Amazon tries to placate data center protesters

Link: Amazon pledges $1B to data center communities, warns that local opposition threatens U.S. AI lead, by Todd Bishop in GeekWire

This is a sign that protests are working:

“Amazon says it will spend more than $1 billion over five years in the U.S. communities where it builds and operates data centers, responding to a growing backlash across the country against the tech industry’s massive AI infrastructure buildout.”

But I’d consider this a settlement rather than a win: companies like Amazon need the data centers to be built in order to continue their growth. Communities opposing them should be able to keep pressing and get bigger, ongoing concessions at the very least.

The objections here follow a predictable playbook: claims about widespread foreign interference (because surely no real American could oppose data centers in their communities) and a warning that America will lose to China if it doesn’t keep building. It’s a scaremongering technique designed to keep people in line without offering further benefits to communities. America won’t lose; Amazon might.

The current concessions over five years represent 0.1% of Amazon’s annual capital spending. It’s less than pocket change — and Amazon isn’t forgoing tax breaks, so it may get it all back anyway.

And it seems odd that these benefits are set up as something like an altruistic program through Amazon’s own “Built Together” program. Really it should be money that flows directly into towns and cities, on an ongoing basis, with zero strings attached and no involvement from the company. Those towns can do the same things Amazon is claiming to do, but on their terms, and in a way that doesn’t tie them to Amazon’s infrastructure and isn’t a weird PR win for the company.

There’s more to do. This is a sign that the protesters can get much more for their communities.