[ExI] reason on data centers

[Keith Henson]

On Tue, Sep 22, 2026 at 8:04 PM <spike at rainier66.com> wrote:

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> *From:* spike at rainier66.com <spike at rainier66.com>
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> Keith, it is comedy with a point.  Of course it is mixed with silliness,
> but that is Heaton’s style.
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I did not find it funny at all. Reminded me of the very worst commercials
on TV back in the 1950s.

We know data centers will vaporize water and of course they will use
> energy.  But agriculture does that too.  We manage.
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>  a
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Probably true. One interesting gotcha is that the Chinese may crash the
entire AI buildout in the US by releasing free versions that are good for
many uses but take a small fraction of the compute power. All of a sudden
we will have outmoded data centers that gobble oceans of power and lakes of
water and have no income to support them. Something like is happening to
Microsoft when whole countries switch to Linux. That crash could outdo the
dotcom crash by 50 or 100 fold. I wonder if they could be repurposed as
shelters for the homeless? If this happens, there will be a lot more
homeless people who lost their pensions in the crash.

Interesting possibility floated is making using free software (especially
from China) a crime like drugs.

Keith

spike
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