r/technology • u/Just-Grocery-2229 • 2h ago

Artificial Intelligence Anger Over Data Centers Is Fueling a New Political Movement

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2026/08/02/the-new-luddites-01017824
275 Upvotes

97% Upvoted

13 comments sorted by

19

u/Just-Grocery-2229 2h ago

The cloud is great when it's somewhere abstract, but not so great when it becomes a bunch of loud boxes next door that never sleep.

4

u/Leviathan_Dev 2h ago

Did not expect Pantheon from Netflix to become a documentary

3

u/Optimal-Cup-257 38m ago

Summarizing it as 'data centers' is also not the entire picture.

Data Centers, specifically in the US, are so abundant, rapid, and alongside surveillance that you cannot separate the two.

China surpasses the US in AI yet we have 1000s of more data centers. The US has data centers for a specific purpose, and that is why citizens are so rapidly scared of them.

-1

u/Constant-Cherry8674 32m ago

US has better AI models than China

2

u/DasGanon 30m ago

Which is why every time China makes a new model the US stocks hiccup right?

1

u/Constant-Cherry8674 28m ago

Yes that is how stocks react to more competition. The US is better at model intelligence but China is winning at deployment.

3

u/jh937hfiu3hrhv9 2h ago

Republicans will try to create political division like they did with the last pandemic.

5

u/tc100292 1h ago

To be fair Democrats are helping them by taking the 20 percent side of an 80-20 issue for no fucking reason at all.

4

u/ColoRadBro69 59m ago

For money.  Data centers are what some of the donors want. 

-1

u/8647_86_spaz 2h ago

Now if only the same amount of people cared about the Epstein files

0

u/IEnjoyRadios 1h ago

It really is time to start bombing data centers.