You do realize that:
1.)
Amazon has gotten rid of that whole democratizing pilot season thing because:
2.) It didn't really work/isn't really working for them? The wait between pilot and whole season was getting long enough that they'd lose whatever buzz the pilots had, they're becoming more like other streamers where they pick up whole seasons before the show airs (because that's what you have to be doing to compete with Netflix and everyone else going for top talent right now), and on top of that the process wasn't really that great at determining show quality (their most critically acclaimed show before Ms. Maisel was Transparent, and that was the lowest rated show of its pilot season).
From what I've seen, Netflix has forgone that practice you describe because it wasn't working for them, either. They cancelled more shows in the last 2 seasons than the networks did, if I recall correctly. And networks have an itchy trigger finger when it comes to cancellations.
They appear to instead have moved on to signing majorly famous seasoned creatives like Shonda Rhimes and Ryan Murphy to exclusivity/first-pass deals on all their new projects. It's a marked shift from their "throw it at the wall and see if it sticks" attitude that they had previously demonstrated. So Amazon is a few steps behind their major competitor as it is.
The democratized pilot season was a win for consumers and inconvenient for producers and Amazon. Trusting user metrics seems like a better bet in the interim, but a consumer-facing solution is going to be necessary to save big-budget productions and keep pricing low.
Personally, I'm not against raising subscription prices to meet the cost needs of production, but to do that, you have to offer something worth the price, not just something marginally flashier. Their current price point seems to work for what they offer. They've already bumped pricing up to pay for their original programming needs once before, I feel certain that it will happen again. And while some will recoil at the notion, to put it bluntly, asking for a premium hasn't hurt HBO's subscriber numbers one single iota.
As to everything else: Everything that the content makers do, generally speaking, is hiding the actual cost of what the show costs to you. Buying shows after the fact is treated as ancillary income after the networks (or streaming services) pay for production. They aren't gonna cut off their nose to spite their face by pissing off the people actually paying to make the show just so they can make an extra $20-30 off you.
How are they "cutting off the nose to spite their face", exactly? I'm not suggesting day-and-date availability on services like iTunes, but ANY availability beyond their current model of practically none. Because as it stands right now, I'm extorted to pay for Netflix. That's not a feeling that just goes away and not a feeling that's unique to me (hence all the people who pay for a month and then bail, to maneuver around it). That's a feeling that takes one more push of my buttons to lose my subscription, and then they either have to provide ANY a-la-carte solution or lose money anyways and, as you put it, "piss off the people actually paying to make the show".
The major networks and several of the cable channels seem to appreciate the a-la-carte business model and benefit from it greatly, using it to prop up a universal drop in OTA and cable TV ratings and compete with piracy prior to the advent of the current streaming service sprawl. If they, the ones paying for the content, didn't earn a huge chunk of cash from it, they would have stuck to Hulu the moment it became a thing, abandoned the business model and been done with it. Netflix, Amazon and CBS seem to be the only ones who didn't get the memo and lock their streaming originals behind a service subscription indefinitely unless prohibited by contract with the producers (as was likely the case with Marvel).
