Technology & Digital Life

Once upon a time, it was MySpace. (Huh. Turns out you can still link to it.) Then Facebook happened. And Twitter. And beyond those two dominant social-media platforms, there are a host of other, newer options for staying in touch and letting the digital universe get a look at your life. And for certain kinds of sharing, some of those other options make more sense to tech-savvy teens than the Big Two do.

Google's "Project Loon" just launched in New Zealand — it uses balloons floating in the stratosphere to bring high-speed Internet access to remote areas.

The Edward Snowden saga continues: Last night, citing classified documents leaked by the former Booz Allen Hamilton employee, The Guardian newspaper reported that the United States and the United Kingdom spied on their allies during the 2009 G-20 global summit meetings in England.

Transcript

JACKI LYDEN, HOST:

It's WEEKENDS on ALL THINGS CONSIDERED from NPR News. I'm Jacki Lyden.

Coming up, the posthumous release of a book by the man known as the deadliest sniper in U.S. history who was killed earlier this year at a shooting range.

But first, small drones are coming to U.S. airspace. Drone manufacturers, police departments, farmers and many businesses are eager to begin using unmanned aerial vehicles here.

Google scientists have been testing a way to link computers to the internet in rural, war torn or disaster areas where high speed internet does not exist. We hear from Steven Levy, a senior writer with Wired magazine who was embedded with the Google team.

Google has launched — quite literally — a new idea to bring the Internet to some of the world's remotest places.

The tech giant's engineering hothouse, Google X, is testing the use of 12-mile-high helium balloons to get coverage in areas where it's impractical to put in conventional infrastructure.

Google said Saturday that it has 30 of the balloons, or "high-altitude platforms" (HAPS), flying over New Zealand as part of something called Project Loon. They will hover at about twice the altitude of a passenger jet.