[AmazingEveryDay]

All the compute being built out is very impressive and it's nice to think it could be used to further science, further our understanding, just in some way for the greater good. But I think mostly it will be used to serve ads.

[tengbretson]

In the 10 years prior to like 2023, any new large scale data center build-out was explicitly for serving more ads. Meanwhile, now that we have a new tech that's literally solving unsolved math problems, we're suddenly doomers. Why?

[halestock]

Because it's pretty evident that all these data centers are primarily intended to eliminate jobs and make more trillionaires and destroy democracy, and the positive stuff (like solving unsolved math problems) doesn't remotely justify that.

[laughing_man]

That's what pays the bills. You wouldn't expect someone to spend this kind of money without a way to make it back (and then some).

[protocolture]

Amazons business is just cloud services tbh. I dont know what Amazons customer base looks like in aggregate but I bet its more interesting than just ads.

[kylehotchkiss]

Or generate political slops to rile up older people

[tdb7893]

It's already being used for the greatest good of all, creating value for the shareholders!

[Gigachad]

It’ll get used to generate an endless stream of AI slop short form videos to captivate viewers to watch more ads.

[cyanydeez]

common now, think positive: local sex bots in your area waiting to chat

[ares623]

Ads are the future. If you don't like them then you're a luddite.

[user3939382]

Tell that to São Paulo.

[jrflowers]

Look everybody it’s 1670s London haberdasher Jonathon Holder!

[kibwen]

Frankly, it should be a crime, a felony even, to purchase something if you haven't seen an ad for it beforehand. Think of the poor middlemen!

[ddxv]

Unpopular take I know. But ads are a source of revenue for much of the free and open internet. The alternatives are paid features that are a regressive tax on poorer people who can't afford them or fork up larger amounts of their discretionary budget.

While popups and bad ad practices have always been a problem, it's sad to see that they became so bad that the response to them is to paygate web content. More and more sites are locked behind paywalls.

[Gigachad]

Ads create a terribly perverse incentive to increase users viewing time on platforms. It's the whole reason most of the internet has become so horrible. My email provider doesn't try to drive up my engagement because they have no incentive for me to use the product more than I naturally want to. I'd also be willing to bet that the current ad funded system ends up costing the average person more than just paying for services when they get influenced to buy the things in the ads. That's the whole point of advertising after all.

We have already long since had a solution for low income people getting access to paid content, libraries provided access to paid books and newspapers for free. People with higher income would still buy copies themselves for convenience but there was a free option. We also have public funded news orgs providing ad free news and reporting.

[graphime]

> it could be used to further science, further our understanding, just in some way for the greater good

Perhaps voice your concern with your elected government representative?

Unless of course, you think your effort is useless.