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
Documentary Explores The Cyber-War Secrets Of Stuxnet
Alex Gibney's new documentary, Zero Days, looks at the Stuxnet worm—a cyber weapon developed by the U.S. and Israel.
From ACM Opinion
Waiting For Gödel
In June of 1975, the Office of the White House Press Secretary announced President Gerald R. Ford’s picks for the National Medal of Science. One went to the Austrian...
From ACM Opinion
How the Computer Beat the Go Player
The victory in March of the computer program AlphaGo over one of the world's top handful of go players marks the highest accomplishment to date for the burgeoning...
From ACM Opinion
How Alan Turing Found Machine Thinking in the Human Mind
In 1935, Alan Turing set out to build a reputation by outflanking the world's leading mathematician.
From ACM Opinion
Meet the Smartest, Cutest AI-Powered Robot You've Ever Seen
Boris Sofman taps his phone, and the robot on the conference room table in front of him wakes up. Not in that gadget-y way, like when a laptop screen turns on,...
From ACM Opinion
How Risky Are the World Economic Forum's Top 10 Emerging Technologies For 2016?
Take an advanced technology. Add a twist of fantasy. Stir well, and watch the action unfold.
From ACM Opinion
Machines that Talk to S May Soon Sense Our Feelings, Too
After great promise in the 1960s that machines would soon think like humans, progress stalled for decades. Only in the past 10 years or so has research picked up...
From ACM Opinion
Bringing Precision to the AI Safety Discussion
We believe that AI technologies are likely to be overwhelmingly useful and beneficial for humanity. But part of being a responsible steward of any new technology...
From ACM Opinion
Here's Your Chance to Decode President Lincoln's Secret Messages
On April 12, 1865—three days after Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox and two days before President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated—the president sent...
From ACM Opinion
Basic Income: A Sellout of the American Dream
Matt Krisiloff is in a small, glass-walled conference room off the lobby of Y Combinator’s office in San Francisco's South of Market neighborhood, shouting distance...
From ACM Opinion
Too Cute For Their Own Good, Robots Get Self-Defense Instincts
At a shopping mall here one recent Friday, six-year-old Ruby Dowling made friends with a friendly egg-shaped robot.
From ACM Opinion
It'll Be Very Hard For Terrorism Victim's Family to Win Lawsuit Against Twitter
Legal experts say that it will be an uphill battle for the plaintiffs who filed a lawsuit this week against Twitter, Facebook, and Google.
From ACM Opinion
The Physicist Who Studies Isis Communities Online
Neil Johnson, a physicist at the University of Miami in Florida, studies patterns that emerge in complex systems.
From ACM Opinion
For the Golden State Warriors, Brain-Zapping Could Provide an Edge
Back in March, James Michael McAdoo, the power forward for the Golden State Warriors, tweeted out a photo of himself in the training room, sporting a pair of slick...
From ACM Opinion
Losing Control: The Dangers of Killer Robots
New technology could lead humans to relinquish control over decisions to use lethal force.
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
Deep Learning Isn't a Dangerous Magic Genie. It's Just Math
Deep learning is rapidly 'eating' artificial intelligence. But let's not mistake this ascendant form of artificial intelligence for anything more than it really...
From ACM Opinion
Barefoot Networks' New Chips Will Transform the Tech Industry
Nick McKeown and his new startup, Barefoot Networks, just launched out of stealth. That's Silicon Valley-speak for trumpeting the arrival of your new startup in...
From ACM Opinion
What Are the Odds We Are Living in a Computer Simulation?
Last week, Elon Musk, the billionaire founder of Tesla Motors, SpaceX, and other cutting-edge companies, took a surprising question at the Code Conference, a technology...
From ACM Opinion