Communications of the ACM
Generative AI Degrades Online Communities
How large language models are influencing online communities.
From ACM Opinion
The Darkening Web: Misinformation Is the Strongest Cyberweapon
In late June, I was leaving for a flight from Kiev's Boryspil Airport as news broke that Ukraine was the victim of another massive cyberattack.
From ACM Opinion
What James Damore Got Wrong About Gender Bias in Computer Science
In August Google employee James Damore made the news and even Wikipedia by publishing his speculation that female software engineers are underrepresented due to...
From ACM Opinion
Artificial Intelligence: The Future Is Superintelligent
Max Tegmark is a renowned physicist. He is also the irrepressibly optimistic co-founder of the Future of Life Institute in Cambridge, Massachusetts (motto: "Technology...
From ACM Opinion
How We Won Gold in the Cyborg Olympics' Brain Race
In October 2016, inside a sold-out arena in Zurich, a man named Numa Poujouly steered his wheelchair up to the central podium.
From ACM Opinion
The Future of Computing Depends on Making It Reversible
For more than 50 years, computers have made steady and dramatic improvements, all thanks to Moore's Law—the exponential increase over time in the number of transistors...
From ACM Opinion
What I Learned at Gerrymandering Summer Camp
At 6'5", Aaron Dennis towers over the whiteboard beside him.
From ACM Opinion
The Myth of the Skills Gap
The contention that America's workers lack the skills employers demand is an article of faith among analysts, politicians, and pundits of every stripe, from conservative...
From ACM Opinion
How the Voyager Golden Record Was Made
We inhabit a small planet orbiting a medium-sized star about two-thirds of the way out from the center of the Milky Way galaxy—around where Track 2 on an LP record...
From ACM Opinion
How Quantum Mechanics Can Change computing
In early July, Google announced that it will expand its commercially available cloud computing services to include quantum computing.
From Communications of the ACM
Multitasking Without Thrashing
Lessons from operating systems teach how to do multitasking without thrashing.
From Communications of the ACM
Why Agile Teams Fail Without UX Research
Failures to involve end users or to collect comprehensive data representing user needs are described and solutions to avoid such failures are proposed.
From ACM Opinion
A Hunt For Ways to Combat Online Radicalization
Law enforcement officials, technology companies and lawmakers have long tried to limit what they call the "radicalization" of young people over the internet.
From ACM Opinion
Sorry, Banning 'killer Robots' Just Isn't Practical
Late Sunday, 116 entrepreneurs, including Elon Musk, released a letter to the United Nations warning of the dangerous "Pandora's Box" presented by weapons that...
From ACM Opinion
The Enduring Legacy of Zork
In 1977, four recent MIT graduates who'd met at MIT's Laboratory for Computer Science used the lab's PDP-10 mainframe to develop a computer game that captivated...
From ACM Opinion
Fighting Neo-Nazis and the Future of Free Expression
In the wake of Charlottesville, both GoDaddy and Google have refused to manage the domain registration for the Daily Stormer, a neo-Nazi website that, in the...
From ACM Opinion
Everyone Thinks That Automation Will Take Our Jobs. The Evidence Disagrees
Last year, the Japanese company SoftBank opened a cell phone store in Tokyo and staffed it entirely with sales associates named Pepper. This wasn't as hard as it...
From ACM Opinion
Magical Technologies Just Over the Horizon
We the people have always been helplessly drawn to the concept of magic: the notion that you can will something to happen by wiggling your nose, speaking special...
From ACM Opinion
Why Video Games Are Obsessed With the Apocalypse
Video games are, in a way, the perfect medium through which to depict the post-apocalypse. If we assume that after the collapse of civilisation everyone will revert...
From ACM Opinion