How can the "lazy big media companies" adapt? What's the DRM-free business model that would allow them to produce the blockbuster movies that are apparently still quite popular with the public?
I hate to use this analogy, but this really seems like a potential buggy-whip situation: It's quite possible that the content Big Media is producing is simply no longer relevant, even if the lack of relevance is due to changes in how people consume media and not because people are somehow no longer interested in explosions or big-name actors.
But I'm still going to go see Iron Man 3 and Star Trek Into Darkness and I'm not holding my breath that a non-DRM version will be cooked up outside the blockbuster system anytime soon. :)
It looked very much like fans of Firefly would have been able to raise enough to continue making the series but they were given not very subtle hints than getting involved in a crowdfunded production would have been bad for the showbiz careers of those involved.
That's something they have to care about, not I. I have the right to say "fuck you" and not give a shit about their business model. They had ample time to at least make a feeble try to start adapting, but so far this has not happened. I see a "blockbuster" movie about twice a year and could not care less if the typical Hollywood drivel completely stops.
Having said that, this is more a question of content delivery than the actual content.
It's the same as the DRM-encumbered business model: make movies and charge people to watch them. DRM doesn't make that model any more or less effective.
Why include DRM in html5 and potentially alienate open source operating systems?
Why use html5 to help sell more windows/osx copies?
Why use html5 to promote vendor lock-in?
Are copyright laws not enough protection?
The cost of every single feature added to the Standard Web is tremendous and we pay that cost forever. By that standard alone, adding a feature like DRM video to serve the demands of an enormous, incredibly powerful, incredibly rich lobby is ridiculous. There are simply much better problems to be solved with less downsides.
So, to try and rephrase it: The question here isn't whether these people should be 'brought into the fold' on the modern web; DRM is intrinsically at odds with the modern web (and the web we've had before), both in concrete purpose and in the more nebulous philosophical ways. A major strength of the web has always been its ability to open doors and put powerful tools in the hands of everyone, and encrypted/protected video limited to certain platforms/devices just fundamentally runs counter to all of that.