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
After Three Weeks in China, It's Clear Beijing Is Silicon Valley's Only True Competitor
After selling my startup, Shopkick, to SK Planet in 2014, and handing over my CEO role a year later, I packed up my 1- and 3-year-old sons and my wife Angel, and...
From ACM Opinion
Huawei Prepares For Robot Overlords and Communication with the Dead
Chinese technology giant Huawei is preparing for a world where people live forever, dead relatives linger on in computers and robots try to kill humans.
From ACM Opinion
The Seven Deadly Social Networks
Almost five years ago, in a soliloquy transcribed by The Wall Street Journal, Reid Hoffman suggested a comprehensive theory of social-network success.
From ACM Opinion
Like It or Not, Facebook Has the Right to Choose Your News
There's an old saying that you shouldn't pick a fight with someone who buys ink by the barrel.
From ACM Opinion
The Creators of Siri Just Showed Off Their Next AI Assistant, Viv, and It's Incredible
Dag Kittlaus and Adam Cheyer created the artificial intelligence behind Siri, Apple's iconic digital assistant, and one of the first modern apps to capably handle...
From ACM Opinion
What Would Happen If G.p.s. Failed?
The radio signal that is the lifeblood of the Global Positioning System originates from a constellation of twenty-four satellites, orbiting more than twelve thousand...
From ACM Opinion
After Moore's Law: Predicting The Future Beyond Silicon Chips
For several decades now, Georgia Tech professor Tom Conte has been studying how to improve computers: "How do we make them faster and more efficient next time around...
From ACM Opinion
How Wooden Toys Teach Kids to Code
Like most parents, I want my young children to be prepared for the future—one in which knowing how to program a computer will be a basic skill, like clicking "Skip...
From ACM Opinion
The Future of Encryption Is in These Politicians' Hands
Encryption is complicated. Legislating for it, even more so.
From ACM Opinion
An Ipad Misplaced at the Airport Takes Its Own Vacation
Last month, Shelby Bonnie's iPad vanished from his carry-on bag somewhere at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport after a red-eye flight from San Francisco...
From ACM Opinion
Left Behind in the Mobile Revolution, Intel Struggles to Innovate
Intel was once known for its success in branding personal computers with microprocessors, a technology that fueled the digital revolution. But the Silicon Valley...
From ACM Opinion
You Can't Escape Data Surveillance In America
In America, surveillance has always played an outsized role in the relationship between creditors and debtors.
From ACM Opinion
Is Predictive Policing the Law-Enforcement Tactic of the Future?
As big data transforms industries ranging from retailing to health care, it’s also becoming a more important tool for police departments, which are turning to data...
From ACM Opinion
This Top Scientist Offers a Solution For the Havoc Driverless Cars May Wreck on Workers
Proponents of autonomous vehicles are in a sticky situation.
From ACM Opinion
Can Starshot Work?
A couple of weeks ago the world heard about the most seriously funded (and perhaps the most serious) effort yet for starting us on the pathway to interstellar travel...
From ACM Opinion
The Secret Signals That Rule Transport Networks
It is early morning on Brighton beach, and we are sitting on a slope of pebbles, looking out to sea.
From ACM Opinion
Will Smell Ever Come to Smartphones?
Two years ago, at the American Museum of Natural History, in New York, I witnessed David Edwards receive what he claimed was the world's first transatlantic ...
From ACM Opinion
One Easy Way to Make Wikipedia Better
The Pacific Northwest tree octopus existed years before Wikipedia was founded. I’m using "existed" loosely here, of course, because there's no such thing as a Pacific...
From Communications of the ACM