• Catherine Pearson's Screenshot Story: About five years ago, Catherine Pearson began taking screenshots of bouquets on The Nanny (1993–1999) streaming on Netflix as she became a florist. She now has them in a desktop folder. But a few months ago, she couldn't take screenshots as a black box appeared instead. This was around the time streaming platforms imposed a ban on screenshots.
• Mac vs. PC Screenshot Situations: For Mac users, it's nearly impossible to take screenshots from popular streaming services. DRM technology adapted and became more sophisticated. For PC users, with the Snipping Tool in Microsoft Windows, they can freely screen grab content from all streaming platforms. This seems like an oversight by streamers to exclude Mac users due to their assumed cultural class.
• Technical Explanation: On MacOS, DRM blackouts involve the GPU and video decoding hardware. These happen at a low level, and no high-level software can bypass them. Windows uses a less sophisticated or more accurately, less integrated imaging pipeline, which allows easy screenshotting of DRM video. On Apple devices, DRM blackouts are enabled through the deep integration of the OS and hardware at the hardware level.
• Chrome Screenshot Trick on Mac: On the Mac, DRM video was once not blacked out in Chrome but now is by default. But in Chrome's Settings page under System, if "Use graphics acceleration when available" is disabled and Chrome is relaunched, one can screenshot everything in a Chrome window including DRM video. Going to chrome://gpu/ shows the differences before and after toggling the setting.
• Uncertainty about Apple's Support: The author doesn't understand why Apple supported hardware-accelerated video screenshotting in the first place on iOS platforms as no one creates bootleg copies this way and it doesn't stop bootlegging. This "feature" only causes hindrance to honest people trying to capture high-quality screenshots.