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
Project Exodus
On March 27th, an American astronaut named Scott Kelly blasted off from Earth and, six hours later, clambered onto the International Space Station.
From ACM Opinion
Behind the Downfall at Blackberry
Ever since Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis stepped down as co-chairmen and co-chief executives of BlackBerry, neither has spoken much in public about the once-dominant...
From ACM Opinion
An Npr Reporter Raced a Machine to Write a News Story. Who Won?
Even the most creative jobs have parts that are pretty routine—tasks that, at least in theory, can be done by a machine. Take, for example, being a reporter.
From ACM Opinion
As Congress Haggles Over Patriot Act, We Answer 6 Basic Questions
The rest of the month is setting up to be pretty dramatic in the Senate.
From ACM Opinion
The Second Job You Don’t Know You Have
Technology has knocked the bottom rung out of the employment ladder, which has sent youth unemployment around the globe skyrocketing and presented us with a serious...
From ACM Opinion
Hacking the Brain
The perfectibility of the human mind is a theme that has captured our imagination for centuries—the notion that, with the right tools, the right approach, the right...
From ACM Opinion
How the Battle For the Future of the Web Is Shaped By Economics
There are two stories people are trying to tell right now about the future of the Internet.
From ACM Opinion
Attention White-Collar Workers: The Robots Are Coming For Your Jobs
From the self-checkout aisle of the grocery store to the sports section of the newspaper, robots and computer software are increasingly taking the place of humans...
From ACM Opinion
Crispr Germline Engineering—the Community Speaks
With the first papers appearing in the literature that describe CRISPR-Cas9 engineering of human reproductive cells, are we at a new Asilomar moment?
From ACM Opinion
Google's Vint Cerf Warns Against Fragmentation of Internet
Internet pioneer Vinton G. Cerf warned Thursday that political and technological forces threaten universal access and integrity, which he described as the foundation...
From ACM Opinion
Moore's Law Turns 50
On April 19, 1965, just over 50 years ago, Gordon Moore, then the head of research for Fairchild Semiconductor and later one of the co-founders of Intel, was asked...
From ACM Opinion
New Ways to Crash the Market
Five years ago, on the afternoon of May 6, 2010, the Dow and the S. & P. fell more than six per cent in a matter of minutes, losing a trillion dollars in value.
From ACM Opinion
Intel's Gordon Moore Speculates on the Future of Tech and the End of Moore's Law
Gordon Moore appeared in person to talk about the 50th anniversary of Moore's Law, the prediction that he made that has fueled the tech industry and driven the...
From ACM Opinion
'rise of the Robots' and 'shadow Work'
In the late 20th century, while the blue-collar working class gave way to the forces of globalization and automation, the educated elite looked on with benign condescension...
From ACM Opinion
Why Nsa Surveillance Is Worse Than You've Ever Imagined
Last summer, after months of encrypted emails, I spent three days in Moscow hanging out with Edward Snowden for a Wired cover story.
From ACM Opinion
Why the Ruling Against the Nsa's Phone Records Program Could Have Huge Implications
A federal appeals court ruling that the National Security Agency's collection of millions of Americans' phone records is illegal could undercut more than just that...
From ACM Opinion
Does Artificial Intelligence Pose a Threat?
After decades as a sci-fi staple, artificial intelligence has leapt into the mainstream.
From ACM Opinion
The Illegal Phone-Data Sweeps
There is a lot to praise in the powerful ruling issued by a three-judge federal appeals panel in New York on Thursday, which held that the government's vast, continuing...
From ACM Opinion
The Void's Creator Details His Vision For nleashing Virtual Reality's Full Potential
In a 60-by-60-foot room in Salt Lake City, Ken Bretschneider is taking virtual reality experiences to another level.
From ACM Opinion