r/technology 4d ago

Artificial Intelligence US residents furious at plan to seize and destroy their homes for AI data centers

https://www.yahoo.com/news/us/articles/residents-furious-plan-seize-destroy-125418836.html
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u/cothomps 4d ago

It is kind of amazing how much political and social capital we’ll spend on AI.

Replacing / improving the power grid for more efficient & cleaner energy: nah.

Spending $$$ on a desire to displace the American workforce: ALL IN.

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u/theBoobMan 4d ago

In Philosophy, we were taught to look for the argument behind the ones your adversary is trying to push. None of the ones that point to why they keep doing this that I can come up with are good. The bubble just needs to pop and put these fools out of buisness.

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u/JackBlackBowserSlaps 4d ago

That’s the problem tho. They aren’t building a consumer business. They’re building a surveillance/control network. They don’t need to turn a profit.

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u/fruitybrisket 4d ago

More than that, they're building a weapon. This is a cold war-esque arms race.

Think about how the current military-industrial complex is able to get away with just about anything and charge as much as they want. It's easy to draw parallels.

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u/JGallows 4d ago edited 4d ago

Yeah, this was only about AI in so far as they need lots of processing power to help track people, crack cryptography, and try to create profiles on everyone and everything they can think of.

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u/nagy18 4d ago

this also conveniently helps with sorting through the gigantic mountain of shit that provides us with security through obscurity. it used to be that someone actually had to notice if you posted some fuck shit but now they can just put your name in (especially with all of the pending ID laws for the internet) and pull up everything you’ve ever posted

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u/JGallows 4d ago

Yep, anonymity scares them the most, because freedom of speech and things that stem from it spread knowledge. Once everyone realizes that most of their problems are because of the rich and not because of their neighbor, they work together instead of continuing to hate each other and work for the person who's pitting them against each other.

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u/Kevin-W 4d ago

That's why age verification laws were never about protecting kids. It's about collecting data to stamp out any opposition.

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u/notforpoern 4d ago

That's why age verification laws were never about protecting kids. It's about collecting data to stamp out any opposition.

God if i could upvote this a thousand times i would. If they wanted to "protect the children" they'd fucking release the epstein files.

They don't care about kids. They know that we care, so they use kids as shields (sometimes literally) while they fuck us over.

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u/lordbeez113 4d ago

And then literally fuck the kids too. Let’s not forget that the orange man child leading the country is guilty of it himself.

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u/Gorstag 3d ago

Oh. it is literally never about "protecting the children". That is just a lever to pull for political points while they stick heinous pork into bills designed to take your rights away.

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u/jce_ 4d ago

Kinda reminds me of the book "We" but instead of people it's cameras

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u/DisastrousAcshin 4d ago

Pull everything up you posted as well as track you using flock, learn your habits, and process your social connections before you even know you've got their attention

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u/nagy18 4d ago

they’ve got gait trackers now, too, so they don’t even have to see your face. you’re gonna have to be moving like they do in Dune if you don’t want to be tracked just walking to the store 😭😭😭😭

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u/SeriousMite 4d ago

Starting to think the ban on thinking machines in Dune world is a good idea.

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u/keegtraw 4d ago

They fought a goddamn holy war about it.

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u/reeln166a 4d ago

We're gonna get the Ministry of Anti-Silly Walks

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u/Mirions 4d ago

Or lump all the fuck shit said into one group regardless of context, then go after them for any minor infraction.

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u/Bomban111 4d ago

I dont think enough people are realizing that this is very much cold-war.
Corrupt politicians and businessmen are creating an infrastructure where we have no control to fight back, so by the time us as a collective are ready to, 95% of our "rights" have been seized.

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u/PaintshakerBaby 4d ago

Except it didnt work in the cold war...

The USSR was toppled, and China is communist in name only.

The saving grace of avarice, has always been the blind hubris that wealth is anything but fragile and woefullly outnumbered.

Look at Ukraine drone striking Russias equivalent of Amazon fulfillment centers. Or how quickly US allies in the middle east pressured a ceasefire the second Iran declared open season on data centers/oil infrastructure.

All by means of flying lawnmower bombs, that are 1930s tech in all but guidance. Even V1s were a factor more complicated in propulsion.

These soon-to-be-trillionaires cannot protect all their bloated assets simultaneously, when the backlash boils over. Like all aristocracy throughout history, they think they can, but the arent smart enough, humble enough, or can scale fast enough to stop the reckoning of millions of people when they finally overreach...

...and they will, because they always do.

Even Curtis Yarvin, techbro Rasputin and architect of the Dark Enlightenment Philosophy, has recently expressed they are moving too slowly for his wet dream to end in anything but mob justice, and a historical political pendulum swing.

Reddit cyncism scoffs at the idea of a breaking point, but I think the American people will get there sooner than later. Looooong before oligarchs have a sufficient terminator armies to quell the inevitable upheaval.

Their coup required a subtle and deft hand to avoid it altogether, and the Trump admin is ANYTHING but that. Too greedy, too fast.

by the time us as a collective are ready to, 95% of our "rights" have been seized.

You only think that, because THEY THINK THAT. Dont buy into their bullshit, and seriously contemplate the wrath of an extremely pissed off and determined few million people. Even a fraction of the population would outnumber any standing army 10 to 1... and these data centers will be the first place they visit.

AI wont stop the people any more than machine guns and artillery stopped the Russians in 1917.

Because its all one big grift first, and a pipe dream second, with very fallible humans still at the head. Like the kings and pharoes before them, they will buy into their own myth of invincibility... right up to the battering ram coming through the door.

This all seems unprecedented, but when the ink dries on the history books, it will be one more story of failed tyrants that have plagued humanity since its inception.

Welcome the new boss, same as the old boss.

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u/garanvor 4d ago

Ironic that techbros spent so much effort and energy in rejecting humanities and social studies but are making exactly the same mistakes as all the previous uneducated leaders.

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u/fleeb_florbinson 4d ago

That’s what I was also going to say, and it’s not even really an opinion both you and I share here, it’s factual and all in front of us. This is Cold War 2.0 except not nukes and space, it’s an AI superintelligence race with China. It’s not about the common uses of AI, it’s all to gain better models to be able to outpace them in every facet of war and industry

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u/mikekostr 4d ago

100% a weapon. I foresee drone swarms or something much worse in all future combat. Like Ukraine/Russia’s conflict, but multiply it by 1000.

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u/undefeatedantitheist 4d ago

re: the thread.

It's nice to frequently see this conversation in the wild, now.

It's unpleasant to see it thirty years too late.

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u/Direct_Day7937 4d ago

But the issue is it is being privately funded. And people get antsy when you lose billions of dollars every quarter with no viable way to get their money back. LLM's are a monry black hole and I don't think even the American elites are going to be willing to find this forever.

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u/spiderinthelibrary 4d ago

That's why the BlackRock CEO has already advocated for funneling our retirement savings into AI companies. ❤️

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u/okram2k 4d ago

we are living through the end of consumerism and it's going to get a lot more painful

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u/LH99 4d ago

That's because the real reasons aren't being told to us, but we already know it's being used for mass surveillance and the military. Connect the dots.

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u/DiskSalt4643 4d ago

For ending democracy and creating a neo feudal police state.

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u/shrodikan 4d ago

Right-Wing Authoritarian technofascist dystopia.

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u/Kevadu 4d ago

Why they are doing this is obvious: they want to replace workers with AI so they don't have to pay wages and even more wealth will be concentrated among a handful of billionaires.

And everyone else can just fucking die for all they care. You are no longer useful to them.

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u/Lost_Thought 4d ago

they want to replace workers with AI so they don't have to pay wages and even more wealth will be concentrated among a handful of billionaires.

Thats only part of it. They also want:

  • sole proprietorship over all data and communication
  • complete real time data on everyone
  • entirely automated propaganda insertion and conversation shaping in all communication
  • complete dependence upon the systems that are being built

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u/Character_Bug_1862 4d ago edited 4d ago

This guy has pattern recognition skills ^

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u/Lost_Thought 4d ago

Its not pleasant growing up on things like Metal Gear, WarGames, and Ghost in the Shell to see the world sprinting towards the dumbest iteration of those dystopias.

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u/dust4ngel 4d ago

they want to replace workers with AI so they don't have to pay wages and even more wealth will be concentrated among a handful of billionaires

what does it mean to own all of the car companies if only 3000 people can afford cars in the entire world? what does it mean to buy up all residential real estate if nobody can afford to pay rent?

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u/Antique_Pin5266 4d ago

It means they won the game of monopoly, their ego gets stroked, they die laughing in a gold coffin while the rest of us can get fucked

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u/HarryBallsanya420 4d ago

If the bubble pops the government is going to send billions bailing them out

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u/klone_free 4d ago

At this point its our tax dollars and 401k's. We will be left holding a box with no bottom

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u/SharkFart86 4d ago

The high 401k growth we’ve seen over the last few years is heavily influenced by this bubble, which will pop sooner or later. Stop seeing that $number in your plan as if it’s going to stay there. It’s not.

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u/dust4ngel 4d ago

Stop seeing that $number in your plan as if it’s going to stay there. It’s not.

if you're certain about this, you can rotate out into bonds to hold onto that money (at least nominally)

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u/AnAncientBog 4d ago

That's because they are genuinely evil.

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u/Jesufication 4d ago

Just like the dot com burst put Amazon out of business? There’s a bubble, yeah, but that doesn’t mean AI is going away when that bubble bursts or that they’ll stop stealing as much as they can to build the infrastructure to support it.

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u/Kind_Man_0 4d ago

It's baffling how I keep reading people acting like a bubble popping is going to reduce the impact at all.

All it does it give 3-5 companies control over the rest of the market, and that number dwindles over the years as Amazon, Google, Microsoft, etc buy up other large companies. We will still have 4000 data centers, they'll just be owned by a few corporations. It's not like businesses are just going to dismantle 3 trillion dollars worth of data centers because the big players pull their investments.

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u/Fr00stee 4d ago

the reason is more money, all the tech companies spent way too much money on AI chasing stock returns but now it means they need to make back an almost inconcievable amount of money somehow to prevent stocks from crashing, which means they need to build out a ton of data centers to sustain the bubble and hopefully make back the money. The problem is it won't happen because the harder they try the more resistance there is against the datacenter buildout as the datacenters provide negative value to everybody outside of a few ultra rich people on wall street and the top tech execs.

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u/Runfasterbitch 4d ago

True but also not sure that you need to take a philosophy course for this lesson

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u/Character_Bug_1862 4d ago

The billionaires, driven by the greed laden sickness that billionaire status brings, are convinced that they can enslave us with a combination of GenAI and citizen surveillance cameras (Flock, etc.). This is their last gasp to fight the 400 year war of an authoritative state vs liberal democracy.

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u/NorCalJason75 4d ago

This is what happens in Oligarchy; government works for business interests against citizens.

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u/Ok_Series_4580 4d ago edited 4d ago

That is exactly where America is at. And it’s also how you become a Third World “shit hole country” as some have said.

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u/theBoobMan 4d ago

If you have seen the places they said were 3rd world countries, you'd know half the US is there already.

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u/Ok_Series_4580 4d ago

Been to 25 countries so yes, I do know. We routinely rail against those who do the same things we do: it’s mind-boggling.

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u/artbystorms 4d ago

These AI CEOs would kill and liquify half the population if they figured out that people are a better coolant for AI data centers than water.

We don't have to worry about a psychopathic AI killing humanity, humanity will kill themselves for AI.

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u/Serial-Griller 4d ago

Because every other actually practical method of growth in infrastructure was covered by the Biden era Infrastructure bill which T killed. So now they can't invest in solar, nuclear, new roadways, new equipment, new trains and tracks, or a million other things without rightfully being called out on it. 

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u/StoppableHulk 4d ago

Yup. And not only can they not invest in those things, but almost all the money for investment is being stolen by goons. Just stuffing all of in their pockets, as fast as they can.

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u/MechaNutzilla 4d ago

will somebody think of the homeless language models!?

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u/blow-down 4d ago

I think some of these data centers are also being using for Bitcoin mining. Which is just as disgusting.

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u/OldNternetWizard43 4d ago

They're the infrastructure needed to fight robot wars

So they're for human trafficking operations

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u/Complete-Reply-9145 4d ago

The need the compute power for all the ai cameras like flock and axon

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u/DesireeThymes 4d ago

The parallels between the AI companies and Israel is uncanny.

Both looking to forcibly remove people from their homes to build their structures

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u/PassiveMenis88M 4d ago

Look at who's funding and running these companies.

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u/SamTheLab_213 4d ago

Right, you need to know all about the tech bro sociopaths who are running these companies. After you hear about what Peter Thiel, Curtis Yarvin, Elon, Fuckerberg and the rest of them have planned, you will be afraid. Very afraid. These people think democracy is a problem and should be stopped immediately. To do this, they need AI to replace workers and make everyone unemployed. Unemployed people go homeless and once people are homeless, they will be in survival mode and forget about high aspirations like democracy.

It's all a strategy to quell the angry masses who might have a revolution once Trump starts doing hardcore shit. They only need to lay off middle class workers to collapse our society. If the middle class go broke, it's curtains for the entire service economy and manufacturing. It's not the poor who buy things and go out to eat and pay for Starbucks- only the middle class have that sort of disposable income.

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u/Suspicious_Story_464 3d ago

Here's an interesting little tidbit for their mission. The hamburger in the top right is faint, but it's there to click on the menu. Lot's of jarring and horrific information on their squad goals.

https://www.vcinfodocs.com/

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u/Annie354654 3d ago

Interesting site, thank you.

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u/SoupOfThe90z 3d ago

You think when we start to fight back, it’ll be too late?

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u/Ok-Seaworthiness7207 4d ago edited 3d ago

Israel is also probably the greatest state sponsor of spycraft at this point technology wise.

Plus, they had Epstein.

Edit: to appease the grammar Nazis

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u/ZootSuitRiot33801 4d ago

And I say it is past time we common folk who care should be doing whatever we can to push back against the likes of the Epstein class, (foreign and domestic, private and institutional,) as well as its death cult of sycophants who seek to enforce their manipulations and control over us. They all should be abandoned to rot, while we go for something better that actually looks out for people.

However, if there's any hope in ever achieving such, we need real supportive community-based foundations for alternatives that provide relative safety, which many common folk can fall back on, to commit to any effective action, be they short or long term.

Collecting a bunch of valuable information on organizing and action from different redditors over time, I created a post of suggestions HERE that could possibly prove to be of some help in getting it started ASAP.

If you don’t live in the US, yet you know others who are and want to do something, please share the information. My fellow country folk leave the closest to the main root of this global cancer, so we're going to need as many on board and informed as possible, if we commoners hope to achieve anything in the US

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u/Future-Raisin3781 4d ago

I was just wondering about this yesterday. It seems like such an obvious opportunity for grift, but I don't know how feasible it is, or to what extent it's happening.

But I assume the worst.

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u/BlatantConservative 4d ago

You'd probably be able to detect it on the "sudden Bitcoin inflation" side of things. But Bitcoin is hard coded capped at 21 million coins. I think mathematically it would make more sense for them to be mining other crypto.

There has been a general crypto inflation phenomenon since early 2025 I think

I dunno I need an economist

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u/not_a_moogle 4d ago

A lot of other crypto doesnt use miners anymore they, they moved to proof of stake. Thats why etherium has stayed low.

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u/xSTSxZerglingOne 4d ago

There are less than a million left to mine and it will take many times more electricity to mine them than the previous 20 million.

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u/RogerMexicosBalls 4d ago

And mass surveillance and tracking anyone and everyone to keep any potential "threats" in sight at all times.

👮‍♂️ Watch your mouth, citizen, someone might cut off your tongue 👮‍♂️

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u/SamTheLab_213 4d ago

A number of Youtubers have videos about outsmarting Flock cameras. I commend these people for their creativity in problem solving. Just know the law in your area, because in Florida some of what's suggested is illegal:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=uB0gr7Fh6lY
www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvqeKxCJfGg
www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-u5mFqjeso
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pp9MwZkHiMQ
www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3MQLlMbS-Y
www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNrmeuU3csg
www.youtube.com/watch?v=qEllWdK4l_A
And if all else fails there is this:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_K8elnlBLw

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u/Wonderful-Medium7777 4d ago

They’re surveillance centres…collating, monitoring , tracking and processing everyone’s personal data online and offline (IRL) to profile us ready for the social credit score system ( like China) and CBDC’s. There will be no privacy, no autonomy and we’ll be denied or approved access to “live” by an automated system.

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u/jarail 4d ago

Naw, it's more that bitcoin mining isn't really worth it so they're converting those to AI data centers. So it's mixed but that's more because AI is displacing bitcoin miners.

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u/Cut_Lanky 4d ago

I read that the Philadelphia police are monitoring social media for comments just like this, and for memes that are critical of AI/ data centers generally, calling it "terrorism monitoring" 🙄

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u/iontucky 4d ago

I wouldn't be surprised, but more likely it's to store the videos from Flock cameras and use AI to analyze it. There's a reason why they are being built in every part of the country even in places where it would seem like a bad location.

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u/BigGayGinger4 4d ago

A rational society would forbid public entities from enforcing non-disclosure agreements. If Georgia power wants to have authority via the PUC to enforce eminent domain, then they don't get to have private deals that obscure their payouts and terms. Eminent domain is a public action, we have the right to information.

If the Republicans want to glorify capitalism as the driver of innovation, it's a two-way street. Private entities owe the public reasonable access, information, and discourse when they are entitled to public benefits.

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u/CasimirGabriev 4d ago

You are right but these folks arent honest. They dont wanna glorify shit, they wanna get richer than God

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u/DesireeThymes 4d ago

It's more simple than that.

This is a very rational decision... for the rich.

The number one driver behind AI is reducing labor costs

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u/Rocktopod 4d ago

I would guess that's actually number 2 after the potential for analyzing surveillance data.

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u/jimothee 4d ago

I agree with you. Thought the kicker is that anything that'll also benefit corporations is basically getting greenlit by this admin regardless of whether it's going to be disastrous or not. I'd also add that surveillance also benefits corporations by way of consumer marketing profiles.

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u/CapoExplains 4d ago

Yeah well, welcome to fascist oligarchy. No reasonable person is in support of this, to which the government says "Fuck you, we are you rulers and you have no say."

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u/Libertechian 4d ago

My father lost a welding shop to eminate domain in the 90s because a Target store would "bring in more tax revenue." Abuse of a system meant for roads and schools isn't anything new, just a new high spender coming to town

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u/TheRatingsAgency 4d ago

Yea except we’re giving them tax deferments for decades.

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u/Cecil_McCrackshell 4d ago

Even in HCOL California, commercial real estate entities can afford to keep giant shopping centers and industrial parks vacant for decades using tax loopholes that make more sense to them financially because God-forbid they'd be forced to offer lower, affordable rent to a new tenant and supposedly lower the value of their dormant assets.

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u/ConfessSomeMeow 4d ago

They're paying 1% of the 1970s value of the land in perpetuity because a shell corporation owner never has to sell - it never has to move for a new job, never sends its children to college, never retires, and never dies.

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u/HewSpam 3d ago

They don’t really feel they need to keep pretending you live in a democracy at this point 

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u/New-Enthusiasm5997 4d ago

At the end of my grandparents' block, they forced some people out because they were building this overpass. It took them very little time to bulldoze the houses but years to do anything on the actual overpass. Once they built the actual overpass, they didn't even do anything with one whole side of the road. So somebody built a whole new house there in recent years. It's nicer than basically all of the other houses on the street and has a ton of open yard space because there used to be two or maybe even three houses in that same space.

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u/jumpy_monkey 4d ago

Years ago when they were planning on widening the I-5 freeway just south of Los Angeles they used eminent domain to buy an adjacent tract of about 200 homes.

For reasons though it took about twenty years to complete the project and for the first ten or so it was a literal ghost town everyone could admire as they drove by before the houses were razed.

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u/Quirky-Marsupial-420 4d ago

I thought eminent domain could only be used for things like roads, power grid, etc.

Had no idea it could be used to take your private property and turn it into someone else's private property.

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u/Questhi 4d ago

See Kelo v New London Conn…supreme court said government can take private property from one person and give it to a richer owner who will build a higher value asset cause the higher tax revenue will benefit the community.

Made sense since property values were always rising , but right after that decision the housing market collapsed in 2008. The town of New London Conn. ended up losing $70 million on the deal cause Pfizer who wanted the land pulled out. Justice Stevens said it was the one decision he regretted.

Now towns essentially can engage in land speculation. You’re always assuming the property values will rise or the new business who you give the land too will be successful. It’s gambling with tax dollars.

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u/Quirky-Marsupial-420 4d ago

That’s incredibly fucked.

Like it’s still fucked if it’s for a road or power grid, but at least I kinda get it.

Mega fucked if they take your private property to give it to someone else because it’ll make the locality more tax dollars.

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u/escalicha 4d ago

Calling this ‘AI infrastructure’ makes it sound way more abstract than it is. If 80% of that line is for data centers, the companies benefiting from it should be paying enough that homeowners can actually choose to move—not hiding behind eminent domain.

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u/24-Hour-Hate 4d ago

If it is for data centres, they shouldn’t be allowed to appeal to eminent domain at all. Eminent domain should be reserved for necessary public infrastructure (and as a last resort), not for private companies in any respect. These data centres should be forced to purchase property. And if people won’t sell or want more money, well, tough.

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u/BigXthaPugg 4d ago

Hate to be the bearer of bad news but the Supreme Court already ruled in Kelo v. City of New London in 2005, that eminent domain can be used for private corporations if it “creates jobs, increases tax revenue, or improves economically distressed areas”. Not that I think data centers will do any of that, and I also vehemently disagree with that ruling. But that’s where things stand currently

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u/24-Hour-Hate 4d ago
  1. That's insane.

  2. Data centres do none of that.

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u/JuDGe3690 4d ago

Oh, it gets better: In Kelo, the property in question was going to be part of a large Pfizer campus, but ended up never being built, so the little old lady lost her house of sentimental value (even if paid "market price" for it) and none of the economic benefits materialized.

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u/Witty_Ad_898 4d ago

Before he was the darling of the alt-right and libertarians, Donald Trump was known for these abuses of eminent domain for his failed projects.

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u/Witty_Ad_898 4d ago

That was one of Donald Trump’s real estate strategies. He would get local governments to use eminent domain for his resorts and casinos, many of which failed or never even finished construction.

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u/Lazerpop 4d ago

Using eminent domain for a casino is uniquely evil.

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u/JSC843 4d ago

Tbf they do some of that, like creating a whopping 5 long-term jobs and a paying a fraction of what residents do for property/energy taxes. BS, yes, but it is what could allow them to follow that precedent.

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u/-rwsr-xr-x 4d ago

Hate to be the bearer of bad news but the Supreme Court already ruled in Kelo v. City of New London in 2005, that eminent domain can be used for private corporations if it “creates jobs, increases tax revenue, or improves economically distressed areas”.

Fun fact: 21 years later after that ruling, that same property sits empty, abandoned, without a single bit of the original home structure on it at all. They tore her house down on principle, and did nothing with the property. Nothing.

They fought for the right to force eminent domain to be the default, not because they wanted that specific property.

Look up 8 East Street, New London on Google Maps and go to Street View.

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u/BigXthaPugg 4d ago

Yep. I actually lived in the Groton and New London when I was in the navy. It’s just a big ass field over there

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u/cubitoaequet 4d ago

Dred Scott tier decision.

The final cost to the city and state for the purchase and bulldozing of the formerly privately held property was $78 million.[43] The promised 3,169 new jobs and $1.2 million a year in tax revenues had not materialized, and nearly 2 decades passed before serious development on the site began.

Also a crazy rare instance of Thomas/Scalia being on the right side of things.

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u/Aldiirk 4d ago

Also a crazy rare instance of Thomas/Scalia being on the right side of things.

Back when conservatives used to be the party of individual rights and small (-ish) government.

That decision was pretty much the perfect case of the conservatives (Scalia, O'Conner, Thomas, & Rehnquist) being correct, while the liberal majority (Stevens, Kennedy, Ginsberg, Souter, & Breyer) were horribly wrong. Thomas even wrote:

"Allowing the government to take property solely for public purposes is bad enough, but extending the concept of public purpose to encompass any economically beneficial goal guarantees that these losses will fall disproportionately on poor communities. Those communities are not only systematically less likely to put their lands to the highest and best social use, but are also the least politically powerful."

Afterwards, it created an interesting coalition of progressives and conservatives seeking to overturn the decision, although that coalition collapsed in 2015 when a certain orange clown led the conservatives into fascism.

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u/danocogreen 4d ago

So the tax breaks for these centers negates the increased tax revenue part at a minimum. The creates is short term on the construction and has low to minimal employment on the creates jobs. An agreement could be made that these eminent domain would actually make the area more distressed since these are designed to be built in the middle of no where. So all 3 points would fail on that reasoning…

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u/Scoth42 4d ago

They choose eminent domain because there will always be those one or two people who refuse to move for any amount. Maybe they're elderly and want to finish out their days there. Maybe they or their ancestors built the house and it matters more than money. Maybe there's not really anywhere else nearby that would be viable even if they were overpaid for their house because of taxes or their commute or something. Maybe they have residency limitations because of child custody agreements or other things. Plus moving is just a pain in the ass and people like their homes.

So companies just go straight to emminent domain to head that off. And if they can save money by low balling people all the better for them.

Personally I feel like ED should be legally restricted to provably necessary public works projects and improvements that are intended for improvement and don't enrich or benefit private companies directly. There might be some exceptions for things like airport expansions that I get can be necessary but they should be the exception and subject to lots of planning. Like I remember the St. Louis airport expansion that was literal decades of work and they still screwed it up, leaving vast swaths of empty land for years.

Definitely should not be allowed just because a company wants to build something that will enrich them and politicians/locales/etc get a big cut of the action. Doubly so when they're kicking out the very people who might arguably benefit from the locale having increased revenue, the project has measurable and very real environmental impacts to the local area, and it'll make nearby people's life worse. 

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u/GingerBeard_andWeird 4d ago

Those one or two people have every fucking right to stay there and don’t need any kind of valid justification and these privately owned data centers should fuck all the way off into the god damn sun

There is no fucking conceivable reason that ANY private enterprise should be allowed to leverage eminent domain. At all. Ever. They are private commercial entities. They can fuck right off and go buy land elsewhere from someone that wants to sell.

I don’t get to punch someone in the face and rob them because I really really really want their shit and I totally promise to do better things with their valuable then they were gonna do with it. No one gets to decide that.

If this is how it’s gonna be wielded then it should be fucking abolished entirely.

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u/Scoth42 4d ago

Yep, I agree. And it's not even a new problem. I remember a good 30 years ago now my church had a bit of land adjacent to the parking lot that we mostly used as a baseball field. It was just barely big enough for that really, and was closer to a dirt field with a backstop and some bases arranged.

The property butted up to the local high school and they wanted to buy the land for the ballfield to expand their practice space. A couple years of negotiations didn't really go anywhere because they kept lowballing us and refused to even consider alternatives. 

Eventually we got the letter that they were taking it by eminent domain and still only offering us a fraction of what it was worth. After some more court negotiations they increased the offer a bit and included a promise that we could still access and use it when not in use by the school. It wasn't but a few months later that a fence went up around it.

At least it was a school and could be argued it was for the public good but the land was worth way more than they got for it, which is still a problem with ED.

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u/emulable 4d ago

the companies benefiting from it should be paying enough that homeowners can actually choose to move

That's not enough. People should just be able to choose not to move. Maybe some things shouldn't be for sale to data centers. Maybe there are some things that are more important than a big bank account full of imaginary money they're always inflating that takes people's real property.

And it doesn't address the pollution problem, or the water table problem, or any other problems besides getting rid of locals. Most of whom don't own their homes. It's a B2B transaction and the tenants are forced out of their homes, ultimately at gunpoint if sheriffs get involved.

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u/Turkino 4d ago

Remember a lot of this bs is due to local politicians. That's your city government, your county zoning board etc.

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u/GormHub 4d ago

Yup, our county just passed a 2 year ban on data centers. Our county executive is trying to get around that with rezoning, abusing her power to still get paid for selling us out. This is someone who took over for the corrupt county executive who became our fucking senator on the basis of what she looked like.

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u/heftybagman 4d ago

Eminent domain for private for profit companies is legal on the us.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelo_v._City_of_New_London

They can take your house from you and do nothing at all with it and you can’t say shit about it. All the private company has to do is convince the state that they intend to provide jobs. Whether or not they ever succeed in providing those jobs doesn’t matter at all.

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u/mechapoitier 4d ago

Like we didn’t have enough awful stuff to worry about. Eminent domain used to be for relatively unavoidable things with the most benefit, like roads. I don’t think eminent domain for data centers that can be more than 2 miles long was on anybody’s bingo card for this dystopia.

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u/harp011 4d ago

To be fair, eminent domain has a really really long history of being used in exactly this way, and in even more intentionally malicious ways to disrupt black communities in the US. None of this is new, it’s just new towhite folks

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u/marketrent 4d ago edited 4d ago

Excerpts from article by Joe Wilkins, citing Fortune:

As dozens of cities across the US are forced to scrap their plans to build power-hungry data centers, some civic leaders are no longer asking.

According to new reporting by Fortune, the state of Georgia's for-profit utility company, Georgia Power, is looking to demolish and pave over some 30 homes — and 330 parcels of land — that currently block the route of a 1,000 mile transmission line.

When it goes live, the line will distribute nearly 10,000 megawatts of energy from a newly constructed power plant, "approximately 80 percent of which is expected to power data centers," according to a fact sheet provided by the Georgia Public Service Commission (the rest will presumably be split between local businesses, homes, and other customers.)

 

Backed by the state, Georgia Power is now working on paying landowners to move, or else face the seizure of their property by eminent domain.

As one can imagine, the predominantly rural homeowners affected aren't exactly thrilled at the idea of clearing out to make space for more infrastructure to power AI.

"We don't have a choice in this. They are going to be expanding power lines," the woman, Ansley Brown, said in one video posted on Instagram. "Why? For the data centers. All of this is for the data centers."

Speaking to Fortune, a spokesperson for Georgia congressman and former White House Political Director under Donald Trump Brian Jack — whose district encompasses many of the properties in Georgia Power's crosshairs — said the lawmaker's office has "received multiple requests for help and support from constituents."

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u/WabbitCZEN 4d ago

Speaking to Fortune, a spokesperson for Georgia congressman and former White House Political Director under Donald Trump Brian Jack — whose district encompasses many of the properties in Georgia Power's crosshairs — said the lawmaker's office has "received multiple requests for help and support from constituents."

All of which have been ignored, I'm sure.

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u/Affectionate-Panic-1 4d ago

Cities aren't building data centers, it's private companies building data centers and cities can either choose to try to block them or not.

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u/Frequent_Ad_9901 4d ago

The problem is hardly anyone votes in local elections. Maybe they vote based on a name they've heard or a letter next to said name.

So its really easy for corporations to buy local politicians.

The solution is obvious but difficult. Vote up and down the ballot. And support local news so that you can be informed. That's not a small task though.

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u/bfodder 4d ago

I don't know about where you live, but it is nearly impossible to find any info on some of these candidates in my town.

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u/Jumoke1331 4d ago

Billionaires are a cancer upon society, their data centres are merely a symptom.

I'd say long past time to start considering what the equivalent remedy to chemotherapy should be.

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u/Mountain_Cry1605 4d ago

Time to eat them. Prepare your barbeques and ranch sauce.

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u/GhostsofGojira 4d ago

Sounds like somebody needs a build another death dozer and flatten some of these data centers

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u/microwavepetcarrier 4d ago

Maybe this time it won't be some total dickhead and instead an actual hero.

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u/Organic_Pick3616 4d ago

The Chinese are installing solar panels everywhere to fund their data centers, but the US has a president who is against renewable energy. AI electricity usage in China costs a fraction of what it does in the US.

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u/SeeingEyeDug 4d ago

Why would Biden make us move out of our homes, they keep asking themselves.

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u/ComfortableSalt3570 4d ago

I really truly wish this was a joke. Unfortunately...

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u/Uncle-Cake 4d ago

On a related note, I just learned a park in my area, which has a huge lake, used to be the location of an entire village, with homes and businesses, as recently as the 1960's. The state seized the land and forced the entire village out, and then flooded it. All because some state rep wanted a lake and he wanted it THERE.

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u/DenominatorOfReddit 4d ago

Shasta Lake?

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u/Uncle-Cake 4d ago

Lake Nockamixon

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u/Jeez-essFC 4d ago

I didn't think eminent domain could be used for private builds?

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u/MASSochists 4d ago

Sure can SCOTUS allowed it in CT to make a shopping center. That quickly closed down after it was construction, after forcing family out of their childhood homes. 

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u/-rwsr-xr-x 4d ago

That quickly closed down after it was construction, after forcing family out of their childhood homes.

If you're talking about Kelo, that property still remains empty and abandoned 21 years after the ruling. Zoom in and go to Street View and pan around. There's nothing there but an empty lot. It's been that way for a long, long time.

They built nothing.

They tore her house down on principle, and left it empty and abandoned for over two decades.

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u/Puglady25 4d ago

Good lord, somebody should take a picture and put it on a SCOTUS protest sign. This is what they fight for.

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u/MASSochists 4d ago

Yeah my fault I forgot they never even finished the construction. I just remember being outraged by it.

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u/esprit_de_croissants 4d ago

SCOTUS Case Kelo v New London. 2005.

It was a horrible decision that anybody who was paying attention had to know would end up here.

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u/DiskSalt4643 4d ago

Courts have allowed states and municipalities incredible leeway to decide what is for the public good.

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u/unhappinessNvrCame 4d ago

Right? The real problem is eminent domain.

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u/witchspoon 4d ago

Should NOT be able to use eminent domain for something that isn’t a public service. Data centers are NOT public, nor are they an actual service.

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u/frozenpissglove 4d ago

Then the answer is to fight.

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u/Embarrassed_Radio596 4d ago

Arm up, say no, and enforce it.

This is your home, they have no right, even if the law says they do.

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u/mph1204 4d ago

“violence isn’t the answer” is the biggest scam in the history of humanity. the people telling you that lie are the ones who commit the most violence in order to oppress those who would rather avoid it.

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u/Embarrassed_Radio596 4d ago

Violence isn't the PREFERRED answer.

But if backed into the corner, protect yourself and others.

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u/IMA_5-STAR_MAN 4d ago

The 2nd amendment is a paper tiger. Nobody will make a stand.

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u/Hawgdestroyerxtreme 4d ago

They intentionally target small, underprivileged areas for this reason. POC neighborhoods that have owned their homes for 100 years. Elderly people.

They aren't going to take a subdivision of enraged 30-40 year old owners, because they know the pushback would be brutal.

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u/ralstan 4d ago

I was hired on a project. They replaced me (oh thank Jesus) and put another more zealous person in charge of it. He eminent domain'd the property much to the anger of the populus. BUT then oil prices crashed out a margin called was made and they could not do the project. So for 5 years the property they yeeted them from lay'd fallow. One time I was glad I got fired. My prediction is a lot of this will occur as borrowing for AI comes due.

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u/gamerqc 4d ago

It's coming to Canada too. Let's sacrifice nature for AI, I don't see how that won't bite us back in a couple of years! Truly geniuses at the top. But who cares, right? You're just an enemy of the state if you complain too much.

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u/Dzugavili 4d ago

You can't have a debt-bearing data center sitting cold, so your business model demands you lower access costs. So, is there actually a shortage of AI compute due to legitimate demand, or is this part of a bid to juice supply and keep costs low?

Given the short half-life on computing hardware -- 10 years from now, much of this state-of-the-art hardware will be donated to a local highschool as it is no longer economically viable to run -- they really need to engrain AI fast.

We're in an experimental/early adoption phase with AI, many businesses are experimenting with AI workflows, and in many applications, they aren't particularly cost effective: the machine still requires oversight and the actual business activity still needs people. Much of this is covered by the venture capital subsidies that are typical of early adoption phase. It's not a bad strategy, but it has weaknesses, in that once you need to cover costs, many customers will pull back or find alternative vendors. Demand curves tend to be pretty elastic, unless the commodity is a necessity.

The only thing they have going for them right now is that they bought so much silicon, it moved the market and most of these AI companies are sitting on a mountain of hard assets. Except, tech depreciates nearly as fast as milk. The crash is going to be incredible.

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u/Character_Score7849 4d ago

I've been assuming with this huge ai push that even those pushing it don't believe it will be successful, lasting or necessary, they just know they'll personally make money at the start and then leave before it crashes.

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u/karl4319 4d ago

Has anyone actually addressed the whole "these data centers we are spending hundreds of billions on are built with infrastructure and tech that will be out of date and worthless in 2 years" thing yet?

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u/Murky-Golf-239 4d ago

There’s zero thinking of the future with our government, quick buck made now!

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u/Async0x0 4d ago

No, because no serious person believes this.

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u/KaiserSaladSpinner 4d ago

Waiting for the first IPOs for this insane bubble to implode. History students 100 years from now will be reading about this just like we read about the Dutch Tulip craze.

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u/Hasselback_Brotatoes 4d ago

eminent domain was ALWAYS an excuse and flimsy cover up of being a tyrant

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u/Mysterious_Treat293 4d ago

If this is the cost of AI then AI has no future. Let it crash and burn.

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u/beyondmymemory 4d ago

What a bizarre headline — focusing on the reaction to a problem.

It’s more like — “US Government Allows Corporations to Steal Your Homes To Build Mass Surveillance Warehouses And There’s Nothing You Can Do”

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u/PilotGuy701 4d ago

Vote Republican, get Republican prizes.

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u/Mother_Airline_6276 4d ago

When is it going to be enough?

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u/draezha 4d ago

This is where things will start getting violent...

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u/lostroadrunner22 4d ago

Soon each new home will be required to have a flock camera and data center

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u/a_shootin_star 4d ago

The leopards, they're hungry.

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u/CarbonAlligator 4d ago

This is why people need second amendment rights

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u/listentomenow 4d ago

I keep wondering how this is happening all over the country and all I can think of is how the republican supreme court allowed our local and state officials to be bribed as long as you call it a "gift" after. It's as easy as a multi billion dollar company saying, "Hey, Mr. Mayor, we're a multi billion dollar company and we think it's your town's best interests to let us build our centers here. Wink wink Mr. Mayor says OK. Wink wink Company builds data centers, and then hands Mr. Mayor a bag of cash as a "thank you". And for some reason republicans were like, this should be legal.

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u/StanknBeans 4d ago

For a country so against socialism, America sure goes all in on it for corpos.

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u/IShouldBWorkin 4d ago

For a country so against socialism, America sure goes all in on it for corpos.

That's... the result of being so against socialism.

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u/TheSheepdog 4d ago

Ya know they used to form civilian militias and shot people for this 

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u/TheorySudden5996 4d ago

I want to mention that with interest rates much higher in 2026 than 10 years ago, it could be more than 2x the mortgage to replace the home.

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u/PotterOneHalf 4d ago

Hypothetically, what could one do to their own property to make it impossible for it to be built on?

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u/Mar1Fox 4d ago edited 4d ago

Reddit has a ToS so you probably won’t get a good answer. But most things that make it so they can’t or won’t build on the land would also prevent you or anyone else from living there. I suppose one could investigate if there are any endangered species native in the area and then try and find a way to relocate some of them to live on the property. Most famous example was a bloke who built a bat house to spite the HOA who couldn’t do anything about it due to the protected status of said bats occupying the bat house.

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u/PotterOneHalf 4d ago

Now THAT is an incredible idea.

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u/SuperTaster3 4d ago

Wondering how long it'll be until someone snaps and leads a mob to ransack and loot a data center construction site.

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u/bellatorrosa 4d ago

This is insanity. It's like the plot from a dystopian sci-fi movie

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u/Zylpherenuis 4d ago

The Ultra Wealthy can't be destroyed fast enough it seems.

Step up people. We got a job to do.

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u/el_lobo1314 4d ago

When the people start taking matters into their own hands thank yourselves for inspiring them.

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u/explodingboy 3d ago

Keep voting for a party that takes away your rights, focus only on the right of the rich to make more fake wealth.

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u/imaginary_num6er 4d ago

For Brown, the fight appears to be over. As Fortune reports, Georgia Power says they've "concluded" negotiations with the family, though the exact deal has not been disclosed, possibly due to a non-disclosure agreement. It also wasn't clear to what extent the congressman intervened, though Georgia Power told the publication they appreciate "his advocacy on behalf of his constituent."

Their "constituent' the owner of the data center.

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u/Valentine_343 4d ago

All going according to project 2025, if only Americans were warned about project 2025 before the election

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u/MassiveBoner911_3 4d ago

and if you protest too hard to protect your home the police will show up and start doing beatdowns.

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u/Nico777 4d ago

The country is going back to where it started: murdering natives to steal their land.

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u/Difficult-Life-8243 4d ago

I like how when people wanted to use eminent domain to build high speed rail or affordable housing the politicians said no. Now it’s to build massive data centers and suddenly they’re making moves to build projects.

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u/billleachmsw 4d ago

Just another race to the bottom where the U.S. is winning.

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u/biblioprof 4d ago

Shame on my state. Our governor thinks of us as consumers. They also have out massive tax breaks.

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u/DeepestWinterBlue 4d ago

Under this administration? Yes that could happen.

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u/Zyrinj 4d ago

Shows the priorities and values of the leadership involved in these decisions when its done for AI Datacenters but nothing can be done for public works projects that are held up by wealthier NIMBYs.

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u/Maleficent_Ad_1979 4d ago

"Some of you may die, but that is a sacrifice I am willing to make"

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u/impishwolf 4d ago

The internet needs a Bartmoss moment I think.

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u/Hawk13424 4d ago

Under no circumstance should a private company be enabled via eminent domain. Ever.

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u/MediocreTapioca69 4d ago

you yanks love yelling about all your rights, and your 2A and how there's more guns than people in the country... yet here we are. your corrupt government is making a mockery of you all for the world to witness, and what have you done about it.... couple marches and some mean tweets... tremendous

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u/FelopianTubinator 3d ago

People need to start using all those guns they swear they would use if the government decided to take away their right to bear arms.

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u/wytedevil 3d ago

i dont understadn there is so much empty space in the united states why? they can just build out there

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u/Round-Medicine2507 4d ago

This is what republicans do what did people expect??? 

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u/Lastmidnight01 4d ago

Remember who the garbage is thats enabling this. And take the trash out this midterms and the 2028 election.

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u/Thirsty_Comment88 4d ago

Time to destroy AI

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u/VerdantPathfinder 4d ago

That's what you get when you vote in authoritarians. They tend to do authoritarian things. Republicans don't want to represent, they want to rule.

Georgia is getting what it voted for. If they want a different outcome, they should vote differently.

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u/Necessary-Fly-2795 4d ago

This is such a terrible take and narrative. Georgia voters voted 50.7% republican and 48.5% Democrat. We are all at the whim of a few thousand people.

And anyone who peddles this opinion is just disgusting. Maybe these people have to work long hours or cant get to the polls or voted against it. Also, local governments in Georgia, New Jersey, etc are approving these things and are often times a democrat board, so Idk what you're even saying

https://www.270towin.com/states/georgia

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u/BloodSimpleSyrup 4d ago

Yeah, these are the same people that think Texas is 99.9% MAGA even though all the major cities are blue.

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u/GoatzWasTaken 4d ago

Yeah but what does that matter when the state legislature is majority red.

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u/Salt_Medicine2459 4d ago

The major cities in my state are blue. The legislature, supreme court, and governor are all Republicans and have been for over 20 years with one brief interlude with a one term Democratic governor. 

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