BRUSSELS - "The authors produce culture, and culture is the seed of democracy, tolerance, freedom of thought. This is why I invite parliamentarians to have the courage to establish adequate rules, because the right to be remunerated for the own work is a basic and inviolable right ". So in an interview with ANSA, the president of Siae Giulio Rapetti, aka Mogol, turns to the Italian parliamentarians to complete the transposition of the EU copyright directive approved last year. Of the rules that provide for web giants, such as Google, YouTube and Facebook, to remunerate publishers and authors of content shared on their platforms.
"I have been wondering for some time how it is possible that, in the face of this evident injustice, there are still resistances, that someone is still reticent", underlines Mogol. "It is a matter that does not have a political color, it is rather a matter of conscience". According to the president of Siae in recent months a campaign of widespread disinformation has been organized by the giants of the web, "supported by those who, like them, have preached a completely distorting concept of 'freedom'".
"I am free to order what I want at the restaurant, but am I also free to have lunch and then go out without paying the bill?". For Mogol, establishing rules on online content sharing "does not mean suffocating freedom, because copyright is not a barrier to progress but a support for creativity". The battle for copyright protection particularly involves younger artists often born on YouTube. "When we talk about copyright, we talk about the work of people, authors and publishers, who alone in Italy are over 90 thousand, including many young people under 30".
If on the one hand YouTube and Facebook certainly represent an opportunity for music, always at hand on the mobile phone, the artists must however be protected by adequate regulations. "Statistics inform us that the fruition of creative works takes place more and more through online platforms. This revolution for multinationals on the web is worth huge profits also thanks to the works of many authors" , explains Mogol.
Today sharing services "are in a position to decide the visibility and success of a song thanks to the use of algorithms," says Mogol. The president of Siae promises battle in the coming months for the definition of copyright rules: "We will continue to fight to ensure that the directive is implemented in Italy in compliance with the deadlines, but above all in the most correct way possible, in order to guarantee the creators maximum protection ".
According to Mughal there is above all the cultural identity of the country. "The work of those who create will continue to be free only if properly protected and remunerated. Without respect for the rights of those who create, the authors of the present would disappear and there would be no authors in the future. And without authors in the future, there will be no more beauty to be able to save us "he concludes.
