WTF?! With all the negativity associated with the facilities, it's fair to say that the term data center has become a dirty word. OpenAI is well aware of this, which is why the company wants to call them something else: compute campuses.
An OpenAI spokesperson told Business Insider about the rebrand. "Compute campuses better describes the scale and role of the infrastructure we're building for AI," the spokesperson said. "These are long-term investments in computing, energy infrastructure and skilled work."
It seems that the ChatGPT maker is trying to appeal to those living near data centers by convincing them that they are part of this beautiful AI revolution.
"We want the communities hosting that infrastructure to help shape it and share in the opportunities it creates," the OpenAI spokesperson added.
Whether the locals angry about the noise, pollution, falling house prices, increased water consumption, and higher electricity bills will care about this shaping and sharing remains to be seen.
Several companies have tried offering incentives to local residents to appease them (or convince them not to sue), but even handing over thousands of dollars isn't enough to tempt many people. A survey from earlier this year found more Americans would rather live next to a nuclear power plant than a data center.
Data centers have become one of the most contentious topics in US politics. President Trump, who has long supported the building of the facilities, recently said that the companies behind them should make financial deals with local communities to win over residents. But similar incentives, including the promise of a $10,000 "grant" from a data center developer in Pennsylvania, have failed to convince people in the past.
Some data center supporters have accused those who oppose them of being influenced by Chinese social media campaigns designed to slow America's AI advantage – even though these campaigns use facts that are actually true. Fox News even compared the pushback to protesting against tank and plane factories during World War II.
OpenAI appears to be taking the lead in this name change, but it wouldn't be the first time that a technology has started being called something else recently.
In September, Trump signed an executive order renaming artificial intelligence to "superintelligence," turning AI into SI. The Department of Justice was an early adopter of this term, using it in a statement about a fraud case. Meanwhile, Elon Musk was so committed that he renamed SpaceXAI to SpaceXSI.