UPDATE: EFF Has Resigned Membership in W3C
See: “An open letter to the W3C Director, CEO, team and membership”
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Note: Background about today’s W3C announcement available via this post from July 7, 2017: “Standards: W3C Gives Go Ahead to DRM for the Web”
From a W3C News Release (September 18, 2017):
Furthering its goal to make the Web a first-class platform for media and entertainment, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) published Encrypted Media Extensions (EME) as a W3C Recommendation or Web standard. EME is an Application Programming Interface (API) that allows plugin-free playback of protected (encrypted) content in Web browsers, which works seamlessly on all major platforms. W3C’s Media Source Extensions (MSE) provides the API for streaming video while its companion Encrypted Media Extensions (EME) provides the API for handling encrypted content. The combination of MSE and EME is the most common practice today that allows Web developers to stop using plugins to deliver commercial quality video over the Web.
The viewing experience of watching movies and TV shows on the Web has now moved from a cumbersome and possibly insecure arrangement to the security of the Open Web Platform. The integration of the EME API into the Open Web enables Web browsers to communicate with the software that allows playback of protected content.
Read the Complete Launch Announcement
Direct to Primary Document: Encrypted Media Extensions (W3C Recommendation 18 September 2017)
Direct to Reflections On The EME Debate
by W3C CEO, Jeff Jaffe
About Gary Price
