Soundside is on summer break, but while we’re away, we’re bringing you some of our best stories since we launched our show in January.
Today: the best of tech.
2022 has already been a big year for the tech industry: Microsoft announced its intention to acquire video game giant Activision Blizzard, the metaverse hit the mainstream, and we watched another wave of union votes at Amazon warehouses.
There was also one tech trend that captured the fascination and confusion of people across the internet: non-fungible tokens, better known as NFTs.
Back in March, Soundside producer Alec Cowan took listeners to the world’s first NFT museum. He caught up with the creators who craft the digital tokens, and the collectors that gobble up their work.
But NFTs aren’t the only tech phenomena that have captured the delight (and disdain) of those outside of their creators’ communities.
Recently, Hollywood has found a new fascination: the tech bro villain.
You know the archetype: they’re a narcissist, a know-it-all, and they have plenty of power at their disposal.
In February, HBO Max released the tech-thriller movie “KIMI.” The film follows an agoraphobic tech worker in Seattle played by Zoë Kravitz who overhears a murder during her work as a “voice stream interpreter” and must leave the comfort of her home to track down the murderer only to discover that she too is being tracked and surveilled.
Soundside host Libby Denkmann spoke to Bilge Ebiri, a film critic at Vulture and New York Magazine, about the connection between fictional tech villains and real life.
Denkmann also caught up with a panel of local journalists about whether tech bros deserve their bad rap.
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