Commerce Secretary Gary Locke was in Nashville, TN on Monday to speak to an audience of people mostly in the country music industry. He was there to reinforce the Obama administration's commitment to cracking down on music piracy on the Internet.As the Washington Post reports , total revenues for recorded music in the United States dropped from $14.6 billion in 1999 to $7.7 billion in 2008. Locke also made mention of the growth of the digital music downloads, which reached $3.1 billion in 2009, up 19 percent from the previous year. The drop appears huge, but it's hard to know exactly what it means. Did piracy have an impact on the music industry? Probably. But did it actually cost it $7 billion? That's yet to be seen.Locke made reference to the June discussions of "the Administration's recent release of a Joint Strategic Plan by the newly created Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator reflects the depth of our commitment to curb intellectual property piracy both here and abroad." Quoting Vice President Biden, Locke reiterated the administration's policy that "Locke professed that "this copyright and patent framework needs to evolve to meet the evolving challenges of the 21st century." Yet the biggest problem is that we the concerned citizenry don't see what is being done. So while Locke might report that the "(Commerce) Department is also conducting a comprehensive review of the relationship among copyright policy, creativity, and innovation in the Internet economy," all we hear about is enormous fines being levied against poor grandmothers who have never heard of LimeWire.Media piracy is a complicated issue. Locke quoted President Obama, saying that, “single greatest asset is the innovation and ingenuity and creativity of the American people." This is a particularly interesting sentence because it addresses virtual goods: the immaterial products of patents, IP, and copyrightable materials. Not only does it involve the intangible, it increasingly is wrapped up in global policies and international law.It would have been more productive had Locke come together with the members of the recording industry to discuss the plans of both sides. There were no plans of the industry's plans to innovate in light of the rapid technology shifts in media consumption. There was no discussion of whether piracy numbers were up or down (as has been extensively debated elsewhere) and why that might be. Without any actual discussion, it's hard to see Locke's visit to Nashville as anything more than reassuring a giant media industry that the government cares.Discussions of media piracy are always a touchy subject, inciting emotionally charged responses dealing with politics of all sorts. We'd like to know your take on Locke's visit and the issues at hand, but remember to be civil!