Your consent does not matter how content is ultimately rendered on and by the user's machine, it's their machine, not yours. If they want the <video> element displayed in a specific way it will be displayed in a specific way. This merely gives you an illusion of control, control you never had since video elements (especially their context menu) are not part of the DOM.

Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on your perspective, that isn't really true at all. There are plenty of other ways to serve video, and plenty of ways users' own machines can be used against them that are widely supported by the companies building those machines.

All this attitude does is promote more heavy-handed control. People complain about the rise of devices that aren't so user-programmable, and the standardisation of technologies like DRM, and the limited availability of some content on minority platforms like Linux, as being user-hostile and reducing freedom and openness on the web. And yet then we see discussions like this, full of people abusing that freedom to break the law and openly apologetic of a simple change that invited even those who wouldn't intentionally violate another's trust to do so unwittingly.

Ok, but why?

> Sure, if they really want to, they can inspect the page and download the video. But having a download button right in my content is not the user experience I have in mind for this site.

That reads like misdirection given what's coming next:

> Not because I don't want people downloading my videos. But because I don't want to ADVERTISE downloading my videos, which is what this button does without my consent.

Why?

More importantly: why would you, given your desire to control presentation to the sending side, use a technology which fundamentally gives that control to the receiving side?

Because it invites users to break the terms of use for a site and the law, even if they are otherwise responsible and cooperative people and don't realise they would be doing anything wrong by doing so.

Go read the feedback on the issues raised as soon as Chrome did this, and you can see just how widespread a problem this has been for real world site operators and the developers working for them.

More importantly: why would you, given your desire to control presentation to the sending side, use a technology which fundamentally gives that control to the receiving side?

Maybe some people just prefer not to apply heavyweight and possibly broken DRM just to deal with a small minority of users who would abuse less restricted access to the material?

Unfortunately, if the prevailing attitude in this HN discussion is anything to go by, anyone who wants to operate a viable site that way is out of luck, and we should all just assume all users are hostile and restrict them as heavily as possible through whatever legal and technical means are available. That kinda sucks if you actually wanted to be nice about how you ran a site.

It's called the User Agent for a reason: it's intended to serve the user's wishes, not the website. Why do you think you have any right to control how the User Agent presents the data you sent it? You don't even know (or control) which browser the user is using or the features it provides to the user.

> they can inspect the page and download the video.

Inspecting the page isn't necessary, and the user's agent (the browser) already downloaded the video. You need to realize you lost all control over that data when you decided to send it to the user. The addition of a button to save the already downloaded video is patenty a useful feature for a User Agent. The publisher's interests are not relevant.

> some crummy Flash player that will [...] be unsafe.

Given that you explicitly show you understand that using the Flash player is "unsafe"...

> I'm going to have to use a crappy flash player

...this is intentionally exposing your users to known risks so you can pretend you have any control over what the user and their agent does with the data you sent them. The mental gymnastics involved in justifying that as anything even close to ethical behavior must be really impressive.

Because in many cases the user has explicitly agreed certain terms for accessing that content?

You need to realize you lost all control over that data when you decided to send it to the user.

Please go and argue that with the people who say DRM is evil and content providers shouldn't have any right to limit what users can do with their own equipment, because in the real world your positions are contradictory.

I've been one of those people since about a decade before we called it "DRM".

> in the real world your positions are contradictory.

Maybe try re-parsing my comment? Why would I argue about DRM, which I never mentioned? Users do have the right to use their own property (a General Purpose Computer[1]). Obviously, they would be liable if they made copies of copyright protected work that were sent to them from a website, but the fact that tools can be used for illegal purposes or to break contracts doesn't change the fact that you still have the right to use those tools. This is true even when the manufacturer olf a tool adds a feature you don't like.

> Because in many cases the user has explicitly agreed certain terms for accessing that content?

So what? If-and-only-if an actual contract was offered, understood by all parties, and agreed to, then you're free to find them the user in breech of contract. None of that is relevant to a tool having any particular feature. Even when a contract actually exists (a ToS is not a contract), the browser creators are an unrelated 3rd party.

Obviously. And just to be clear, this is the situation in many cases where people have been upset by these changes.

None of that is relevant to a tool having any particular feature.

Sure it is, if the tool is actively promoting something that will interfere with a lawful contract with another party. The law often recognises this problem explicitly, in many jurisdictions. (If you weren't aware of this, you might like to look up "tortious intereference" as a starting point.)

Even when a contract actually exists (a ToS is not a contract), the browser creators are an unrelated 3rd party.

They cease to be unrelated when their actions interfere with the first two parties in a way that harms one of them.