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 Opinion
It's Not Just Facebook. Thousands of Companies Are Spying on You
In the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, news articles and commentators have focused on what Facebook knows about us. A lot, it turns out.
From ACM Opinion
Here's How Trump's FCC Affects You
President Trump rarely spoke about the Federal Communications Commission during his campaign or after entering the White House.
From ACM Opinion
Sue Over Fake News? Not So Fast
The latest controversy involving so-called fake news has left many wondering why websites that publish patently false statements on the Internet have not been prosecuted...
From ACM Opinion
Trump's Populism Is Only the Beginning. Here Come the Robots.
Donald Trump's win is a wake-up call that voters are angry with a system that's made middle-class jobs tougher to come by, and increased inequality.
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
China's Xiaomi's Is Changing the .s. Too
Xiaomi is the most important phone manufacturer you've never heard of.
From ACM Opinion
From Windows to the Xbox: Bill Gates' 'pioneering' Impact
To ask what impact Bill Gates has had on computing is, in a way, too small a question.
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
Snowden—Facts, Fictions, and Fears
"Any analyst at any time can target anyone. Any selector, anywhere ... I, sitting at my desk, certainly had the authorities to wiretap anyone, from you or your...
From ACM Opinion
The 12 Best Designs from the Past 100 Years
Is the much-loved Piaggio Vespa more iconic than the floppy disk? Is the iPod more of a design classic than the Airbus A380?
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
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 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.12