It's not a long term rental, it's an limited rental, and the rental period is determined by the "landlord", solely at their discretion. We've all become digital serfs, digiserf, if you will.
Not all of us, some of us don't buy digital goods with DRM embedded.
Most of the friends I talk to that buy drm stuff buy it thinking it will be around forever. They just don't conceive of a world without iTunes or Amazon.
Just as a side note, neither iTunes nor Amazon have DRM on purchased music. That battle was won my consumers.
The battle for DRM-free video, however, is far from won. I’m not aware of any source for legal DRM-free video purchases (other than niches like stock video clips).
If you think Amazon will refund you 3000 dollars worth of digital goods in 50 years if they go bankrupt, you're dreaming. If you're very lucky, whoever bought them out might let you keep your stuff, or more likely, let you buy it again.
In 50 years their code will be cracked or the root keys leaked (especially during a bankruptcy meltdown). Of course that’s not something to count on, but history is a proven record that opsec failures will produce the opportunities for “liberation”
No need to wait 50 years if you wish to break the law. Right now you can steal all the content you like. Don't forget removing DRM in the US is illegal, and laws will undoubtedly only get more draconian.
Not all of us have become serfs. I haven't bought a Foo Fighters album since "In Your Honour" had DRM that made copying it to my mini disc player difficult. I've enjoyed their albums since though.
I fully believe artists deserve their share of the wealth created from their work. Unfortunately many artists' work impossible to financially support without also supporting DRM.
In all fairness, I don't know if the Foo Fighters still use DRM. It was irritating enough at the time that it became a lifelong grudge for me (same thing with Civ and any Tell Tale Games title).
