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Why China's Homemade Microchips Will Struggle to Displace Western Giants
From ACM Opinion

Why China's Homemade Microchips Will Struggle to Displace Western Giants

If China's ultimate aim in the sphere of technology is to become completely self-sufficient, it is well on the way to achieving this ambitious goal.

From ACM Opinion

Sneaky Apps That Track Cellphones

A perversion of smartphone technology called "stalking apps"—precise, secretive trackings of the movements of cellphone users—is increasingly a matter of national...

How Technology Has Restored the Soul of Politics
From ACM Opinion

How Technology Has Restored the Soul of Politics

In 1979, I was an aeronautical-engineering major at San Jose State University, sneaking time in the laser lab to make holograms or running over to the computer...

Forget Yolo: Why 'big Data' Should Be the Word of the Year
From ACM Opinion

Forget Yolo: Why 'big Data' Should Be the Word of the Year

"Big Data" hasn't made any of the words-of-the-year lists I've seen so far. That's probably because it didn't get the wide public exposure given to items like "...

Conference-Journal Hybrids
From Communications of the ACM

Conference-Journal Hybrids

Considering how to combine the best elements of conferences and journals.

What College Could Be Like
From Communications of the ACM

What College Could Be Like

Imagining an optimized education model.

Five Lessons from Really Good History
From Communications of the ACM

Five Lessons from Really Good History

Lessons learned from four award-winning books on the history of information technology.

Beyond Location
From Communications of the ACM

Beyond Location: Data Security in the 21st Century

Viewing evolving data security issues as engineering problems to be solved.

How We Build Things
From Communications of the ACM

How We Build Things: . . . and Why Things Are 90% Complete

It seems to be a law of software development that things always take longer than we expect. When a project manager talks to a designer, programmer, or tester...

The Apple-Samsung Lawsuits
From Communications of the ACM

The Apple-Samsung Lawsuits

In search of a middle ground in the intellectual property wars.

How Hackers Exploit 'the Seven Deadly Sins'
From ACM Opinion

How Hackers Exploit 'the Seven Deadly Sins'

This isn't the high tech wizardry of Hollywood but is a good, old-fashioned confidence trick.

Intellectual Ventures: Why the Patent System Needs Aggregators Like ­S
From ACM Opinion

Intellectual Ventures: Why the Patent System Needs Aggregators Like ­S

The U.S. patent system borrowed from mainland Europe a concept that had evolved over hundreds of years: the "moral right" for inventors to protect their ideas....

A Plea to Google: Protect Our Email Privacy
From ACM Opinion

A Plea to Google: Protect Our Email Privacy

We recently learned that even the director of the CIA, David Petraeus, can't seem to secure his private email conversations properly, and over the past month tech...

From ACM Opinion

Internet Regulation Seen at National Level As Treaty Talks Fail

The world's major Internet companies, backed by U.S. policymakers, got much of what they wanted last week when many nations refused to sign a global telecommunications...

Red Pill, Blue Pill: Is the ­niverse Just a Giant Computer Simulation?
From ACM Opinion

Red Pill, Blue Pill: Is the ­niverse Just a Giant Computer Simulation?

I've started making my way (skeptically) through Ray Kurzweil’s How to Create a Mind, and at the recommendation of a friend, I've also started keeping tabs on ...

Opening the Doors to the Life of Pi
From ACM Opinion

Opening the Doors to the Life of Pi

For those of us who have been intoxicated by the powers and possibilities of mathematics, the mystery isn't why that fascination developed but why it isn't universal...

How the ­n's 'game-Changing' Internet Treaty Failed
From ACM Opinion

How the ­n's 'game-Changing' Internet Treaty Failed

Did you know that, for the past two weeks, the future of the Internet has been at stake?

From ACM Opinion

I Am Not Big Brother

I've grown accustomed to reading inaccurate accounts of my day job. I'm in political data.

From ACM Opinion

Zeitgeist 2012: What Piqued Your Curiosity This Year?

As 2012 comes to a close, it's time for our 12th annual Year-End Zeitgeist—an in-depth look at the "spirit of the times" as seen through the billions of searches...

Workplace Distractions: Here's Why You Won't Finish This Article
From ACM Opinion

Workplace Distractions: Here's Why You Won't Finish This Article

In the few minutes it takes to read this article, chances are you'll pause to check your phone, answer a text, switch to your desktop to read an email from the...
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