"Data centers are probably having only a small effect on residential electricity prices."

So... 4%, which is double the target inflation rate and is solely due to datacenters... is "small"? That's the increase the researchers indicate is due to datacenters, meaning that's on top of inflation factors.

No thanks. Even if the 4% is spread over the 5 years, nearly 1% a year is also too damned much.

If a new subdivision is built and real people live there creating demands on services, that's understandable. If new industrial or commercial developments that create jobs and products is built and that creates demands on services, that's understandable. Yes, there are datacenters that provide things we apparently want such as hosting DoorDash or Amazon or porn sites. But the current rush is about AI, which is being shoved where it isn't asked-for, like Red Dye #3.

If the results of this study was a tenth of a percent per year or less, maybe it'd be "small". This isn't.

The person you're replying to said "as someone from a northern climate". They're telling you that regardless of the DST changes, where they live, school starts while it's dark some of the time.

How many kids in kindergarten to grade two are walking (busy) country roads to school? Sounds unlikely and rare. Rural kids are typically transported to/from school by bus, specifically because walking - light or dark - isn't practical.

The "kids in the dark" thing is just boogeyman fearmongering.

Well, obviously.

It doesn't disproportionately impact black people, transfer private wealth to 1% of the population, treat non-straight people worse than animals, or spread trivially-discounted lies about scientific and medical facts... so it can't be from the mind of a conservative.

Conservative trolls don't do well here.

God's going to get pissed off if you keep bugging him for shit He took care of 24 hours earlier.

Ubiquitous: existing or being everywhere at the same time; constantly encountered.
Windows: holds 76.36% of the worldwide desktop operating system market
HEIC on Windows: Microsoft Store HEVC Video Extension costs $0.99

Yeah, no. Yes, it's present on Apple devices. And admittedly there are about as many iPhones as Windows computers. But that's still half, and it's not the important half where actual work is generally done. It's the half where annoying people take pictures and send them to people that need to jump through hoops to do anything with them.

Yeah, it's almost as bad as the level of bellyaching from those who insist we just have to do the stupidity.

You're correct and I lack the mod points to surface your insight.

These are effectively concealed or hidden cameras, which is not the same thing, and that's why the described panic is fictional.

That said, I do think this is interesting overall because it's a question of how human society changes based on technology. We have rudimentary technology that taps the optic nerve in experimental stages to help with some types of blindness. Sooner or later that sort of thing will probably become routine and non-invasive. Maybe it's 50 years out, but odds are good - I think - that eventually people will be able to record everything they see and hear. It's just perfect memory plus the ability to share that memory. Well... I wonder how societies will adapt to that. Will people just wear disguises all the time? Will no-tell hotels become the norm? Will we all be so inundated with fake materials that embarrassing real materials won't shame us? Getting there will no doubt be painful, but I do find it interesting to ponder.

AND. And build better sites. That's my opinion.

The pathways for these intrusions are going to be found and exploited. It'll be by greedy blackhats, nation-state blackhats, and maladjusted domestic blackhats but it's going to happen.

The key difference is that domestic actors - be they individuals or companies - can and should be prosecuted. It doesn't matter if it's a script kiddie using non-AI tools or some frontier model-training corporate entity... accessing computer systems you don't have the rights to is illegal.

As for the "safety" of these tools, it seems to me that they're being developed with a default-allow-plus-blacklist model of permission instead of default-deny-plus-whitelist model. Someone will find ways to "trick" them into working around blacklists of behavior and access. They should be scoped the opposite way so the only behaviors and targets they can use is limited. I totally get it that reduces their utility dramatically but... tough.

The problem is they're not currently good at not pattern-matching.

That's debatable.

Part of why I read is plot/story/character, which generally survives any edit process. The other part of why I read is creative word-choices and sentence structures. Authors like Douglas Adams made deliberately convoluted structures that amused. The style of an author is - to me - an important thing.

Can LLM editors today accept and accommodate the voice of an author? No.
Will they ever? Almost definitely.

Where I'm at is that these tools need to be better-than-human before they should be deployed on creative material. This isn't just spell-checking, it's editing, which does involve understanding of the material and what an author is doing and why, and accepting that the results don't always fit the norms and shouldn't. Creative material is about pushing boundaries into new frontiers, and while LLM will probably get there, it's not there today and I don't want it blending my favorite authors' into some beige hellscape.

Nobody's going to read it, expert or not. It's a wall of... whatever. It's not written or formatted in a way that is enticing to a reader.

Remember... LLMs regurgitate materials that already exists. People who are familiar with the topic likely already know anything accurate or factual in it. People who aren't familiar with the topic could go somewhere reliable to ingest the facts. This unsolicited pile of words... serves nobody.

The key word is "it." There is no singular "it". Flattening the category of AI-enabled software to a singular "it" implies that there is a flat truth that applies to that entire category.

The AI-enabled software "it" that is running a store into the ground doesn't present a meaningful threat to anyone.
the AI-enabled software "it" that is being used by black-hats to find security vulnerabilities does.

AI is a tool. Think of it not unlike nuclear. Nuclear power plants aren't an existential threat, despite the harm a plant accident can cause. Nuclear weapons are.

What's clear is that trying to simplify complex topics into bite-sized "common-sense" topics doesn't work in 2026.

No, I don't think the tech-bros are being honest. But I don't think it matters anymore. Someone is going to weaponize this technology and a lot of people are going to suffer because of it. Not Skynet scenarios but rather Cyberpunk / Blade Runner scenarios. There's a real danger to the health and well-being of a large portion of the human race, for sure. The tech-bros aren't going to let that stop them from getting richer, for sure.

What we - the 99% - can or should do about that, I don't know.

Fair enough, and the feedback is always appreciated. All I can offer in return is to bold what I wrote...
"On the gripping hand, there could be individual-level cases that do have society-wide impact."

Thank you.

Wow. Brutal.

I was very careful in my choice of words. This isn't about understanding. It's about feeling, which is why I used the word "feel" instead of "think" repeatedly.

I understand the role of the US Supreme Court and its equivalents in other countries. It's just that I'm uncomfortable with it being triggered in this case. I'm sure that doing so will be technically correct if allowed, but I don't feel that this case is a witchhunt... it's a witch. Yes, that means I've convicted Bankman-Fried in my heart. Granted. The courts to date have done the same, so it's not like the conclusion of guilt is absurd.

I have mixed feelings on this.

On the one hand, someone who believes they have been wrongfully convicted of any crime should be allowed to have that conviction reviewed by every level of justice that exists.

On the other hand, I feel something like a supreme court should spend its time on law matters that impact a large portion of their country. Issues and topics that refer to policy and fundamental law. Spending their time examining a single person's case feels like a use of their time that is unjust to the rest of the country.

On the gripping hand, there could be individual-level cases that do have society-wide impact.

In the end, this is only happening because there's a lot of money involved, which also feels unjust. A random citizen wrongfully convicted of theft or fraud could never get their case before the US Supreme Court, so why should this guy? I hate it all.