RadCasts

Tech companies are racing to build thousands of huge data centers to power the artificial intelligence revolution. To find the land they need, they are barreling into rural communities across the United States with the promise of good jobs. But not everyone is buying that pitch.

Karen Weise, a technology correspondent for The New York Times, tells the story of one county pushing back against Big Tech. 

Guest: Karen Weise, a technology correspondent for The New York Times.

Background reading: 

• What exactly are artificial intelligence companies trying to build? Here’s a guide.
• How large tech companies are offloading the risks of the A.I. boom.
• At this big Amazon data center in Indiana, everything is supersized for A.I.

Photo: AJ Mast for The New York Times

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

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When society, financial systems and human beings fall short, how can we repair the damage? Tom Sutcliffe hosts Radio 4's discussion programme which starts the week, exploring the social, moral and political contradictions of the world we face today, with US novelist George Saunders, Turkish writer Ece Temulkuran and investigative journalist Oliver Bullough,

The Booker Prize winning novelist, George Saunders new book Vigil deals with the moral ambivalence of a greedy oil executive; the death bed reckoning of a man who resists facing his life and legacy. The Turkish writer, Ece Temulkuran's new book Nation of Strangers: Rebuilding a Home in the 21st Century explores the rising global displacement of people who will need to forge stronger connections amid political and social upheaval.

In an investigation of money laundering, Oliver Bullough's Everybody Loves Our Dollars sets out the scale of the problem and why we are failing to tackle the global systems that allow illicit money to move freely using sites as varied as Bicester Shopping Village in Oxfordshire and a casino in Vancouver, Canada.

Producer: Ruth Watts