DRM cant work
unless you own my computer lock stock and barrel.
And stop me watching and listening to it too. Because if you don’t I can record it, and if I can those nasty pirates will be able to too.
Streaming video leader Netflix says it's eager to move away from using Microsoft's moribund Silverlight technology to support its service on desktop PCs, but it will be a while yet before today's HTML5 browsers support the features it needs to make that happen. In a blog post on Monday, reps for Netflix – which by some …
Believe it or not; there are some people who actually truly believe that if you use a browser plugin or video player such as VLC to record a video stream then it's illegal. On a not-to-be-mentioned official support forum I once saw a post get removed because I hinted at this possibility (but in all honesty; the whole subject was also bordering offtopic-ness).
The point being though; if some people have apparently already degenerated to this level "It's illegal to..." then I can easily see this work. Behind a nice smoke screen of course.
For the record; we're talking about a video link which anyone can access, without the need to register, to agree to something or anything of the sort. You click the link and watch the video. Problem being is that $company behind said video's sells the right to store them offline.
Tom you are very narrow minded if you think DRM "can't work" if some people can get around it. The aim is not to make it impossible for you to rip it - as you say this is not feasible - but to make it hard enough that 90% of people don't know how to do it, or are put off doing it by the need to install and configure a bunch of extra software.
> make it hard enough that 90% of people don't know how to do it, or are put off doing it by the need to install and configure a bunch of extra software.
But that is precisely why it's pointless. Most people who want to record it just want to be able to watch it again later, or on a mobile device, they aren't pirates. They've paid for their download and they aren't going to cost Netflix anything if they keep a copy.
Meanwhile the real pirates, the ones who intend to duplicate it onto DVDs and tapes to sell for a couple of $$ on a market stall, will always find a way around the DRM. Even if 99% of people find it too hard, the pirates are in the 1% who will put the effort and money into doing it. DRM that isn't 100% unbreakable is of zero use, and no DRM is 100% unbreakable.
It would be more useful to watermark it and tie that watermark to the subscriber. That way they would be able to find (and ban/prosecute) anyone who was distributing copies.
Or then you do as Steve Jobs did, make it easy to be leagal. And you find most to go the legal road.
It started with iTunes and DRM, but Apple with Steve Jobs got those requirements removed. Just as they wanted from the beginning. Instead of that record labels got to have variable pricing and not only the 99c for each song option.
This happened when Apple wanted to up the quality of their offerings from 128 to 256kbps enkoding. New contract.
"I'm still sore about the BBC's DRM on their iplayer content. No time shifted viewing of the Royal Institute Christmas Lectures for me! :("
If you're not talking about live streams, but recorded iPlayer content, it's trivial to snarf it down locally as reasonably friendly h.264, with a little initiative.
(anon. for Reasons[tm])
They don´t need DRM to work perfectly. It is fine if it is hard for 95% of people to copy movies. The geeks will always find a way around anything - just for the hell of it if for no other reason. The rest of the world will find it hard and confusing. The industry will continue to fight against file sharing but never expect anything more than temporary advantages.
Most people I know have computers, smart phones, tablets, Kindles etc but they really don´t have a clue how to use them properly. I know of two sisters aged 12 and 14 who regularly buy the same music from iTunes. My sister and her husband sometimes buy the same Kindle books from Amazon. They would have no idea how to use emule or piratebay even if the thought occurred to them.
The people that I know who do file share have massive collections of movies, music etc - far more than they can ever use and a hundred times more that they would have bought if they could not copy. This is mostly how the industry claims the billions of lost revenue.
So relax, Netflix know what they are doing and how their business model works. That is more than I can say for Hollywood and the music industry.
Lets look at this example... "I know of two sisters aged 12 and 14 who regularly buy the same music from iTunes."
There is NO DRM on iTunes music. Yet they still bought it anyway. Just copying the file was too much trouble.
The real question is if they removed DRM how many people who buy now would start making copies. How many who copy now to avoid DRM would buy a DRM free file.
I have not seen anything to indicate that removing DRM and offering people an easy way to buy would result in a loss. Looking at the removal or DRM on music downloads I don't see where it crashed the system.
The only place DRM is reasonable is for rental files (it still will not stop people making copies).
Unless you have a camera watching you to ensure you aren't recording it....
http://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PG01&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=%2220120278904%22.PGNR.&OS=DN/20120278904&RS=DN/20120278904
(This is Kinect by the way, for anyone confused by patent-speak). Kinect can monitor if you are entitled to watch a movie...
Sadly it won't work like that (for the foreseeable future) because of the way "big content" sees the markets and how to maximise profits by trying to control where and when you can fart.
It is the same as the whole DRM issue: it pisses off paying customers while those pirating the material have no restrictions on how they can enjoy it. Really, every attempt to lock stuff down have failed over and over again, pirates still get the material and share it. So stop buggering willing customers around with all sorts of requirements on "security" when the alternative is DRM-free "free" content.
Really, they need to get a grip on this and look at what the customer wants: pay a modest fee and play it on any platform that has a web browser, worldwide.
To be fair to Netflix, they're trying- when they made House of Cards, it was released everywhere at the same time. I suspect that the need for DRM comes more from whoever has the right to license the content in a particular territory, not on Netflix's need to compete with a genie that's already out of the bottle. Streaming providers have probably got to go to at least a token bit of effort to demonstrate to the licensor that their website does more than seed the perfect torrent.
Netflix (unlike hulu) is independent which bodes well for the future. They are trying to do a walmart, get big by playing the game, then when they are big enough start to dictate terms. Walmart can dictate terms for cd's because if your cd isn't on walmarts shelves you aren't going to do as well. Hopefully netflix is working through the politics, theres no huge technical reason they can't server all content globally, with or without drm and allow local cacheing. The reason is clearly in dealing with the rights holders. Once netflix is global and is as entrenched as say amazon or walmart, then they can start to push for more control.
I would love to see cacheing, drm I can live with but I understand and support those that want it gone. Now if they can buy hulu, get rid of the damn ads and get all channels onboard it would be awesome, pork would probably also be circling an azure moon but a boy can dream.
If you get it easier, faster and with higher quality the legal way, few would bother with pirated material at all. Even if it comes with DRM.
They key is in how easy do I get it, pay a few cents and get top quality with no hassle or waiting. Then people will pay.
But if they get it easier and with better quality with very little waiting from a bay of pirated material, they go that road.
Really what they just said is we want to offer you non Silverlight content.....but we aren’t going to just now. Until they offer something that I can use on my Linux machine. They wont get any business from me. 2021 is a while away. They have plenty time to sit on their backsides before they do anything with HTML5..
I've been involved with developing set top boxes and software and hardware is obliged to implement DRM by the content producers. Put simply, no DRM, no content. So we had to licence the DRM, and on top of that our set top box had to meet certain security requirements such as denying users root access, closing ssh and other ports, implementing port knocking, implementing read only partitions in firmware, multi stage boots, signed bootloaders, using hardware based paths for DVB-CSA functionality and so on. It's a lot of work.
So unless Linux gets a proper layer of DRM, you I doubt will ever see Netflix or any similar service.
I expect it would require browsers to open up the video tag to 3rd party plugins (which arguably should have happened a long time ago) and for you to install a plugin to handle the content. I expect the plugin would be closed source and produced either by Netflix themselves or one of their partners.
"So unless Linux gets a proper layer of DRM, you I doubt will ever see Netflix or any similar service"
I think you mean one you have to pay for. There's always the post DVD option.
BTW there's no native BB7, BB10 or playbook app for netflix or lovefilm. First one that does is getting a subscription (I know good ereader have ported the android app to the Z10 and the Q10 but I don't have one of those)..
I think the short answer is "makes it incompatible". To comply with the GPLv3, the decrypt keys would need to be provided with the source...unless there was some way to securely download them...but then that mechanism would need to be public, so.... Once the keys are known...all bets are off.
However, to be provided in a GNU/Linux distro the plugin/whatever does not have to be GPL compliant. It can just be a binary blob. Nothing to stop someone like Canonical writing said blob and supplying it; "Ubuntu, now with Netflix!" Of course, each distro would need to write their own blob(s) or Netflix would need to provide it (and it sounds like they want to get out of that).
Note: I am not a GPL or crypto expert - if someone else has more knowledge (and can cite sources), please do so.
@Charles 9 - Cobblers. Ubuntu (to pick just one of the many non-free distros) contains blobs OOTB.
The "non-free" codecs thing is down to how they are licensed. Not their freedom (or lack thereof). It can depend on the nature of the distro and where they are based. Mint, for example, installs them by default.
Last I looked Lovefilm didn't stream to Android - only the Kindle Fire variants. Has that changed? Netflix is fine on Android.
I find it irritating that my main use of mobile video content capability is on a plane and so far that's down to Google's off line rental service or shall we say exactly what they wanted to avoid.
Use both on the PS3 - okay but none have quite cracked the UI (so far netflix is better but lovefilm seems easier for deeper search/browse) and Lovefilm seems to need more bandwidth and/or stutters a lot on the server side.
I suspect Linux support not for PC but for low cost media boxes will be a driver as I'm not convinced everyone will get 'smart' TVs and apple TV and full function blu ray and games consoles. The low subscription cost needs to be alongside mass market and that's more easily achieved by supporting low cost hardware.
Its not a linux problem - its a hardware problem. Your hardware will have to have DRM for it to 'work'.
I've seem DRM stuff in Windows7 being copied from a VM - or at least that's I think what I was told was going on - I had no means of checking and I doubt the OS had either without UEFI.
So it wont really work on probably 95% of internet enabled devices by 2019.
The content producers are going to have to find their own way of keeping their content secure rather than blocking up the internet highway with their ideas.
"But we've got to get through this phase so that we can get to that." ... Netflix
The HyperRadioProActive Posit is that the phase is past history and current presents await new streaming steamy content showing success at work, rest and play in Space Places and Live Operational Virtual Environments :-)
Your Move, Netflix .... and if there be questions, are the answers always Yes to speed along QuITe Quiet Technology .... SMARTR ProgramMING AIMissionary Drive with SPecial ADvisors doing their Virtual Thing in Present Realities which be Subverted TeleVisual Treats corrupted to deliver Nightmares and Mayhem rather than Heavenly Order in Hellish Conditions.
Although Max Keiser, Netflix, is strong in that Highly Qualified Expert Field and therefore if not partner then competitor in novel content supply for Earthly Realisation ....aka Future Creation?
If Netflix truly is as big as it says it is now - the time has come for it to stand up to the content providers like Apple did - and insist on no DRM from now on.
Streaming is all well and good but unless content can be watched offline (and on what I want to, when I want to, for as long as I want to) it's FA use to me, and probably many others:
1. even when at home on broadband there may be other things I or my family want to do with the bandwidth at that point - I don't want it clogged up with a streaming movie.
2. the bandwidth might be crap at the time I want to watch - we are going to get into a sort of electricity model of massive bandwidth being required 6pm-10pm through the county if we don't kill streaming models now.
3. A lot of the time I'm not at home. I'm on a train, on holiday, in a hotel - places where I can't stream.
It's like the apple podcast app - "you don't need to worry your little head whether its on your phone or in the cloud" - yes I fucking do - because unlike you, Mr Apple engineer, I have holidays abroad (thats outside the USA for americans wanting a definition) where roaming costs a fortune... and you know on trains, in the country, etc where starbucks wifi is not available....
Did you not read the article? Netflix simply do not want to sell downloadable content. You might not like streaming-only services so you can go to another provider, but Netflix's success is proving you are in something of a minority and either the cost/profit predictions of offering this are not worth it, or they feel it would dilute their brand. It's their choice and you are perfectly free to go elsewhere.
> I don't think that's the case. The "we only do streaming" is probably an easier sell to the backwards content owners.
You might be right, but with mobile devices increasingly being always connected, the downloaders will be more and more a very small minority. From a business perspective, the minority are not significant enough for Netflix to take a stand for.
Seriously though, the fact that Netflix is *so* cheap, it's a wonder why anyone is that bothered about downloading anyway if you are in a position to stream, which makes the DRM argument pretty moot.
Most of what I watch on the box is from Netflix these days. Apart from one or two things that the kids and my wife watch, it's hardly worthwhile having cable (in Canada where I am) since about 95% of it is utter shite and interrupted by ads every few minutes. Better to pay a little and get the ad-free stuff.
Like was mentioned above, Netflix will become as dominant as Amazon then they will be able to dictate terms to the studios. The big issues as pointed out in the article for Netflix is getting the latest content and getting the biggest spread of device coverage.
What would be next? Complaining DRM as implemented in the spec is ineffective and thus forcing people to boot into "secure trusted mode". Then more things will follow suit, including those idiotic websites that hijack your right button so you can't click on view source. Before you know it you won't be able to use commercial web sites before booting into "secure trusted mode" and your computer is now a closed box appliance.
Beware of the slippery slope. There's pointy stakes at the end.
Maybe it's because I have NoScript installed, but I haven't seen a site that blocks the right button. I wonder if sites will begin trying to detect the presence of NoScript or forcing a bypass by incorporating the click-block into a block of essential-to-the-site scripts you have to allow to function.
...to put missfeatures into a browser just to please a few companies. Netflix, if you want me as one of your customers, drop your DRM. If not just f*ck off.
It is not a good idea to give up our essential freedom to use the web the way it was intended to be try to save a business model that just doesn't fit into our computerized world any more.
I don't think "our essential freedom to use the web the way it was intended to be" included watching hi-definition streaming video. The very idea would have seemed preposterous.
Have you never considered that allowing you to save offline content skews Netflix's business also? They want to measure when and how things are watched and this affects what they pay for licenses and how much they can dictate to the content providers. If you download everything and watch it at your leisure, they lose this information.
They could change their model but why should they when streaming is the way the world is going this decade?
There are tons of easily available tools to allow capturing the screen(s) content. DRM is waste of time (incl. CPU), coding and servers no purpose, add unnecessary bloat and obscurity.
I can affect only legitimate customers and I bet "how to save files from netflix " in a search engine will yield a very simple step-by-step. To put it simply in order DRM to work it has to violate the laws of physics.
And here we have another example of a company willing to sacrifice the majority of its customers who use it correctly to chase after the minority that don’t, imagine the same meeting at a car manufacture
“Thank you for turning up today everyone, I will get right down to the purpose of this meeting, studies show that 0.00000000000000000001% of people getting into our cars steal them, and 100% of our cars that are stolen are access by thief’s via the windows and doors, so we have decided to stop making cars with windows and doors.
Now I want you guys to come up with a way that our cars can be access by the owners, and no I don’t care that the cost of implementing this or the impact this will have on our consumers, making them chose to use another company, far outweighs the actual miniscule impact on us of cars being stolen, that’s not important.
Just get it done.”
WTF are you on about? Why is Netflix going to lose the majority of its customers for staying with DRM? The facts show that Netflix streaming is growing at a huge rate so you're just letting your idealist rhetoric get in front of the facts, which is that they are coining it and DRM has marginal impact.
If you don't want DRM, there is a simple answer: don't buy DRM'd content. How is that difficult?
Amazing the number of people who always pop out of the woodwork and talk about how the evil big corporations are ruining their lives by restricting how their customers can use the stuff they've spent loads of money producing. Those very same people also keep on buying that content and supporting the current business model so there is no incentive for the model to change. If you don't like the business don't support it, wouldn't that be a much better way of protesting than posting in some backwater IT blog's comment section.
@Vlad
Since when does "not buy" == "download illegally"?
If you don't agree with the company that made it just don't want it. period. full stop. Don't go and watch it - that just proves you really actually do agree with their model (i.e. they make content you actually do want to watch) and you are just a cheapskate ...
I knew that would come up :-)
Since with all the high talk of protecting creativity they have managed to outlaw competition in the IP business, the only way to get a product competitively is on a black market - aka "illegal downloads".
The way copyright currently works would be highly illegal in itself in most other industries (price fixing, cartels, market manipulations). So, them claiming illegality against the only market competition there is is a bit rich.
Netflix has never offered downloadable content and the request to do so in order to copy and then watch it on other devices is totally meaningless. You can watch Netflix content as often as you like, it's a streaming service and your access to their entire library is only limited by the length of your subscription. Their DRM is in place to pacify Hollywood, without it they wouldn't be able to get contracts with movie studios, that ought to obvious to anyone with an ounce of intelligence. Just because you have the tools to bypass it doesn't mean they shouldn't use it. It's there to stop the general public from recording their streaming video, a public that isn't going to try very hard to do so. It's like a lock on your door, an experienced burglar can get through any lock in seconds. But we still lock our doors because 99% of those that break into homes won't waste time on door locks when plenty of people still leave their homes and forget to lock the back door.
Why trouble yourself with breaking the DRM on streaming video feed when you can just download from a torrent site?
You won't be able to come into my house whilst I'm away to watch my big screen TV anymore.
I've just installed the most advanced security system out there. There is no way in through any of the windows, and all door locks are secured by the most advanced crypto available. It is uncrackable.
Oh, by the way, here are the keys and the passwords so you can come in to water the flowers. Have a nice day
I don't care about the fact that Netflix offers content with DRM, £5.99 a month is great, what bugs me is silverlight , I dual boot Win8 and Linux Mint, netflix works great with WIn8 both metro and browser, Linux Mint requires a version of FIrefox running in Wine which has been specially compiled for silverlight, It's a pain in the neck, HTML5 will fix this :D
ps for Netflix UK users wishing to view Netflix US, have a look at firefox/chrome addon 'MediaHint' (google it)
As someone else was saying, DRM in Netflix is not for pirates. For someone to pirate the crappy quality that Netflix is streaming would mean they are not right in the head, when the much better Blu-Ray is available.
I am a Netflix subscriber, but it I really want to see a movie in high definition I move my *ss to the nearest renting kiosk and get a BD. Problem is that few movies are worth watching, never mind in HD.
So DRM in Netflix is, again, to control who watches when.