Communications of the ACM
The blog archive provides access to past blog postings from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
April 2011
From The Female Perspective of Computer Science
Making 'Introduction to Computers for Arts and Social Sciences' Even More Awesome
I'm getting ready to teach our introductory computer course for arts and social science majors again this summer. If you read my blog around this time last year, you already know that this course used to focus mostly on software…
From The Eponymous Pickle
PayPal Ties EWallets
The method uses text messages to transfer payments. The article goes on to provide a good overview of the current market, tests underway, and the belief by many that NFC will emerge as the standard for contactless payment via…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Decline of Manufacturing
MJ Perry on a global trend of a decline in manufacturing. Though with population increasing don't we still need to have more things to be manufactured? Very interesting statistics.
From The Eponymous Pickle
Examining A Measure of Social Connectivity
In Roughtype: A look at a study that generates a measure called NFC, or 'need for cognition', which is ' ... "a recognized indicator for deep or shallow thinking." People who like to challenge their minds have high NFC, while…
From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
CNBC.com
Yesterday, CNBC.com published a slideshow of 10 products and companies that have changed the world. Calling them “game-changing disruptions,” CNBC.com reported: It takes a lot to shift the course of an industry. For every truly…
From Computer Science Teachers Association
Please Vote
The CSTA Board of Directors are elected for two year terms. And, as opposed to many corporate Boards of Directors, where the vote of the individual shareholder doesn't really matter, your vote does count.
By now, all members…From The Eponymous Pickle
IBM and Yale Team Up to Teach Analytics
Business intelligence professionals are needed and companies and schools are seeking to provide the analytics training. Includes a video.
From Schneier on Security
Friday Squid Blogging: Giant Squid Eye Preserved in a Jar
Great picture from the Smithsonian Institution.
From Schneier on Security
TED Talk
This is a surprise. My TED talk made it to the website. It's a surprise because I didn't speak at TED. I spoke last year at a regional TED event, TEDxPSU. And not all talks from the regional events get on the main site, only…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Augmented Reality in the Workplace
In ReadwriteWeb: Some thoughts about the value of using AR in the workplace. I agree, there is more opportunity there, since at least currently, there tends to be more standardization in a work environment, and more leverage…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Visualize This
FlowingData previews the book: Visualize This. " ... The FlowingData Guide to Design, Visualization, and Statistics A book by Nathan Yau who writes for FlowingData, Visualize This is a practical guide on visualization andpre…
From The Eponymous Pickle
How to Build Confidence
In the HBR Blog: How to Build Confidence. " ... Very few people succeed in business without a degree of confidence. Yet everyone, from young people in their first real jobs to seasoned leaders in the upper ranks of organizations…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Open Data, Predictive Analytics and Visualization
Good piece. Getting all the proper pieces together, making it easy to do, and then being able to interact with multiple sources, kinds and aggregations of data can be a game changer.
From The Computing Community Consortium Blog
NIH, NSF Announce Call for mHealth White Papers
The NSF, NIH, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and McKesson Foundation announced this week a call for white papers on innovative methods to accelerate the evaluation of the efficacy and safety of mobile health technologies — in…
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Is science more art or industry?
In my previous post, I argued that people who pursue double-blind peer review have an idealized “LEGO block” view of scientific research. Research papers are “pure” units of knowledge and who wrote them is irrelevant. Let us…
From Putting People First
Mobile trends in Africa: a collaborative outlook towards 2020
A few months back Rudy de Waele (m-trends) got in touch with Ken Banks (kiwanja | FrontlineSMS) and Eric Hersman (WhiteAfrican) about helping to curate a collaborative outlook on the mobile industry in Africa, called
From Putting People First
Book: Simple And Usable
Simple And Usable: Web, Mobile and Interaction Design by Giles Colborne New Riders, Sep 2010 Paperback, 208 pages In a complex world, products that are easy to use win favor with consumers. This is the first book on the topic…
From Computer Science Teacher - Thoughts and Information From Alfred Thompson
Academic Feedback Survey
If you are a computer science or information technology professor/instructor/teacher would you help us out as we make plans for how Microsoft can support you in the coming year. Please take 2-3 minutes to help the Microsoft Academic…
From Apophenia
A Customer Service Nightmare: Resolving Trademark and Personal Reputation in a Limited Name Space
Yesterday, I threw a public hissy fit when I found out that Tumblr’s customer service had acted on a trademark request from a company called Zephoria who had written them to ask that they release my account to them. (Tumblr…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Gamifying Mundane and Innovative Processes
Lauren Carlson contacted me a few days ago to point out some posts in her Software Advice blog. She originally posted a very good introductory note about the idea of Gamification for sales force automation. In particular looking…
From Computer Science Teachers Association
Equity
There has been an increased emphasis on equity issues in computer science education in recent years, supported largely by NSF programs aimed at broadening participation in computing. Yet, I have found that when folks talk about…
From U.S. Public Policy Committee of the ACM
Policy Highlights from Communications of the ACM - February 2011 (Vol. 54, No. 2)
Below is a list of items with policy relevance from the February issue of Communications of the ACM. As always, much of the material in CACM is premium content, and free content one month may slip behind a pay wall the next.…
From Computational Complexity
How important is Teaching Experience on the job market (guest post)
( Annoucements: New York Theory day May 13 and UMCP Theory Postdoc opening. )
This is an anon guest blogger. Even we don't know who this is! He or she emailed us about the topic and we invited him or her to do a guest blog…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Flypaper
Just exploring Flypaper: " .... Software anyone can use to create professional quality multi-touch, interactive or motion graphics content in one-sixth the time and expense ... ". Looks to be very good and easy to use so far…
From The Female Perspective of Computer Science
Examples of Games that Teach CS Concepts and Programming
In my previous post I introduced the fact that there weren't very many educational games that specifically aim to teach computer science concepts. Here I'll share my list so far, and see if you can add any new examples.Video…
From The Eponymous Pickle
Payday Timing
Roger Dooley posts: Walmart CEO confirms Payday Timing Effect. Was thought to be common knowledge, but had never seen a specific 'proof' of the effect. Though this is a simple case, is an example of how an analytically armed…
From The Eponymous Pickle
EmPower Background
Recently I had a meeting with EmPower, custom market and media intelligence services company. Here is an overview of their background and services.
From The Eponymous Pickle
Kevin Emmons EKR Blog
Newly discovered blog by Kevin Emmons that covers, among other things, neuromarketing. Most recently: Android Phones Using Neuromarketing, where he talks about the strategies in the Droid and IPhone marketing campaigns.
From Computer Science Teacher - Thoughts and Information From Alfred Thompson
Where Do Female Computer Scientists Come From
As someone who is mildly addicted to statistics and who has a degree in Sociology (really) I found this article in Fast Company very interesting on several levels. LinkedIn Wants To Help You Name Your New Baby/CEO It reports…
From Wild WebMink
? Abuses
Barnes & Noble Charges Microsoft with Misusing Patents to Further an Anticompetitive Scheme Against Android Barnes and Noble’s strongly-worded response to Microsoft’s patent suit makes great reading, albeit rather depressing.…