You might want to check out Feist v. Rural Telephone Company (1991), and also look up the Berne Convention (on copyright), which the U.S. joined in the 1970s.

If by "information" you mean mere facts without creativity in selection or arrangement, those are generally not protectable by copyright in the United States, although possibly in some other countries. Copyright generally protects works of authorship, and nothing else. No creativity no copyright.

So for this case involving LI, I get my name and employer name isn't protected but there is a section where you describe your role. That is extremely creative, right? There are infinite ways similar work could be described. It isn't just a "fact". So they can't use that information it would seem.

Not the creative part, no. Someone could presumably use the non-creative stuff as far as copyright is concerned, although other means (notably shrink wrap licensing) are often attempted to restrict that.

I used to regularly see books at the university book store that were wrapped in literal shrink wrap licenses for that reason, which of course makes browsing difficult. And then there was a major case on the subject ProCD v. Zeidenberg (7th Cir 1996), where such a license was found valid and enforceable.

Never. "Mere listings" of data (like the phone book) are not copyrightable.

But also anything you write which is copyrightable is copyright immediately. You can register the work w/ the copyright office for some extra perks but it's not strictly necessary.