Megan Garber

[Commentary] APIs -- application programming interfaces -- are enablers of remix culture, essentially. And what they mix is structured data. They are, essentially, a way for companies and developers to talk to each other and build off of each other.

They're a means of converting the information a service contains into the stuff of the wider Internet. Because of all that, APIs have been seen, traditionally, as symbolic and practical.

So it's hard not to see the closure of the Netflix API, on top of the closure of all the other APIs, as symbolic in its own way -- of a new era of the web that is less concerned with outreach, and more concerned with consolidation. A web controlled by companies that prefer their own way of doing things, without external input. A web that takes the productive enthusiasms of independent developers and says, essentially, "Thanks, but no thanks."

Starkey Hearing Technologies recently launched Halo, a hearing device that syncs with iPhones and iPads.

The technology, the company says, doesn't just amplify hearing; it also allows users to listen to music, sync movies, receive phone calls, and chat over Facetime. It allows for geotagging according to specific places -- so, for example, it calibrates itself to the volume of a user's favorite restaurant or coffee shop. It joins devices across wireless networks. It's a medical-tech answer, basically, to the broad aspiration of the connected home.