The same pattern occurs in TV, film, and games. In movies, for instance, a lot of the money is made in selling foreign distribution rights. There is still a sig

The same pattern occurs in TV, film, and games. In movies, for instance, a lot of the money is made in selling foreign distribution rights. There is still a significant cost associated with exhibiting movies in China, for example, including localization, marketing, distribution to theaters, etc. An American studio would rather license off the rights to a foreign distributor, taking a sort of annuity income stream, than incur those costs and burdens itself. This has become so lucrative, in fact, that foreign sales potential often "wags the dog" in the domestic (US) market. Movies get financed and produced off of pre-sales to other territories. (This is a mildly simplified way of describing the process, but on the whole, it will probably suffice). So you see these patterns play out in the home video market as an aftereffect. Rights were carved up and sold off during the theatrical window, and more rights were carved up and sold off in anticipation of the home video window. And by the time that window rolls around, various parties hold the rights to various spots on the map. It's in the interest of none of those parties to break down DRM or region control. It's hard to overstate the systemic importance of foreign distribution to the moviemaking business. Accordingly, it's hard to overstate the fierceness with which studios and distributors will fight to maintain region controls and exhibition windows. Eventually, this model will have to give. It makes increasingly little sense to consumers. And, while there was once a physical scarcity making it necessary, that scarcity is largely nonexistent (barring extensive local marketing costs). But it'll be a long time before we see any major changes here. There are just so many parties aligned against change, and the capital costs of building a competing ecosystem are enormous. With books, the barriers to entry are much lower. So I have a bit more hope for that market in the next few years.