My ideal pragmatic solution would be a platform (or two, or five) that acts like a dumb pipe for content providers to license their content to, and receive some form of compensation every time it is watched, prorated into the amount of the episode/movie is actually watched.
However, given the difficult licensing issues found for every country, that's probably not going to happen any time soon.
Obviously, the cable/satellite/telco video companies of the world don't want to get disintermediated here; so most of them have been building IP video platforms for the last few years. It will still likely require a cable video subscription (though maybe with a slight discount as you won't need to rent a cable box.)
That's why cable companies bundle channels together instead of letting you pick and choose the ones you want.
If it wasn't for this, the industry would become even more risk-averse, and we would see a lot less diversity of content, or risky unproven ventures.
In the end I believe this would be a net loss to everyone.