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> smaller players to come together and form an open-source working group based on a chromium fork

Google can and does use DRM to block even this from happening: https://blog.samuelmaddock.com/posts/google-widevine-blocked...

Even Mozilla needed to license Widevine from Google to support modern video: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/enable-drm

Based on the policy evidenced in Maddock's post, it seems impossible to develop an open-source browser in 2019 that supports video streaming.




Crack the DRM and do it in a country that does not care about DMCA and has lax copyright laws. You could create an "illegal browser", and judging by how effective all the other antipiracy efforts have been to date (i.e. not at all), I doubt you'll face too much opposition...


Or don't consume DRMed content?


So, all commercial video content on the web?


Sure... vote with your wallet, only in video space. When DRM'ed content becomes less popular, companies will have to reconsider.

Of course, I'm one of those who doesn't care much about mass media in general. Addictions could make this shift impossible.


Not all commercial content is DRMed. Example: Rifftraxx.

You can also enjoy lots of high-quality, DRM-free content on YouTube, Vimeo, peertube, fosdem and god knows where.

There’s more to internet video than Netflix, Hulu and Prime.


From the perspective of general population - which is where you need adoption to be even a mote of dust next to Chrome - no, there isn't.


Or go the "insert DeCSS here" route that some used back when that was a thing. "If you happen to have somehow acquired a WideVine lib, having hash [some string], stick it here if you want to watch Netflix."


> support modern video

There's nothing particularly modern about DRM.


In some sort of Stallman utopia maybe. In the real world...


Well maybe we don't really need DRM? I mean, there are other sources of entertainment which do not threaten the FOSS


Sure, people gonna use a browser where the only entertainment is a 240p stream of Stallmann chewing his toes.

These responses... Dont support amazon or netflix, twitch? Even FOSS needs to be realistic and see what is a solution and what is not.

A FOSS product needs to support the things people want to do. Otherwise it will not succeed. We should have learned this in the last twenty years.

Without Firefox and its compromises, Google would have 99% market share and FOSS people would browse wuth Lynx or wget


Yes, support direct torrent video streaming. Screw the fat cats. Long live Stallman, death to late stage capitalism computing!


Use an open-source DRM solution?


DRMs are integrated by websites owners.

If a website is using Proprietary DRM A, your browser needs to be licensed to use DRM A.


Such a thing doesn’t exist because then it could be trivially broken.




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