I am not going to "negotiate" with Sony, Panasonic, IBM, and the other three members of the consortium for a "better deal". The Copy Protection is baked into the spec and cannot be removed - that's already a deal breaker for me. The terrible fees on top of it for even utilizing the copy protection you can't even choose not to use make it even worse.

My tactic has been to release my work under open licenses (www.bbsdocumentary.com is one, www.getlamp.com is about to be), give presentations in which I discuss this situation, and write weblog entries about such, which, as you see, do garner attention.

I donate to the EFF and their occasional efforts to improve the situation on a legal basis.

I question the seriousness of this post if you think that it is possible to have 'reasonable' negotiations with the AACS, the MPAA, Sony, etc about their licensing policies.

Large companies/organizations usually dictate their licensing terms downwards. They only make exceptions if they view you as a large enough group to be talking on their level (i.e. a major movie studio).