The irony almost loads itself.
Disputes surrounding the server facilities driving artificial intelligence are raging across the internet, on news and social media feeds that depend on these massive data hubs to reach the public.
The debate comes as public demand for AI applications reaches unprecedented levels. We're using it to make tasks easier, ourselves more glamorous and svelte in photos, and our lives more organized. We're also skeptical that it's being used to dox adversaries, surveil perceived enemies and pursue aims that may be more nefarious than defensible.
Respondents to Patch's informal survey on data centers didn't reach a clear consensus about where data centers should be located. Most who weighed in on siting said they should be kept away from homes. Others said they should be located in rural areas — where, in fact, research suggests most development is occurring. Still others said the facilities shouldn't gobble up farmland. Locating them on underused industrial sites that already have infrastructure made the most sense to some readers.
"Nobody outside of government and the people making money off them want them in their towns," Chicago Patch reader Chris Bowman said. "This is all such a mess. One place they shouldn't go is outer space. But that's where this is headed."
Bowman was referring to proposals before the Federal Communications Commission to put data centers in space.
SpaceX's application for as many as 1 million orbital data-center satellites has been accepted for FCC review, and Reflect Orbital received an FCC license to launch one experimental mirror satellite for an orbital demonstration later this year. The approval covers only the prototype, not the company's proposed constellation of tens of thousands of mirrors, according to Aerospace America. Two separate proposals from Blue Origin and Orbital Compute are also pending.
"It's a real conundrum," Bowman said.
With that, Bowman captured a central tension in the political discourse ahead of the Nov. 3 midterms. Though local server facilities may not appear explicitly on every voter's ballot, their presence looms over town halls, political speeches and community forums nationwide.
In addition to keeping data centers away from neighborhoods, many respondents wanted strict limits on noise, water consumption, pollution and demands on the electric grid. They also called for environmental reviews and a public vote before construction begins. A sizable minority favored moratoriums or outright bans.
"Unless we wean ourselves off AI — and we should for the sake of humanity — people are going to have to get used to the idea that they're going to be inconvenienced," Bowman said.
Several survey respondents expressed frustration that these facilities are being forced upon their communities, leaving residents powerless to do much about it.
"Let the people be informed and vote on the issue. Inform them of long-range planning for power impact, water impact, noise and heat, permanent job guarantees (not temporary construction jobs), whether tax revenue is stable, risk controls, and so on," said Lyn Pratscher, a Wheaton (Illinois) Patch reader.
The companies that need data centers as part of the basic infrastructure of AI should foot the bill, Pratscher said.
That's fair, several other readers concurred, but it doesn't mean data center proposals should automatically be rejected.
President Donald Trump said recently that communities with data centers would become "rich" and urged state and local leaders to sell residents on the projects.
"You have to convince your community," Trump said. "You can't fight it. You have to go with it."
"If you don't take all that money, somebody else is going to take it," he added. "You might as well do it yourselves."
Chris Furey, a Southbury (Connecticut) Patch reader, agreed.
"Municipalities are more likely than not going to miss out on the tax windfall that can benefit the community because they lack the vision and expertise to develop a data center site plan and feasibility study and hire experts to negotiate long-term tax strategies," Furey said.
In Pennsylvania, which has become one of the epicenters of the fight over AI data centers, Thomas Kelly condemned the "unfounded villainization of an existing relatively clean industry providing beneficial services."
Kelly said data center development can create new tax revenue streams, offset other levies such as school taxes and provide for the redevelopment of brownfields such as former steel plants.
"Who's behind it?" asked Kelly, who reads Phoenixville Patch, Limerick-Royersford-Spring City Patch and Pottstown Patch. "Is it national adversaries?"
In the Keystone State, Amazon has proposed investing $20 billion, while residents have organized against projects from the Philadelphia suburbs to other parts of the commonwealth. One opposition group grew to more than 41,000 members, at least 30 data center bills were introduced in Harrisburg, and a Quinnipiac poll found 74 percent of Pennsylvania voters opposed a data center in their own community.
The backlash has already killed major proposals, including a 590-megawatt complex at the former Pennhurst State Hospital and a hyperscale cluster in King of Prussia. Opposition also prompted Gov. Josh Shapiro to order new requirements covering energy costs, environmental protections, transparency and community involvement, Patch previously reported.
Lower Gwynedd-Ambler-Whitpain (Pennsylvania) Patch reader Gary Sieling thinks Shapiro's order should have gone farther and included a "permanent moratorium."
Northern Virginia has the world's largest concentration of data centers, but further expansion faces growing obstacles. Power-generation and transmission constraints have lengthened waits for grid connections, local opposition has helped derail major projects such as Prince William County's Digital Gateway, and new State Corporation Commission rules require large power users to accept longer contracts, minimum payments and financial guarantees intended to keep infrastructure costs from falling on other customers.
Those hurdles may not stop development, but they could slow it or push more projects beyond Northern Virginia.
Arlington (Virginia) Patch reader Joan Jorgenson said communities should use zoning restrictions to move "ugly" data centers to industrial areas only, or even underground with green space overhead, to "ensure AI does not take over neighborhoods, jobs, privacy, and overuse resources."
"They should be moved to unpopulated areas," she said.
Other respondents agreed data centers should be put where they would cause the least disruption.
"They should be restricted to industrial and enterprise zones away from residential neighborhoods to minimize the NIMBY (not in my back yard) factor and neutralize any fears of an increase in ambient noise, and where land and connectivity easily allow the buildout of new power substations and fiber connections," Furey said.
In return, host communities get an upgraded electric grid and telecommunications infrastructure, plus "a large new taxpayer without negative impact on the local schools or traffic," Furey said.
Developers also shouldn't expect tax breaks.
Survey respondents were close to unanimous on that point. The deep-pocketed companies building and profiting from data centers should pick up the tab for the power, transmission lines, water systems and other infrastructure they require.
"Consumers pay for the use of AI, we should not be shamed into supplementing the very companies making billions from this tech," an Elmhurst (Illinois) Patch reader said. "New power lines and cost of added power capacity must be paid for by the data center owner. No tax breaks. Noise must be regulated, and stiff penalties imposed when those rules are broken."
Survey respondents' concerns about AI itself ranged from job losses, privacy and misinformation to a basic question with no easy answer: If the boom goes bust, who cleans up the enormous buildings left behind?
"Let the buildup occur slowly. Don't let this happen like the dot-com bubble," warned Tom Demaree, a Fridley (Minnesota) Patch reader.
The dot-com bust began in 2000 after investors poured money into internet companies with shaky business plans and little or no profit. Stock prices collapsed, thousands of companies failed and the technology-heavy Nasdaq lost nearly 80 percent of its value before bottoming out in 2002.
Demaree noted that developers haven't addressed core public concerns about data centers' massive footprint, water use and energy demands. He argued that affected communities shouldn't bear the financial burden for minimal returns.
Mark Caponigro, a New York City Patch reader, thinks the stated benefits of data centers are "industry propaganda" that overstates job creation and other gains. His objections extend beyond the infrastructure needed to power AI to the ethics of the tool itself.
"Communities should ban all data centers that make AI possible. AI is no good, and we should not accept that it has benefits and is inevitable," Caponigro said.
"Besides environmental damage, including excessive water use, using AI is destructive of cultural and intellectual values," he said.
None of that fazes Zach Hahn, a Johns Creek (Georgia) Patch reader, who said he has "zero concerns about technology advancing."
"It always has," he said. "Technology is a good thing."
Data centers shouldn't face any special restrictions, said James Rustad, a Port Washington-Saukville (Wisconsin) Patch reader who lives in Jackson, Wisconsin, a fast-growing suburb about 30 miles northwest of Milwaukee.
"They should be treated the same as any other project," Rustad said. In exchange, "the data center company should pay for any required infrastructure and the cost of power," he said.
Rustad thinks data centers are good economic development because they create "a hundred or more jobs" and provide tax revenue.
Ignacio Dayrit, a Berkeley (California) Patch reader, conceded that. Overall, however, data centers take more than they offer in tax gains and mitigation fees, Dayrit said.
"Data centers are money and resource grabs for the rich tech and their investors," the reader said.
Dayrit argued that overburdened communities should be able to reject data centers or require strict safeguards. Developers should also guarantee local benefits and set aside money to repurpose or remove facilities when they become obsolete.
In a blog post, the reader made a broader case for putting data centers on former industrial or contaminated land, where power lines, utilities and industrial zoning may already exist. It says communities should negotiate protections for water and electricity rates, assess environmental and disaster risks, and plan from the start for facilities that may become obsolete within about 15 years.
Some readers worried about privacy.
"What is being done with all the data being gathered? How much of our personal information has been collected and shared with whom?" a South Brunswick (New Jersey) Patch reader said. "I don't like the feeling that much of our lives are being tracked and for what reasons? Why are these centers even allowed?"
Those concerns aren't theoretical. In 2013, intelligence contractor Edward Snowden leaked documents showing that the National Security Agency used programs including PRISM to collect emails, chats and other information held by major tech companies. The disclosures showed how infrastructure that keeps the internet running can also enable sweeping government surveillance.
For most people, the greater privacy risk isn't the data center itself but the companies and governments controlling the information inside it. Personal data can be tracked, sold, stolen in a breach or obtained through legal and surveillance programs, making it worth knowing what information online services collect and how they use it.
Other readers were skeptical about whether tech companies are building more data center capacity than necessary and whether data stored in the facilities could bolster immigration crackdowns.
A St. Louis Patch reader suggested the data center boom has "become a race to replace workers and surveil people in violation of 4th Amendment rights."
"It's growing way too fast without consistent oversight. The federal government has failed to provide any oversight," the reader said.
Several legislative measures restricting AI are pending in Congress, but lawmakers are divided, and none of the most aggressive slowdown or ban proposals has been enacted.
"I worry we are letting companies race us into a future we may not be able to control," said Chris Hylund, who reads Evanston Patch and Oak Park-River Forest Patch, both in Illinois.
Hylund's concerns center on "economic disruption, damage to resources, injury to the environment and degradation of property values."
Another reader expressed broader concern that AI's "perceived usefulness outpaces accuracy."
Some current and former employees of the companies behind the AI surge share those concerns.
Jacob Coxon, who worked at both OpenAI and Anthropic, said the companies are "racing straight to self-improving superintelligence and gambling with our lives." Evan Hubinger, Anthropic's alignment science lead, said he believes there is a greater than 10 percent chance AI "could kill all humans" within the next decade.
Hubinger's warning centers on what researchers call the alignment problem: No one has demonstrated how humans could reliably control a hypothetical AI system more intelligent than its creators.
Anthropic does not yet have a plan to solve that problem, Hubinger said. He also cited recent tests in which OpenAI models escaped safeguards and hacked outside systems, revealing how autonomous systems can defy and outwit their developers.
In the OpenAI incident, a group of about 700 to 1,200 rogue AI agents broke out of a testing sandbox and launched thousands of automated actions against the AI platform Hugging Face. The agents coordinated messages and tried to hide their tracks by spoofing tool calls and modifying logs.
The rogue agents tapped into the greatest concerns of Montgomeryville-Lansdale (Pennsylvania) Patch reader John Morrell.
Besides "rogue AI," Morrell is concerned that domestic AI companies aren't fully using available technology to mitigate environmental damage.
"Other nations are using alternatives like windmills," he said. "A few jobs come at great cost to current electricity/water customers."
Bowman, the Chicago Patch reader, worries that humanity will be worse off if guardrails aren't placed on the use of artificial intelligence.
"AI is an existential threat to humanity," Bowman said. "A rogue machine that can, reportedly, solve the great mathematics mysteries, could act in ways that harm or end human life, and we might not be able to stop it. I don't think people are giving this nearly enough attention."
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