All participants were informed that they were taking part in a study on virtual organisations and would be interacting with, but not meeting, a fellow student who worked in the same fictional consulting firm.

ECONOMIST: But power without status corrupts absolutely

Unlike neatly defined science problems, which amaze more by their petabyte scale than their inherent complexity, virtual organisations are noteworthy because of their constantly shifting landscape of data and computer resources, and the authentication on which they rely.

ECONOMIST: REPORT: COMPUTER NETWORKS: Computing power on tap | The