Re: I strongly urge all supporters to reconsider the EME proposal. It is not in your best interests!

Le ven. 17/05/13, 09:54, Mark Watson <watsonm@netflix.com>:
> On Fri, May 17, 2013 at 3:47 AM, Hugo Roy <hugo@fsfe.org> wrote:
> > What we are discussing here is whether EME should get the W3C
> > “stamp of approval” which we equate with the “Open Web”. By Open,
> > it means this is something not discriminating or excluding anyone
> > regardless of which technology they use.
> >
> 
> I can't resist pointing out that you do wish to exclude companies that use
> DRM for content distribution, which is also a choice of technology.

I am not talking about content distribution but about what
technology web users are using. So if you want to distribute
content in a way that discriminates some web users from other web
users, you are clearly outside of the scope of what we refer to as
the “open web”.

You are wrong when you say that I wish to exclude companies that
use DRM. These companies are entirely welcome to distribute
content on the Web. They are also entirely welcome to distribute
content on the open Web, that is, in a way that do not
discriminate or exclude some users because of technological
consideration (for instance, a website designed solely for IE6 is
not “open”.)

> If I understand your position correctly, you believe that the choice to use
> Free software to consume media has more legitimacy than the choice to use
> DRM technology to distribute it and so that latter group should adapt to
> the choice of the former. I don't believe the opposite, btw.

My belief regarding this is completely separate from what we
discuss here; which is a W3C spec for the Web. 

> 
> >
> > I understand that one of the core argument put forward by the W3C
> > is that the Open Web is not a synonym for "content free of charge"
> > (which is a straw-man argument). The W3C CEO made the distinction
> > between that and "premium content" which was implied to equate
> > content restricted by DRM, hence justifying EME's approval.
> >
> > If I understand you correctly from your previous email to this
> > group (BTW thank you for moving the discussions here); this is
> > also your view.
> >
> 
> Not quite. I think the web should support content distribution models other
> than those in which the user is granted full rights to do whatever they
> choose with the content after it has been downloaded.

You have skipped some parts of my emails obviously. The web
already support content distribution models other than those in
which the user is granted full rights to do whatever they choose
with the content. I mean, I would even say that 90% of the content
distributed on the Web today does *not* give the user full rights
to do whatever they choose. And that is true also for "premium
content" which already exists on the web; even sometimes without
DRM and without proprietary software.

> For example rental and subscription models. Right now, those who
> sell content without full rights require technical as well as
> legal restrictions on the customer.

Maybe. So? They are free to try this. 

What does it have to do with a W3C spec, what does it have to do
with the open web?

> > I think it is important to draw some distinctions here. First, we
> > need to debunk the straw-man argument. AFAIK no one is claiming
> > that the Open Web should only be for distributing content free of
> > charge. Actually, such a requirement would be against the very
> > principles of freedom that are core to the Web and core to Free
> > Software (aka Open Source) licenses.
> >
> > Now, the second bit of the argument for supporting EME is that
> > there need to be a place for "premium content" which by that I
> > suppose means copyrighted films produced by corporations such as
> > Hollywood studios, that Netflix has to stream.
> >
> > But jumping from there to assume that it means we need to have DRM
> > is a whole other debate.
> >
> 
> It's a reality, as you noted above, that technical restrictions are
> required (by the content owners) for such content.

Can you back up your argument? Because I have got plenty of
examples of "premium content" where there are no technical
restrictions taking the forms of DRM. Media websites paywalls are
one example.

> >
> > Sure, you say that these companies require DRM and you say they
> > impose them to Netflix. Well, it's your problem if you cannot
> > negotiate better terms with them, there are *no reasons* why all
> > web users should have to bear the costs (directly and indirectly)
> > of these technological restrictions.
> >
> 
> The reason all users (web and app users too) have to bear these costs is
> because the producers of the content require them to, in exchange for
> viewing the content. The producers of the content have their own reasons
> for that, which you could debate with them. What I have a problem with is
> the idea that they are not entitled to attach (perfectly legal) conditions
> of their choosing to their product offer. Noone has to accept that offer.

Are we not talking about standardisation here, i.e. about making
things that are aimed at the entire Web? We are talking about
having CDMs on web users' computers and implementations in web
browsers, etc.

So yes, we are discussing something that people will have little
choice not to accept.

> 
> 
> >
> > Moreover, there are already "premium content" distributed on the
> > Web, where money is involved and that do *not* require DRM. For
> > instance, there are a lot of news media where you need to
> > subscribe and pay a monthly fee. These media are usually not
> > distributing their article under Creative Commons (which means
> > you're not allowed to make and distribute copies of it, that would
> > be copyright infringement). However, they are not imposing DRM on
> > their users.
> >
> 
> Which is fine. I'm missing how the fact that some people distribute content
> without DRM means that all people must.

You're missing the fact that it means DRM is not a "requirement"
for distributing such content on the web. Which has been an
argument I have read here. 


> > That shows that the two issues are actually separate and should
> > not be bind together to legitimate DRM, as if DRM was a
> > requirement for having paid-for content on the Web. Because it is
> > not.
> >
> 
> But it is required today for certain models of paid-for content, by certain
> people, for certain content. You could ask whether that set of models,
> producers, content is important enough to web users to be supported by the
> web. I'd argue that the scale of usage of such content on the Internet
> today says yes.
> 
> But I think you are using "required" in some sense of physical or economic
> necessity, rather than the sense of "required by a person". Of course there
> is no physical necessity. As for economic necessity, there's a judgement
> call there and the people entitled to make that judgement (and indeed often
> required to by their duties to their shareholders) are the owners of the
> content.

So you need to explain: why should the W3C and the Open Web accept
to bow to some people and thus impose proprietary software? Your
argument is that some people impose it to Netflix and others. So
why should we care?

> […]
> Of course they are different. Emmanual clarified that his conditions were
> not intended seriously, which was obvious, but my point was to illustrate a
> common form of argument that it is ok for authors to impose conditions of
> access on their content but only if those conditions have some kind of
> superior moral status.
> 
> Now, you may be arguing that legal conditions are ok, but technical ones
> are not, which is a different and less slippery distinction than the moral
> one. But there is clearly not consensus amongst opponents of EME on this.
> Often it is argued that the technical restrictions are wrong because the
> legal restrictions they enforce are also wrong in some way.

I would like to know other opinions about this. Isn't there
consensus amongst opponents of EME here that technical
restrictions imposed on users are entirely different than legal
restrictions? Because in one case a computer implements a rule and
makes the user powerless while in the other case the rule is
enforced by humans in legal institutions that are here to
safeguard human rights.

I would be surprised if there is no consensus on that.

> 
> You say DRM restricts what the user can do with the content and then you
> simply assert that this restriction is unfair.

No, I made an argument to explain that a technical implementation
of a rule can be unfair when it makes a human being powerless in
front of a machine of his own. It is unfair because if the human
has no control over the program running in the machine, the only
alternative means that the program controls the user, and the
developers who design the program thus controls the user's
computing.

When it comes to implementing legal rules, I think machines still
suck and I am glad that we still have humans to take care of the
law. Humans usually have a better sense of fairness and justice
than machines.

> The technical restrictions
> match the legal ones that the user has freely agreed to.

I don't think most people have consciously agreed to DRM. Nobody
asked them their opinion before selling a DVD.

> Also, noone is imposing anything on anyone. The contract to receive and
> view content is freely entered into by both parties.

This would be true if we were not discussing a W3C standard.

> […]
> I see it as a much weaker statement on the part of the W3C. It's more along
> the lines of the W3C saying to browsers that if they are going to provide
> support for product offers with terms of the kind we've been discussing
> (which they are), please do it this way. The alternative is that the W3C
> says nothing and then we have a worse situation for users in various ways.

It would be a worse situation for distributors of DRMd-content. I
agree. I feel sorry for them, but I fail to see why this should be
a concern of the W3C.
 
Best regards,
Hugo
-- 
Hugo Roy | Free Software Foundation Europe, www.fsfe.org
FSFE Legal Team, Deputy Coordinator, www.fsfe.org/legal
FSFE French Team, Coordinator, www.fsfe.org/fr/
 
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Received on Friday, 17 May 2013 18:30:31 UTC