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
Minitel, the Open Network Before the Internet
In 1991, most Americans had not yet heard of the internet.
From ACM Opinion
Online Voting Won't Save Democracy
Technology can do a lot more to make our elections more secure and reliable, and to ensure that participation in the democratic process is available to all.
From ACM Opinion
The Wisdom of Nokia's Dumbphone
They weighed heavy in pockets and jackets and bags, for they were thick and bulky, not lithe and narrow.
From ACM Opinion
The Lost Civilization of Dial-p Bulletin Board Systems
I have a vivid, recurring dream. I climb the stairs in my parents' house to see my old bedroom. In the back corner, I hear a faint humming.
From ACM Opinion
Chinese Characters Are Futuristic and the Alphabet Is Old News
On a bright fall morning at Stanford, Tom Mullaney is telling me what's wrong with QWERTY keyboards.
From ACM Opinion
How Twitter Bots Are Shaping the Election
There is power in numbers, or so the saying goes. But statistics mean different things to different people. Take Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, for instance.
From ACM Opinion
How to Turn Your Self-Driving Car Into a Time Machine
The self-driving car's greatest promise is that it will buy its passengers that most precious and finite of resources: time.
From ACM Opinion
How Electronic Voting Could ndermine the Election
It's 2016: What possible reason is there to vote on paper? When we use touchscreens to communicate, work, and shop, why can't we use similar technology to vote?
From ACM Opinion
What Happens If Gps Fails?
In only took thirteen millionths of a second to cause a whole lot of problems.
From ACM Opinion
Toward the End of Pilots
A memory that’s stayed with me from my stint in the military nearly 50 years ago is a sign that my supply sergeant kept on his desk: "We’ve been working with less...
From ACM Opinion
Can Google's Driverless Car Project Survive a Fatal Accident?
Everybody knew this day would come.
From ACM Opinion
How to Build an nbeatable Poker-Playing Robot
Each summer, the computer-science researchers behind the world's best poker-playing robots bring their creations together for a tournament.
From ACM Opinion
How the Microscope Redefined the Fact
A picture may be worth a thousand words, but the inverse is also true: A word is worth a thousand pictures.
From ACM Opinion
How the Internet of Things Limits Consumer Choice
In theory, the Internet of Things—the connected network of tiny computers inside home appliances, household objects, even clothing—promises to make your life easier...
From ACM Opinion
Driverless Cars Are Like Elevators
One of the challenges in describing the potential of self-driving cars is that they promise to do so much.
From ACM Opinion
The Room Where the Internet Was Born
Starting a cross-country drive to New York in Los Angeles is pretty inconvenient, unless your cross-country drive is also a vision quest to see the Internet.
From ACM Opinion
Mark Zuckerberg and the End of Language
Earlier this year, Mark Zuckerberg hosted an online Q&A session on his personal Facebook page.
From ACM Opinion
Humans, Not Robots, Are the Real Reason Artificial Intelligence Is Scary
Unfortunately, much of the recent outcry against artificial-intelligence weapons has been confused, conjuring robot takeovers of mankind.
From ACM Opinion
Beware the Listening Machines
One of my great pleasures in life is attending conferences on fields I'm intrigued by, but know nothing about.
From ACM Opinion