big big picture in my opinion

(This might be obvious to everybody but I'll babble it anyway)
Whether the music industry are screwing the consumer or being screwed by the consumer I think theres a bigger picture.
Record companies historically made their business by discovering or creating talent, then marketing the talent to millions, and finally distributing their product.
As it turns out there is now something much bigger than them that can do all those things even better, more efficiently and in a more democratic process. I don't need to tell you what that is.
But what will become of the poor millionaire musicians now if their music was freely traded? Well it turns out they make a LOT of their money from tours (so much the record companies try to get a piece of it)
There probably is a hard limit to touring (factors of time and audience size) so Britneys unrealized extra millions will probably distribute out over smaller acts.
This will hurt the talent that prefers to stay in the studio or maybe they can figure something else out after the boy bands are crashing and burning without relentless record company marketing and promotion.