercial services are offered. This is clearly a commercial goal, which I don't see represented in the W3C mission. A decision to adopt this goal would surely need to be made at a senior level in W3C, with advice from the AC.
>>> 
>>> Only indirectly, insofar as we require commercial services that wish
>>> to work through the web platform to operate on top of technologies
>>> which are open-source and royalty-free.  This is a reasonable goal,
>>> and consistent with our history.
>> 
>> Today we have non-RF plugins and codecs. You want to remove support for those ?
> 
> Ideally, yes.  Practically, we can't right now.  However, we can work
> toward making them irrelevant, and try out best to ensure that we
> don't introduce any new opportunities for them to take hold.

So, I think this would be a very bad thing, since these have been venues for innovation in the past and it would be detrimental to progress in general to remove such venues.

> 
> 
>>>> Are you saying copyright infringement doesn't matter, because you believe - wrongly - that it doesn't hurt one part of the industry ?
>>> 
>>> I'm saying it's irrelevant,  yes.
>> 
>> So, this view is at odds with some pretty basic principles of intellectual property which underpin the industries we are talking about. Again this view is not supported in the W3C mission.
> 
> Bwuh?  You cut out the part of my quote where I explained *why* it's irrelevant.

Because the explanation was irrelevant. If you believe that the rights of authors can become irrelevant for any reason, then my comment above stands.

> 
> ~TJ
>

Received on Monday, 5 March 2012 19:20:01 UTC