Confessed gadget freak Mark Fleischmann asks "Who's In Control?" He dissects the continuing attack on consumer fair use.

An excerpt from his commentary:

Inside every gadget lover is a control freak. And guess what? My inner control freak is getting freaked out. Every daily brings a new headline that heightens his alarm. He started out whispering and now he's working up to a scream.

OK, time for a reality check. It's wrong to steal. I spend a large portion of my income on purchased CDs and rented DVDs, and if you aren't willing to pay anything to artists and the companies who market them, you just suck. Mass-scale pirates deserve to hear the slam of the jailhouse door. As a small-time book publisher and author, I'm in favor of companies protecting their intellectual property-within reasonable limits. Those limits are defined by the phrase fair use.

What worries me is that the rules are literally being rewritten as you read this. Dolly back, as they say in the film industry, and three patterns become clear: What was once legal and "fair use" of existing gear is being redefined, criminalized, and copy-protected out of existence under new laws and regulations. Your existing gear, including your HDTV and your PC, is also being directly sabotaged by software. And gear you buy in the future may not have the functionality you've always taken for granted.

Here's another threesome for you: The forces responsible for this tectonic shift in consumer electronics are partly private, partly public, and partly a combination of the two. That combination is a particularly deadly one. When government colludes with business, to whom can you turn?"