Can't stop the signal: Today So Far

• Something in KUOW's digital signal is making a very specific car's infotainment system go haywire.
• Washington is en route to upgrading its utilities and nixing carbon, but there are challenges to progress.

This post originally appeared in KUOW's Today So Far newsletter for Feb. 9, 2022.

Fun fact: KUOW's top listeners drive 2016 Mazdas. That's because they have no choice and have to listen.

This story has had Lionel Richie's song "Stuck On You" stuck in my head for a couple days now. In January, people who own 2016 Mazdas noticed their infotainment systems (fancy radios in their cars) wouldn't work. The menu screens were going wacky. Bluetooth was kaput. And their radios were stuck on 94.9 FM. There are a few theories about how and why this is happening. Read about that here. But so far, all anyone can figure is that something in the digital signal is interfering with the car's system.

I think if we give this a couple weeks, we'll start seeing online chatter about how all the fake, government-controlled birds are using the recently-launched 5G signal to relay a computer virus into 2016 Mazdas. The goal? Indoctrination through subliminal radio messaging so people believe the lie that the world is round. Do your research. It's on the internet.

Dyer prediction: I have a feeling that this will come down to computer code. Radio signals are digital these days. They send information so the title of the song you are listening to shows up on your radio's screen, for example. Something like this has already happened. The podcast 99% Invisible made Mazda infotainment systems glitch a couple years ago. It was determined that the character combo of "% I" means something in the code the radios are programed with, and made them go haywire. I'm assuming something similar is happening here. I'll keep you updated when the answer is found.

Speaking of those fake government birds (I hope readers realize the bird thing is sarcasm), the power lines they rely on to charge up are going to evolve over the next couple of decades. Thanks to legislation signed in 2019, Washington's electric grid is on its way to modernizing and phasing out carbon emissions. But that is easier said than done. As KUOW's Soundside reports, there is a significant need for innovation for the state to generate all its power from renewable or carbon-free sources by 2045. There are other goals en route to that deadline. Read more here.

Adaptation and innovation are going to be key for the challenge ahead. Washington has goals to nix natural gas, for example. That means more pressure will be placed on the electric grid for things like heating and cooking. You can also expect more and more electric cars hitting the road each year, which means one more thing (a pretty major thing) to plug in. Our utilities are likely going to look a lot different over the coming decades.

Have a comment or want to reach out to me? Send me an email at dyer@kuow.org.

AS SEEN ON KUOW

Hospital assistant Tracy Chambers, right, talks with another staff member in a hallway in the acute care unit of Harborview Medical Center, Friday, Jan. 14, 2022, in Seattle. About half the patients in the unit were Covid-19 positive or in quarantine after exposure. Check out updates on the pandemic in our daily pandemic blog. (Elaine Thompson / AP)

DID YOU KNOW?

You've likely heard of Rosa Parks and how she refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama bus in the 1950s. The act led to the famous Montgomery Bus Boycott, and helped put Martin Luther King Jr. in a larger spotlight.

But have you heard of Claudette Colvin? She is an often unsung hero of the U.S Civil Rights movement. Nine months before Parks was arrested on that segregated bus, Colvin refused to give up her seat to a white woman. She was arrested and became one of the plaintiffs in the Browder vs Gayle lawsuit that ultimately deemed bus segregation unconstitutional, putting an end to it. But despite being the first to refuse to give up her seat, civil rights leaders at the time did not use her as a figure of the movement, not on the level of Parks.

At the time, Colvin was 15, unmarried, and pregnant. Civil Rights leaders in this more conservative time and area felt that her profile would work against them. But Colvin's action did add up to nixing bus segregation in the state. And it had consequences for her. She was placed on probation. The court never followed up to complete that probation, and her status as a juvenile delinquent was never overturned. Just last year, at the age of 82, Colvin's request to have her juvenile record expunged was approved, and her slate was wiped clean.

She told NPR: "When I think about why I'm seeking to have my name cleared by the state, it is because I believe if that happened it would show the generation growing up now that progress is possible, and things do get better. It will inspire them to make the world better."

What else don't we know? Email us at hello@kuow.org.

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