acm - an acm publication
Follow us on social media...

Peter J. Denning, Editor in ChiefThe digitally connected world has become a large, swirling sea of information stripped of context.

We help our readers make sense of it, find meaning in it, learn what to trust, and prepare for the future that may show up. "Ubiquity and Your Future

Peter J. Denning,
Editor-in-Chief

Ubiquity Upgrades!

FROM THE BLOG

LATEST ARTICLES

opinion

Artificial Intelligence: ChatGPT's Astonishing Fabrications About Percy Ludgate

by Brian Coghlan, Brian Randell, Noel O'Boyle, Walter Tichy

How well you speak will always be an indicator of how well you know the subject at hand. And while nerves can often lead novice speakers to resort to distracting sounds and placeholders, a second or two of silence will help focus you as well as your audience. In this installment, Philip Yaffe reminds us that silence is golden. ...


opinion

Teens and Screens: The Siren Song of Social Media

by Kemal Delic, Jeff Johnson

How well you speak will always be an indicator of how well you know the subject at hand. And while nerves can often lead novice speakers to resort to distracting sounds and placeholders, a second or two of silence will help focus you as well as your audience. In this installment, Philip Yaffe reminds us that silence is golden. ...



opinion

Teens and Screens: Opening Statement: ACM Ubiquity Symposium on Teens and Screens

by Peter J. Denning

In 2025, teens use the Internet to find community, gather information, play games, listen to podcasts, participate in livestreams, and more. Many adults, parents, and lawmakers are concerned about the amount of time young people spend online, fearing negative effects on their mental health. This symposium presents four perspectives on this issue. ...


research-article

Artificial Intelligence: Generative AI

by Peter J. Denning

Large language models (LLMs) are the first neural network machines capable of carrying on conversations with humans. They are trained on billions of words of text scraped from the internet. They generate text responses to text inputs. They have transformed the public awareness of artificial intelligence, bringing on reactions ranging from astonishment and awe to trepidation and horror. They have spurred massive investments in new tools for drafting texts, summarizing conversations, summarizing literature, generating images, coding simple programs, supporting education, and amusing humans. Experience with them has shown them likely to respond with fabrications (called "hallucinations") that severely undermine their trustworthiness and make them unsafe for critical applications. Here, we will examine the limitations of LLMs imposed by their design and function. These are not bugs but are inherent limitations of the technology. The same limitations make it unlikely that LLM machines will ever be capable of performing all human tasks at the skill levels of humans.

...