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The Hut Where the Internet Began
From ACM Opinion

The Hut Where the Internet Began

Let's start at the end point: what you're doing right now. You are pulling information from a network onto a screen, enhancing your embodied experience with a communication...

Apple's Power Over Design, in 4 Words
From ACM Opinion

Apple's Power Over Design, in 4 Words

"Apple just permeates everything."

What the Digital Brains of the Future Might Be Like
From ACM Opinion

What the Digital Brains of the Future Might Be Like

It is the rare entrepreneur who hits it truly big twice. Those who do—such as Ev Williams, Ted Turner, and Elon Musk—tend to stay within the original industry that...

Governments Won't Need to Issue Ids: Data Brokers Will Identify You For Them
From ACM Opinion

Governments Won't Need to Issue Ids: Data Brokers Will Identify You For Them

Our government collects a lot of information about us. Tax records, legal records, license records, records of government services received—it's all in databases...

Time and Navigation: How We Found Our Way in the World
From ACM Opinion

Time and Navigation: How We Found Our Way in the World

Type an address into your phone, and up will pop a step-by-step route from where you are to where you want to be. This is, in its way, magic—magic that has, at...

The Touch-Screen Generation
From ACM Opinion

The Touch-Screen Generation

On a chilly day last spring, a few dozen developers of children’s apps for phones and tablets gathered at an old beach resort in Monterey, California, to show off...

The Best Books About Biotechnology
From ACM Opinion

The Best Books About Biotechnology

I've spent the last few weeks creating a syllabus for myself on the world—people, techniques, theory, history—of biotechnology. I've talked with some scholars,...

The Definitive Story of Steve Wozniak, Steve Jobs, and Phone Phreaking
From ACM Opinion

The Definitive Story of Steve Wozniak, Steve Jobs, and Phone Phreaking

Like the flap of a butterfly's wings causing a hurricane half a world away, the ripples of unintended consequences from Ron Rosenbaum's "Secrets of the Little Blue...

Why Google Maps Is Better Than Apple Maps
From ACM Opinion

Why Google Maps Is Better Than Apple Maps

There's a simple answer: people.

In China, 25 Million People ­se Only Their Cell Phones to Read Books
From ACM Opinion

In China, 25 Million People ­se Only Their Cell Phones to Read Books

On vacation in China earlier this month, I stopped by Shanghai's seven-story downtown "Book City," bustling with activity on a weekday afternoon that, as a publisher...

The Giant ­nderground Machinery That Runs San Francisco's Famous Cable Cars
From ACM Opinion

The Giant ­nderground Machinery That Runs San Francisco's Famous Cable Cars

Every day and night, beneath the streets of San Francisco, huge wheels turn, pulling cable cars to their far-flung destinations and back again, as if weaving them...

The Greatest Bond Villain of All: Technology
From ACM Opinion

The Greatest Bond Villain of All: Technology

Tech has always played a prominent role in the Bond franchise; it's a key element of the plot formula: Bond opens with a chase scene, the core mission is revealed...

The Consequences of Machine Intelligence
From ACM Opinion

The Consequences of Machine Intelligence

The question of what happens when machines get to be as intelligent as and even more intelligent than people seems to occupy many science-fiction writers.

Iphone 5? Yawn. What Will the 'phone' of 2022 Look Like?
From ACM Opinion

Iphone 5? Yawn. What Will the 'phone' of 2022 Look Like?

The near-term future of phones is fairly well-established. The iPhone 5 was released Wednesday and its similarity to every Apple phone since 2007 serves as a reminder...

E-Reading: A Midterm Progress Report
From ACM Opinion

E-Reading: A Midterm Progress Report

E-readers have been around long enough now that the novelty has largely worn off.

Why There Are Too Many Patents in America
From ACM Opinion

Why There Are Too Many Patents in America

Recently, while sitting as a trial judge, I dismissed a case in which Apple and Motorola had sued each other for alleged infringement of patents for components...

Is It Possible to Wage a Just Cyberwar?
From ACM Opinion

Is It Possible to Wage a Just Cyberwar?

In the last week or so, cyberwarfare has made front-page news: the United States may have been behind the Stuxnet cyberattack on Iran; Iran may have suffered another...

The Remote Control as Subversive Technology
From ACM Opinion

The Remote Control as Subversive Technology

Television began as a box.

How Does Siri Knockoff Evi Compare to the Iphone's Original Digital Assistant?
From ACM Opinion

How Does Siri Knockoff Evi Compare to the Iphone's Original Digital Assistant?

Evi, the Siri knockoff that got attention last week for looking too much like Siri, has beendownloaded over 200,000 times, leading us to believe that this one might...

The Campaign to Terrify You About Emp
From ACM Opinion

The Campaign to Terrify You About Emp

From Newt Gingrich to a Congressional "EMP Caucus," some conservatives warn the electronics-frying blast could pose gravely underestimated dangers to the U.S.
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