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
The Philosopher Whose Fingerprints Are All Over the Ftc's New Approach to Privacy
A mile or two away from Facebook's headquarters in Silicon Valley, Helen Nissenbaum of New York University was standing in a basement on Stanford's campus explaining...
From ACM Opinion
'a Clockwork Orange' Strikes 40
The New York Times recently ran an opinion piece about the concept of a morality pill, a theoretical-but-apparently-not-implausible panacea for humankind's ethical...
From ACM Opinion
The Big Data Boom Is the Innovation Story of Our Time
The data revolution has turned customers into unwitting business consultants, as our purchases and searches are tracked to improve everything from Web sites to...
From ACM Opinion
Cloud-Powered Facial Recognition Is Terrifying
"I never forget a face," goes the Marx Brothers one-liner, "but in your case, I'll be glad to make an exception." Unlike Groucho Marx, unfortunately, the cloud...
From ACM Opinion
Technology Is Our Friend... Except When It Isn't
The technology in question starts with "gigapixel" photography. Gigapixel photos are giant panoramas that themselves consist of hundreds of component mega-pixel...
From ACM Opinion
The Campaign to Terrify You About Emp
From Newt Gingrich to a Congressional "EMP Caucus," some conservatives warn the electronics-frying blast could pose gravely underestimated dangers to the U.S.
From ACM Opinion
On the Latest Google Chinese-Hacking News
Thanks to many people who have written in asking whether the recent Google announcement of a new China-based wave of attacks on Gmail accounts is related to the...
From ACM Opinion
The Anthropology of Hackers
A "hacker" is a technologist with a love for computing and a "hack" is a clever technical solution arrived through a non-obvious means. It doesn't mean to compromise...
From ACM Opinion