Pushing for changes in contract terms strikes me as a good idea. So does moving more of this into the public gaze, to educate readers. It would likely help publishers who are owned by others to say "Look, see our customers, this isn't just us here in the office telling you this stuff."

I admit to being bugged because I thought your very fine reader-side analysis then slid into precisely the same sort of ignorance about publishers you rightly criticize when it comes to authors' ignorance of readers' situations. At least, if you've actually studied the conditions modern genre fiction publishers (or other kinds of publishers) work in and what they're on record as supporting and agitating for, I missed it.

Hoping that doesn't come out mean. I am mean today, but it's about something completely else, and I don't want to dump it on you.