"I keep coming back to this graph because it’s so eye-popping, almost impossible to believe.
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"I keep coming back to this graph because it’s so eye-popping, almost impossible to believe. As you see in the legend, the blue line is data centers. The grey line is everything else. Everything else. Commercial properties. Rental properties. Single family homes. Multiple family homes. Pick your preferred flavor of development, NIMBY, YIMBY, urban, rural, it’s in there. You basically have rapid data center growth and everything else contracting."
@jalefkowit I don't know what to make of this. I just hope those data centers are never profitable.
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"I keep coming back to this graph because it’s so eye-popping, almost impossible to believe. As you see in the legend, the blue line is data centers. The grey line is everything else. Everything else. Commercial properties. Rental properties. Single family homes. Multiple family homes. Pick your preferred flavor of development, NIMBY, YIMBY, urban, rural, it’s in there. You basically have rapid data center growth and everything else contracting."
Now let's ask ourselves why oil oligarchs developed a sudden taste for a huge data center construction overbuild ...
Too many dollars chasing too few assets; a recipe for "profitable" global financial crises
Pump & Dumps
https://www.desmog.com/2025/12/11/the-koch-network-is-pushing-trump-to-accelerate-ai-documents-show/
https://fortune.com/2026/10/14/exclusive-koch-venture-emanate-a16z-industrial-ai/
https://therealdeal.com/national/2026/07/30/koch-receiving-bids-for-potential-15b-data-center-sale/
Subsidies
https://goodjobsfirst.org/koch-rides-the-data-center-boom/Money laundering
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-11-06/saudis-plan-100-billion-ai-powerhouse-to-rival-uae-s-tech-hubCorruption
https://newrepublic.com/article/216376/midterms-data-centers-trump-diesel-ice-corruption -
@jalefkowit As a civilization we appear to have picked machines over humanity.
@gooba42 @jalefkowit Yes, exactly — it’s *staggering* how, despite all of the warnings from the arts, the researchers, and the spiritual leaders, how, despite all the ways that books, TV shows, movies, comic books, video games, and music made warnings about this across the many centuries of human life, our civilization just shrugs in the face of life-ending tech and says “eh, what’s the worst that could happen?!”
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"I keep coming back to this graph because it’s so eye-popping, almost impossible to believe. As you see in the legend, the blue line is data centers. The grey line is everything else. Everything else. Commercial properties. Rental properties. Single family homes. Multiple family homes. Pick your preferred flavor of development, NIMBY, YIMBY, urban, rural, it’s in there. You basically have rapid data center growth and everything else contracting."
@jalefkowit Growing a lot of tulips here I see.
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@gooba42 @jalefkowit Yes, exactly — it’s *staggering* how, despite all of the warnings from the arts, the researchers, and the spiritual leaders, how, despite all the ways that books, TV shows, movies, comic books, video games, and music made warnings about this across the many centuries of human life, our civilization just shrugs in the face of life-ending tech and says “eh, what’s the worst that could happen?!”
@XennyG @gooba42 @jalefkowit because it looks SO COOL in the movies!
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@aparrish @jalefkowit Now wonder the oligarchs are so interested in Albania now.
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@SnoopJ If your money is in data centers, sure
@jalefkowit @SnoopJ even this remains to be seen
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Starting a new political party on the platform "Homes For People Before Homes For GPUs"
Yous before GPUs!
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"I keep coming back to this graph because it’s so eye-popping, almost impossible to believe. As you see in the legend, the blue line is data centers. The grey line is everything else. Everything else. Commercial properties. Rental properties. Single family homes. Multiple family homes. Pick your preferred flavor of development, NIMBY, YIMBY, urban, rural, it’s in there. You basically have rapid data center growth and everything else contracting."
I do fear that some great, powerful, unfeeling entity is going roll over us, our neighbors and civilization and grind it into dust.
AI?! That's laughable. The problem is the same as it's been for the last half-century. It's the corporations run by fools that are willing to sacrifice the world on burning pyre of excess so long as they can keep themselves convinced that through some miracle they will be in a position to rule over the ashes.
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"I keep coming back to this graph because it’s so eye-popping, almost impossible to believe. As you see in the legend, the blue line is data centers. The grey line is everything else. Everything else. Commercial properties. Rental properties. Single family homes. Multiple family homes. Pick your preferred flavor of development, NIMBY, YIMBY, urban, rural, it’s in there. You basically have rapid data center growth and everything else contracting."
@jalefkowit
I hope data center buildings will be fit for future habitation. I expect that eventually, data center usage will drop, like that of indoor shopping malls. Malls are now being repurposed as residences and other uses. I hope the same happens with data centers. -
Starting a new political party on the platform "Homes For People Before Homes For GPUs"
@jalefkowit Well, I'm sure the drop in home building may also have something to do with out of control ICE raids and the non-stop deportations impacting all the folks who actually build our homes and such.
Not to mention Trump's tariffs on Canadian lumber (and all sorts of other imported things!) that make building homes too expensive as well, etc.
Sure, the data center spend may be a part of it, but I bet what is making homebuilding uneconomical at the moment is a combination of factors.
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"I keep coming back to this graph because it’s so eye-popping, almost impossible to believe. As you see in the legend, the blue line is data centers. The grey line is everything else. Everything else. Commercial properties. Rental properties. Single family homes. Multiple family homes. Pick your preferred flavor of development, NIMBY, YIMBY, urban, rural, it’s in there. You basically have rapid data center growth and everything else contracting."
@jalefkowit yes, but the graph doesn't show the actual numbers. Is that information also available?
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"I keep coming back to this graph because it’s so eye-popping, almost impossible to believe. As you see in the legend, the blue line is data centers. The grey line is everything else. Everything else. Commercial properties. Rental properties. Single family homes. Multiple family homes. Pick your preferred flavor of development, NIMBY, YIMBY, urban, rural, it’s in there. You basically have rapid data center growth and everything else contracting."
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@marjolica @jalefkowit
This link has Dec 2023 spending at ~$1600 billion annual adjusted rate for private construction. The OP's graph only vaguely gestures at a possible source, so its hard to tell what number is actually being plotted there. (Monthly spending?)
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@GhostOnTheHalfShell @jalefkowit
and soon they will switch to robot factories i guess
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In fairness, our politicians are delivering on their promise for new housing.
It's just that we failed to specify that housing was for people rather than clankers.
you shouldn't call them clankers, they are listening and watching
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you shouldn't call them clankers, they are listening and watching
Good.
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"I keep coming back to this graph because it’s so eye-popping, almost impossible to believe. As you see in the legend, the blue line is data centers. The grey line is everything else. Everything else. Commercial properties. Rental properties. Single family homes. Multiple family homes. Pick your preferred flavor of development, NIMBY, YIMBY, urban, rural, it’s in there. You basically have rapid data center growth and everything else contracting."
@jalefkowit I've been thinking we were in an undeclared recession, but maybe it's actually a depression
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"I keep coming back to this graph because it’s so eye-popping, almost impossible to believe. As you see in the legend, the blue line is data centers. The grey line is everything else. Everything else. Commercial properties. Rental properties. Single family homes. Multiple family homes. Pick your preferred flavor of development, NIMBY, YIMBY, urban, rural, it’s in there. You basically have rapid data center growth and everything else contracting."
@jalefkowit Crazy fact. It looks like the U.S. is ruining its own economy because of a bubble. AI isn't a business model that can really generate sustainable profits—at least not as much as is currently being invested in it. There are so many good, free alternatives.
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"I keep coming back to this graph because it’s so eye-popping, almost impossible to believe. As you see in the legend, the blue line is data centers. The grey line is everything else. Everything else. Commercial properties. Rental properties. Single family homes. Multiple family homes. Pick your preferred flavor of development, NIMBY, YIMBY, urban, rural, it’s in there. You basically have rapid data center growth and everything else contracting."
@jalefkowit Isn't late stage capitalism amazing (if you're already one of the 0.01%).
