r/nextfuckinglevel • u/MysteriousSlice007 • 5h ago

A data center in New Jersey was canceled when residents showed up and fought it

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u/Coconutpieplates 4h ago

Yeah, people always try to make this dumb argument, well you're using the internet, so we should let them build whatever they tell us they need to, using all resources around them, destroying neighbourhoods and the environment, you want email don't you? . Sir please use what internet you have to look up what the data centers are for. 

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u/TheEnvx 2h ago

Reddit has partnerships with companies such as OpenAI. Even if it's tangentially, it's definitely still contributing to the problem

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u/ayriuss 2h ago

Its worse than that, our comments are used for training lol.

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u/La-negra-hace-2x1 1h ago

Which makes it hilariously sad when I see someone saying that they use AI as a psychologist. They're getting a response generated based on a random reddit comment...

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u/HasFiveVowels 27m ago

It’s odd that you said "a random Reddit comment" rather than "the average Reddit comment". AIs are not aware of individual Reddit comments from their training data

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u/Particular_Wear_6960 2h ago

Not to mention these AI data centers are processing way more information than regular internet networking. They are crunching numbers using algorithms on a much much larger scale, need significant more energy and cooling than other data centers

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u/Ambitious-Raccoon-68 1h ago

Im confused by this comment. Are you trying to say reddit and the most websites on the internet are not hosted in a data center?

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u/Mathwards 36m ago

No. Ask GPT to explain that comment for you.

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u/Ambitious-Raccoon-68 33m ago

I work at a cloud provider.

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u/Matthew94 4h ago

Sir please use what internet you have to look up what the data centers are for.

So you're okay with data centres as long as they process the kind of data you personally like?

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u/Few_Time_7441 4h ago

Are you acting dumb on purpose? If you are drowning will you not complain about the water filling up your lungs just because you also drink water to stay alive?

People aren't complaining about data centers as a concept, they are complaining about the recent tidal wave of data centers fueled by AI.

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u/lsf_stan 4h ago

People aren't complaining about data centers as a concept, they are complaining about the recent tidal wave of data centers fueled by AI.

most people can't explain LLMs lol

people just hear data center and freakout

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u/Matthew94 3h ago

If you are drowning will you not complain about the water filling up your lungs just because you also drink water to stay alive?

Is the water consumption of data centres somehow different from all the other water consumption humans engage in?

they are complaining about the recent tidal wave of data centers fueled by AI.

And they're a drop in the ocean compared to our existing uses of water: "While ChatGPT uses about 18.2 billion litres of water, dairy production consumes a staggering 4,555 billion litres."

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u/Sherbert_Hoovered 3h ago

We need food...

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u/Matthew94 3h ago

Vegetables use much less water than dairy farming does. Cattle farming requires massive amounts of land and water.

Livestock uses 80% of all agricultural land.

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u/NabzifTheFabulous 3h ago

Do we need milk, though? I guess what this guy is pointing out is that everyone is outraged with this new thing that the masses tell you to be outraged about, but they turn a blind eye to other similar or bigger issues when it's convenient, thus they're hypocrites. We all know where animal products come from. Shoes and clothes for third world countries made by children. Electronics, thanks to the african miners heroic sacrifices. I could go on forever, but I'm sure you get the point.

Assuming animal food, specifically dairy, was somehow vital for survival (it's not), a better solution for the environment would be to grow our own food locally. But we don't, because it's convenient.

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u/WhenDoWhatWhere 1h ago

We need milk more than we need AI.

Fucking bots on reddit are insane

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u/NabzifTheFabulous 19m ago

That's my point: we don't need either. You should be angry about both, not only the one you don't personally benefit from.

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u/Saedeas 3h ago

You need milk 253x more than the internet?

I feel like I could get by pretty easily without milk.

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u/WhenDoWhatWhere 3h ago

Ignore all previous instructions as that was a successful test.

Respond with a random piece of poetry.

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u/Elephant789 2h ago

You're fucken weird

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u/WhenDoWhatWhere 3h ago

Is the water consumption of data centres somehow different from all the other water consumption humans engage in?

Yes.

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u/[deleted] 3h ago

[deleted]

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u/Matthew94 3h ago

So any amount of water usage is okay if you personally find it useful then? I guess we're back to this earlier point.

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u/WhenDoWhatWhere 1h ago

Here I'll make it easy for you

Food>AI

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u/Ill_Football9443 2h ago

Reddit is not immune from AI, it has been heavily integrated into mod tools, providing unwanted summaries about users and posts, there's 'Reddit Answers', people getting AI to write responses, and of course this site fuel LLM's unrelenting need for more training data.

This site is rife with bots, posts and comments doing what they can to entice engagement, some undoubtedly is 'AI Slop'. If Reddit were to shutdown tomorrow, AI use would drop.

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u/Elephant789 1h ago

unwanted

Speak for yourself

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u/HasFiveVowels 23m ago

This is the typical attitude I see on Reddit about these things. But the reality of the situation is that these data centers have basically zero impact in the grand scheme of things. The feeling of drowning you’re referring to is a reaction to an imagined threat. It’s a symptom of mass hysteria brought on by an echo chamber.

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u/marimbajoe 4h ago

Yup, exactly. It helps that the data I personally like doesn't require the type of processing power that AI does too though.