As the alarm bells sound ever louder about the potentially existential threat of breakneck AI development, people far removed from Silicon Valley debates about the future of the artificial intelligence revolution are voicing other more immediately tangible worries about the building of the vast datacentres that power these entities.
For this week’s cover story, economics and political writer Eduardo Porter, analyses why communities are pushing back against AI and the future that the big tech plutocrats want to create. These fears, based around environmental concerns over resource use and rapid societal change, are, he argues, far more complex than luddite attitudes or nimbyism.
It’s a position exemplified by reporting from two rural communities in India and the UK where vast datacentres are already under construction or being planned. As Hannah Ellis-Petersen and Aakash Hassan find out, the villagers of Tarluvada, in Andhra Pradesh, feel that government promises of a “golden age” that a hyperscale Google datacentre would bring them have been broken. Meanwhile, Sandra Laville meets protesters in Great Torrington, Devon, who sense that they are being kept in the dark about plans for an AI campus, one of Europe’s largest, in a Unesco-designated nature reserve.
The US campaigner Elizabeth Humphreys, who joined a meeting in Great Torrington, told villagers: “This is a global issue; we are all connected.” And it felt like an issue where Guardian Weekly could bring together our journalism from correspondents across the world to highlight a subject that connects and affects us all.
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Five essential reads in this week’s edition
Spotlight | Kyiv’s cold front is approaching
Charlotte Higgins reports on how residents are preparing for winter, stocking up on food and determination, as Russia increases its attacks on energy infrastructure
Environment | What Nepal has taught Argentina
What can the Patagonian town of El Chaltén at the foot of the Torre glacier do to avoid an event similar to the disaster in Nepal? María de los Ángeles Orfila finds out
Feature | Andy Burnham: a man with a plan
As the first Labour conference with Andy Burnham as prime minister takes place, Hettie O’Brien finds out just how radical his policies could be
Opinion | Macron’s brave swansong
In his final speech to the UN, Emmanuel Macron told the world how to stand up to Trump, says Steve Bloomfield
Culture | A minimalist at 90
As he prepares to celebrate a milestone birthday, Steve Reich tells Flora Willson how he developed his musical ideas and why he wants others to take up the baton of performing his works
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What else we’ve been reading
• When Arsène Wenger was appointed Arsenal manager 30 years ago this week, football was a very different sport to what it is today. This professorial French coach brought new methods and great success to north London and is rightly described in this piece as “arguably the most seismic managerial appointment in modern English football history”. Anthony Naughton, assistant editor
• I enjoyed the story of a broadcaster bonding with his adult son over playing video games as he captures the nostalgic joy and emotional bonding that gaming can bring, before he and his son move to different parts of the world. Bowie Qiu, marketing manager
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Other highlights from the Guardian website
• Video | NAZA – official trailer
• Audio | Marina Hyde on Trump, tech bros and Taylor Swift
• Gallery | The endangered native ponies of Eriskay in the Outer Hebrides
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