4 ms·

I think part of it is the perception that real environmental and public health damage is being done for totally trivial and indefensible causes. A data center i

I think part of it is the perception that real environmental and public health damage is being done for totally trivial and indefensible causes. A data center is not like an airplane parts manufacturer, which has lots of ugly pollution but provides a necessary national service. Most people use generative AI recreationally, and the productivity gains among white-collar workers are awfully ephemeral. And if you're less pessimistic about the economics of generative AI... that makes it worse! "We get a ton of money, you get increased natural gas emissions, increased unemployment, your electric bill is going up... oh and guess who's bailing us out when the bubble bursts?" Pretty rotten deal!

luxuryballs 3mo ago
casual/recreational AI use is only a subset of computing, data centers are a hardware problem, I say that tongue-in-cheek but literally it’s true, data centers and computing have always been growing in demand and distribution/regional needs regardless of the software and it will continue to evolve, making it an AI issue seems like an opportunistic way of injecting sentiment about AI for the purpose of discussing cultural opinions about AI, these vibes will transcend time and space regardless of the need for physical server space