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
Ford Engineers Have 3D Printers on Their Desks. When Will You Get One?
Ford has caught the DIY revolution and now puts 3D printers at workstations for its engineers.
From ACM Opinion
Social Media: Five Predictions For 2013
When you think of social media these days, you probably think primarily of Facebook and Twitter, and perhaps Instagram. But while those services have massive—and...
From ACM Opinion
Computer Code Frees S to Think in New Ways
At the start of 2012, Michael Bloomberg, the mayor of New York tweeted: "My New Year's resolution is to learn to code with Codecademy."
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
Why China's Homemade Microchips Will Struggle to Displace Western Giants
If China's ultimate aim in the sphere of technology is to become completely self-sufficient, it is well on the way to achieving this ambitious goal.
From ACM Opinion
We Don't Need More Data Scientists; Just Make Big Data Easier to se
Virtually any article today about big data inevitably turns to the notion that the country is suffering from a crucial shortage of data scientists.
From ACM Opinion
Sneaky Apps That Track Cellphones
A perversion of smartphone technology called "stalking apps"—precise, secretive trackings of the movements of cellphone users—is increasingly a matter of national...
From ACM Opinion
How Technology Has Restored the Soul of Politics
In 1979, I was an aeronautical-engineering major at San Jose State University, sneaking time in the laser lab to make holograms or running over to the computer...
From ACM Opinion
Forget Yolo: Why 'big Data' Should Be the Word of the Year
"Big Data" hasn't made any of the words-of-the-year lists I've seen so far. That's probably because it didn't get the wide public exposure given to items like "...
From ACM Opinion
Who Owns the Content You pload Online?
The outrage over Instagram's announcement that it is changing its terms and conditions has turned the spotlight on the relationship between websites and users who...
From ACM Opinion
The Man Looking to Turn Samsung Into a Silicon Valley Trendsetter
Samsung Electronics is a company at the top of its game, having become the world’s leading smartphone manufacturer in the last year.
From ACM Opinion
The Woman Charged With Making Windows 8 Succeed
As the head of Windows product development at Microsoft, Julie Larson-Green is responsible for a piece of software used by some 1.3 billion people worldwide.
From ACM Opinion
Five Big Tech Stories to Watch For in 2013
We were dazzled by an array of smartphones. We were fascinated and then disappointed by Facebook's initial public offering. And we held our breaths as we awaited...
From ACM Opinion
Quantum Networks May Be More Realistic Than We Thought
The nice thing about buzzwords, though, is that some people take them seriously while also recognizing the problems inherent to the idea.
From ACM Opinion
The Real Brothers Grimm Were Stranger Than Fiction
Head over to Google's homepage on Thursday and you'll enjoy a scrollable comic strip telling the story of Little Red Riding Hood.
From ACM Opinion
'the Idea We Live in a Simulation Isn't Science Fiction'
If the universe is just a Matrix-like simulation, how could we ever know? Physicist Silas Beane thinks he has the answer.
From ACM Opinion
Building My Own Laptop
We are building an open laptop, with some wacky features in it for hackers like me.
From ACM Opinion
How Hackers Exploit 'the Seven Deadly Sins'
This isn't the high tech wizardry of Hollywood but is a good, old-fashioned confidence trick.
From ACM News
How Google Is Taking the Knowledge Graph Global
Earlier this month, Google shared a fascinating statistic. The number of items in the company's Knowledge Graph—its database of people, places, and things, and...
From ACM Opinion