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US residents angry datacenters 'shoved down our throats' are recalling officials

theguardian.com

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Re: US residents angry datacenters 'shoved down our throats' are recalling officials

#21

Post by helterskelter »

SoftTalker wrote: post #15
Recurecur wrote: post #6

We should all keep in mind that foreign interests, primarily China, are astroturfing to drive resentment in the USA against AI and datacenters. National governments are largely viewing AI as a strategic capability. That’s not to say there aren’t downsides, but they vary quite a bit depending on location and grid capacity. I actually expect there will be major progress made on the energy efficiency and performance of…

Why aren't we (in the US) building all these data centers in the Southwest where huge amounts of vacant land and the best wind and solar power options are? With fiber connectivity it doesn't matter if they are in remote locations.

Probably the lack of water. I don't know why they need to continually pump it instead of doing a closed loop and cooling it through a few miles of pipe underground which is practically free, after you install the plumbing. Sure evaporative cooling is good, but certainly there are workable alternatives.

Re: US residents angry datacenters 'shoved down our throats' are recalling officials

#22

Post by Zigurd »

khriss wrote: post #13
Recurecur wrote: post #6

We should all keep in mind that foreign interests, primarily China, are astroturfing to drive resentment in the USA against AI and datacenters. National governments are largely viewing AI as a strategic capability. That’s not to say there aren’t downsides, but they vary quite a bit depending on location and grid capacity. I actually expect there will be major progress made on the energy efficiency and performance of…

> We should all keep in mind that foreign interests, primarily China, are astroturfing to drive resentment in the USA against AI and datacenters There hasn't been any credible reporting on this so far. It's far more likely people are just mad that they have to pay for the AI boom both literally via increased electricity rates and via increased noise, water shortage and construction related pollution caused by the dat…

If it were true that data centers are building "American dynamism" and China wants to suppress that, surely they would be building data centers the way they build trains.

They're not. And that should make you go hmmm.

Re: US residents angry datacenters 'shoved down our throats' are recalling officials

#23

Post by treis »

tayo42 wrote: post #5

What's driving the need for datacenters All over the world? Aren't there only a handful of companies need compute and can build datacenters? This isn't aws building more regions is it? Also recently I was surprised and not surprised to find people are making anti ai like their identity now. Like there's a reddit community dedicated to this

There are things called LLMs that are incredibly useful but require a staggering amount of compute. Providers are building out data centers to meet the new need.

Re: US residents angry datacenters 'shoved down our throats' are recalling officials

#24

Post by coldpie »

SoftTalker wrote: post #20
ChiperSoft wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Investors, thats what is driving it. AI is the only thing venture capital has cared about since 2022, so the people who earn fortunes from sucking on the VC teat are following the money. It doesn't matter if the data centers are worthless in five years, they will have extracted wealth from building them.

How do you extract wealth from building a highly capital-intensive physical plant? Construction crews and building material suppliers do not work on a promise of future payments.

You get VC to give your company $X00 M to build out AI capabilities, take a $X M salary for yourself, and retire. Doesn't matter what happens past that.

Re: US residents angry datacenters 'shoved down our throats' are recalling officials

#25

Post by raychis »

People aren’t mad about technology. They’re mad about being told after the fact that their town might lose water, power, quiet, or tax revenue to a project they didn't have a say in.

Build the future, sure. But don’t sneak it past the people who have to live next to it. If you have to sneak it like that, then maybe it is not worth having.

Get sick of all the shady behaviour and lying. These companies, owners, and CEOs need to be taken down a peg.

Re: US residents angry datacenters 'shoved down our throats' are recalling officials

#26

Post by SoftTalker »

helterskelter wrote: post #21
SoftTalker wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why aren't we (in the US) building all these data centers in the Southwest where huge amounts of vacant land and the best wind and solar power options are? With fiber connectivity it doesn't matter if they are in remote locations.

Probably the lack of water. I don't know why they need to continually pump it instead of doing a closed loop and cooling it through a few miles of pipe underground which is practically free, after you install the plumbing. Sure evaporative cooling is good, but certainly there are workable alternatives.

That or latent heat cooling, the other end of the phase-state spectrum: Instead of evaporating water during the day, make ice all night when ambient air temps drop and then use it to cool a closed-loop system during the day.

Re: US residents angry datacenters 'shoved down our throats' are recalling officials

#28

Post by linsomniac »

tayo42 wrote: post #5

What's driving the need for datacenters All over the world? Aren't there only a handful of companies need compute and can build datacenters? This isn't aws building more regions is it? Also recently I was surprised and not surprised to find people are making anti ai like their identity now. Like there's a reddit community dedicated to this

In the "AI 2027" article/story, they're talking about next generation models "using 100 times the compute used to train GPT4. Here's a video covering that part of it https://youtu.be/5KVDDfAkRgc?si=TR8XDQmye6O6kkiT&t=169 (the 100x is at 4:38, this video starts where he starts talking compute of GPT3).

So my guess is that what is driving the need is that (speculated) 100x the next major models.

Re: US residents angry datacenters 'shoved down our throats' are recalling officials

#29

Post by sofixa »

mikestew wrote: post #10
Danox wrote: post #2

The honeymoon is over. Among regular citizens, gamers and some groups of tech, many are now incensed by the cost of memory, I was once mildly enthusiastic about AI but now not so much.

I'm sure it's more than the cost of memory. The person that does all of their computing on their phone doesn't care. They do care that aspect of life is infected with this shit. From the useless "AI" chatbot that is really just a reskin of their old POS chatbot (or an "Actual Indian"), to the U. S. government talking about giving money to these companies ('cuz ol' Larry and Elon need the money), all the way to the te…

Don't forget the US government openly bragging about using AI for targeting in the Iran war, while also trying to pretend it didn't strike a school and kill a few hundred schoolchildren. (No we don't know if it was AI that made the mistake, and it's not like we're likely to get a proper investigation into it)

Re: US residents angry datacenters 'shoved down our throats' are recalling officials

#30

Post by tayo42 »

jeroenhd wrote: post #19
tayo42 wrote: post #5

What's driving the need for datacenters All over the world? Aren't there only a handful of companies need compute and can build datacenters? This isn't aws building more regions is it? Also recently I was surprised and not surprised to find people are making anti ai like their identity now. Like there's a reddit community dedicated to this

Investors chasing the ideal of not having to employ any people while still making money somehow. And, of course, being the company to provide all the AI; in a gold rush, don't dig for gold, start selling buckets.

I get that, I mean who are the investors? Random colo companies? Are The big cloud providers are bringing up new small regions in all of these random towns? Only so many companies can even get the hardware to fill it. And there are only a handful llm providers.

There's only so many companies involved as far as I can tell,but these datacenter stories seem everywhere?

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