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Karen, an App That Knows You All Too Well
From ACM Opinion

Karen, an App That Knows You All Too Well

Thinking about a life coach but not ready to commit to the real thing?

The Math of March Madness
From ACM Opinion

The Math of March Madness

The N.C.A.A. men's basketball tournament started Thursday, but for most Americans the real action began days before, as they pored over brackets, competing to make...

If an Algorithm Wrote This, How Would You Even Know?
From ACM Opinion

If an Algorithm Wrote This, How Would You Even Know?

Let me hazard a guess that you think a real person has written what you're reading. Maybe you're right. Maybe not.

Outing A.I.: Beyond the Turing Test
From ACM Opinion

Outing A.I.: Beyond the Turing Test

Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) is having a moment, albeit one marked by crucial ambiguities.

The Reality of Quantum Weirdness
From ACM Opinion

The Reality of Quantum Weirdness

In Akira Kurosawa's film "Rashomon," a samurai has been murdered, but it's not clear why or by whom.

Google, Mighty Now, but Not Forever
From ACM Opinion

Google, Mighty Now, but Not Forever

Technology giants often meet their end not with a bang but a whimper, a slow, imperceptible descent into irrelevancy that may not immediately be reflected in the...

A Retreat For Google Glass and a Case Study in the Perils of Making Hardware
From ACM Opinion

A Retreat For Google Glass and a Case Study in the Perils of Making Hardware

You won't have Glass to kick around anymore. At least not for a while.

Death By Robot
From ACM Opinion

Death By Robot

Imagine it's a Sunday in the not-too-distant future.

Looking to Mars to Help Understand Changing Climates
From ACM Opinion

Looking to Mars to Help Understand Changing Climates

Where now it stands the Plain of Gold did once my river flow.

Turing's Spirit Hovers at a Restored Estate
From ACM Opinion

Turing's Spirit Hovers at a Restored Estate

When "Captain Ridley's shooting party" gathered here in late August 1938 as weekend guests at Bletchley Park, a Buckinghamshire country house, they were accompanied...

Artificial Intelligence as a Threat
From ACM Opinion

Artificial Intelligence as a Threat

Ebola sounds like the stuff of nightmares. Bird flu and SARS also send shivers down my spine.

When Iphones Ring, the Economy Listens
From ACM Opinion

When Iphones Ring, the Economy Listens

Gloomy economic news and the wild swings of the stock market may be getting you down. But at least you can count on this: We’ve entered the sweet spot of the ...

To Siri, With Love
From ACM Opinion

To Siri, With Love

Just how bad a mother am I? I wondered, as I watched my 13-year-old son deep in conversation with Siri.

Why Germans Are Afraid of Google
From ACM Opinion

Why Germans Are Afraid of Google

These days Germany is known for being many things: a leader in clean technology, a manufacturing powerhouse, Europe's foreign policy center.

Why Is Our Sci-Fi So Glum About A.i.?
From ACM Opinion

Why Is Our Sci-Fi So Glum About A.i.?

When I was 12, I invented a superhero named Boy Genius, a guy my age who awakens one morning with access to 100 percent of his brain power.

A ­nified Theory
From ACM Opinion

A ­nified Theory

For the last half-century we've had a popular notion that our intellectual culture is sundered in two—the literary and the scientific.

Security Secrets, Dated but Real
From ACM Opinion

Security Secrets, Dated but Real

Was the National Cryptologic Museum designed using a code of some kind?

Every Little Byte Counts
From ACM Opinion

Every Little Byte Counts

In "On What We Can Not Do," a short and pungent essay published a few years ago, the Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben outlined two ways in which power operates...

The Cloud Industry Needs Aereo to Win. But Consumers Need Something Better.
From ACM Opinion

The Cloud Industry Needs Aereo to Win. But Consumers Need Something Better.

The best way to think about Aereo, the company at the center of this week's Supreme Court battle over the future of computing, is as an example of legal performance...

From ACM Opinion

Abstract Ideas Don't Deserve Patents

The Constitution gives Congress the power to grant inventors a temporary monopoly over their creations to "promote the progress of science and useful arts."
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