Radiohead had the balls to do it

• Internet is changing the world as we know it (no shit!). Quick and cheap distribution of data is slowly but surely changing everything we know.
• Especially the publishing business. We don't need middlemen when it comes to distribution of bit streams (0100101010101).
• And that is what is happening at the moment. "Big media" is lobbying to try and stop P2P, but in reality they are fighting to try and maintain their power position...this is causing quite some damage in the process. For example...a single mother was given a 220.000$ bill, because she had 24 songs on her opened eMule. And we have all kinds of restrictions on data access, which is rather ironic, because the reason why we have copyright protection in the first place is to ensure individuals get as much fresh data as possible (constitutional clauses...).
• Conflicts of distribution channels, prevented most "big" artist to say no thanks to middlemen and started distributing their music on-line. (The "smaller" ones had no choice then to go online (for example: iLike...) and try their luck- Arctic Monkeys succeeded...)
• So why did a group that could sell their album via "big media" and make a profit go online?
• They are probably not mother Theresa, so they must be after some sorts of profits. And in the long run, they reckoned they would get more by trying something new. And so far it seems they have succeeded according to this.
• Besides the donations (10 mio$), lets not forget, they will probably spread their fan base and thus sell more concert tickets, T-shirts...
• How are "Big groups" and "big media" going to respond to this?