"If so, why would anyone produce the digital content knowing they won't receive compensation?"

Why should we restrict freedom of information and create a huge Orwellian enforcement bureaucracy just to make it easier for a small segment of society to make money off digital content? If your business model requires forcibly prohibiting people to share strings of 1s and 0s to be successful, then find a better business model. If you can't, that's your problem.

I agree that content creators deserve respect and attribution, but the freedom to share information is much more important as a social principle.

Are we talking about "freedom of information" or are we talking about music, movies, tv shows, software and other content that was created for the sole purpose of economic income?

"Information" to me sounds like you're talking about something more fundamental, I'm just not sure what. But sharing copyrighted material should by no means be considered something that is a social principle.

"But sharing copyrighted material should by no means be considered something that is a social principle."

It is, in fact. My friends don't have to pay royalties to content creators when they look at paintings I have hanging up in my house, watch a movie I rented, or borrow a book from me. This isn't because we don't respect copyright as a society, but because we recognize that sharing is a natural human activity, and the measures required to enforce the prevention of such behavior would create a society without freedom or privacy that no one wants to live in.

For similar reasons, what I choose to upload and download on a p2p network is no one's business but mine and the peer I've connected to. They are in effect private conversations, and any legal system that requires monitoring of these private conversations will, carried to its logical conclusion, eliminate all privacy and freedom in digital life, since any single packet on the network, whether it's for email, web traffic, or any other use, could conceivably contain copyrighted bit sequences and therefore be marked for inspection. Similarly, every file on our computers would obviously need to be scanned at borders and other checkpoints to be sure no one had infringing bit sequences on their systems.

Look, there have been plenty of examples that show that a significant percentage of people are willing to pay for digital content even when they could otherwise obtain it freely through file sharing, whether out of respect content creators, or for the sake of quality and convenience. So this isn't a question of whether or not copyrighted digital content can survive--it's been well proven that it can survive and thrive. No, the question is whether we should allow a few entrenched stakeholders to trample our civil rights in order to milk a bit of extra revenue out of the system without having to innovate in response to new cultural norms.

Your civil rights aren't being trampled because it is illegal to download or upload and post online a 1080p rip of the latest Hollywood blockbuster for thousands to download easily.

You claim that these laws don't hurt civil rights because they are legally enforceable. This doesn't add up. Legality is irrelevant.

It's easy to fall into a pattern of accept government to be a definitive source of truth about political concepts. This is flawed thinking. Were the government to say that up was down, it would not make it any more true.

Likewise, when the government chooses to call something property doesn't mean that it is property by a reasonable definition.

The enforcement of content protection laws impede privacy, free speech, free expression and the principle of live and let live. It's a clear-cut imposition on civil rights.

It does? Why has this line of thinking just come about within the last 20 years or so when it became easy to pirate IP due to the emergence of mp3s and high speed Internet connections? All of the chatter above is just hand wringing trying to justify that your entertainment should be free because it is easy to obtain without getting in hot water.

My motives have nothing to do with free entertainment. Generally I find movies to be shit, but occasionally order one off amazon because I can afford it and can't be bothered with the hassle of managing a download. I love music (to perform) but don't listen to it because I find it distracting.

I'm interested in digging in hard on issues where the people in our time all seem to be blinkered to the truth. What are the issues where people in five hundred years will look back at us and say "how could they have been so [stupid/cruel/content]."

Copyright's one of them. It's not conducive to creativity, it doesn't reward creators. There's never been a public policy case made that explains why we have it, just vague hand-waving about how it's necessary for creation of production.

In order to enforce it the government needs to encroach on more and more freedoms.

For all its madness, copyright is generally accepted. Good people are made to feel guity for doing it, partly because of unsupported economic claims, and partly from bald-faced lies that smart people should see throuh, such as branding copyright infringement as 'stealing'.

Of course it rewards creators. Much of the content you read in your local bookstore or watch on TV wouldn't be made if the authors didn't have any system in place in which they could guarantee a return on their investment. Yes some people will do it for free, but many wouldn't have the ability to do so if they weren't able to sustain themselves.

The system we have makes some things possible but kills others, such as remixing which is the dominant mechanism for creativity when people are left to their own devices. It mandates a few business models and outlaws everything else. You can't review public policy just from its good effects, what's important is the opportunity cost.

There are some major flaws in your argument here. First, remember that someone creating content of any kind, digital or not, is not automatically entitles to compensation. Even in the days of CDs, someone had to physically buy the discs for them to make money--and if the music sucked, they didn't. There are plenty of reasons why someone would create content without expecting to be directly paid for it: reputation, enjoyment, contributing to the sum of human knowledge and the human experience. Why do scientists do research? Yes, they are salaried, but they are not getting paid for their "content" specifically; their research is released into the world for free (hidden only behind journal pay walls, a separate issue).

As for your comment on non digital domains, it suffers from the same flaw as previous arguments above. When you get your teeth cleaned or your car towed, it is NOT true that the dentist for example could still clean other teeth. He can in the future, but during the time he cleaned your teeth, he could have been cleaning someonje else's teeth but wasn't because he was cleaning yours. There is an opportunity cost there. With digital files, there is no such cost. It makes no difference whatsoever to a file or its creator whether it is shared one time or a thousand, since the creator isn't doing anything differently nor investing incremental time or money for each additional share.

You're getting downvoted for willfully conflating two different terms in a game of semantics in order to muddy the waters in support of your argument, you arrogant little shit.