We are in the middle of war, a conflict to determine whether the individual people of this nation or entrenched moneyed interests decide what each of us are allowed to see, hear and read; and where, when and to what extent we are allowed to do so.

The Internet has quickly breaking down and replacing all the traditional distribution systems for intellectual property that our society has taken for granted in the past, most of which are top-heavy, inefficient systems with a history of abusing, under-compensating, and discarding the talents they depend on for their content; putting up editorial or critical barriers that deny market entry to talents attempting to enter the market, and charging their customers inflated prices that have little to do with actual production and distribution costs. New, efficient Internet-based distribution systems are trying to establish themselves that would give talents more control over their products, and a greater percentage of the profits from their sale; give every talent direct access to potential customers so they can produce their art by their rules, and find an audience for it; and offer customers a greater selection of products at lower prices. And in the process put many of those feeding off the old systems out of work!

The people who have grown fat from the old distribution systems fear the emerging new Internet-based distribution systems, and are using their considerable resources and influence to stop them. To do so, they are attempting to force changes in the law, through Congress and the courts, to gain unprecedented control over digitally stored intellectual property that goes far beyond that enjoyed by other forms of media. They are even willing throw out the traditional "fair use" and First Sale rights that are at the core of our society's academic and political discourse, and even gut our constitutionally-guaranteed freedoms of speech, press and association to maintain that control. Even worse, it appears that, so far, our Congresscritters and judges are more than willing to help them!

On these pages I intend to examine four different but related examples of the Media Wars being fought as we speak in this country: emerging online music distribution systems based on the MP3 Audio file format, and how and why the recording industry is trying to stop it; the DVD playback encryption process, how it's being used to hijack our "fair use" rights, and the egregious new law the movie industry has spawned to protect it; the peer-to-peer file sharing processes that will revolutionize every aspect of our society, Napster and other systems emerging to implement it, and the forces arrayed against it (and why they won't win!); and the e-book publishing revolution that is moving literature from a physical book to a digital file on an e-book reader, tablet, or smartphone..