> These copyright holding corporations are just blindly optimizing for maximizing their grasp on any content whatsoever.

This is what the reality is:

These copyright holding corporations are just optimizing for maximizing their grasp on their own recordings within any content whatsoever.

They legally own the recordings. What happens with the recordings is ultimately up to them. If they want to be paid for the use of their recordings, it’s their choice and they are free to do so.

> the maker of the video never wanted or asked for

Let’s flip this on its head... Did the rightsholders ask for him to be recording at a specific moment in time when their content was playing?

No. He made that choice. He chose to record that musical work.

He could have done plenty of things to avoid a recording a copyrighted work.