What is also true though is that The Pirate Bay or Megaupload are about as poor of a choice for content creators as it gets. As far as I know, the amount of mon

What is also true though is that The Pirate Bay or Megaupload are about as poor of a choice for content creators as it gets. As far as I know, the amount of money The Pirate Bay and Megaupload have paid content creators is diddly squat, and the amount of original programming produced by these two places is zero. There are certainly reasons for not liking DRM, but "freedom to pirate" seems like a pretty poor one. You are right about investors retreating to "safe low creativity", especially in times of downturn. Traditional movie theaters are in decline, so of course traditional cinema is playing it safe for now with reboots and sequels. Netflix, on the other hand, is more awash in investor cash... so at the moment, they are able to take greater risks. As far as cutting out the "investor" side goes, it would be interesting to see a content host that is explicitly non-profit. Beyond major content hosts, I think the Soundclouds / Bandcamps / Patreons etc. definitely have their place, and have been helpful for some not-so-commercial / hobbyist artists. Even these platforms however seem to struggle with the conflict between making a profit vs serving the artistic community sometimes.