Jesse Kornbluth: Well, this is an historic moment: Madonna's first online chat! Welcome, Madonna.

Madonna: Hello!

Jesse Kornbluth: "Music," your new CD, comes out tomorrow. For your fans, this is Christmas Eve. What is it like for you?

Madonna: Christmas Day. :) It's exciting... it'll be great to get some feedback after living with it for almost a year.

Jesse Kornbluth: You've had lots of epic releases. Is every one exciting?

Madonna: Yes, I have butterflies in my stomach every time. It never gets boring.

Jesse Kornbluth: Critics and fans thought "Ray of Light" was a breakthrough. Does that put more pressure on you?

Madonna: No. It inspires me.

Jesse Kornbluth: So it's sports. Set a record. Go higher.

Madonna: Yeah, exactly -- I keep raising the bar.

Jesse Kornbluth: What was your artistic intent this time out?

Madonna: Hmmm. To join the coldness or the remoteness of living in the machine age, in the world of high technology, with warmth and compassion and a sense of humor. But not get too soppy about it. :)

Jesse Kornbluth: In your Rolling Stone interview, you paint a pretty bleak picture of the music scene, and you also talk about yourself as a kind of "revolutionary" in spirit. If your revolution were successful, how would music -- or our lives -- be different?

Madonna: Well, I'm not saying that I would single-handedly be responsible for a revolution. I'm a cog in the wheel.

Jesse Kornbluth: But what change would you like to see?

Madonna: I would like people to take more risks and be less concerned with becoming popular. Music is supposed to be a reflection of what's going on in society, and as far as I'm concerned, we've become too complacent.

Jesse Kornbluth: And your music -- a lot of it here -- gets us off our asses and dancing.

Madonna: Or thinking, I hope. Dancing or thinking. :)

Jesse Kornbluth: We have some questions that children have sent in.

Madonna: Okay.

Jesse Kornbluth: Here's one. What's it like to be a singer and a Mom?

Madonna: It's like being pulled from every cell and nerve fiber and every hair... it's invigorating and exhausting.

Jesse Kornbluth: Let's take a member question about "Music."

Question: What was the hardest song to write?

Madonna: The hardest song to write... was "Impressive Instant."

Jesse Kornbluth: Why?

Madonna: Because I didn't want to follow a normal song structure, and I have a tendency to be very symmetrical when I'm writing. I wanted it to be different every time. I didn't want each verse to be the same length or the chorus to sound the same. What I did was I improvised while I was singing.

Jesse Kornbluth: Another member question.

Question: Do you see your new album as a recreation of your older music, or is this all new to you?

Madonna: It's both. It's new, but it's that I am the sum total of what I am. I've brought in elements from my past. I hope people interpret it that way.

Jesse Kornbluth: Britney Spears says, "When I'm depressed, I think of Madonna" When you're depressed -- if ever -- who do you think of?

Madonna: My children.

Jesse Kornbluth: Do you get depressed?

Madonna: Absolutely.

Jesse Kornbluth: For how long?

Madonna: It never lasts for very long. I'd say short bouts of ridiculous, usually inexplicable depression.

Jesse Kornbluth: In the New Yorker today, they say if you were on an island with "Survivor's" Richard Hatch, it wouldn't be long until his bloated corpse floated off the beach. True, you have had a long and glorious career. It does seem that you survive everything. I bet it doesn't seem all that self-evident to you, though.

Madonna: Well, I'm just living my life.

Jesse Kornbluth: Do you ever get nostalgic?

Madonna: Oh, definitely. I get nostalgic about a time in my life before I was an empire, when I was just a girl living in New York, writing songs and collecting bracelets on my arm.

Jesse Kornbluth: And are you now the permanent prisoner of your empire?

Madonna: No, I wouldn't say I'm a prisoner. But I would say it's a daily struggle to have the responsibilities I have and to maintain spontaneity and maintain the humor I have.

Question: How do you feel when people say you are a good role model for young women? Do you feel it's too much pressure, or do you view it as a compliment and an honor?

Madonna: I think it's a compliment and an honor.

Jesse Kornbluth: Do you listen to your own music?

Madonna: Yes, I listen to gobs and gobs when I'm working on it, then I have to get away from it before I can stand to listen to it again.

Jesse Kornbluth: At any point, do you feel objective about what you've done?

Madonna: It usually has to be at least a year after I've released it. And then I've moved onto something else.

Question: Do you plan on doing any more movies in the near future?

Madonna: Yeah, if I can find a script that's good enough. I'd love to. But I want to be as revolutionary in my movies as I am in my music -- that's pretty hard. Most scripts are pretty bad.

Question: What are some of the costs of ambition and determination, and is there such a thing as too much of either?

Madonna: Well, I think you have to constantly step back and figure out why you're doing what you're doing. If you're only interested in being powerful or rich, then yes, the cost is too great. You have to have a reason for what you're doing and know why you're saying what you're saying.

Jesse Kornbluth: But don't the reasons change over time?

Madonna: Yes, they do.

Jesse Kornbluth: And are you in touch with today's reasons?

Madonna: Yeah, that's the whole point, to be ever-mindful of your reasons and if they're changing.

Jesse Kornbluth: A question from Latin America: You sing so beautifully in Spanish. Any plans to sing in Spanish again?

Madonna: Absolutely. Probably I will do a Spanish version of my third single.

Jesse Kornbluth: Can we talk about Madonna and globalization?

Madonna: Okee dokee.

Jesse Kornbluth: Has living abroad changed your music?

Madonna: To a certain extent, but I've always listened to European music more than American music. And I've always been influenced by English music, especially the last five years.

Jesse Kornbluth: Another question from South America, this one from Argentina....

Madonna: All right!

Jesse Kornbluth: If one of your children wanted to be a singer...

Madonna: Would I let them? Why not? If that's what they want, why not?

Jesse Kornbluth: Do you and your daughter sing together?

Madonna: Absolutely! We sing Britney Spears songs together.

Jesse Kornbluth: What are you listening to?

Madonna: I listen to a lot of ambient music, which my boyfriend hates, because he says it sounds like the record's skipping all the time. Have you heard of Gavin Bryars? Or William Orbit's classical music CD?

Jesse Kornbluth: You ever listen to world music -- like Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan?

Madonna: Yes, I do, when I'm practicing yoga.

Question: Is there any special thing or place that inspires you? What do you do to regenerate or reinvigorate yourself creatively, mentally, spiritually?

Madonna: I like to put myself into situations where all I do is read books, watch movies, go to museums and have dinner with interesting people.

Jesse Kornbluth: And how long can you do that before you feel "full" and ready to create?

Madonna: Well, it would be a great luxury to be able to do for a couple of months. I suppose that's what I was doing waiting for the birth of my son. And now I'm full!

Question: Is there anything in life that you have always wanted and still do not have?

Madonna: More free time. More free time, more sleep.

Jesse Kornbluth: One thing that's been nagging at me -- what's with the cowboy hat?

Madonna: What do you mean, what's with the cowboy hat?

Jesse Kornbluth: I mean, there's no country on this CD.

Madonna: Yeah, there is! What did you listen to? The cowboy hat represents a real kind of iconography --- it's one with nature and animals and all-American, and I think it's an ironic twist when you consider how much synthesizer there is on the album.

Jesse Kornbluth: Iconography -- OK. In fashion, we're seeing the '70s again, embroidered denim.

Madonna: Is that '70s?

Jesse Kornbluth: Would you be there?

Madonna: Cool, then I'm right there with the times, keeping up with the Joneses without even knowing it. That's the best way, by the way.

Jesse Kornbluth: Do you even pay attention to of-the-minute stuff?

Madonna: In a peripheral way. For instance, I haven't read the latest issues of W or Vogue.

Jesse Kornbluth: You mention in Rolling Stone about writing e-mail. Dare we ask, do you use AOL?

Madonna: Yeah, I use AOL! Duh!

Jesse Kornbluth: Do you read the stuff we do about you?

Madonna: Duh!

Jesse Kornbluth: And OK, one more... how many e-mails do you write a day?

Madonna: Oh God, at least 50.

Jesse Kornbluth: Want to tell us your e-mail address?

Madonna: Wanna have a bomb delivered to your house?

Jesse Kornbluth: Amazingly enough, we're outta time. I'm going home.

Madonna: I'm going to eat French fries.

Jesse Kornbluth: And we are so pleased and amused you dropped by.

Madonna: Thanks for having me!

Jesse Kornbluth: Any old time.

Madonna: LOL.