Writing for MacStories, Ryan Christoffel examines the Apple media platform and presents a Grand Unified Theory of the company’s strategy. We know that Apple combines hardware, software, and services into a profitable user experience, and Mr. Christoffel opines on how this is shaping Apple customers’ media consumption.

Apple has one unified goal, I believe, driving all its media efforts: it aspires to utilize hardware, software, and services to provide the entirety of a user’s media experience. If you consume media, Apple wants to provide the full stack of that consumption, from media delivery to media discovery. My aim in this story is to share an overview of how that goal is being fulfilled today.

Facebook has a patent application for a way to use your smartphone’s microphone to eavesdrop on you without your knowledge. The system triggers with a sound too high for humans to hear, records whatever your phone’s mic can pick up, and then sends the data back to Facebook. Don’t worry about that being creepy because Facebook says the patent is to stop other companies from spying on us, and they won’t ever use this tech on us. Or so they tell Mashable. If only Facebook didn’t have a history of abusing our privacy.

Smart home technology may add convenience to our lives, but there’s a darker side, too. The New York Times explores how domestic abusers are using smarthome devices to control and gaslight their victims. Reports of smart home devices in domestic abuse cases has been on the rise over the past year, too. From the report:

One woman had turned on her air-conditioner, but said it then switched off without her touching it. Another said the code numbers of the digital lock at her front door changed every day and she could not figure out why. Still another told an abuse help line that she kept hearing the doorbell ring, but no one was there.

It’s a stark reminder that abusers will find a way to turn anything into a weapon against their victims.