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Communications of the ACM

Opinion Archive


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The opinion archive provides access to past opinion stories from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.

December 2012


From ACM Opinion

Seven Questions For Google Enterprise Chief Amit Singh

Seven Questions For Google Enterprise Chief Amit Singh

It's been a big year for many things related to the Enterprise business at Google.


From ACM Opinion

Looking Back: The Five Most Important Security Stories of 2012

Looking Back: The Five Most Important Security Stories of 2012

The dance among blackhat, whitehat, and grayhat hackers grew ever more intricate in 2012, thanks to a steady stream of exploits, vulnerability discoveries, and data breaches.


From ACM Opinion

Ford Engineers Have 3D Printers on Their Desks. When Will You Get One?

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

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 growing—user bases, they're of course not the only games in town…


From ACM Opinion

Computer Code Frees ­S to Think in New Ways

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

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 virtue of moderation.


From ACM Opinion

Why China's Homemade Microchips Will Struggle to Displace Western Giants

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

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 concern, particularly for domestic abuse victims. No less threatening…


From ACM Opinion

How Technology Has Restored the Soul of Politics

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 lab in the middle of the night to try my hand at IBM punch cards…


From ACM Opinion

Forget Yolo: Why 'big Data' Should Be the Word of the Year

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 "frankenstorm," "fiscal cliff," and YOLO.


From ACM Opinion

Who Owns the Content You ­pload Online?

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 upload content, whether it is photos, video, blogs, or even games…


From ACM Opinion

The Man Looking to Turn Samsung Into a Silicon Valley Trendsetter

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

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

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 the verdict in the Apple v. Samsung trial.


From ACM Opinion

Quantum Networks May Be More Realistic Than We Thought

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

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

Debunker of Doomsday: Nasa Scientist Tries to Talk Some Sense Into the World

Debunker of Doomsday: Nasa Scientist Tries to Talk Some Sense Into the World

Swirling with lunacy and paranoia, the theories warn of mayhem and cataclysm.


From ACM Opinion

'the Idea We Live in a Simulation Isn't Science Fiction'

'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

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'

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

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 the connections between them—had tripled in size over its first seven…


From ACM Opinion

Intellectual Ventures: Why the Patent System Needs Aggregators Like ­S

Intellectual Ventures: Why the Patent System Needs Aggregators Like ­S

The U.S. patent system borrowed from mainland Europe a concept that had evolved over hundreds of years: the "moral right" for inventors to protect their ideas. But America's founders went even further—they also included the obligation…


From ACM Opinion

By Hiring Kurzweil, Google Just Killed the Singularity

By Hiring Kurzweil, Google Just Killed the Singularity

Late last Friday, Google announced a jaw-dropping hire: Ray Kurzweil will join the company as a Director of Engineering. Has the world’s brainiest tech company suddenly bought into Kurzweil’s "rapture of the nerds" b.s. er "technological…


From ACM Opinion

A Plea to Google: Protect Our Email Privacy

A Plea to Google: Protect Our Email Privacy

We recently learned that even the director of the CIA, David Petraeus, can't seem to secure his private email conversations properly, and over the past month tech commentators have responded to that discovery with a familiar…


From ACM Opinion

Internet Regulation Seen at National Level As Treaty Talks Fail

The world's major Internet companies, backed by U.S. policymakers, got much of what they wanted last week when many nations refused to sign a global telecommunications treaty that opponents feared could lead to greater government…


From ACM Opinion

Red Pill, Blue Pill: Is the ­niverse Just a Giant Computer Simulation?

Red Pill, Blue Pill: Is the ­niverse Just a Giant Computer Simulation?

I've started making my way (skeptically) through Ray Kurzweil’s How to Create a Mind, and at the recommendation of a friend, I've also started keeping tabs on KurzweilAI, a Kurzweil-blessed site devoted to futurism coverage—everything…


From ACM Opinion

This Real-Life Pixar Lamp Cutely Refuses to Let You Turn It Off

This Real-Life Pixar Lamp Cutely Refuses to Let You Turn It Off

Design-class projects have come a long way. That's the only conclusion I can draw from this brilliant video of a robotic desk lamp that squeaks, swivels, and mugs for attention like the Pixar mascot come to life.


From ACM Opinion

Opening the Doors to the Life of Pi

Opening the Doors to the Life of Pi

For those of us who have been intoxicated by the powers and possibilities of mathematics, the mystery isn't why that fascination developed but why it isn't universal.


From ACM Opinion

How the ­n's 'game-Changing' Internet Treaty Failed

How the ­n's 'game-Changing' Internet Treaty Failed

Did you know that, for the past two weeks, the future of the Internet has been at stake?

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