The RM Sherwood data centre protest had like 10 people, because the meeting was online and the shadily-appointed RM decision makers weren't even there. But we all chatted and then did some "Water is life" chanting while 3 security guards and an RCMP officer looked on grumpily, and I did a CTV interview. Then I had an interview with the Wall Street Journal about orbital data centers. Then a podcast recording about the situation in orbit in general. Holy shit what a morning.
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@sundogplanets i got into the online meeting, there were probably twenty of us setting fire to the chat but, naturally and very much on purpose, we were soundly ignored
@action_jay Glad to know that people were online too! Even if it didn't help...
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The Canadian telecom giant says the new buildings will add up to 730 megwatts of capacity to its already approved six data halls, which will require 470 megawatts of power. The total power demand of the data centre campus would be 1.2 gigawatts.
Bell Canada and the provincial government have already confirmed the initial 300 megawatts will be supplied by SaskPower. Bell Canada will then be responsible for providing the remain 900 megawatts through the construction of its own gas-powered generation system.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/ai-data-centre-9.7372812
@sundogplanets A company called Clearstone is trying to develop an enormous data centre in place called Southfleet in Kent. I am trying to get some resistance mobilised. Should you have any pointers, I'd be pleased to read xx
@Geri @JugglingWithEggs is involved in the protests about the Norwich one
I know good folk at Friends of the Earth who are campaigning against the proposed #Norwich #Datacentre…but after the September protest i’m keen to get more involved and see the pressure kept up:
Now that I have food and coffee (how the fuck did I do all that without coffee), I want to share the part of the CTV interview I'm most proud of, because I think they will almost certainly cut it. I described the under-construction data center as looking like that scene in Lord of the rings where Saruman has destroyed the forest and all these zillions of orcs are building giant machines in giant holes in the ground with lots of fire and smoke everywhere.
@sundogplanets I suddenly feel the urge to rewatch "Lord of the rings".
@sundogplanets you made me think of the great scene from 'il postino', explaining metaphors or metafore.
@sundogplanets
Sadly we have no Ents.
@sundogplanets You have reminded me of one of my favorite bits from Time Bandits: Evil getting excited about computers.
https://youtu.be/7rdpJztS28A
(I'm not trying to compare the construction workers to orcs - I'm trying to compare AI data center overlords to Saruman)
I keep thinking about how the protest today went down. It was all just so weird. Like 10 people showed up, almost entirely women, mostly middle-aged and older. The security guards and cop kept angrily telling us to get off the sidewalk, out of the parking lot, onto the street I guess? And then this awesome Indigenous woman just started fiercely drumming and walking towards them. We all followed. We chanted a bit (in the parking lot and on the sidewalk), did some interviews, and left.
Every single aspect of this data centre (probably like all of them) is nakedly corrupt. I don't know how anyone is supposed to fight against that. That protest was both incredibly sad and incredibly uplifting at the same time.
@sundogplanets You do so much and I hope you have time for some well earned rest, but I really appreciate what you do.
@sundogplanets Having worked in a public service role close to politicians: they fear protests, especially ones which are clearly not organised by the usual suspects. There number of people does not matter so much as the mere fact that it happened.
Beta of luck.