Written for CS 497: Discrimination in Computing at the University of Waterloo, Winter 2022 As the characters of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind find out, erasing a memory of someone is a lot easier said than done. In what seems like a classic case of life imitating art, the…

Written for CS 497: Discrimination in Computing at the University of Waterloo, Winter 2022 In the beginning, there was the First Amendment. But what happens when First Amendment rights are used to sexually exploit children, spread hate, interfere in elections, or disseminate lies? In the early 1990’s, the internet was…

Why it’s sometimes okay to allow algorithms to make decisions for us… and why it’s sometimes not. Written for CS 497: Discrimination in Computing at the University of Waterloo, Winter 2022 Humans are terrible drivers. More than 35,000 people died in motor vehicle crashes in 2019 in the U.S. alone…

Written for CS 497: Discrimination in Computing at the University of Waterloo, Winter 2022. When I think of fairness I think of my grade 4 teacher. Mrs. Godley was a tyrant who ruled over the grade 4 class of Broadacres Junior School with an iron fist, and no one was…

The Backstory When we were 12, my best friend and I decided we were going to be famous. So, we wrote a novel that we were sure was going to land us a sweet book deal, a signing at our local bookstore, and probably a Pulitzer or two. Since we still wanted…