But enabling private communication is not the same as a public free for all. Some information should use private communication, but not be shared publicly, some examples that comes to mind is credit card numbers or private encryption keys.
How do you determine what information is legitimately private and what is not? If the only information that is ever transmitted under encryption is that which your adversary doesn't want you to transmit -- that is, if the only encrypted traffic is communication which the oppressor regime doesn't want to allow -- then the oppressor regime can easily prevent all encrypted traffic from reaching its destination. The only way to fight that is to encrypt everything. And if everything is secret, how do you prevent piracy? You can't. It is impossible.
Thus, the only way piracy is ever going to be fought is through examples being made. A grandmother who inadvertently downloaded Madonnas latest album by mistake is sentenced to pay millions in damages. A teenager listening to her favorite band is sentenced to ten years in prison.
What is worse? Ruining someone's life because they listened to the music they like, or musicians /possibly/ not getting paid as much as they /possibly/ might have earned, were there no internet?
I know what I think is the right response to that. And I say that as a person who once thought he'd make a living making music. Of course, wanting to do that and actually being able to are completely separate things. Perhaps it's not the piracy which is holding the musician back. Perhaps they are just not good enough.
