So, there’s a piece in Jacobin arguing that data center moratoria are a “terrible idea” making the rounds on social media and beyond. It’s pretty easy to see why this makes for some good discourse; naturally, there’s going to be frisson among AI optimists when a perceived opponent—here, the nation’s most influential socialist magazine—makes a case for aligning with the tech industry’s goals.
While I’m pretty unconvinced on all but one or two of the points that the piece itself raises, and I think it seriously misconstrues the class politics of data center fights, I do think it’s worth litigating this idea. Because I do believe we should be thinking about what a broader and more engaged politics of resisting, regulating, and ultimately governing AI might look like. It’s a good occasion, in other words, to ask:
- Who is fighting data centers?
- Why are they fighting them?
- Are anti-data center movements a dead end—or a starting point?
As others have pointed out, moratoria like the one Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have proposed are designed to buy time to work questions like that out—to develop good governance and regulation of AI—not install a permanent ban.
It’s impossible to totally ban it since these models can be run locally. Anyway I think if we’re going to allow people to make AI slop and consume absurd amounts of electricity then there needs to be some guardrails put in place. Premium utility tax for electricity consumed (also apply this to crypto), watermarks for AI content, priority for renewables in new grid power, provisions for noise pollution. All of it.
But like the article points out, what we need here is time and the tech overlords just don’t want to give us that.
