by Pamela Okoro

Created on: February 10, 2009   Last Updated: February 20, 2009

For this article's sake, let's say AUTHORS are regular writers (poets, short story and article writers, and novelists) while SONG WRITERS are the people that write the lyrics to the songs we listen to everyday.

Now, if one author owes it to another to give him his credit when quoting him, then why should he not give due honor to a song writer whose lyrics is adding value to his write up? It's legal to obtain permission from another author and use his written words in my article- so why should I not first get permission from Celine Dion or whoever owns the rights to it; to use the lyrics of Immortality?

Intellectual property is one of the hardest things to protect, but it should be valued and we must try to protect it. Hard work and diligence are applied to creating the song lyrics, if artistes can sue their colleagues in the industry for using their beats, tunes and lyrics; why then can't they sue authors for using their words?

A song writer sits like any author and pours out his soul and intellect, works at rhyming and rhythm in the written word like a poet, develops a story line through verses, choruses and hooks. And at the end of the day he buys a novel and sees his hard work just quoted very casually within someone else's lines. I say sue!

Saying authors don't need permission to quote song lyrics is the same thing as saying authors can use other authors literature without permission. Correct me if I'm wrong but in the dictionary it's defined as plagiarism; and I'm yet to meet a hardworking author that appreciates it. Song lyrics are written by hard working people, not necessarily the singers of the songs. They are almost unknown, do we have to steal what little artistic identity they have going for them?

There has to be an industry standard for quoting lyrics equivalent to that in the literary field. For example: words quoted must also denote the song they have been culled from and when very many words are used the express permission of the song writer should be obtained- even public domain songs should be titled when quoted so that the authors are not credited with creative works that really did not originate from them.

Song writers are writers too and should be protected by the music industry that they are work for.

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