Just to get some writing down.

I find it very interesting that SCA guy chose that computer because it wasn't locked down. It required a combination of his being inquisitive, and of there being gaps in the system due to my own sloppiness. There is always a tension between the administrator's desire for a perfectly controlled space and the instructor's need for a flexible environment that doesn't punish mistakes and allows modifications such as the installation of software or the configuration of programs. Aaron used the space to download music, often the first thing that students do when they find the gates unlocked. They rush to mediums that may or may not be textually-based. It is true that email is popular, but so is music acquisition and the endless acquisition and deployment of graphics. I have often decried the "commercialization" of the net, in part because it is unfortunate that digital music and film, the twin towers of the entertainment complex, are the only channels through which networked identity can flow. Yet music has been a large part of adolescent identity prior to the birth of the internet, and film as well. It is just that they lend themselves more easily to digitalization than other artifacts of adolescence such as cars. Women, of course, are often reduced to pornography (Fark.com).

I'm not just going to take you on a tour of this classroom, but of the matrix that they dip into, because on many different levels they are inseparable.