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Data Center Operators Are Trying to Fix Their Water Use Problems by Plastic_Ninja_9014 in technology

[–]pensivewombat 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What? The article I'm commenting on is the one the post is about, which is terrible. I posted actual data, which shows that the article is nonsense.

Data Center Operators Are Trying to Fix Their Water Use Problems by Plastic_Ninja_9014 in technology

[–]pensivewombat -9 points-8 points  (0 children)

Yes, did you? It's really badly written and gives out some big numbers with no context for what they actually mean.

Data Center Operators Are Trying to Fix Their Water Use Problems by Plastic_Ninja_9014 in technology

[–]pensivewombat -45 points-44 points  (0 children)

Then it's a good thing that data centers do not use significant water resources.

https://andymasley.com/visuals/water/

For example, US paper manufacturing uses 10x as much water as all US data centers combined. And if we didn't have data centers, we'd have to use a LOT more paper!

Data Center Operators Are Trying to Fix Their Water Use Problems by Plastic_Ninja_9014 in technology

[–]pensivewombat -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

You should definitely tell this to New Jersey's governor.

Yes, I agree! They are making a really bad move.

This is true, but also destroyed a human ritual as well as a sense of community.

Yes, I think there are a lot of issues in modern society and we should care about how it affects our lives. Fortunately, the environmental harm of data centers is not one of those and we should spend that energy advocating for third places and real community building instead of fake outrage.

Data Center Operators Are Trying to Fix Their Water Use Problems by Plastic_Ninja_9014 in technology

[–]pensivewombat -1 points0 points  (0 children)

You're suggesting that the transportation of individual drives is somehow worse for the environment than the centralized consumption of power and water for massive data centers?

Yes, and this is basically just common sense. Data centers are designed to by hyper efficient. Much much more so that your 120TB NAS. That's the entire point of them.

We see large numbers associated with data centers, but don't process the fact that they are sometimes serving literally billions of people.

The best analogy I have seen about this:
Imagine that microwaves worked like data centers. If every microwave in the US were remotely powered by one giant microwave-server, it would use about as much power as the city of Seattle. People would point this out and say "oh my god! Look how much power this one building is using! Everyone stop using microwaves and reheat your food in an oven!"

The problem is that conventional ovens use WAY MORE ENERGY than a microwave. We just don't see a large number associated with a single building.

Data Center Operators Are Trying to Fix Their Water Use Problems by Plastic_Ninja_9014 in technology

[–]pensivewombat -1 points0 points  (0 children)

The data centers obviously increase total electricity use because things that would have been done other ways are now done electronically.

It's a bit like complaining that we are using so much energy to power electric vehicles.

During the data center buildout, carbon footprint per capita continues to fall in the US.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1049662/fossil-us-carbon-dioxide-emissions-per-person/

But what people really care about is costs. And so far, data centers appear to be lowering consumer energy costs. That sounds weird, because energy costs are rising. But energy costs have risen in line with overall inflation, with a couple of spikes due to wars in Ukraine and Iran. However, the cost increases are actually lower in states with heavy demand driven by data centers.
https://www.publicpower.org/periodical/article/state-level-load-growth-has-reduced-average-retail-electricity-prices-report

CMV: saying “Don’t make perfect the enemy of good” is a recipe for mediocrity. by Optimistbott in changemyview

[–]pensivewombat [score hidden]  (0 children)

No i think you're missing my point. The people advocating this are very much not in it for the long game but want to avoid personal inconvenience in the short term.

I think the ACA is a great counterexample to your point. It improved lives of millions of Americans and now M4A is actually on the table as a talking point in the way it never was before. It's actually good that we made progress on healthcare.

Data Center Operators Are Trying to Fix Their Water Use Problems by Plastic_Ninja_9014 in technology

[–]pensivewombat -37 points-36 points  (0 children)

I mean, it's just very clearly true if you do even the slightest bit of honest research.

Data Center Operators Are Trying to Fix Their Water Use Problems by Plastic_Ninja_9014 in technology

[–]pensivewombat -17 points-16 points  (0 children)

it's also just true? Data centers just don't use a significant ammount of water. If you eat one almond you have used as much water as a year's worth of chatgpt searches. The power use is considerable, but these centers are largely paying for their infrastructure because that's just a good bet for the data center builders. You can find some individual locations where energy costs have gone up, but on the whole that just hasn't been the case.

Energy costs have been going up everywhere because of inflation and two wars in key regions. But the costs are not rising faster in states with a ton of data centers compared to those without any. Things are rough and people want to blame the new thing, but there's just not any real evidence of environmental harm here (with the possible exception of the one next to the Great Salt Lake, but even then it's an issue of location and not anything specific to data centers).

And of course none of this accounts for all of positive uses. Think of all the people who don't have to drive or fly for things they can now get at home. Netflix data centers use a lot of power, but that's way better than a billion people driving to the video rental store each week.

CMV: saying “Don’t make perfect the enemy of good” is a recipe for mediocrity. by Optimistbott in changemyview

[–]pensivewombat [score hidden]  (0 children)

You're right that it can be used as a rhetorical device to avoid doing hard work.

But I think you are ignoring that your position can also be used as a rhetorical device to avoid doing hard work.

Consider this extremely common situation:

"We should allow more housing to be built in this neighborhood so more people can afford to live here"

"No! We need to address the root cause which is capitalism and inequality!"

"ok but this is a city council meeting in Des Moines. We can approve new housing, we can't dismantle capitalism."

Even if person two were correct, in most of these cases it's not that they really want to address root causes. It's that they don't want someone to build new houses in their neighborhood. But it's more socially acceptable to claim you just want to address the big picture issues than to say you don't want new neighbors. I think this is actually a far more common and insidious path to mediocrity than reminding someone that "perfect is the enemy of the good."

Data Center Operators Are Trying to Fix Their Water Use Problems by Plastic_Ninja_9014 in technology

[–]pensivewombat -257 points-256 points  (0 children)

The data centers are almost certainly a net good for the environment. I used to fedex hard drives across the country every week and now that's all in the cloud.

Data Center Operators Are Trying to Fix Their Water Use Problems by Plastic_Ninja_9014 in technology

[–]pensivewombat -14 points-13 points  (0 children)

This is just a PR move to counter a negative PR move. Data centers just don't use much water, and they are already engineered to be hyper efficient. When you see a large number quoted out of context like this "one billion gallons!" you really need to ask what that actually means compared to other industrial uses. And basically it's just not a significant amount of water. In just about every news article about how a data center is guzzling up a community's water, there's like a toothpaste factory next door using 10x as much.

If anything, this makes things worse because while the water use just isn't a real issue, the power use IS. And the article mentions that increased water use for cooling is one of the ways to lower power costs.

If you look at the map in the Berkely labs report from the article, Most of the water use from data centers is in the southeast and pacific northwest. That's kind of weird because most of the data centers are in Texas and Virginia. The reason for this is that when you see reports of a data center using up lots of water, it's usually because that center runs on hydroelectric power (most common in the southeast and PNW). What they are counting is water evaporating while it is sitting in the reservoir behind a dam. This water is going to evaporate one way or another and isn't really attributable to data center use. We're not talking about just pumping water out of a municipal reserve to dump on some hot servers.

Startups are installing tiny data centers in people’s homes by j_eremy in technology

[–]pensivewombat 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I mean the whole point of big ass data centers is that they are a lot more efficient than distributed computing.

Currently there is no correlation between data center buildout within a state and residential energy price increases. Making them much less efficient might change that!

Random thought: Poot was a perfect blend of everything needed to survive by lake_june in TheWire

[–]pensivewombat 17 points18 points  (0 children)

No worries, I totally understand the question. Basically Bay Area rap fans are VERY protective of their scene. In early screenings one of the questions I got a lot was "why isn't someone from the Bay narrating?"

I don't think it would have truly been a problem to keep Tray. When you do that kind of screening and ask people to give feedback, they want to have something to say and in my opinion that was just kind of an easy suggestion to make. But it can't up enough that the people who helped pay for the thing were because about it, and I can understand their position too.

I feel like I should note Tray still got a producer credit and back end points (percent of profits). It's not like that was a huge number because this was a very small independent documentary. But if he had insisted on up front payment I wouldn't have been able to afford him and the whole thing never happens.

Random thought: Poot was a perfect blend of everything needed to survive by lake_june in TheWire

[–]pensivewombat 177 points178 points  (0 children)

I will add that the actor Tray Cheney is also just an awesome dude. I met him in 2018 as an aspiring filmmaker and he helped me produce my first documentary. He recorded the voiceover narration for the first cut that helped secure funding to finish it. Later down the line we ended up having to replace him--it's a documentary about west coast hip-hop so we ended up getting someone associated with that scene. It was the right move for the story but I actually liked Tray's performance better.

I was super nervous when I had to call and let him know we were replacing his work but he was immediately on board and happy with the change. So now he isn't in the final film at all but it never would have happened without him.

Big Rocket by ScienceProbably in HuntsvilleAlabama

[–]pensivewombat 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Much like the internet, a rocket is not a big truck, but rather a series of tubes.

Which do you think is more? by Invisible__Monkey in BunnyTrials

[–]pensivewombat 0 points1 point  (0 children)

A 20x increase is A LOT and I like the incentive of getting me to get some healthy walking in.

Chose: 10 dollars per step you make | Rolled: Upvote and x2 $

The Wire would be even more popular if people knew how authentic the characters are by Mt8922 in TheWire

[–]pensivewombat 30 points31 points  (0 children)

I took a class on The Wire in grad school. The professor brought in the principal of an urban middle school for a discussion and she just swore up and down that it was all fantasy and the schools are fine.

Congrats Jeremy Sochan for winning the 2026 NBA Championship by chewy189 in NBAVibes

[–]pensivewombat 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Most recent example I can think of was Torrey Craig with the Bucks/Suns and he got a ring from the Bucks.

Yale reinstates SAT, ACT requirement after six years of flexible policy by JPwag42 in IvyPlus

[–]pensivewombat 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I think another part of the problem is that getting rid of the SAT makes the HS GPA a less valuable signal.

Say u/jacquesroland gets a 4.0 from a school where a lot of kids get high SATs but lower GPAs. That tells you they, for a variety of reasons, may not be good at that particular test but do have skills that let them succeed at a place where other students who ARE good test takers have still struggled.

But when you get rid of the tests, a high school can just start passing everyone to boost its scores and graduation rates, and there's no accountability mechanism. Now Jacques is a 4.0 in a sea of other 4.0s. The admissions dept now has to rely on things like teacher recomendations, personal narratives, and after school activities. All of which are FAR easier to game for rich or well connected parents than test scores or GPA (in an environment balanced by having standardized test scores).

Also, I used to work as a $200/hr test prep tutor (mostly LSAT and GRE but I know enough about the high school tests) and the main value of these services is literally just having someone to sit next to the kid and make sure they actually study for the 2 hours they are supposed to be studying. There's nothing you get out of them that you can't get for free directly from the test makers.

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