Communications of the ACM
The news archive provides access to past news stories from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
March 2023
From ACM News
Publishers Worry A.I. Chatbots Will Cut Readership
Many sites get at least half their traffic from search engines. Fuller results generated by new chatbots could mean far fewer visitors.
From ACM News
ChatGPT Opened a New Era in Search. Microsoft Could Ruin It
Startups say Microsoft and its Bing chatbot—not just Google—are stifling competition when it comes to creating better search engines.
From ACM News
The Technion Mourns the Passing of Distinguished Professor Jacob Ziv
In addition to his scientific achievements, Ziv will be remembered for his kindness, generosity, and dedication to the next generation of scientists.
From ACM TechNews
Forestry VR Project to Give Plantations Better Information About Quality, Progress
Scientists at the University of South Australia are creating virtual reality maps of forest plantations to advance forestry management.
From ACM TechNews
Supersized Atoms Could Help Quantum Computers Link to Optical Fibers
Researchers developed a device that could enable multiple quantum computers to be networked together by converting quantum outputs into light signals that can travel through optical fibers.
From ACM TechNews
Conservatives Aim to Build Their Own Chatbot
Chatbots have become a new political weapon, with conservatives aiming to design bots reflecting their values amid accusations that artificial intelligence companies instill liberal bias in their programs.
From ACM TechNews
Eye Tracking During Building Inspections Provides Insight on How Experts Think
Researchers used eye-tracking software to analyze building inspectors' gaze patterns to gain insights into safety assessment behaviors.
From ACM News
Will AI Replace Computer Programmers?
Advances in artificial intelligence tools that can code could improve productivity, but portend disruption.
From ACM News
Meet The Band's New Drummer: Keirzo the Robot
Keirzo has absorbed recordings of a range of different drummers, and is practicing and merging various techniques to develop its own playing style.
From ACM News
Elon Musk and Others Call for Pause on A.I., Citing 'Profound Risks to Society'
More than 1,000 tech leaders, researchers, and others signed an open letter urging a moratorium on the development of the most powerful artificial intelligence systems.
From ACM TechNews
School District Offers Blueprint for Increasing CS Student Numbers
New York's Mineola school district has boosted the numbers of its students taking computer science by infusing the subject into curricula as early as pre-kindergarten.
From ACM TechNews
Pwn2Own Hackers Breach a Tesla Twice
Participants of the Pwn2Own software exploitation conference hacked technology from automaker Tesla twice at the Zero Day Initiative's Pwn2Own software exploitation conference.
From ACM TechNews
Venus Flytrap Cyborg Snaps Shut with Smartphone Commands
Wenlong Li and colleagues at Singapore's Nanyang Technological University have transformed Venus flytraps into biological robots.
From ACM News
Disney Scraps Metaverse Division As Virtual Worlds Become Yesterday's Tech Fad
History is littered with predictions about virtual reality worlds that were going to change everything.
From ACM News
More Details, but Not Enough
Disputed Google research is receiving further scrutiny, despite the company's inaction in open-sourcing its data or source code as promised.
From ACM News
As Part of Ongoing Effort to Beef Up Cybersecurity, Biden Turns Gaze to Commercial Spyware
The Biden administration says commercial spyware has proliferated in recent years with few controls and a high risk of abuse.
From ACM News
For Chip Makers, a Choice Between the U.S. and China Looms
Washington seeks to steer the semiconductor supply chain using 'guardrails' under the Chips Act.
From ACM News
Publishers Prepare for Showdown With Microsoft, Google Over AI Tools
Media executives want compensation for use of their content in ChatGPT, Bing and Bard.
From ACM News
At least 50 U.S. Government Employees Targeted with Phone Spyware Overseas
White House bans federal agencies from using spyware that poses national security and human rights risks in the U.S.
From ACM News
Lack of Computer Science Teachers Holding Irish Students Back, says Report
New research has found that as of August 2022, there were only 34 accredited computer science teachers in Ireland.
From ACM TechNews
Utah Law Could Curb Use of TikTok, Instagram by Children, Teens
Utah's Governor Spencer J. Cox signed a social media bill that could restrict access to applications like TikTok and Instagram by children and adolescents.
From ACM TechNews
GitHub Launches GPT-4-Powered Copilot Coding Assistant
Software developer hosting service GitHub launched a new version of its Copilot coding assistant powered by the Generative Pre-trained Transformer 4 (GPT-4) multimodal large language model.
From ACM TechNews
Robot Caterpillar Demonstrates Locomotion Approach for Soft Robotics
North Carolina State University researchers have created a caterpillar-like soft robot that can locomote forward, backward, and duck under cramped areas.
From ACM News
Humans (Mostly) Love Trash Robots
Simple robots wander NYC asking for trash and recycling, and it's adorable.
From ACM News
Can a Machine Know That We Know What It Knows?
Machine learning researchers have struggled over the past couple of decades to capture the flexibility of human knowledge in computer models.
From ACM News
The Quest for Environmentally Sustainable Materials
Machine Learning increasingly is being used to aid material discovery, since it can drastically speed up the process
From ACM News
What If We Could Just Ask AI to be Less Biased?
Plus: ChatGPT is about to revolutionize the economy. We need to decide what that looks like.
From ACM News
Amazon To Go Head to Head with SpaceX in a Battle for Satellite Internet Dominance
In its bid to catch up with Starlink, the company plans to build as many as four satellites a day.
From ACM News
'X-Ray Vision' Could Be the Next Superpower You Get With Augmented Reality
With Microsoft's HoloLens and a special application developed by MIT researchers, AR can be used to find hidden objects.
From ACM News
VR Is Revolutionizing Therapy. Why Aren't More People Using It?
VR therapy has been studied since the 1990s. But as of 2023, we're still talking about its potential.