My suggestions for Mr. Leeds?
#1:
Make the DDI like unto a God. Put older editions in the compendium. Older rules references. Older books we can read
right on the site. Who the heck wouldn't pay $10/month to be able to search every word of text ever printed in a D&D rulebook? To be able to roll on 1e tables right there? To search for "The Escathon, Planescape" and get everything that mentions them.
Mr. Leeds: People would give you piles of money to do this. Do this. Make piles of money doing it. Laugh all the way to the bank and the next shareholder's meeting, and give them all the bird, because they will crown you king of the money pile when you unite some millions of D&D fans under a single roof that channels part of their paychecks to you every month. Every D&D player with a computer will be visiting your website and giving you money.
#2:
Stop Being Scared of Pirates. Grow a pair. Absolutely seriously. The pirates can't kill you. D&D (and books in general) aren't the music industry. No one cares if the PHBII shows up on torrent sites a week after it's released. You're never going to get cheapskates and scofflaws to pay. These aren't lost sales, they're more like market data, showing you what people in general are interested in. Most people -- most consumers -- want to give you money for awesome stuff. Let them. Make it easy for them. Let them do whatever they want with what they buy.
#3:
Sell A Friggin' T-Shirt Or Something. The D&D brand is much stronger than just the books. Why can't I buy a "Jesus Saves (and takes half damage)" shirt at the WotC store? Why can't I walk around with the D&D logo emblazoned on my boxer shorts? Why can't I buy a print of some D&D artwork and slap it in a frame and stick it up on my wall? Even if I friggin' hate a given edition, I might be all "OMG SEXY ELF POSTER" and get it anyway. If WEBCOMIC ARTISTS can do this, why cant you? Bonus point: this stuff has a huge profit margin, and isn't easily pirate-able, so FRIGGIN DO IT.
#4:
Start selling PDFs again, and don't charge more than $10 for them. Remind the brick-and-mortar folks that PDF's aren't books, and that you're giving them shirts and posters and Designer-hosted gamedays or whatever, so they can shove a dice bag in it. It's not your job to keep them in business, it's your job to sell D&D. You do this by selling PDF, 'cuz some folks just won't do it in other ways. And you sell them not for the same price as a hardcover book, because people aren't idiots. For bonus points, this means you'll get a lot of people buying the same book twice, and only grousing about it mildly. "grumble grumble don't wanna will do so anyway" kind of stuff. If they don't want to buy it twice, they don't have to -- they'll find ways around it, and you can let them. A $10 convenience isn't a big deal for most folks.
#5:
Embrace Open Gaming. WotC
invented that junk, and it rocks. The GSL makes everyone's mouths taste like doodie. Friggin' go OGL already. You don't need to put everything online for free like 3e did, because you don't need an SRD: just designate some of your rules content as open. That's all. Lead the industry again, man!
#6:
Gaming Groups are your Recruitment Tool. People get into D&D by joining existing groups, by and large. By meeting folks who already play and thinking it might be kind of neat. Make this easy. I don't know exactly how you go about that, but if you're going to grow your player base, you must do this. Free Idea: link it to the gaming stores, who will then sex you up for giving them fresh customer meat in their physical store.
I am not very diplomatic, so I assume you can put these in less abrasive terms. This is why I am a dude on the message boards and not a CEO. All of these are things the CEO of WotC should be taking into account.
I should also say the Print-On-Demand idea is pretty ding dang good.
Friggin' awesome that you got to do this. Lucky it wound up you and not me.
