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
Why Alibaba Is Betting Big on AI Chips and Quantum Computing
During the opening ceremony of Alibaba's 2018 computing conference last week, Simon Hu, president of Alibaba Cloud, invited the MC to taste some tea on the stage—but...
From ACM Opinion
Google at 20: How Two 'Obnoxious' Students Changed the Internet
In the summer of 1995, a second-year grad student called Sergey Brin was giving a tour of Stanford University to prospective students. Larry Page, an engineering...
From ACM Opinion
When Reporting on Defcon, Avoid Stereotypes and A.T.M.s
As one of The New York Times's three Surfacing residents, I've grown accustomed to entering unfamiliar places.
From ACM Opinion
Paper-Based Electronics Could Fold, Biodegrade and Be the Basis for the Next Generation of Devices
It seems like every few months there's a new cellphone, laptop or tablet that is so exciting people line up around the block to get their hands on it.
From ACM Opinion
How America Could Lose the Quantum-Computing Race
There's an arms race underway to develop the next generation of computers—known as "quantum" computers—and there's no guarantee that the United States is going...
From ACM Opinion
David Patterson Says It's Time for New Computer Architectures and Software Languages
David Patterson—University of California professor, Google engineer, and RISC pioneer—says there's no better time than now to be a computer architect.
From ACM Opinion
In 1968, Computers Got Personal: How the 'Mother of All Demos' Changed the World
On a crisp California afternoon in early December 1968, a square-jawed, mild-mannered Stanford researcher named Douglas Engelbart took the stage at San Francisco's...
From ACM Opinion
How Bots Ruined Clicktivism
I recently came across two tweets—or rather, thousands of tweets sharing the same two ideas over and over again.
From ACM Opinion
What Worries People about Future Science and Tech Innovations?
Many Americans see the future crowding into the present and some of the innovations ahead unnerve them, especially as they reshape ideas about human dominion.
From ACM Opinion
Why the Russians Might Hack the Boy Scouts Next
In the two years since Russia made headlines for targeting an American political organization–the Democratic National Committee–and undermining Hillary Clinton's...
From ACM Opinion
Safe Artificial Intelligence Requires Cultural Intelligence
Knowledge, to paraphrase British journalist Miles Kington, is knowing a tomato is a fruit; wisdom is knowing there's a norm against putting it in a fruit salad....
From ACM Opinion
Artificial Intelligence Is Greater Concern than Climate Change or Terrorism, Says New Head of British Science Association
Artificial Intelligence is a greater concern than antibiotic resistance, climate change or terrorism for the future of Britain, the incoming president of the British...
From ACM Opinion
Ten Years of Large Hadron Collider Discoveries Are Just the Start of Decoding the niverse
Ten years! Ten years since the start of operations for the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), one of the most complex machines ever created.
From ACM Opinion
What is Cyberwar?
At its core, cyberwarfare refers the use of digital attacks by one country or nation to disrupt the computer systems of another with the aim of create significant...
From ACM Opinion
For Safety's Sake, We Must Slow Innovation in Internet-Connected Things
Smart gadgets are everywhere.
From ACM Opinion
How Will Google's Innovation Continue Beyond Its 20th Year?
As millions of people came online in the late 1990s they needed help figuring out what each webpage was about, and how to find what they were looking for.
From ACM Opinion
Google Chrome's Biggest Challenge at Age 10 Might Just Be Its Own Success
Exactly 10 years ago Tuesday, a newly promoted vice president named Sundar Pichai stood before a group of tech reporters in a conference room at Google's Mountain...
From ACM Opinion
Fake America Great Again
Guess what? I just got hold of some embarrassing video footage of Texas senator Ted Cruz singing and gyrating to Tina Turner. His political enemies will have great...
From ACM Opinion
Forgotten Heroes of the Enigma Story
Alan Turing's crucial unscrambling of German messages in the Second World War was a tour de force of codebreaking.
From ACM Opinion