> Musicians don't make money from streaming or CDs

The main reason that's the case is due to record labels forcing musicians into bad deals, because they are often the gatekeepers to popularity. Some of the streaming platforms are better about this now, but the economics of streaming have been set by the record labels and the streaming companies, so even if it's a bad deal, independent artists just have to deal with it. This doesn't have to be the case, it's just where we've unfortunately ended up.

> they make it from live performances, performing at private events, endorsements, etc.

Sometimes musicians write songs that they don't perform themselves. They license the performance rights to others. Copyright enables that.

These things are aided by copyright, though, even if the songwriter and performer is the same person. If a musician writes a song, and doesn't have copyright to protect it, other musicians could perform it as well. Maybe people start liking another performer's rendition more, and the original songwriter doesn't get to make money at live performances anymore, and gets no royalties from other performances. You could argue that's just tough luck, I suppose, but I don't think that's particularly fair.

> My dad slaved away for years writing his books. He knew they'd never make money, he did it for the academic reputation.

That's just a reflection of the idea that the value in a copyrighted work isn't necessarily monetary. Presumably your dad used the reputation he gained from writing those books for some purpose that was valuable to him. Without copyright, someone could have taken his work and used it for their own gains. After a while, the original provenance of his work may have gotten muddied enough that he couldn't use that work to enhance his own reputation anymore.

> we give away all our work for free under the most permissible license we could find - the Boost license.

That's great, but not everyone wants to do that. Who are you to say that no one should be able to retain GPL-like control over their software if they want? Who are you to say that someone shouldn't be allowed to release something while prohibiting commercial use?

And hell, the Boost license is certainly not even the most permissible license available: it still requires that the copyright/license notice be included with any distributions or derived work. Copyright enables you to make that requirement. If you didn't want that requirement, then you could have released into the public domain (or licensed similarly to public domain, for jurisdictions that don't have that concept). You didn't do that, and your license relies on copyright in order to function.

I will be the first person to agree that we need heavy copyright reform. DMCA should be gutted if not completely repealed. Copyright term should be reduced (the only thing from TFA I agree with) to something on the order of 20 years, or perhaps something where you have a shorter term with the option to renew for another short term if the work ends up being important to you. There should be no criminal penalties for copyright infringement; all of it should be dealt with in civil court, and monetary penalties should be based on what the infringer gained, not some made-up number that the rightsholder "lost". Unfortunately these reforms are unlikely.