Technology

In a new book, medical ethicist Harriet Washington details how genes and tissues are increasingly being patented by pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. Those firms, she argues, are focused more on their profits than on the medical needs of patients.

The "i" prefix began as an abbreviation for the word "Internet," but ended up being much more than that. "By the time i- was fleshed out, Apple had transformed itself from a culty computer-maker to a major religion," says linguist Geoff Nunberg.

Facebook, Google, Amazon and Apple are expanding rapidly into finance, advertising, media and retail. Tech writer Farad Manjoo outlines how the four companies are heading in new directions -- and encroaching on each other's territory -- as they try to expand their customer base.

Technologies like GPS and social media are posing new challenges to interpreting the Constitution's guarantees of privacy and free speech. Law professor and journalist Jeffrey Rosen says we're now in an era the Founding Fathers could never have imagined, in which private companies are determining the rules for what can be shared.

As protesters in the Middle East use social media to communicate, the regimes they're battling are using sophisticated technology to intercept their emails and text messages. Journalist Ben Elgin details how Western companies are providing software and equipment to help Middle Eastern governments crack down on dissidents.

YouTube's future success depends on increasing the amount of time people spend watching videos on the site. The Google-owned website plans to roll out more than 100 new, professionally produced channels in a push to draw viewers away from television, and onto the Web.

Advertisers collect information with every digital move people make. They then target ads based on that information. Communications scholar Joseph Turow worries that advertisers will use such data to discriminate against people and put them into "reputation silos."

Parents should be paying very close attention to the digital media their children are using, says child advocate James Steyer. "Young people in particular often self-reveal before they self-reflect," he says. "There is no eraser button today for youthful indiscretion."

What does the Internet look like? Journalist Andrew Blum decided to find out. His new book, Tubes, is a journey into the Internet's physical infrastructure -- where our data is stored and transmitted.

ProPublica investigative reporter Peter Maass says that cellphone companies monitor where we are, who we call, what we buy -- and often provide it to law enforcement when requested. "They are collecting a heck of a lot more information than we expect them to be collecting about us," he tells Fresh Air.

New York Times business reporter Charles Duhigg says that consumers and innovation are the big losers in the patent wars. "Patents have become a toll gate on the road of innovation," he says.

In her book Alone Together, psychologist Sherry Turkle explains how digital devices are affecting our communication and relationships. "What is so seductive about texting, about keeping that phone on, about that little red light on the BlackBerry, is you want to know who wants you," Turkle says.

"Big Data" had just as much to do with President Obama's victory as phrases like "Etch A Sketch" and "47 percent," says linguist Geoff Nunberg. Big Data is also behind anxieties about intrusions on our privacy, whether from the government's anti-terrorist data sweeps or the ads that track us on the Web.

Science journalist Emily Anthes talks about how scientists are engineering mice with tumors and working to create pigs that can grow organs for human transplant and insects that could serve as drones for the military.

In the introduction to his new book, Full Upright and Locked Position, aviation consultant Mark Gerchick writes that for most people, "the magic of air travel has morphed into an uncomfortable, crowded and utterly soulless ordeal to be avoided whenever possible."

The new eyeglass frames allow you to take pictures and browse the Internet while you wear them. Early adopters focused on the tiny screens have already been dubbed "glassholes." Fresh Air linguist Geoff Nunberg reminds us that in Shakespeare's time "distraction" was another word for madness.

Today's Internet users have become accustomed to stories of hacking, identity theft and cyberattacks, but there was a time when the freedom and anonymity of the Web were new, and no one was sure what rules — if any — applied to its use.