Netflix blaming piracy is just a warning that hostile legislation will pass and all of this will be shut down. Call me pessimistic.
Luckily the speed at which new counter-measures to anti-piracy technologies can be developed is much faster than any legislative body can ever hope to move. It’s an impossible battle to win by enforcement alone. These companies need to realize that they need to provide actual value to retain customers and remain competitive. People aren’t going to stand for a reskinned version of cable.
In my country, while it is illegal to download or to share pirated content, our law enforcement really only goes after the big fish doing the sharing. Sites may go down, but as an end user, my only real risk is getting a DMCA notice from my ISP if I’m sharing data (seeding torrents) while not using a VPN, and possibly having my service disconnected if I continue. While technically I could be in trouble with the law, it is not really a fear in my country to be a downloader of pirated media.
Stronger legislation could mean laws that entice law enforcement to act on smaller uploaders or even downloaders.
