Past Articles by Martin Kaste
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Tech Companies Have A Lot At Stake With Immigration Bill The tech industry is getting a lot in the Senate's immigration overhaul bill. It increases the number of temporary worker visas for skilled technical workers but the industry is pushing for more, including the end of provisions meant to protect American tech workers from unfair competition. The industry's goals and tactics are antagonizing other groups that want to see the bill pass. |
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Take Your Seat, The 'No Photography' Sign Is Lit A viral video from an American Airlines flight highlights a little-known airline policy: no unauthorized photography. |
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Take Your Seat, The 'No Photography' Sign Is Lit A viral video from an American Airlines flight highlights a little-known airline policy: no unauthorized photography. |
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Take Your Seat, The 'No Photography' Sign Is Lit A viral video from an American Airlines flight highlights a little-known airline policy: no unauthorized photography. |
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Airlines Can Keep You From Snapping, But Not Sharing Photos A recent incident on a commercial airliner raises an interesting question: can an airline bar you from taking pictures on their plane? |
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Facebook Joins Lobby For Overhauling Immigration Some progressive groups are angry with Facebook for running ads supporting GOP lawmakers on board with the immigration overhaul bill. The left-wing groups have turned a blind eye to what Facebook gets out of the overhaul measure, and what it may cost American tech workers. |
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Facebook Joins Lobby For Overhauling Immigration Some progressive groups are angry with Facebook for running ads supporting GOP lawmakers on board with the immigration overhaul bill. The left-wing groups have turned a blind eye to what Facebook gets out of the overhaul measure, and what it may cost American tech workers. |
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Facebook Joins Lobby For Overhauling Immigration Some progressive groups are angry with Facebook for running ads supporting GOP lawmakers on board with the immigration overhaul bill. The left-wing groups have turned a blind eye to what Facebook gets out of the overhaul measure, and what it may cost American tech workers. |
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'Bertha' Does The Heavy Lifting In Seattle Tunnel Project The world's largest tunnel boring machine in a few months will begin digging a new double-decker highway tunnel under downtown Seattle. If all goes according to plan, Bertha will start digging this summer. It'll emerge again late next year on the other side of downtown, not far from the Space Needle. |
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Will Bureaucracy Keep The U.S. Drone Industry Grounded? Tough federal aviation rules and public backlash against drones have raised worries that the U.S. unmanned aerial vehicle industry will be left behind foreign competitors. Developers say the U.S. light drone industry is being overtaken by manufacturers in Israel and Australia. |
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Will Bureaucracy Keep The U.S. Drone Industry Grounded? Tough federal aviation rules and public backlash against drones have raised worries that the U.S. unmanned aerial vehicle industry will be left behind foreign competitors. Developers say the U.S. light drone industry is being overtaken by manufacturers in Israel and Australia. |
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Senate Moves To Update Federal Online Privacy Laws The long-promised update to the 1986 Electronic Communications Privacy Act is moving through Congress. On Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee approved a bill that would make the police get a warrant before peeking at your old emails and anything else you store online. The House is moving in the same direction. |
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Senate Moves To Update Federal Online Privacy Laws The long-promised update to the 1986 Electronic Communications Privacy Act is moving through Congress. On Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee approved a bill that would make the police get a warrant before peeking at your old emails and anything else you store online. The House is moving in the same direction. |
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Who's Hiring H-1B Visa Workers? It's Not Who You Might Think There's been increasing support for the number of H1-B visas given to highly skilled workers. Large tech companies are leading the push for the increase, but the bulk of the visas go to workers at large consulting firms. |
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Who's Hiring H1-B Visa Workers? It's Not Who You Might Think There's been increasing support for the number of H1-B visas given to highly skilled workers. Large tech companies are leading the push for the increase, but the bulk of the visas go to workers at large consulting firms. |
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Who's Hiring H1-B Visa Workers? It's Not Who You Might Think There's been increasing support for the number of H1-B visas given to highly-skilled workers. Large tech companies are leading the push for the increase, but the bulk of the visas go to workers at large consulting firms. |
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Cyberattack Against Spam-Fighting Organization One Of The Largest Ever A large cyber-attack on an anti-spam organization in Europe is slowing down the Internet. Spamhaus says it was hit by a massive distributed denial of service for more than a week. |
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Yes, Your New Car Has A 'Black Box.' Where's The Off Switch? Most newer cars have recorders that collect data at the moment of a crash and preserve key information. The data is meant to improve safety, but it's also useful in court. The federal government now wants to make the recorders mandatory on all new cars, but privacy advocates say people should have the option of turning their cars' recorders off. |
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Court To Sentence AT&T Hacker Andrew Auernheimer A hacker who released more than 100,000 AT&T customer email addresses will be sentenced in a federal courtroom in New Jersey on Monday. Andrew Auernheimer exposed a security flaw on AT&T's iPad service. |
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Even Where It's Legal, Pot Producers Weigh The Business Risks Marijuana proponents in Washington state have talked of a "gold rush" as the state transitions to a legal, licensed marijuana industry. But uncertainty about state rules and potential federal intervention have made pursuing opportunities in the industry a high-risk business proposition. |
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Even Where It's Legal, Pot Producers Weigh The Business Risks Marijuana proponents in Washington state have talked of a "gold rush" as the state transitions to a legal, licensed marijuana industry. But uncertainty about state rules and potential federal intervention have made pursuing opportunities in the industry a high-risk business proposition. |
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As Police Drones Take Off, Washington State Pushes Back Unmanned aerial vehicles are starting to show up in American police departments, courtesy of grants from the Department of Homeland Security. But that's caused something of a backlash, and now some state legislatures are considering legal limits on drones to address opponents' privacy concerns. |
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American Tech Workers Challenge H-1B Visa Story Two days ago, Morning Edition aired a story about the H-1B program which grants temporary work visas to foreigners with special skills like computer programming. In the story, it was reported that employers have to show they tried to recruit Americans first. But as it turns out, many companies bypass American applicants. |
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American Tech Workers Challenge H-1B Visa Story Two days ago, Morning Edition aired a story about the H-1B program which grants temporary work visas to foreigners with special skills like computer programming. In the story, it was reported that employers have to show they tried to recruit Americans first. But as it turns out, many companies bypass American applicants. |
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Older Tech Workers Oppose Overhauling H-1B Visas Overhauling immigration is complicated and controversial. There's been a proposed increase in H-1B visas. Those are the visas that allow companies to bring in skilled foreign workers for jobs that can't be filled by Americans. |
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Older Tech Workers Oppose Overhauling H-1B Visas Overhauling immigration is complicated and controversial. There's been a proposed increase in H-1B visas. Those are the visas that allow companies to bring in skilled foreign workers for jobs that can't be filled by Americans. |
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From Oil Fields To REI, Interior Nominee Has Outdoorsy Cred Usually, the job of heading the Interior Department goes to a Western politician versed in the struggles over natural resources. So the president's nomination of Sally Jewell, a relatively obscure CEO, has left some of the key players unsure of how to react. |
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From Oil Fields To REI, Interior Nominee Has Outdoorsy Cred Usually, the job of heading the Interior Department goes to a Western politician versed in the struggles over natural resources. So the president's nomination of Sally Jewell, a relatively obscure CEO, has left some of the key players unsure of how to react. |
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Armed 'Good Guys' And The Realities Of Facing A Gunman As the nation ponders how to stop the next mass shooting, the gun rights movement offers one controversial answer: armed civilians. In 2005, one such private citizen tried to stop a mass shooting at a mall in Washington state — and paid a heavy price. |
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Google Explains How It Handles Police Requests For Users' Data For the first time, Google has posted its policies for when it gives up users' information to the government. It's part of a broader company strategy to push for tougher privacy laws. |
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Google Explains How It Handles Police Requests For Users' Data For the first time, Google has posted its policies for when it gives up users' information to the government. It's part of a broader company strategy to push for tougher privacy laws. |
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Is It Morally Wrong For U.S. To Export Coal? The Seattle area is seeing widespread, well-organized opposition to an export industry: coal. Thousands of people have turned out to express their disgust with a plan to build export terminals on Puget Sound to ship American coal to Asia. Opponents cite noise, traffic delays, coal dust and global warming. |
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Is It Morally Wrong For U.S. To Export Coal? The Seattle area is seeing widespread, well-organized opposition to an export industry: coal. Thousands of people have turned out to express their disgust with a plan to build export terminals on Puget Sound to ship American coal to Asia. Opponents cite noise, traffic delays, coal dust and global warming. |
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Sen. Inouye, A War Hero Who Broke Barriers, Dies At 88 Hawaii Democrat Daniel Inouye, the Senate's senior member, received the Medal of Honor for his service in World War II. In Italy, he personally stormed three German machine gun nests, taking them out but losing his right arm in the process. Inouye died Monday after suffering from a respiratory ailment. |
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Pot's Legal In Washington State, But Don't Drive High Last month's ballot initiative that legalized marijuana contained a deal-sweetener for hesitant voters — a new DUI standard that may make life riskier for regular pot users. Regular users of medical marijuana say they'll be stuck on the wrong side of the law. |
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Pot's Legal In Washington State, But Don't Drive High Last month's ballot initiative that legalized marijuana contained a deal-sweetener for hesitant voters — a new DUI standard that may make life riskier for regular pot users. Regular users of medical marijuana say they'll be stuck on the wrong side of the law. |
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Senate Committee OKs Electronic Privacy Measure The Senate Judiciary Committee voted Thursday to make it a little harder for police to read people's old emails. It's something privacy groups and tech companies have wanted for years, but law enforcement groups are less pleased. |
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Post-Petraeus, Net Privacy Backers Hope For A Boost Privacy groups and tech companies have been pushing for more protection for emails and other online personal information for years. They hope the FBI investigation into Gen. David Petraeus' email correspondence with Paula Broadwell will give their efforts new momentum. |
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Left Homeless, Storm Victims Turn To Internet To Find Shelter Tens of thousands of people in the New York City area lost their homes to Superstorm Sandy. Many may be in need of temporary housing, so the home-sharing website Airbnb is working to connect people made homeless by Sandy with people willing to provide free housing. |
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Can Dumping Iron Into The Sea Fight Climate Change? Climate and ocean scientists are questioning a "rogue" experiment off the Canadian coast. A native village dumped hundreds of tons of iron into the water to cause a bloom of plankton, which would then capture greenhouse gases. |
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Can Dumping Iron Into The Sea Fight Climate Change? Climate and ocean scientists are questioning a "rogue" experiment off the Canadian coast. A native village dumped hundreds of tons of iron into the water to cause a bloom of plankton, which would then capture greenhouse gases. |
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3 Ballot Measures Would OK Pot Beyond Medicine This November, three states will vote on ballot initiatives to legalize marijuana for recreational use. The legalization effort is getting support from U.S. attorneys and a Republican candidate for Senate. Some of the most intense opposition is coming from earlier legalization pioneers. |
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Colorado, A Big Win For Obama In 2008, Now A Harder Sell In Colorado, the presidential race is a statistical dead heat. The state went heavily for candidate Barack Obama in 2008 - but the president is now facing fierce headwinds. The race is starting to look more like what's happening nationwide - a struggle to bring out the party base. |
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Hawaii Prep School Gave Obama Window To Success Punahou School occupies a privileged position in Hawaiian society. Barack Obama attended the school on a scholarship starting in the fifth grade. Punahou's lasting gift to Obama was that the elite environment familiarized him with success. |
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Montana Democrat Faces An Uphill Battle To Keep His Senate Seat Republicans retain hopes of retaking control of the Senate. They lost the majority in 2006, in part because of the razor-close victory of Democratic challenger Jon Tester in Montana. Now, Tester is the incumbent facing a tough challenge of his own against the state's sole member of the House. |
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Can A Republican Win A Senate Seat In Blue Hawaii? Surprisingly, some analysts are putting Hawaii's Senate race in the tossup column this year. Hawaii hasn't elected a Republican to the Senate since 1970. But with former Gov. Linda Lingle running, Republicans believe they have a chance. And whoever wins, the state will have its first female senator. |
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Newspaper Takes A Stand On Anonymous Commenters The Spokesman-Review in Spokane, Wash., found itself in court when it tried to protect the anonymity of a reader who posted a snarky, and possibly defamatory, comment. The paper says it had an obligation to protect her identity, but there's growing pressure on news sites to reconsider the practice of allowing anonymous comments. |
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Korean Families Chase Their Dreams In The U.S. A public school in Los Angeles has become a magnet for Korean families who want their kids to learn English while escaping the intense rigor of the Korean school system. In the U.S., they move from school district to school district, cherry-picking the best schools as their kids rise through the grades. |
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Seattle Forager Inspires Others To Learn About Wild, Forgotten Foods A walk in the woods isn't that different from a walk through the produce section of the supermarket for Langdon Cook, an influential Seattle forager, blogger, and home cook. He's dedicated to rekindling interest in forgotten foods. |
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Hidden Dangers Of Tsunami Debris Cross The Pacific Western U.S. beaches are getting a regular dose of debris from the 2011 tsunami in Japan. The first few items were curiosities - a boat here, a soccer ball there. But as the litter accumulates, so does the potential threat of biological invasion. |
