Introduction

Many of the leading voices in computing have graced the pages of Communications over the past 50 years. Their research, opinions, and professional journeys have influenced countless future leaders, and will continue to do so. In this section, we’ve invited some of the most prominent among them to look into the future of the field and reflect on how 50 years of CACM are helping inspire and create it. As difficult as it is to look even a few years ahead, these voices have managed to anticipate the needs of future users, even as they advance the field’s deepest scientific principles. A notable theme is how much computing ultimately depends on trust, whether in an e-commerce transaction, a robot’s behavior, a software agent’s instructions, a network’s architecture, a human’s intentions, or the scholarship of a paper. See how computation connects us all.