Looking at the images of #AI #datacenters one cannot help but wonder about how much physical desolation and trash (made of degraded short-lived hardware no one will be able to use efficiently) AI bubble will leave behind. The dotcom bubble pales in comparison.
After all, the dotcom bubble only left behind scores of Aeron chairs and that fibre that @pluralistic keeps mentioning, so one could count that a net positive.
A screenshot of a title of the following article:
https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/gpus/datacenter-gpu-service-life-can-be-surprisingly-short-only-one-to-three-years-is-expected-according-to-unnamed-google-architect
The title states:
> Datacenter GPU service life can be surprisingly short — only one to three years is expected according to unnamed Google architect
> A photo of the "Stargate I" site in Abilene, Texas. Credit: OpenAI
Taken from the following article: https://arstechnica.com/ai/2025/09/why-does-openai-need-six-giant-data-centers/