From Mr Rick Carnes.

Sir, Christian Engström of the Pirates party (“Copyright law threatens our online freedom”, July 7) is absolutely correct in his assumption that Elvis’s music does not belong to him. It belongs to great songwriters like Otis Blackwell, who wrote so many of Elvis's big hits such as “All shook up” and “Return to sender”, and who fought for years to protect and strengthen US copyright law. Without copyright, Mr Blackwell would never have been able to create that “common cultural heritage” that Mr Engström wants to think of as his own.

He forgets that it isn’t technology that “opens up new possibilities” – it is the people who create the technology, the very people who earn their livings from patents and copyrights.

Computer code, songs, artwork and drug patents don’t appear “as if by magic”. These people invest their lives, their dreams, their money, their time and all their hopes for the future in their work.

Creative people don’t necessarily create only for money, but the money is necessary if only for them to continue to create.

The real “restriction” on Mr Engström’s access to an Elvis song is a paltry 99 cents for a download on iTunes. For that he wants us to abandon the copyright and patent laws that have been constructed over hundreds of years.

Nor is the world “at a crossroads”, as he claims. We will not face the apocalypse if people have to pay for music again. What is already causing serious cultural damage is the failure to enforce copyright law on the internet. I started making my own music at eight years old and by 13 I was making money at it. By 27 I was a professional songwriter and built a lifelong career as an “active” creator of musical culture; until, that is, I was put out of business by illegal downloading.

Mr Engström warns that “society has to make a choice” between total anonymity or totalitarian control on the internet. This is naive. The right choice is neither. Instead, we need to find some sweet spot in between. It is simple to conflate the ideas of privacy and theft. I could, for instance, claim that it is my right to wear a ski mask into a bank in order to keep my identity “private” from the prying eye of the bank security camera. The security guards might take exception to that, and for good reason.

Similarly, while governments should limit intrusion into people's private lives they also have the responsibility to protect citizens from the theft of their property.

Laws are passed based on history, common sense and hopefully the common good. The internet is a new medium and the world is still trying to come to grips with the balance between privacy and security. I would ask Mr Engström to give that a chance to happen by toning down the rhetoric.

Rick Carnes,
President,
Songwriters Guild of America,
South Nashville, TN, US