Sorry Bryan, but there's so much in your post that sounds incredibly naive about all this. First of all it was not until the invention of printing in the 15th Century that a form of copyright protection was devised...(that old pesky culprit, technology). Then the law was formalized by The Statute of Queen Anne in England in 1709: http://www.patent.gov.uk/copy/history/

Works are, or become "traditional" because either they were created and passed down anonymously (as with much old folk music and stories of folklore), or because the copyright has expired and the work has passed into public domain. According to present U.S. Copyright Law this period of protection is from the date of creation to 70 years past the death of the author: Copyright Law of the U. S. Of A.http://www.loc.gov/copyright/title17/ Click on Duration of copyright

So how does an artist survive such a situation? For performance artists (musicians,
actors, etc) it is simple – provide live performances, and make your money off of that.

I'm sorry, Bryan, but you don't have a clue here. Statistically only 2% of all performing artists (actors, dancers, musicians, singer/songwriters, magicians, etc.) make a living income by performing.
And of that 2%, only a handful are the super-rich celebrities. Otherwise it's a constant struggle...holding down a "day" or "real" job and performing on the side. C'mon! If every performing artist could just snap their fingers and establish a career in performance that pays enough to make a living don't you'd think they'd just do it instead of struggling along?

And if writers and recording artists had the capital to package, promote and distribute their works to the level of high-visibility, don't you think every one of them would eliminate the hated publishers/producers, (the "middleman"), and do just that?

And why do you believe that the owners of trademarks and patents have a right to the protection of their works but artists, or the creators of "intellectual property," don't?

And, by the way, plagiarism and copyright infringement is the same thing...where's this 'shade of gray' you seem to see?

I find it alarming that someone of your intellect and good-intentions, Bryan, is unaware of many of the implications here. But I think that's a symptom of the current problem. And this rebuttal is addressed to the issue, not personally to you, I assure you.