Most physical object businesses has a multi-tier process that, greatly simplified, can be described as: (1) design -> (2) produce -> (3) distribute This simpl

Most physical object businesses has a multi-tier process that, greatly simplified, can be described as: (1) design -> (2) produce -> (3) distribute This simplified traditional model can be directly applied to movies, games, books, etc. For example: (1) guy writes book -> (2) publisher runs the printing press -> (3) dude runs book store Each of these steps can be greatly sub-divided. For example, someone needs to drive the truck full of books to the book store! Furthermore, the line between each of these steps can be very blurry. An author could, for example, print his own book at home, if he were so inclined. The big monkey wrench comes into things when you consider the most important missing element: MONEY! Where does it come from? In the days of yore, if you wanted to produce a film, you'd have to go find backers, like you would for a startup business. Those backers could be friends, family, fools, professional investors, pre-order sales, etc. More interestingly, one type of backer could be the production/distribution suppliers. They often have greater diversification, so they are more stable in the long term. As they grow more and more stable, they grow more and more rich. With their riches, they can go re-invest more and more of the supply and distribution chain. Once they own more and more of the supply and distribution chain, they can invest more and more in the design end of the process. Now here's where things get rotton: It is extremely difficult to profit from a movie these days which are not funded by the major studios. They simply won't run it in the theaters that they have exclusivity deals with! ie. most of them! You're fucked. This is true of a scary number of media empires! In addition to movies, think about TV, music, Broadway, books (especially text books). I'm sure I'm missing many. It even is true of software! It may no longer true for boxed software at your local Compu R' Us store, but it still is for video games. You're simply not gonna make as much money if your game doesn't show up on the shelves at Walmart. So while capitalism works pretty well in general, it's got a fatal flaw: it tends to generate monopolies. And monopolies are dangerous. If not presently malevolent, monopolies are like time bombs waiting to go off when new leadership steps in. I doubt the movie studios set out with the goal of controlling all media and public opinion. It just so happens that being good at making money makes you good at accumulating power. And power corrupts. So now back to the question you asked: What is The Pirate Bay's stance? Well.... I'd imagine that they view themselves as liberators from the tyranny of the production companies. If those companies went poof and disappeared tomorrow, films wouldn't disappear. I mean, just look at youtube.com/freddiew -- there are talented people out there who are figuring out how to fund things like they're doing with their VGHS film. Surely, destroying the production companies would cause people to loose jobs and lots of great films to die on the planning desk. But people will overcome. The industry will find new ways of funding itself and the middleman will become less powerful. Sure, YouTube is huge, but that won't stop you from clicking a Vimeo link. The internet simply makes it too hard to get disgustingly rich from being a publishing or distribution platform. And if you do get disgustingly rich, you simply can't lock every movie theater into an exclusivity deal: anyone could run his own movie theater! And many other movie theaters are just a few keystrokes away! There are new ones every day.