Communications of the ACM
Innovation Is Overrated: A Provocation
Digital innovation is not working in the interest of the whole of society. It is time to radically rethink its purpose without…
From ACM Opinion
Facebook's Top AI Scientist Says It's 'Dust' Without Artificial Intelligence
Without artificial intelligence there wouldn't be much left of Facebook as we know it today.
From ACM News
Nasa's Bold Bet on Juno Will Pay Off. Stay Tuned.
Memory-foam mattresses. The breathing devices firefighters wear. And infrared ear thermometers that give near-instant readings.
From ACM Opinion
A Computer Takes On a Human Master of the Board Game Go
In 1997, IBM's Deep Blue computer defeated the world chess champion Garry Kasparov. It was a momentous occasion for artificial intelligence, showing how far a clever...
From ACM Opinion
Graphene: 'miracle Material' Will Be in Your Home Sooner Than You Think
Just under 10 years ago, the Dutch-British physicist Andre Geim stumbled across a substance that would revolutionize the way we understand matter and win him and...
From ACM Opinion
If 'e.t.' Finds Voyager 1, Will It Phone Earth?
In 1519, Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan launched the expedition that completed the first circumnavigation of the globe. And so humanity learned the full...
From ACM Opinion
Why Fbi and CIA Didn't Connect the Dots
The FBI and the CIA are being criticized for not keeping better track of Tamerlan Tsarnaev in the months before the Boston Marathon bombings.
From ACM Opinion
Digital Tattoos, Mind-Reading Headphones: The Shape of Things to Come?
Forecasting future technology has never been easy. In the 1950s, scientists and technologists envisaged that by now the world would be free from disease, traversed...
From ACM Opinion
Graphene: The Nano-Size Material with a Massive Future
Ever since it was discovered in 2004, graphene has been hailed as a natural wonder of the materials world destined to transform our lives in the 21st century.
From ACM Opinion
Nate Silver: What Big Data Can't Predict
Statistician Nate Silver isn't famous because he's a mathematical genius. (Although, he is.)
From ACM Opinion
17 of Apple's Favorite Apps
Steve Jobs was a stickler for detail, requiring final approval on everything from ads to wording on his Keynote presentations. It's no surprise then that the company...
From ACM News
How Secure Is the Papal Election?
As the College of Cardinals prepares to elect a new pope, security people like me wonder about the process. How does it work, and just how hard would it be to hack...
From ACM Opinion
How Samsung Is Out-Innovating Apple
There's no arguing that Apple set the standard for modern mobile devices with the iPhone and the iPad. It didn't take long after those two products launched for...
From ACM Opinion
Make Guns Smart
Voices across the political spectrum are debating how to prevent mass shootings such as the one in Newtown, Connecticut.
From ACM Opinion
How to Design a Better World
When I was young, my teachers praised me for being good at math and art, but my father would always tell people, "You know, John is good at math."
From ACM Opinion
Why Everybody Wants a Slice of Raspberry Pi
In a world where computers are increasingly powerful and are concealed within ever more glossy slabs of aluminum, the Raspberry Pi offers surprising proof for the...
From ACM Opinion
Cyborg Anthropologist: We Can All Be Superhuman
Cyborg anthropology is the study of the interaction between humans and technology, and how technology affects culture.
From ACM Opinion
Why We Must Fight For the Internet's Freedom
The Internet empowers each one of us to speak, create, learn, and share.
From ACM Opinion
How Smartphones Make S Superhuman
Both men lit themselves on fire in protest. But only one of them is credited with starting a revolution.
From ACM Opinion