To me, the real problem is greed. If the content providers were content to simply make a profit and live like normal human beings, then prices would be reasonable and pirating would be even more uncommon than it is already. But no, everybody has to try and become a millionaire (ah, so old-fashioned, I mean billionaire of course!).
The current thinking is that it is a corporation's job to maximize profit. That makes corporations necessarily hostile to society and civilization as a whole. This type of thinking dictates that they must gouge, hype, stifle competition, and use monopolistic practices to victimize the consumer for maximum gain.
In the United States, we can't even pass health care reform because corporations don't want it. These corporations bribe, intimidate, and use the media they control to turn public opinion against the public good. For as long as we continue to believe that greed is good, and that the goal of business is to maximize profits, our societies will continue to decline, and our jobs will go elsewhere, and our governments will work against us.
