Building Liberal Compute

12 pointsposted 6 days ago
by surprisetalk

2 Comments

arn3n

2 hours ago

The title made me hope for an article about making software serve democracies better instead of consolidating power and wealth. It's about how datacenter build-out in the EU might be accelerated by loosening regulations. Still interesting but a bit of a bummer.

I guess, on that note, are there writeups or articles on how software/compute might be used to help, rather than hinder, liberal democracies? From someone who increasingly sees the tech industry as a tool for authoritarians.

idle_zealot

2 hours ago

It's always funny to see liberalism used to defend oligarchy. Arguing simultaneously that AI data centers are critical for European sovereignty and that democratic institutions should keep their hands off them and let three American plutocrats build them wherever and however they choose is genuinely insane.

I don't know for sure, but when enlightenment thinkers pioneered liberal ideology and included in it respect for private property, I don't think they had in mind that the roads and water and means of transportation, communication, the land you live on and the air you breathe being the private property of a totally-not-a-king very smart businessman.