Communications of the ACM
The blog archive provides access to past blog postings from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
November 2014
From The Eponymous Pickle
Viable Synergy
Brought to my attention via Founder and CEO: Sunnie Southern" .. Viable Synergy is a product and services innovation firm. We help individuals, organizations and communities turn ideas into viable products and services from concept…
From BLOG@CACM
Envisioning Your Ideal Live-In Robot at Miraikan
Miraikan in Tokyo showcases Japanese technologies and challenges visitors to think how humans can improve their quality of life while mitigating risks.
From Schneier on Security
FBI Agents Pose as Repairmen to Bypass Warrant Process
This is a creepy story. The FBI wanted access to a hotel guest's room without a warrant. So agents broke his Internet connection, and then posed as Internet technicians to gain access to his hotel room without a warrant. From…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Unexpected Delight in Service Design
Upcoming TalkThe OBAIS Department at the Lindner College of Business, University of Cincinnati, invites you to attend the following research seminar.DATE & TIME: Friday, December 5, 2014, 1:30 PM LOCATION: UC Carl H. Lindner…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Smart Door Lock
A capability always mentioned in our brainstorms for considering the Smart Home. The Smart Door Lock. The Verge looks at Smart Lock. Which includes one time use smartphone 'keys' to give to friends and family. Is this a place…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Wired on the Future of AI
The term Artificial Intelligence - AI is not used as much any more, probably to deal with controlling expectations. The considerable activity today tends to be very focused, which based on our own experience, is the best direction…
From The Eponymous Pickle
IOT and Disruptive Innovation
In the Cisco Blog: IOT in manufacturing innovation. We used early forms of IOT as key aspects of retail applications. Look forward to see the forthcoming survey mentioned below." .... Perhaps no other industry is being disrupted…
From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
Analysis of Current and Future Computer Science Needs via Advertised Faculty Searches
The following is a guest blog post from Craig E. Wills, Professor and Department Head of the Computer Science Department at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. The wealth of faculty searches in Computer Science during this hiring…
From Schneier on Security
Regin: Another Military-Grade Malware
Regin is another military-grade surveillance malware (tech details from Symantec and Kaspersky). It seems to have been in operation between 2008 and 2011. The Intercept has linked it to NSA/GCHQ operations, although I am still…
From Computer Science Teacher - Thoughts and Information From Alfred Thompson
CSTA Leadership Gets Busy for CS Ed Week!
Did you see this on the CSTA mailing list? When the CSTA Board met recently we started talking about sharing what we were doing in our schools for Computer Science Education week. It’s not all about the Hour of Code – cool as…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Google does Scene Analysis
In DigitalStrategy: Don't know where the IP rests today, but here is Google also doing scene analysis on images. Again I can see some interesting applications with Ad copy analysis, and real time interaction between displays…
From Schneier on Security
The Security Underpinnnings of Cryptography
Nice article on some of the security assumptions we rely on in cryptographic algorithms....
From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
National Robotics Initiative (NRI)
Last week the National Science Foundation (NSF), in partnership with the National Institutes of Health (NIH), U.S. Department of Agriculture and NASA announced $31.5 million in new awards to spur the development and use of robots…
From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
Live-streamed CCC BRAIN Workshop
Computer science and brain science share deep intellectual roots. Today, understanding the structure and function of the human brain is one of the greatest scientific challenges of our generation. Decades of study and continued…
From My Biased Coin
More Good News, Eddie Kohler Edition
Continuing the good news at Harvard, word has been given that Eddie Kohler has officially been offered tenure. So we hope/expect/are excited about keeping Eddie here for decades to come. Eddie's contributions to computer science…
From The Eponymous Pickle
CIO vs an IT Services Supermarket
Don Tapscott on the continued need for a CIO in industry. Interesting thoughts, but by the same reasoning why do we need any executive leaders? A CIO should be a leader, both for current needs, and for forecasting future information…
From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
Get Schooled on Science Policy: LiSPI Call for Nominations Now Open!
The following is a Computing Research Policy Blog post by Peter Harsha, CRA Director of Government Affairs. As part of its mission to develop a next generation of leaders in the computing research community, the Computing Research…
From The Eponymous Pickle
How Does Word of Mouth Drive Sales?
In Retailwire: A favorite concept that we modeled in depth a number of times. It also merits further direct lab and online testing. Still believe there are opportunities to understand the network interactions of WOM better.…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Print Thyself
In the New Yorker. How 3D Printing is revolutionizing medicine. Good non-technical article on the topic. Possibilities and limitations. Via Walter Riker." ... For her part, Lewis is passionate about the changes that 3-D…
From Schneier on Security
New Kryptos Clue
Jim Sanborn has given he world another clue to the fourth cyphertext in his Kryptos sculpture at the CIA headquarters. Older posts on Kryptos....
From Computer Science Teacher - Thoughts and Information From Alfred Thompson
Interesting Links 24 November 2014
This will be a short week in school. Thanksgiving is Thursday in the US and my school is off for a five day weekend. I’m looking forward to a bit of a break. I think my students are more ready though. Well let’s share some links…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Fidelity Labs Develops StockCity
Have examined a number of methods that use realistic spaces to represent abstract data. Never found these methods that useful beyond attracting curiosity. Here another example by Fidelity. With the latest technology:" ... Fidelity…
From Computational Complexity
Guest Post about Barbie `I can be an engineer' -- Sounds good but its not.
There is now a I can be an engineer Barbie. That sounds good! It's not. Imagine how this could be turned around and made sexist. What you are imagining might not be as bad as the reality. Depends on your imagination. GuestII…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Foresight Institute's Feynman Prize
Nobel Prize winning Physicist Richard Feynman is known for having issued the challenge that has inspired nanotechnology research for years. See his talk: There is plenty of room at the bottom. Also known as a very enthusiastic…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Text Mining using R
In BiCorner: An introduction to text mining using R. Nicely done. Motivation for using text mining and some simple examples.
From The Eponymous Pickle
Stanford Building Stories from Pictures
This was a sub problem solution we needed for an expert system that worked with archives of advertising copy. Later I worked with a startup that aimed to classify photographs for their potential use in Ads. Good progress in…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Changes in Word Meanings as Context
A challenge for delivering intelligence as implemented in ontologies. Which we discovered quickly when implementing knowledge provided by advertising equities. Its all about the context, in time and space.
From The Eponymous Pickle
Big Data Delusions and Assumption Fever
I like push backs, especially on very complex, big investments. Be aware of the big assumptions that are included. Does not mean the concepts are not useful. The comments, some by practitioners, are worth reading. In IEEE…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Games are for Learning
On Games and learning. The idea has been around for a long time, but have seen relatively few really good examples of success. Our own successes stemmed from competitive solution exploration." ... When I entered the games for…
From The Eponymous Pickle
On What the Eye is Prepared to See
Was taken by this Smithsonian article on unexpected events on dunes in Michigan. " ... a quote from the French philosopher Henri Bergson: “The eye sees only what the mind is prepared to comprehend.” .. ". The article makes…