Soundside

All good things must come to an end, and while that includes things like MoPop's Nirvana exhibition, it also means the work week is coming to a close. With that in mind, here's Soundside producer Jason Megatron Burrows with all the things you could be doing this weekend! LINKS: Seahawks vs 49ers - 1:05 pm Sunday 9/7 Seattle Storm vs NY Liberty - 7:00 pm Friday 9/5 SEA-Nordic Film Festival Port Tow...

Last week, the parents of a 16-year-old boy who died by suicide sued OpenAI, the company that owns ChatGPT. They say the bot fed into their son’s suicidal ideation, giving him technical advice on how to commit the act and even encouraging him to hide his plans.  The tragedy highlights the dark side of the emotional dependence some people have developed with AI. What potential power does...

Monsanto has settled with more than 200 people in Monroe, Washington, who were exposed to PCBs -- toxic chemicals once produced by the company.  Students, parents and staff at the Sky Valley alternative school in Snohomish County, had filed lawsuits against Monsanto starting in 2018, after reporting significant illnesses. The amount of the settlement has not been revealed, but it looks t...

If you’re a news junkie (or social media user) your feeds have likely been inundated lately with headlines and videos of immigration officers taking people into custody across our region. Like the story about federal agents arresting two people working to tame the Bear Gulch fire near Lake Cushman. Or the arrest of a Washington National Guard veteran who has lived in the U.S. for decades&hel...

In 22 states, people subject to certain domestic violence protection orders must surrender their guns.  Washington State has had that requirement since 2014, when lawmakers unanimously voted to strip abusers of their guns.  But not all judges here have been enforcing that law. That’s because of a 2022 appeals court decision that led many judges and judicial officers to view it as u...

If you’ve driven from Seattle to Mount Rainier this summer, you might’ve had to find a different route from normal – one that misses the town of Wilkeson. Since April, this Pierce County town of just under 500 people has been cut off from a major source of economic activity: Through traffic, due to the closure of the Fairfax Bridge a few months ago.   And, to add insult...

It’s Thursday, and on Thursdays, we hear from Soundside Producer Jason Megatron Burrows with everything worth doing this weekend... but he's on vacation so here's Producer Shane Mehling instead. WA State Fair BUMBERSHOOT PAX West 2025 Seattle Indies Expo Dave Matthews’ Annual takeover of The Gorge Cypress Hill at Marymoore Park Blackberry Festival Olympia Harbor Days Thank you to the s...

Have you been at a party recently and found yourself reaching for sparkling water instead of a glass of wine? Join the club.   A new Gallup poll found that Americans are drinking less than ever before. Only 54% of U.S. adults are reporting that they consume alcohol. That’s a record low since the survey company started asking about people’s drinking habits back in 1939. ...

The story of Amanda Knox has been told many times, and there have been several versions: there were the sensational allegations laid out by an Italian prosecutor, of a University of Washington exchange student who, in 2007, murdered her British roommate as part of a sex-game-gone wrong.  That story landed Knox in Italian prison for almost four years; that story was fiction. Then, there were t...

Governor Ferguson continues to defy demands from the Trump Administration to end Washington’s “sanctuary state” policies. But lawmakers say there’s one place here where protections for immigrants are falling short: state prisons. That, says Tacoma state Representative Sharlett Mena, means the state isn’t doing everything it could to keep Washingtonians safe. According...

President Trump has threatened to sign an Executive Order that would end mail-in voting in America.  His comments last week come at a time when the President is suggesting multiple ways to help Republicans hold onto Congress in the 2026 midterms. Nearly a third of national ballots came through the mail in the 2024 election. And the Washington State legislature required vote-by-mail starting i...

The future of Seattle City Light might run through Oregon.  The city has contracted two solar fields in central Oregon in an effort to meet surging demand for electricity in the city. It’s estimated that by 2033, the utility will need to about double its current production in order to keep up. But where all of that new power will come from is still unclear. Guest David Kroman , Seattle...

Recent tech company protests are highlighting the connection between worker power and free speech here in Seattle. On Sunday, protestors, including current and former Microsoft employees, kayaked across Lake Washington to the homes of Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, and President Brad Smith. From the water they unfurled banners reading “Microsoft kills kids” and “Satya + Brad = War...

Recently on Soundside, we took a ride into the world of micromobility. Specifically, we wanted to know as more e-bikes and scooters crowd the streets and sidewalks, how are cities like Seattle adapting? And after that segment, we got an interesting listener question about helmets, inspired by this Slate article . So we decided to investigate. "I think it's very wise to wear a helmet," our expert g...

A brand new contemporary art space opened up this week   in downtown Seattle. It's called Cannonball Arts, and Soundside recently got a sneak preview. GUESTS: Brent Watanabe , a Seattle based artist who specializes in computer-controlled installations Greg Lundgren , Creative Director of New Rising Sun RELATED LINKS: Cannonball Arts Downtown Seattle’s Bed Bath & Beyond building to b...

What does the Pacific Northwest sound like to you?  Is it the tide rolling over a rocky beach? The wind across the Palouse? Or maybe a ferry horn echoing across the Puget Sound? On Soundside, we occasionally ask field recordists about THEIR iconic sounds of the northwest. Today, we hear from Gordon Hempton, also known as the Sound Tracker. He sent us a recording of snow melting on Hurricane R...

It’s Thursday, and on Thursdays, we hear from Soundside Producer Jason Megatron Burrows with everything worth doing this weekend! LINKS: A Clarinet Concert with Cameron DeLuca Bend It Like Booker WA State Garlic Fest The Evergreen State Fair Get Sauced! ZooTunes Comedy What the Funk Fest Makah Days in Neah Bay Everfree Northwest Dragonflight GameCon Thank you to the supporters of KUOW, you h...

A group of current and former Microsoft employees briefly occupied part of the company’s Redmond campus yesterday to protest the relationship between the tech giant and Israel’s military.  The protest was led by a group called No Azure for Apartheid. Their name refers to a cloud computing service that has been contracted for use by Israel’s government. The demonstration foll...

For college students, saying you majored in computer science used to be code (excuse the pun) for a six-figure salary and job stability.  Now some fear those days are behind us.  Since 2014, the number of undergraduates majoring in computer science has more than doubled, but the job offers aren’t flowing like they used to.  Natasha Singer, a technology reporter at The New York...

In many ways, the homicide of Barbara Innis was a clear cut case. There were witnesses, a weapon, and a suspect immediately taken into custody.  The complication: the suspect, Barbara’s husband, can’t remember the crime. 87 year old George Innis had shown signs of dementia for years prior to the killing of his wife at their Bellevue assisted living center. His journey through the...

If you got your coffee from a Seattle Starbucks this morning, it may have been prepared by a unionized barista.  At least 33 Starbucks in Washington have unions, including the cafe at the company’s headquarters in Sodo and the Reserve Roastery on Capitol Hill, according to The Seattle Times. It’s the result of an organizing effort that began in 2021 in Buffalo, New York. Starbucks...

Across Washington, student vaccination rates have fallen slightly over the past few years, but those statewide figures gloss over some parts that saw pretty big declines --- especially in one southwest Washington school district. The data showed the Naselle-Grays River Valley School District saw student vaccinations for diseases like tetanus, polio and rubella drop by more than 46%, making it the...

It’s not just your imagination: There are more shared bikes and scooters zipping around the streets of Seattle. Data collected by the city's Department of Transportation shows that between January and early August of 2025, the number of trips recorded on shared bikes and scooters jumped nearly 75 percent compared with the same time period last year.  As streets and sidewalks get more cr...

Last week, actress Bindi Irwin made a viral post on Instagram. Bindi is the daughter of the late Steve Irwin – the famed “Crocodile Hunter.”  Bindi is also, herself, a conservationist, but her post didn’t have to do with wildlife health. Rather, it was about her own. She said she was recovering from surgery to remove 51 lesions, a cyst, and her appendix. Prior to this,...

For years, Seattle residents have known that several city police officers attended the ‘Stop the Steal’ rally in Washington D.C. on January 6th, 2021. But the names of most of those police officers were unknown until recently. After a lengthy court fight, the city in late July disclosed the identities of all the officers who attended the rally.  The city also released records from...