In this particular case what they were selling wasn't a licensed copy of a movie or show. They were selling a license to stream. When the contract ran out they had to pull it from the streaming platform.

Sony said that affected customers will lose the ability to stream titles including Outrage: Way of the Yakuza, Paddington, Paddington 2, Pan’s Labyrinth, Rambo 3, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, and The Boy in the Striped Pajamas “due to our content licensing agreements.” As of September, Sony will remove any affected titles that UK users bought from their PlayStation library, per the notice.

Ok. So let's say for the sake of argument, you have Netflix. You pay for Netflix specifically for... I dunno, Top Gear. Suddenly without warning Netflix is forced to pull Top Gear from its streaming platform because the license to provide it to stream has lapsed or been otherwise ended. That's basically what happened here except that they allowed you to pay per show or movie.

In this case what these customers paid for is the license to stream these digital items. Which (shitty though I agree it is) they agreed to when they made their purchases. But the fact is, Sony didn't reach into people's Harddrives and remove anything. What they did was remove these shows and movies from the digital streaming library of people who purchased it and the only reason they did is because otherwise they'd be sued if they didn't.

So while I appreciate your outrage, I think it's pretty important to note that the license holder (the entity that actually owns the ability to sell distribution rights for digital licenses to consumers) is the one who sets the terms, not the platform of distribution, and this happens so often that literally no digital media is safe except when you can download it DRM free (Google play music, band camp, GOG etc).

I don't disagree that Sony is at fault for agreeing to that distribution agreement. That's not anything like what I said. What I said was that they did it because they are required to by law.