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
Time Machines Would Run Afoul of the Second Law of Thermodynamics
We've all seen those movies where someone goes back in time and tries to change something (the classic "Grandfather Paradox": what happens if you go back in time...
From ACM Opinion
Meet the People Behind the Wayback Machine, One of Our Favorite Things About the Internet
Brewster Kahle is quick to point out that we are not standing inside a former Scientology church.
From ACM Opinion
How the .s. Could Escalate Its Name-and-Shame Campaign Against China's Espionage
Earlier this week the U.S. Department of Justice indicted five Chinese military officers for industrial espionage, accusing them of leading attacks on the computers...
From ACM Opinion
Man Behind the First Computer Password: It's Become a Nightmare
In the early 1960s, Fernando Corbató helped deploy the first known computer password.
From Communications of the ACM
Beyond Data and Analysis
Why business analytics and big data really matter for modern business organizations.
From ACM Opinion
Secrets, Lies and Snowden's Email: Why I Was Forced to Shut Down Lavabit
My legal saga started last summer with a knock at the door, behind which stood two federal agents ready to to serve me with a court order requiring the installation...
From ACM Opinion
Should .s. Hackers Fix Cybersecurity Holes or Exploit Them?
There's a debate going on about whether the U.S. government—specifically, the NSA and United States Cyber Command—should stockpile Internet vulnerabilities or disclose...
From ACM Opinion
The Internet's History Isn’t As "open" As You Think
This spring, the Federal Communications Commission is deciding how to regulate the "Open Internet"—a term it uses to refer to the movement for net neutrality.
From ACM Opinion
Every Little Byte Counts
In "On What We Can Not Do," a short and pungent essay published a few years ago, the Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben outlined two ways in which power operates...
From ACM Opinion
Three Questions with the Man Leading Baidu's New AI Effort
Artificial intelligence is guided by the far-off goal of having software match humans at important tasks.
From ACM Opinion
How a Raccoon Became an Aardvark
In July of 2008, Dylan Breves, then a seventeen-year-old student from New York City, made a mundane edit to a Wikipedia entry on the coati.
From ACM Opinion
The Myths & Realities of How the Eu's New 'right To Be Forgotten' in Google Works
Is it true that anyone in the EU can have anything removed from Google and other search engines?
From ACM Opinion
My Duolingo Learning App Can Reshape Education
Duolingo users are making new courses for people who speak Asian languages like Chinese and Hindi. How does that work?
From ACM News
How Google Built Its 3-D Interactive Rubik's Cube Doodle
Today Google launched one of its coolest doodles yet: a 3-D interactive Rubik's Cube.
From ACM Opinion
Why the Death of Net Neutrality Would Be a Disaster For Libraries
The Internet's eyes turned to the Federal Communications Commission on Thursday, as the panel approved a plan to consider allowing Internet service providers to...
From ACM Opinion
Ungoogle Me: The Case For Scrubbing Search Results
The Internet has much to say about the recent ruling by the Court of Justice of the European Union, which determines that if a person wants some personal information...
From ACM Opinion
Forget 'the Cloud'; 'the Fog' Is Tech's Future
I'm as big a believer in the transformational power of cloud computing as anyone you'll meet.
From ACM Opinion