That's right, but they wouldn't necessarily have to (strictly speaking) sell copies. They could instead license the right to make copies for a fee. My suspicio

That's right, but they wouldn't necessarily have to (strictly speaking) sell copies. They could instead license the right to make copies for a fee. My suspicion is that that fee would be set to extract as much money as possible from the rental stores (cf. Netflix) and that they are/were better off with the status quo.