I would actually argue the opposite: piracy exists because of DRM.

They already record all that, so where's the downside?

But according to the article, these would be privately-owned laptops. Meaning that the IT staff at the school couldn't reasonably expect to SSH and stop unauthorized use, since they would have no reasonable expectation of knowing the laptop's su password. I know if my child's school required this, I would make damn sure that I locked it down to where the school couldn't do anything on it. The loaners are a different story, but then they should be locked down anyway to prevent abuse.

It can't have been simple anchor drag...I need my daily conspiracy fix, damn it!

So why can't an interested company with $4 billion a year in profits invest 1/4 of a year's profits to this consortium rather than begging the Government for help? Seems to me that if they are truly interested in innovation, they can take some of the risk as well.