this post was submitted on 13 Oct 2024

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Microsoft Azure CTO: US data centers will soon hit size limits (www.semafor.com)

submitted 3 days ago by return2ozma@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world

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[–] Agent641@lemmy.world 11 points 1 day ago

CCleaner, do your stuff!

[–] echodot@feddit.uk 5 points 1 day ago

Perhaps if they deleted all of the unnecessary user data they've collected they'd be able to consolidate it down to something reasonable

[–] nooneescapesthelaw@mander.xyz 6 points 1 day ago

Given their AI ambitions, a solution could be building data centers in multiple locations to avoid overloading any one region’s power grid. It would be technically challenging, but it may be necessary, Russinovich told Semafor.

“I think it’s inevitable, especially when you get to the kind of scale that these things are getting to,” he said. “In some cases, that might be the only feasible way to train them is to go across data centers, or even across regions,” he said.

Pretty interesting!

[–] sepiroth154@feddit.nl 142 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

Infinite growth meets finite world.

[+] rottingleaf@lemmy.world -52 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (2 children)

While I'm still libertarian, those are supposed to be the people capable of using resources efficiently to maintain their market position, right? And the existing legislation's effect on that mechanism is supposed to be negligible, right?

So those supposedly sane at directing resources people are basically burning as much energy as they can get for lossy compression of datasets in random ways trying to reach a gold vein.

I think something went off track here.

[–] Cagi@lemmy.ca 102 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (2 children)

"I'm libertarian" followed by an assumption like businesses are "supposed to" do anything except make money and bump their stock prices by any means necessary. Yep, checks out.

Businesses are horribly inefficient due to their short term thinking. Efficiency is a marshmallow test. Doing things right in hopes of making $150 tomorrow will always be tossed out in favout of a garunteed $100 right now, doing it fast and dirty. The idea that businesses are naturally incentivized to do x because of market forces is bullshit if x is anything other than whatever makes the most money right now.

They send our natural resources to the other side of the world so slaves can turn them into goods that they ship right back to us. Efficiency is an expense that businesses are often incentivized to avoid when doing it wrong is cheaper.

If you want businesses to do anything but chase short term profits as ruthlessly as they can get away with, you need regulations.

[–] Flocklesscrow@lemm.ee 24 points 3 days ago

Nailed it

[+] rottingleaf@lemmy.world -51 points 2 days ago (4 children)

Water is supposed to flow down. If there's wood under that water, it's supposed to rot.

I've become libertarian due to a lot of experience with people.

It's the hated ideology exactly because it doesn't give an outlet to someone's wish of finding the golden pill and\or being above the nature. Well, there is no satisfaction for such wishes IRL, libertarians are just honest.

All that text is clueless accusations mixed with implications that you have some better idea. You don't, look around.

[–] Cagi@lemmy.ca 18 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (2 children)

No one has ever dealt with people before, it's certainly not something everyone does every day, you are the only one. You clearly have an advantage over every one else. And businesses work exactly like wet wood, it's a flawless analogy.

I wasted so much time speaking with politicians, learning about economics, sociology, law, civics, and history, and all I needed to do was have experiences with people and I'd be a political genius too. I mean here I am, almost 40 years old, having spent my entire working career and off time dealing with people, but that doesn't count. None of it counts but yours.

When I look around now vs years ago and see how deregulation is the cause of for almost all of our modern woes, I am left to agree with you, the solution must be even more delegation. Unmitigated greed by earth's most ruthless people has always heralded a golden age of universal prosperity. Just look at the industrial revolution and the 20s. Children working and dying in factories and mines again is a sign of good things, but society can only succeed if we can sell these kids hard, addictive drugs without legal interference.

Edit: Libertarians aren't hated, they are laughed at. Its the ultimate indicator your political opinions are nonsense, just like your comments in defense of it have demonstrated. It's entirely based on what you think should happen, not was does happen. The advantage of living among people is the strength and prosperity that comes from cooperation and pooled resources. But that's not the opinion the rich people who would enslave you paid good money for you to have.

Inb4 "fool blocked" as a response to your cognitive dissonance.

[–] pearsaltchocolatebar@discuss.online 43 points 2 days ago (2 children)

No, it's a hated ideology because it doesn't work, and all it does is show your lack of understanding of how the world and human behavior work

Letting private businesses run unchecked is always going to be a bad idea. Full stop.

[–] surewhynotlem@lemmy.world 5 points 2 days ago (1 children)

So you've met people, and think they're smart and educated enough to do the right thing all by themselves?

This seems odd to me

[–] Lennny@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Libertarians are just honest.....mother fucker, this you?

[–] rottingleaf@lemmy.world -4 points 1 day ago

No, I don't know your mom. Don't remember her for sure. Another fool blocked

[–] dan1101@lemm.ee 26 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Unfortunately corporate greed completely breaks the possibility of a libertarian society to me.

[+] rottingleaf@lemmy.world -22 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Corporations in the wide sense are the central enemy of libertarianism. Libertarianism is based on individual decisions and individual responsibility, which can't be delegated. I can imagine you don't really want those, but this is less compatible with corporations than any other ideology.

Greed is a basic incentive. Even (spherical example in vacuum) if you manage to somehow lobotomize every baby so that there wouldn't be people able to feel greed, you'll get those on whom it won't work and you'll get those who'll reach the same result analytically based on other incentives.

[–] pearsaltchocolatebar@discuss.online 14 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Corporations only exist to limit personal liability. If you remove the regulations that hold people liable, corporations won't need to exist because the days of the barons and tycoons will return.

[–] Cryophilia@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago (2 children)

I've been hearing a lot more interest in on site power generation, which would be nice except it will probably end up being natural gas.

[–] helenslunch@feddit.nl 8 points 1 day ago

MS specifically is looking to fire up 3 mile island to power their AI datacenters. Yes, really.

[–] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I keep hearing about micro nuclear reactors, and I hear there are some in testing in my general area (I'm in Utah, and I hear there are some projects in Wyoming and Idaho). So here's hoping that'll become a thing.

Also, solar panels should work pretty well. I'm thinking:

solar -> batteries -> hydrogen
hydrogen -> trucks and recharging batteries

So, basically like a massive UPS with some physical, local energy storage. Here's hoping these will become practical in the near future.

[–] Don_alForno@feddit.org 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I keep hearing about micro nuclear reactors

They are not becoming a thing and they are an asinine idea from the start. It's basically decentralizing something that can only profit from centralization as it requires massive amounts of infrastructure for safety and security reasons in each location.

Nuclear is the most expensive way to make electricity and that will not change anytime soon.

So, basically like a massive UPS with some physical, local energy storage. Here's hoping these will become practical in the near Future.

They are practical, and they are already being built.

[–] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 1 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

I don't think that's true, but it depends on what metrics you're taking into account (startup costs, energy storage, etc). In pretty much every study I've seen, nuclear is competitive, with the main issue being time to build a new reactor and arrange waste disposal, not long term running costs.

If small nuclear plants are so impractical, why is Google funding seven of them?

[–] Don_alForno@feddit.org 1 points 10 hours ago

Nuclear is only competitive if you don't factor in the negative externalities ( it has that part in common with fossil fuels) and the massive amount of government guarantees and subsidies that go into each and every plant.

Nuclear accidents are not insurable on the free market, that should tell you everything. If they were and owners had to factor in a market based insurance price, that alone would be so astronomically high that no investor would ever touch nuclear.

So governments guarantee to pay for damages in case of nuclear incidents. Governments bear the cost of waste disposal. Governments bear the cost of security (as in military /anti terrorism measures, because these things are awesome targets). Governments pay huge amounts of direct subsidies or take on debt via government owned companies to cap consumer prices. None of this is factored into electricity prices, none of this is factored into most studies.

If small nuclear plants are so impractical, why is Google funding seven of them?

Because, again, google won't ever have to foot the actual bill. Also, google has a history of investing into things that don't work out, so I wouldn't necessarily cite them as an authority.

[–] SlopppyEngineer@lemmy.world 64 points 3 days ago

Ah yes, the "when brute force isn't working you ain't using enough of it" approach to AI.

[–] WhatAmLemmy@lemmy.world 22 points 3 days ago (3 children)

Maybe the secret police storing exabytes of the entire global populations data, to enrich their cronies in tech and surveillance capitalism, should reallocate those resources to something that benefits instead of enslaves?

[–] melroy@kbin.melroy.org 21 points 3 days ago (1 children)

AI is the biggest problem here

[–] WhatAmLemmy@lemmy.world -4 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Yeah, I'm sure the largest data harvester on the planet isn't consuming an enormous volume of energy or resources, and certainly isn't also using AI to exhaustively analyze those exabytes of data with its hundreds of billions in blank cheque funding.

I too love big brother!

[–] fr_mg@lemmy.world 4 points 3 days ago

Just erased (really) that surveillance data, it will spare lots of memory for good goals. But they will go for more toys.

[–] corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca 0 points 2 days ago

Maybe the secret police

Are the secret police in the room here with you? Can you see them? Are they talking to you?