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There's an article in The Guardian today about the illegal streaming of live Premiership games. I find the article itself a little strange, and the Premier League's reactions described in it strange. Take this:

They not only undermine the business model of the Premier League's lucrative domestic and overseas rights deals, but make a mockery of the long-standing Saturday 3pm "blackout" designed to protect lower league attendances. The Premier League has been determined not to repeat the mistakes of the music industry, which was slow to react. It was still squandering millions on "fruit and flowers" when the ground crumbled beneath it as illegal filesharing took hold.

"Good quality content is in the interests of everybody – fans, broadcasters, ISPs as well as the technology companies which sell equipment," said a Premier League spokesman. "So, like all content providers, we are keen that both the legislators and the regulators recognise that there has to be a fair market that serves the fan whilst keeping standards high."

They have taken a twin track response: hunting down and trying to close the sites responsible, while lobbying government for tighter copyright controls. The next few months will be crucial. Alongside other major rights holders including BSkyB and ITV, the Premier League was one of a so-called "gang of five" rights owners who called on the government to bring forward legislation encouraging internet service providers to take more responsibility. Following the publication of the Digital Britain report earlier this year, some of those rights owners now fear the momentum has been lost and will appeal to Stephen Timms, newly entrusted with ministerial responsibility for introducing legislation arising from it, to do so before next year's general election.

That quote from the Premier League spokesman I've highlighted I originally read as meaning that the Premier League would be looking to combat illegal game streams with streams of their own, but, as the rest of the article makes clear what they actually seem to mean is that because the streams are "low quality," they have to be vigourously pursued and shut down, leaving The Premier League itself to control the quality of online live-match coverage by - not providing any at all.
Personally, I would prefer to pay to watch a good quality stream of a game which would be guaranteed to work for the duration of the match, rather than spend ages looking for a stream that works, hoping it lasts all game, scrambling for another feed if the one I'm watching fails, etc.. The Champions League Semi-Final against Arsenal, I paid for a Sky stream, rather than chance missing such an important game by an inability to find a good illegal stream of it. For Premier League games not covered by Sky, there isn't any choice but to watch illegal streams. Until The Premier League does something about that, I don't see anything changing.
And yet the article itself doesn't cover anything like that, it says the Premier League, "has been determined not to repeat the mistakes of the music industry," yet from what the article actually says that would seem to be precisely what they are doing. Trying to shut down streams when 100s more can flourish in their place, rather than trying to provide a legal alternative.
And then, " lobbying government for tighter copyright controls." Excuse me? Illegal streaming is illegal, people do it. Why do they think more copyright control is the answer? The music industry is interested in the same thing, and it's the dying breath of a dinosaur. Copyright should change to reflect the digital age, copyright cannot protect against technological advances.
There is a mention of making more content available, from the company the Premier League uses to police its copyright:

"The Premier League has taken the lead in trying to get to grips with this," said NetResult's chief executive, Christopher Stokes. "There are two ways to deal with it – getting to grips with piracy, but also in making sure that more of your content is available online."

But there is no evidence of this anywhere in the article. In fact, the article mentions how the Premier League is suing Google over clips on Youtube. This is then followed by this:

One advantage the Premier League and sports rights owners have over the music and film industries is the fact that their value lies in live action

So why work against people who use Youtube to create a buzz about your product. It's the live action that's important. Again, no lesson seems to have been learned from the music industry, who alienate their customers by treating them like criminals, rather than provide decent online content themselves.
The problem with the article is that it seems intent on portraying the Premier League as the good guys, providing 2 quotes from them which are forward-looking while the rest of the article demonstrates how reactionary they actually are.