Alec Cowan
Producer, Soundside
About
Alec Cowan is a producer for Soundside. His interests have brought many eclectic stories to the program, and his segments gravitate toward history, technology, arts and culture, and the environment. Proud to be KUOW's unofficial "boat guy."
Prior to joining Soundside, Alec wore many hats at KUOW. He was a producer for The Record with Bill Radke and Primed seasons two and three . He also reported an episode of SoundQs detailing how prohibition forever changed Seattle policing and assisted with reporting a breakthrough cold case solved with the use of genetic genealogy.
Before joining KUOW Alec worked in NPR's Story Lab, where he helped pilot the Louder Than a Riot podcast, about hip-hop and mass incarceration, and assisted in producing a story on volunteerism in Iraq for Rough Translation. Originally from Grand Junction, Colorado, his roots in the Northwest begin in Eugene, where he studied English and philosophy at the University of Oregon and worked as a news reporter for NPR member station KLCC. He is likely neglecting his saxophone, growing book collection, and expanding personal project list in favor of boosting his online Xbox ranking.
Location: Seattle
Languages Spoken: English
Pronouns: he/him/his
Podcasts
Stories
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Arts & Life
A snowball that became an avalanche. Lessons from the financial struggles of the Bellevue Arts Museum
What started as an art fair made it big in 2001, when the Bellevue Arts Museum opened its brand-new building on the corner of 6th Street and Bellevue Way. But in the decades since opening its doors, BAM has struggled financially, and in recent reporting, the Seattle Times’ Margo Vansynghel found that a recent fundraiser was just one symptom of larger financial struggles.
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Technology
What former Binance CEO's money laundering conviction could mean for crypto crime
This week a Seattle federal court sentenced Changpeng Zhao -- founder and former CEO of the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, Binance -- to four months in prison. In contrast to the high-profile case of FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried, who used his crypto exchange to defraud billions of dollars from its users, Zhao pled guilty to not doing more to prevent money laundering on his exchange.
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Technology
How tech titans profit off the anxiety of relentless change
In her new book, "Technocapitalism: the Rise of the New Robber Barons and the Fight for the Common Good," investigative reporter and economist Loretta Napoleoni tracks the rise of 'tech titans,' and argues they have used technology to become massively wealthy at a high cost to most of the rest of us.
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Environment
Can we combat climate change by brightening clouds?
A University of Washington professor is the lead researcher on a team experimenting with "cloud brightening" technology to make clouds more reflective so they bounce more of the sun’s rays back out to space, theoretically cooling the Earth and combating global warming.
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Health
How beverage battles undermined the tap and gave rise to bottled water
Dip into your average grocery or convenience store, and you’ll have your pick of at least a dozen different brands of bottled water. But despite being so ubiquitous in American culture today, the meteoric rise of bottled water isn't by coincidence -- and your average bottle and average tap have more in common than you might think.
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Health
Bird flu is now spreading to cattle. Should Washington dairy farmers be worried?
As of last week, a long-running avian influenzas outbreak has affected more than 85 million poultry birds -- making it the deadliest avian flu in U.S. history. If that wasn’t enough cause for concern, cases of avian flu are now showing up in dairy cows and in Texas, at least one case was confirmed to have jumped from a dairy cow to a person.
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Business
Is Amazon’s ‘Just Walk Out’ technology powered by AI or by hundreds of underpaid workers in India?
The world’s first Amazon Go store in Seattle opened on Jan. 22, 2018. The New York Times called it “A Store of the Future,” where all customers had to do was pop an item in their cart and walk out. A little over six years in the future, developers for Amazon's “Just Walk Out” technology are facing layoffs, and the technology itself is being fazed out at 40 Amazon Fresh grocery stores.
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Economy
Do basic income programs cause people to work less? Let's ask Alaska
Since the early 1980s, Alaska has sent checks to residents every October, generally for around $1,000 or $2,000. In 2020, they were for more than $3,000. A typical household could get up to $10,000.
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Arts & Life
Seattle operetta follows Japanese American women trapped on both sides of WWII
The separation of Japanese American families during WWII is the focus of "Currents," a new operetta by local librettist AC Petersen and composer Jeremy Berdin.
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Arts & Life
Companion? Significant other? How we can understand friends who are more than just the 'best'
For a lot of people, our life-long significant other is a friend. And in a society that obsessed with finding a romantic soul mate, these platonic relationships are left in a gray area. It was after forging a strong platonic friendship that author Rhaina Cohen realized we often lack the words to talk about the variety of life-long best-friendships we can have. Cohen is the author of "The Other Significant Others: Reimagining Life with Friendship at the Center"