Who owns your computer? [digital rights management]

Sony's much-debated choice to use rootkit-like technology to protect intellectual property highlights the increasingly blurry line between who can, should, or does control interactions among computational devices, algorithms embodied in software, and data upon which they act. With respect to policy and defense, two key questions emerge: When systems or computational elements are combined, whose policy and expectation dominates? What sorts of defenses are appropriate, and in which situations? The challenge to educators is to provide the experiences, and seek the understanding, that let others make better choices when such conflicts arise in the future