this post was submitted on 27 Jun 2026
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You know I will say as an IT tech, that often times works in data centers doing repairs upgrades ads changes etc. That data centers are absolutely horrid to work in. The constant hum in drone will just wear you out. There's absolutely no way to silence something like that. It literally gets into your bones. That's why most data centers are not really staffed unless somebody is on site to do some work. This myth of data centers creating jobs is absolutely idiotic. I've never been in a data center with more than one or two employees in it. And most of those like I said aren't full-time employees they literally show up let you in show you where you need to work and will only hang out long enough while you're on the site. Having to wear headphones in a data center is absolutely mandatory.
A gigafactory with close to zero human maintenance, literally a dream come true if you're a robber baron.
Most factories are already close.
Not in the US, they're not.
Yea, they are. Quite a bit of automation, many employees are there to maintain the machines, not do the actual work.
I've worked in industrial automation for the past 18 years. What you're talking about is lights-out manufacturing. While this may be the state of the art in some sectors, it's definitely not for most sectors and even less in the aged installed base in the US.
The investment to bring old factories even close to fully automated is simply not being made, and for good reason. The sad reality is that exploiting humans to do a lot of the more expensive to automate work is cheaper.
I used to work for a company where we were in the data centers constantly, either deploying new machines or servicing others. Definitely not the norm, and way overstaffed compared to other companies. But, it made sense given their business model.
Anyway, working in the hot aisles is miserable when you have to do a bunch of cabling work (about 60% of the copper we ran was cut and tipped to length). It also sucked working on equipment at the tops of our racks as ours were like 56U high. Ear protection was must-have, I used noise cancelling headphones but a lot of guys didn't even use ear plugs.
I guess the only jobs that those created are temporary during the construction.
After that it's some security guards and they just contract smart hands for a few hours when they need it. Landscaping I guess.
After that it's just a big noisy heater.
Maybe an office for two or three people, but they're not really human habitable. The HVAC is like a cold twenty mile an hour wind being blasted at hot twenty mile an hour wind produced by little powerful fans designed to push air.
It would be like being trapped in a room with a million drones.
Aren't we also discovering the noise is also putting pressure on vital organs?
Pretty sure I saw that with these data centers.
Oh I think the idea is that the data centers will create amazing jobs in society at large, of people making AI slop to be consumed by other people's AI agents and this somehow produces value.
Well yeah, they say that data centers create jobs just so that it sounds like a good idea to people. Thankfully, people are starting to realize just how horrid data centers and AI is for the environment and daily life etc. I say that as someone who uses AI for work daily, and unfortunately I do find AI useful outside of work too...
I dunno, I used to love naps behind the server racks with warm air blowing in my face.
Never noticed the noise till I get in the suite.