How so fickle. Just because one does wrong against another does not give excuse to commit wrong in retaliation. There is also the fact that in the case of the creator not having the rights to his/her own creation, as I understand, that is a result of that creator consigning those rights to the publisher in exchange for publicity and marketing. Yes, it is a dick move that companies hold onto these rights and do nothing with them. However, it was a conscious choice on the part of the original creator to hand those rights to the publisher, and so, it is 100% legitimate. If you agree to something, then you accept the full consequences of that agreement, until such time as the agreement is annulled or rescinded, either by the parties with whom the agreement was made or by higher authority.
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In the past, a publisher was more necessary because it was difficult for individuals and small groups to execute the entire process of creating, refining, and marketing their works. The publisher acted to assist these individuals and groups, and because the publisher was a necessary partner in the endeavor, the publisher had significant power to negotiate such onerous terms as has lead to the complete gang-rapeage that content creators are suffering from.
However, the advances in technology, the advent of the internet, and numerous digital content outlets have paved the way to allow self-publication. The publisher is no longer a necessary partner. Yet, many content creator are still hesitant or at least uncertain about going the independent/self-publishing route. Thus, they continue to constrain themselves to an outdated paradigm that only screws them over in the end.
To be sure, the publishers themselves are fighting to maintain relevance in a changing market environment, and it's rather sad that it has been the technology companies, not the publishers, that have devised the new means by which the market can continue and flourish into the future. The publishers are dinosaurs, and their extinction is inevitable because they refused so long to adapt to the changes in the market and failed to recognize new opportunities for new business models that would help them to continue. Their insistence on maintaining the old ways of doing business has doomed them to perdition.
Even further, the incumbent publishers have sealed their fates with the generation of growing resentment for their policies and tactics and their failure to serve the needs of the market. In my opinion, the market, as a whole, having tried everything up to this point to give the existing publishers the benefit of the doubt and encourage them toward the products and services that are desired, making abundantly clear those things for which we would gladly give our money and being summarily ignored or dismissed by the publishers, is at a point of exhausted patience and now should seek to take matters into its own hands with publicly generated content. Essentially, if the current incumbent publishers can not or will not serve the demands of the market, then the market must find its own solution without them. The publishers have had their chance and been given ample opportunity. They were given the choice to join us to venture forth into the future or be left behind to die. They have chosen death.
In my opinion, the way forward is self-publication and publicly generated digital content. Current technology has made such content extremely easy to create, market, distribute, and discover. I foresee the cusp of a new market reality in which the old hegemony of big content publishers is extinguished and in its place will be a new collection of self-publishers, public content, and digital distribution services(things like Amazon, iTunes, Steam, etc. but perhaps with better search, discovery, and community features). Granted the quality of such content is not necessarily going to be that great at the outset(of course, it's not like the current content from many of the big publishers is hitting it out of the park), but, in time, the market is likely to further adapt to be more discerning and provide opportunity for methods, services, and technologies that help separate the wheat from the chaff.
One thing that the incumbent publishers are not understanding is the social nature of today's fans of content. People no longer passively take in content like hooking a hose to a garbage disposal unit. Instead, they like to involve themselves with the content and share that involvement with others. Fans today like to develop a community around the content and express their love and appreciation of the content by creating their own derivatives of that content(check out fanfiction.net sometime for just one example of what I mean). In my opinion, it is critical for any content creator or content service going forward to allow, encourage, and cultivate that community because it builds loyalty and enthusiasm for the works, which can serve to boost sales. Understand, I am not talking about piracy, I am talking about community cultivation in which fans are freely able to show their love of the content through their own works based on that content(bootlegging would still be illegal).
So to summarize: piracy is still a bad thing, regardless how one feels about the tyranny of the current content publishing regime. However, the current publishers are doomed precisely because of their tyrannical actions which has garnered them nothing but antipathy from the market. Further, technology has advanced to the point that the old business models are no longer needed or functional; yet, the current publishing regime has failed to recognize this and adapt accordingly. It is now necessary for the market to proceed into the future of content creation and distribution via self-publishing and publicly created content that is uninhibited by the whims of the current publishers; in essence, it's time to just leave them behind to die. In going forward with these new business models, it is important to account for the desire of the market to socialize and become emotionally invested in the content through community building.
Didn't mean to end up with a wall-o-text on this, but this is just my opinion.