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AI exits in America probably have a political cliff approaching fast as populist backlash will hit them, or perhaps they see political winds favorable to regula

AI exits in America probably have a political cliff approaching fast as populist backlash will hit them, or perhaps they see political winds favorable to regulatory capture in the future and are waiting for that?

JumpCrisscross 4mo ago
> AI exits in America probably have a political cliff approaching fast as populist backlash will hit them The populist backlash is coming for datacenters. I'm unconvinced that's truly problematic to these companies given data travels close to the speed of light and plenty of countries have energy, data interconnects and governments unresponsive to locals' concerns.
- kridsdale1 4mo ago
  This morning I heard a convincing argument that the data center backlash is only really significant in the USA because jobs here equal health care access. Europeans can afford to be less threatened existentially.
  - vrganj 3mo ago
    Its also about pollution and water and similar concerns
  - cromka 3mo ago
    If heck the weather maps for the past free days in Europe, you'll see why they won't get any popular here, either.
strangattractor 4mo ago
Data centers are the next Dark Fiber from 2000. After VCs and private Equity fund them there will not be sufficient demand because AI will inevitably not entirely live up to all the hype. The fire sale will eventually begin. Then Google, M$, Apple and Amazon will buy them at a discount just like Google snatched up the dark fiber after 2000.
- ezst 3mo ago
  Only worse: internet infrastructure (routers, fiber, ...) depreciates over multiple decades, not mere months. What's inside those data centers matters more than them being built: today's cutting edge inference chips or GPUs may not be so useful if either hardware or models evolve in the slightest, and in some way, we should hope for that if we want to be optimistic about the future of AI/LLMs.
- saati 3mo ago
  Fiber is good for a hundred years, nothing in a data center will last ten.

JumpCrisscross 4mo ago

> AI exits in America probably have a political cliff approaching fast as populist backlash will hit them The populist backlash is coming for datacenters. I'm unconvinced that's truly problematic to these companies given data travels close to the speed of light and plenty of countries have energy, data interconnects and governments unresponsive to locals' concerns.

kridsdale1 4mo ago
This morning I heard a convincing argument that the data center backlash is only really significant in the USA because jobs here equal health care access. Europeans can afford to be less threatened existentially.
- vrganj 3mo ago
  Its also about pollution and water and similar concerns
- cromka 3mo ago
  If heck the weather maps for the past free days in Europe, you'll see why they won't get any popular here, either.

strangattractor 4mo ago

Data centers are the next Dark Fiber from 2000. After VCs and private Equity fund them there will not be sufficient demand because AI will inevitably not entirely live up to all the hype. The fire sale will eventually begin. Then Google, M$, Apple and Amazon will buy them at a discount just like Google snatched up the dark fiber after 2000.

ezst 3mo ago
Only worse: internet infrastructure (routers, fiber, ...) depreciates over multiple decades, not mere months. What's inside those data centers matters more than them being built: today's cutting edge inference chips or GPUs may not be so useful if either hardware or models evolve in the slightest, and in some way, we should hope for that if we want to be optimistic about the future of AI/LLMs.
saati 3mo ago
Fiber is good for a hundred years, nothing in a data center will last ten.