The relationship between Dorna, FIM, MSMA and IRTA is such that Dorna aren't playing chicken. If IRTA (who 'own' GP racing) decided to play hard ball over the format, they would win. But Dorna is the company that has handed over hundreds of millions of dollars to IRTA and the FIM in fees and appearance and prize money.
Their motivation is to sell MotoGP to broadcasters, the broadcasters sell advertising slots on the back of MotoGP's popularity. If motoGP isn't popular, prices are less, Dorna's take is less, the overall amount of money in GP is less. It is in their interest to keep it interesting and to increase viewers.
IRTA's motivation is to represent the teams, sponsors, vendors and manufacturers that are involved in MotoGP.
The MSMA's motivation is to secure the best conditions to race in for the manufacturers.
The FIM's motivation is as the sanctioning body of international two-wheeled motorsport - to make sure that international road-racing continues and is fair.
For Dorna to 'play chicken' to such an extent that the major players walked out of GP racing would be to take their goose and bugger it where the golden eggs come out.
They don't have some deep-seated agenda to emasculate GP racing, they are an entertainment company. They are worried that GP racing isn't as entertaining as it used to be and want to make it more so. They have been successful with Moto3 and Moto2 and now they are looking to attract more and higher-calibre racers to MotoGP.
They drew a line in the sand in 2010 and stated they would no longer fund factory teams, that they would be putting their money into teams running the new CRT-spec bikes. The specification of CRT is wide open - pretty much anything that meets the technical rules goes, as long as it isn't a 'factory' bike.
Aprilia have run close to the wire by making a turnkey GP bike but as Aprilia themselves aren't racing and have no team management or representation in the pits, they are not considered a factory bike. There is nothing to stop Honda and Yamaha doing the same - but they have said they won't. You want an M1 or RC you get a bevy of Honda technical guys with laptops that come with it. You don't get to play with the good stuff, you just get to do the mechanicals.
If a factory such as MV or Guzzi or Norton were to build a prototype and sell it to be run in GP, it would still be considered a CRT bike, because of the nature of their investment and involvement. If Suzuki USA and Yoshimura were to collaborate and run a bike in GP, it would also be considered a CRT, but if Rizla were to re-enter as the official Suzuki factory effort, they wouldn't. But if Rizla were to build their own chassis and stick a few of their old 990 engines in it, they would.
Just stating that Dorna are stuffing up the sport and playing chicken with the factories ignores the relationship between them. Honda need Dorna as much as Dorna needs Honda - more so. If Honda up and left, Dorna would find some other way of getting bikes to take up the slack. Honda would lose 5.5B viewers.
And don't forget - the same company that owns Dorna owns InFront (the rights holders to WSBK). With viewing figures of around 500M versus 5.5B annually, who do you think would win if it came to a showdown on spec, WSBK or MotoGP?
So who's playing chicken?
