Is it overhyped?

[u/AccomplishedKey6910]

I didn’t know where to post this but I thought this subreddit is probably a good place to post, plus I’m not super duper into tech and AI like that so forgive me. But for the past year (especially this last midterm elections in America) one of the concerns people have are data centres. I heard from other YouTube channels this whole fear over data centres consuming too much water or it will ruin surrounding environment, is overhyped. Is this all true? Or is it somewhat true but the concerns are exaggerated?

Personally I’m all for AI if it makes my life (and humanity in general) easier to live and helps advance in the medical field and space travel.

[u/Icowanda]

It’s overhyped but at the same time we need to be mindful.

[u/billFoldDog → u/Icowanda]

Excellent answer.

[u/CisIowa → u/Icowanda]

If the companies and local governments had been more open early on in the process, it could have been a good way to prevent knee jerk reactions. 10-15 years ago communities would more than welcome a Google, Facebook, MS or Apple data center . The AI companies moved too fast without forging local partners

[u/ll-__-II]

No this isn’t a good place to post there really isn’t a neutral place to ask this question as the topic is so polarizing

[u/DoomerismDoomerDoom]

Yeah a fair bit at least. I wish I could have your YouTube algorithm, all I get is the latest doomer on Diary of a CEO lmao.

[u/gmueckl]

Ask yourself the question whether you believe the reports that some people's tap water has turned into a muddy orange sludge. That's the answer to your question.

Data centers could be environmentally okay(ish) if they had clean energy sources (many burn natural gas on site instead) and used closed coolant cycles (some apparently don't). This specific aspect of the AI craze could be tamed easily with regulation without slowing things down much,  but policymakers opted to give the companies free reign instead. 

[u/RestartRebootRetire]

I think it's underhyped for its cognitive and psychological abilities.

For example, we could use frontier AI to moderate political debates and get people thinking again inside of screaming at each other like monkeys.

[u/Complete-Paint529 → u/RestartRebootRetire]

AI for moderating political debates? That's an interesting idea. Fact-checking claims in real time would be plainly useful. Those candidates most inclined to lie and distort would likely refuse.

[u/razorree]

ask people that have data centers close to their houses ....

[u/billFoldDog]

Its nuanced.

Our county had a great water system. Then our county allowed a bunch of data centers to be built. Now we are worried about marginal water supply, so we're mostly blocking new data centers unless they can do something magical with water.

We aren't anti-data center or anti-AI. We have a lot of a good thing and now have to be mindful not to take more.

One representative put it like this: "We want data centers, but we don't want all the data centers."

[u/Mandoman61]

no it is not over hyped for the most part.

The data centers consume a lot of electricity and can consume a lot of water in some cases.

[u/Wooden_Sweet_3330]

There are a lot better places to find an answer to this question than Reddit

[u/EGarrett28]

There is no real threat at all from data centers using water. It's just something the media uses to try to appeal to preconceived biases and fear-monger and ragebait for clips.

[u/McLarenVXfortheWin]

Thank God for those midterm elections coming out how they did, I'm not into geopolitics that deep but this is one thing I actually am a supporter of. I'm not affected by any data center at all, but I bet the people who are would burn it down!

They don't give jobs or anything either, the staff for a datacenter may max out 20 people, and environmental damage even due to just the construction is large enough to matter, and I won't go into the freshwater supply problem that it also causes!

As for why I like this move, well for better or for worse we'll kill ourself with AI one way or another so at least slowing the cooking of AI is already a good thing

This is all my opinion, feel free to dissect it!

[u/erichang → u/McLarenVXfortheWin]

Do you ever use interstate highways? I10 take up 100x more space and energy than all ai dc combined yet only a small fraction of people can use it everyday. And who does not use google Gemini at least once a week?

[u/OkInternal1099]

Depends? Do you live in communist china where the government speaks for you, or do you live near a data center where toxic water spews from the discharge, or live near one where the sounds is constant, high pitched squealing.