Comment by chrisweekly
18 hours ago
> "SpaceX has the vertical integration to be able to plonk down datacenters and get them powered with literal jet/rocket engines/turbines that they make from scratch"
Is that really a viable path? (Honest question)
I honestly think that the whole Memphis/Colossus debacle is what lead to the datacenter backlash. Before then I'd just hear rumblings from people complaining about bitcoin miners, but data centers in general were not seen as an odious land use.
Then Elon goes to Memphis, buys a warehouse and fires up 30 jet turbines in the parking lot, and you start getting reports about the incessant noise and being able to smell it from 5 miles away.
It seems like there's a fundamental problem with realizing other people have agency and if you fuck them hard enough they will fight back.
At this point, you can get the chips you just can't get the power. So in typical elon fashion, he just "solves" the bottleneck. Long term, no, that is not the strat. Thus the pivot to space.
What happens when he sucks the natural gas pipes dry in the peak cold of a Texas winter and thousands of people die to keep xAI burning?
We'll be forgiven for expecting the new overlords will take over in the bang of boiling oceans, as we miss the significant whimper of a cold Texan winter.