Re:YouTube Ditches Flash, and It Hardly Matters
by eridius on Saturday February 07, 2015 @04:48PM
(#9015425)
What makes you think it's even possible for a competitor to arise with DRM-free streaming?
The reason you don't see any DRM-free video streaming of non-independent content is because the content producers require DRM. They won't license their content without it. It's quite literally not possible for a DRM-free Netflix competitor to arise, because they'd have no content (or at least, no content worth watching).
Re:YouTube Ditches Flash, and It Hardly Matters
by cpeterso on Saturday February 07, 2015 @05:09PM
(#9015487)
The content producers, not the distributor Netflix, insist on DRM. If Netflix is streaming the same content to a native application instead of a browser, they will have the same DRM requirements.
So let them, and let a competitor arise that allows a similar service with DRM-free streaming. That's what the free market is for. I'm not sure why implementers of the open web should care about Netflix's concerns.
> Without EME, Netflix would be relying on proprietary browser plugins forever, and if a platform with a significant userbase appeared that didn't support any form of proprietary plugin, and they wanted to support that platform, they'd develop their own proprietary application for it instead of providing DRM-free streaming (think of how Netflix has applications for mobile OS's and even consoles, both living room consoles and handheld consoles).
So let them do that and suffer the consequences of the inferior user experience that would provide.