I would argue that it's a subset of the IP holders who are the parasites here, using their wealth to increase their rights beyond what is reasonable and in the interests of those with whom they are supposed to be cooperating. Piracy is the reaction Schneier mentions to the noncooperatives becoming too numerous and too effective. DRM is yet another strategy to limit the rights of those who continue to cooperate.
Copyright and other intellectual exclusion (IE) laws were introduced in good faith to ensure that (1) it is rational to undertake intellectual endeavours and (2) the number of people who benefit from intellectual endeavours but don't support its development is limited.
Then the background against which IE had been written changed; now, some IE holders began to abuse their monopoly (a form of parasitic behaviour), and they came to informal understandings with lawmakers (who also put their own personal interests ahead of the collective interest, which is again parasitic) to strengthen the IE laws.
The real problem with IE laws is that as more people use intellectual works, the value to society increases, but due to the exclusionary nature of IE laws, they discourage widespread dissemination. The best solution would be a separate parallel economy for intellectual works where all consumers pay an amount from the primary economy that doesn't depend on how many intellectual works they consume, but producers receive an amount that depends on how much utility consumers directly or indirectly extract from their work (in proportion to all other intellectual works). That would open a number of difficult issues, and current parasites under the IE scheme have amassed enough power to resist it strongly, so I doubt we would see it any time soon even though it would be collectively beneficial.
