in a letter written exclusively for Music Week, MPA chief executive Stephen Navin rebuffs Rackow's plea branding it a "retrograde step" for licensing.

"Patrick Rackow's recent article for Music Week is tragically misinformed of current licensing practices and as a result is entirely misguided in its call for 'all rights [to be] returned back into the collection societies," he writes.

Historically, the various collection societies throughout Europe have only ever held national licensing mandates to cover their own territory. Users ...