Eek There’s a mouse in my Airbnb. Can I get a refund?

When Kristal Bird finds a mouse in her Airbnb, she asks the host for a refund. But is that allowed? | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 1 year ago

How mechanics keep 50-year-old BART trains running: Windows 98, eBay, and scraps

Keeping BART running is far from easy. Mechanics rely on frankensteined laptops operating Windows 98, train yard scraps, and vintage computer chips. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 1 year ago

Rolling blackouts possible Monday: record-high temps expected in Bay Area cities

High temperatures could strain the state’s power grid to the point of rolling blackouts, while exacerbating fire conditions across Northern California. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 1 year ago

Tech-infused Airbnb shows seniors how to age in place in style

Noise-canceling carpet. Programmable floors. An Ohio interior designer turned a historic house into an Airbnb loaded with features to help seniors not only vacation but experience tech that can hel… | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 1 year ago

Tech unit of Japanese auto titan leases big Palo Alto office site

A Toyota Motor autonomous vehicle unit has rented a big chunk of office space within the high-profile Stanford Research Park in Palo Alto. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 1 year ago

California man charged in $21M cryptocurrency fraud scheme

Michael Alan Stollery, 54, was accused of falsifying documents, creating fake testimonials and lying about business partnerships with prominent companies in order to lure investors. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 1 year ago

Great America might close in 6 years after developer buys land

The Great America theme park’s final rides are in view now that one of the Bay Area’s biggest real estate developers has bought the land beneath the iconic Santa Clara amusement center … | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 1 year ago

Housing developer ditches project at BART, leaves a dent in city’s housing plans

Brookfield Residential’s mysterious exit sets back the city’s development plans. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 1 year ago

Tesla Shanghai workers can leave the factory for first time in weeks

Thousands of Tesla Inc. workers in Shanghai will be able to return to their homes from Friday, exiting a factory bubble set up to maintain operations during the city’s recent Covid-19 lockdow… | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 1 year ago

Silicon Valley braces for the good times to end

The tech industry is facing a new reality check as broader economic conditions have deteriorated. Each week seems to bring concerning headlines of tech companies laying off employees and implementi… | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 1 year ago

Stanford Nurses on strike reach deal to end strike next week

Contract, which still must be ratified, would give nurses salary raises totaling 17% over three years | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 1 year ago

Stanford Nurses Announce Strike

Ninety-three percent of eligible nurses authorized the strike, the union said. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Man who never wanted to ride in fighter jet accidentally ejects himself

A heart-monitor watch he was wearing recorded his heart rate at 140 beats per minute — “full tachycardia” — before the plane even left the ground. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Ukrainian mom killed identified as Silicon Valley tech firm accountant

Tatiana Perebeinis and her two children – Alise and Nikita – died Sunday wile trying to flee Irpin. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

UC Berkeley loses CRISPR gene editing patent case

UC scientist Jennifer Doudna loses patent rights to a gene editing technique that earned a Nobel Prize. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Apple CEO Tim Cook targeted by possibly armed stalker who came to his home

Apple cites ‘erratic, threatening, and bizarre behavior’ by woman who reportedly drove Porsche SUV to Palo Alto from Virginia in pursuit of company CEO Tim Cook. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Single family home in Sunnyvale has sold for $823,000 over asking

A 1,300 square foot single family home in Sunnyvale has sold for $823,000 over asking, marking the city’s continued surging real estate prices. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Federal officials say BART San Jose extension cost $9.1B–twice original estimate

This announcement could mark a potential 32% increase in the project’s total cost. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Head of California's largest union arrested for theft, fraud

Alma Hernandez was being held at The Sacramento County Main Jail was and was ineligible for bail, according to the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office’s website. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Head of California's largest union arrested for theft, tax fraud

Alma Hernandez was being held at The Sacramento County Main Jail was and was ineligible for bail, according to the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office’s website. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

GAF Energy has opened a San Jose factory to make integrated solar roofs

A solar roof maker has launched a San Jose venture that increasingly is rare in the expensive Bay Area: a new factory. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Tesla agrees to big office lease in Palo Alto, despite HQ exit

Tesla has agreed to a big office lease in Palo Alto, a deal that provides a counterpoint to the electric vehicle maker’s decision to shift its corporate headquarters from Silicon Valley to Te… | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

California unemployment claims rocket higher, worst in five months

California workers filed 75,800 initial claims for unemployment during the week that ended on Sept. 18. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Newsom abolishes CA single-family zoning

SB 9 allows up to four units on what are now single-family lots throughout California — with some caveats. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Fire destroys Palo Alto home tied to Google co-founder Larry Page

Two firefighters suffered minor injuries. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Silicon Valley finds remote work is easier to begin than end

Technology companies that led the charge into remote work as the pandemic unfurled are confronting a new challenge: how, when and even whether they should bring long-isolated employees back to offi… | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Social Security won't be able to pay full benefits by 2034, due to the pandemic

Social Security will have to cut benefits by 2034 if Congress does nothing to address the program’s long-term funding shortfall, according to an annual report released Tuesday by the Social S… | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Theranos: Elizabeth Holmes’ criminal trial to showcase Silicon Valley

Nation-wide interest in the case has been primed by a best-selling book, documentaries and an upcoming movie starring Jennifer Lawrence. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

EUV lithography company ASML launches new San Jose campus

ASML has officially opened its big new tech campus in north San Jose, an office and research center that the company says can accommodate several hundred of its workers. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

I kept honking at a sleeping Tesla driver on the freeway, but she didn’t wake up

She was slumped over while going 55 mph on Highway 85, the reader says — and then the car took the exit at full speed. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

First U.S. Covid deaths came earlier than previously thought

Amended death certificates indicate that COVID contributed to the deaths of people in six states, including California, in January 2020, weeks before what is currently considered the earliest U.S. … | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

LA County school district mandates Covid-19 vaccines for K-12 kids

Culver City Unified School District is believed to be the first in California to mandate COVID-19 vaccination proof for eligible students by Nov. 19, but the superintendent says other districts are… | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

CA drought: Past dry periods have lasted more than 200 years, scientists say

California drought: Past dry periods have lasted more than 200 years, scientists say | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

YouTube suspends Sen. Rand Paul for 1 week for claiming masks are ineffective

The suspension comes on the same day that Twitter banned Georgia Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s account for one week following another violation of the platform’s rules. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Homeless encampment grows on Apple property in Silicon Valley

The tech company says it’s trying to come up with a solution after an encampment of dozens of people and more than 200 tons of debris has formed on its property. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Settlement reached in Flintstone House case

The dinosaurs and other quirky decorations at the so-called Flintstone House in Hillsborough can remain. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Big tech campus at old Fry’s north San Jose store site pushes ahead

A huge tech campus would bring north San Jose nearly 2 million square feet of new offices and demolish an old Fry’s Electronics store. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Japan to start antitrust probe on Apple, Google, Nikkei says

(Bloomberg) — The Japanese government will start investigating how Apple Inc. and Alphabet Inc.’s Google deal with Japanese smartphone makers, which could lead to tightening antitrust r… | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Alphabet moonshot Loon is jolted by layoffs

Despite layoffs at Mountain View-based Loon LLC, displaced workers at the Alphabet moonshot that was created to bring the Internet to remote places are finding jobs with the tech titan, which owns … | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Judge OKs class action for 10K+ women over alleged Google gender pay gap

Plaintiffs welcome this week’s ruling in long-running suit, saying it shows widespread nature of alleged pay bias. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Computer coding could count for foreign language credit under bill

Instead of learning a foreign language, Michigan students could take computer coding classes to replace the high school graduation requirement, under a bill that passed the state House Tuesday. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Theranos: Judge skeptical that Holmes’ luxury lifestyle should go before jury

Holmes’ lawyers argue that evidence of a luxurious lifestyle is irrelevant and inflammatory, while prosecutors claim it shows her motivation for fraud | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Speed cameras may be coming to San Jose, Oakland

While police have reservations about this, they seem less upset than in past years. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 2 years ago

Bay Area Thieves Steal $4.5M from Home Depots

Members of one heist team brought homemade barcode stickers designed to scan lower prices, police say. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 3 years ago

Oakland is building a new phone app for its homeless residents

The app will provide easy access to a database of services. But it won’t help with the main problem: a lack of housing. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 3 years ago

Work from home forever? After Covid, Californians want to ditch daily commutes

Californians who swapped mind-numbing traffic for “commutes” to a home office don’t want to go back to their old daily grind. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 3 years ago

The longtime Los Altos resident founded Adobe in 1982 with a colleague from Xerox, John Warnock, and served in several high-profile roles until his retirement in 2000. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 3 years ago

How IP rights helped US fight Covid-19

Decades of expensive and risky research projects have paved the way for today’s breakthroughs. | Continue reading


@mercurynews.com | 3 years ago