"The problem is with these companies pushing outdated, annoying business models instead of embracing the hundreds of amazing startups trying to fix the problems these companies have."

It's worse than that, in that the business models aren't the only thing that's outdated. The real problem is that the law itself - to which those models are inextricably linked - is what has really become archaic.

After all, copyright spent 300 years evolving under a paradigm in which the ability to copy and distribute, and to make derivations from media were all highly concentrated in capital intensive operations to which few - if any - independent citizens had direct access. In that regard, publishing operations were like Boeing 747s. And these core assumptions are reflected throughout the law.

Today, the paradigm has inverted. Like the Earth becoming unmoored and starting to revolve around the now-fixed sun, the emergence of low-cost, highly distributed general computing has inverted the once-dominant conception. And like the view of an unmoving Earth at the center of the cosmos, the entire conception of copying as a strictly limited right has become unsustainable.

Now it's the law itself that needs to change. The assumptions that are based on the idea that people don't have secure networked computers need to be removed, root and branch. Obviously, business models that depend on the old paradigm will not get "fixed". Rather, they will die. In this sense, the copyright protected industries actually have a clearer understanding of technology than they're usually given credit for. The hundreds (indeed, thousands) of startups wanting to move into the space they occupy are like a teeming horde of army ants. Left unexposed, the cartels would be swiftly consumed. The only 'solution' is to double down on the now-archaic law and maintain what they can while hoping the plutocracy advances far enough to snuff out democratic process entirely.

Though the timber may be rotten, it still props up the roof of the only shelter they have. And that's why they will do literally anything to protect it.

And while there are many many startups, they, too, have a problem in that the absence of reality-based law will ultimately hurt their prospects as well. Like the rest of us, they're operating an an Interregnum - the period between kings - one defined by a collapse that hinders the emergence of its replacement. The old is dying, but won't permit the new to be born.

My own thought is that real reform would mean realizing that we cannot police people's lives well enough to enforce copyright at the individual level. Instead, we need to look at the corporate entity - an entirely non-human construct - when trying to locate the box-office of the future.

This would mean adapting copyright law so that only incorporated entities could be subject to its penalties. Individuals can do what they like. But once they do anything with enough financial scale to merit incorporation, they need to submit those organizations to the traditional rules governing duplication, distribution, and derivation.

This would prevent Universal Pictures from making a copy of Harry Potter and screwing Warner Bros. out of the proceeds from unlicensed public exhibition. And it would keep Warner Bros. from making movies from J.K. Rowling's books without dealing with her directly. It would also prevent operator-controlled commercial services (like Netflix and iTunes) from distributing unauthorized copies of HP. But it would not prevent people from sharing files among themselves, or allow user-controlled exchanges to be liable for their activity. Keep the DMCA takedown as a compromise, acknowledging the corporate nature of neutral intermediaries, and make systems like YouTube's ContentID the norm. But go no further.

Admittedly, this is a massive change. And it may not provide for the future of the existing cartels. But that's not the point. The point is having law that is clear, constitutional, and aligned with reality. The rest of the chips must fall where they may. With that in place, new and lasting business models can finally emerge in peace.