ACM Code of Ethics

I've rarely seen a code of ethics adequately specified such that it accomplishes its aims and can be followed. This is no exception. It seems well-intentioned. It seems that it would like me to be nice, be considerate, be honest, work hard and attempt to do good. I could agree with a statement like that previous sentence.

In an attempt to explain what it means, it comes up with things like:

Ensure that users and those who will be affected by a system have their needs clearly articulated during the assessment and design of requirements; later the system must be validated to meet requirements.

I don't write requirements of that sort, nor do validation testing in the sense implied. If I want to be in the ACM, this leaves me with the choice of either concluding, "Ah, I know what they mean and I'm there in spirit" or not participating. That sorta sucks. If I agree to a set of principles, I want to diligently follow it. I prefer a high-level "Don't be a jerk" approach to such things and sound human judgment entrusted to make calls if needed about propriety or identifying jerks.

I'm a technology ethicist, and (generally) we despise these sorts of codes of ethics. Not only do they not actually tell you what to do when something happens, but they are regularly turned into "checklists" which allow people to say "Yes, okay, dealt with ethics, done" without actually encouraging them to think about the real impact their technology might have.

We tend to advocate a more participatory, ongoing ethical evaluation that is context-sensitive and allows tech developers and designers to be able to actually solve ethical problems rather than just ignore them or ad hoc deal with them when they really become problematic. Of course, though, this is more expensive than just reading a website (or ignoring it), so it doesn't tend to get incorporated into much tech outside of specific university research projects.

How does the ACM square asking all paper authors to assign copyright to the ACM with rule 1.6:

"1.6 Give proper credit for intellectual property.

Computing professionals are obligated to protect the integrity of intellectual property. Specifically, one must not take credit for other's ideas or work" (emphasis mine)

ACM demanding copyright in exchange for publication is not ethical by their own standards. They could switch from copyright assignment to a time-limited, commercial-only license. This would also help them meet 1.1 "Contribute to society and human well-being", since it would help to reduce bitrot.

As an FYI, ACM's Queue magazine is much better than it used to be, and people are talking about it:

http://everythingsysadmin.com/2010/11/acm-queue-magazine-add...

I've been an ACM member for a while, and they've come a long way. With recent political noise from the IEEE (in the wrong direction IMHO) I'm tempted to drop that membership...

I can only imagine the machinations and flame wars leading to that document.

ACM still has great contributors. but it's really some kind of dinosaur today.

Anyone here still get's most of the ground break stuff in CS via ACM instead of researchers blogs or something similar? honestly?