Communications of the ACM
Generative AI Degrades Online Communities
How large language models are influencing online communities.
From ACM Opinion
The Cyborg Insects Are Coming!
Telepathic helmets. Grid-computing swarms of cyborg insects, some for surveillance, some with lethal stingers. New cognitive-enhancement drugs. (What? AdderallProvigil...
From ACM Opinion
Web Browsers Leave 'fingerprints' Behind as You Surf the Net
New research by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has found that an overwhelming majority of web browsers have unique signatures--creating identifiable "fingerprints"...
From ACM Opinion
Why Publishers Should Beware the App Store
In a brilliant column published 16 years ago, the Italian philosopher Umberto Eco explained the difference between Apple and Microsoft in terms of the divide between...
From ACM Opinion
Immigration and Ids: A Modest Proposal
All Americans--whether brown, white, or black--should be required to carry a passport showing they are red, white, and blue.
From ACM TechNews
Html: Still Not All It's Cracked p to Be
The headaches of Web application development are being compounded by the ever-proliferating morass of Web standards, frameworks, and tools.
From ACM Opinion
10 Reasons Why Android Will Dominate the Mobile Market
Google's Android mobile operating system platform has outsold the iPhone in the first quarter of 2010 according to The NPD Group, a consumer market research and...
From ACM Opinion
Sociologists Invade World of Warcraft, See Humanity's Future
In their continued quest to plumb the mysterious depths of human interactions, some sociologists have stopped watching people—and started watching their avatars...
From ACM Opinion
Just How Fragile Is the Internet?
In 1998, a hacker told Congress that he could bring down the Internet in 30 minutes by exploiting a certain flaw that sometimes caused online outages. In 2003...
From ACM Opinion
Apple: The Microsoft of Mobile?
Apple could soon be the target of an antitrust investigation by either the Federal Trade Commission or the Department of Justice, according to numerous press reports...
From ACM Opinion
Interview With Dr. Bruno Bachimont
Bruno Bachimont, scientific advisor of the Department of Research and Innovation at France's Institut National de l'Audiovisuel, discusses the constructive mix...
From ACM Opinion
Rest in Peas: The nrecognized Death of Speech Recognition
The accuracy of computer speech recognition flat-lined in 2001, before reaching human levels. The funding plug was pulled, but no funeral, no text-to-speech eulogy...
From ACM Opinion
The Disruptive Future of Printing
Imagine a school where a student could sketch out an idea for a new design of bicycle and not only draw it in 3D using a computer-aided design package but actually...
From ACM Opinion
Facebook's 'evil Interfaces'
Social networking companies don't have it easy. Advertisers covet their users' data, and in a niche that often seems to lack a clear business model, selling (or...
From ACM Opinion
Google's Nightmare: Facebook 'like' Replaces Links
Facebook dropped a bombshell on the tech industry last week in the form of a Web-wide "Like" button and the launch of the "Open Graph". Using this new platform,...
From ACM Opinion
Steve Jobs' Thoughts on Flash
Apple has a long relationship with Adobe. In fact, we met Adobe’s founders when they were in their proverbial garage. Apple was their first big customer, adopting...
From ACM TechNews
Info Systems Must 'connect the Dots' on Terrorism
Additional personnel alone cannot address the lapses in the U.S. intelligence community, which also needs state-of-the-art information technologies that enhance...
From ACM Opinion
Why We Should Learn the Language of Data
"How can global warming be real when there’s so much snow?" Hearing that question—repeatedly—this past February drove Joseph Romm nuts. A massive snowstorm had...
From ACM Opinion
Today Facebook, Tomorrow the World
With a dizzying array of announcements this week, it seems almost inevitable that the web will become, at least for the near future, an extension of Facebook. Like...
From ACM Opinion
App Rejected? There's a Rule For That.
The story could have been programmed to draw media coverage, were it not for its implausibility: Apple (a reader magnet) banned a future Pulitzer Prize winner's...
From ACM Opinion