Post #2364390

2026-05-08 04:01 UTC

Hey, tech nerds. I have a question for you. Please boost this so it gets seen around. Right now, my city is struggling with a very serious problem, and a very real issue: Google wants to build a datacenter. That&#39;s the problem. The issue is: Google controls the means by which most people access information. What are realistic solutions to this problem? &quot;Use DuckDuckGo&quot; is *not* a reasonable solution, because that misunderstands what I&#39;m saying when I say Google controls the means by which most people access information. I don&#39;t mean Web search. I mean Google is one of the biggest voices in determining what even *counts* as valid information, on the Web. I mean Google has spent decades helping decide which protocols, formats, authentication systems, certificate practices, deliverability rules, browser behaviors, advertising norms, analytics expectations, mobile defaults, SEO conventions, and “security” standards become mandatory for being legible online. And I do mean mandatory. Because none of these things are technically required for people to communicate. People can publish HTML. People can send email. People can host files. People can run servers. People can make feeds. People can share text. But in practice, if your site does not meet the expectations of Google Search, Chrome, Gmail, Android, Maps, YouTube, Google Ads, Google Analytics, Google Cloud, reCAPTCHA, Safe Browsing, and the standards bodies and corporate ecosystems Google helps shape, then your communication becomes less reachable, less deliverable, less trusted, less indexed, less visible, or simply blocked. This is what I mean by “Google controls the means by which most people access information.” Not that Google owns every website. That would almost be easier to fight. The problem is that Google sits at the crossroads of discovery, reputation, authentication, infrastructure, advertising, analytics, spam detection, device defaults, and browser behavior. It gets to define the conditions under which information appears normal, trustworthy, safe, relevant, or even existent. And everyone else has to adapt. Cities adapt. Schools adapt. Small businesses adapt. Libraries adapt. Journalists adapt. Nonprofits adapt. Activists adapt. Indigenous nations adapt. Ordinary people adapt. We are constantly told this is “just how the internet works,” but it is not. It is how an internet works after decades of corporate consolidation, regulatory failure, and public institutions outsourcing basic communication infrastructure to companies whose interests are not aligned with public life. So when Google wants to build a datacenter in my city, the question is not only: “How much water will it use?” “How much power will it use?” “How many jobs will it create?” “What tax breaks will it get?” Those are important questions. But the deeper question is: How do we even have the conversation in which those questions can unfold? Because outside of private algorithmic bubbles, individuals increasingly have no meaningful way to communicate at scale. A personal website is not enough if no one can find it. An email list is not enough if messages are filtered, throttled, or marked suspicious. A public meeting is not enough if people only hear about it through platforms that decide who gets shown what. A local news article is not enough if discovery is mediated by search, social, and ad systems. A community warning is not enough if it has to compete with opaque ranking systems, engagement incentives, and corporate spam filters. So I am asking, seriously: What are realistic solutions? Not individual consumer choices. Not “use another search engine.” Not “just self-host.” Not “build an app.” Not “post somewhere else.” I mean political, technical, legal, municipal, and infrastructural solutions. What can a city do? What can a public library system do? What can a university do? What can local media do? What can state regulators do? What can standards bodies do? What can community organizations do? What can technologists build that does not simply recreate the same dependency under a different brand? Because if the answer is that there is no meaningful way for a community to communicate outside the channels shaped by Google and its peers, then we should be honest about that. That is not a technology problem. That is a governance problem.

Replies (12)

@cinebox@masto.hackers.town 2026-05-08 04:30

@emsenn@kolektiva.social Pressuring local institutions to not host their email and other communications via Google/Facebook/Microsoft is a good start. Way too much local communication is on fucking Facebook. But of course nobody wants to host their own email, and I dont know how to make that part more desirable.

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@murdoc@autistics.life 2026-05-08 10:04

@emsenn@kolektiva.social That's no small ask, but I get why you ask it, because it needs to be. I don't know that I can offer specific solutions, but what I can offer is a framework that can help lead to this kind of change. Among other things, the Techne System teaches skills to help answer the questions you are asking. In particular, you would likely be interested in the Level 3 topics of Social Change Strategies, and Systemic/Institutional Change. It's all free and open so you can investigate it at your convenience and see if it might be of any worth to you. https://techne-system.neocities.org

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@mjdxp@labyrinth.zone 2026-05-08 15:22

@emsenn@kolektiva.social google can't keep flyers out of mailboxes

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@mohs@climatejustice.social 2026-05-08 16:46

@emsenn@kolektiva.social You partly answered the question yourself. It is not something you can resolve on short notice. The goal for this has to be to split up google so it no longer has that power. And IMHO no company should exist, that could exceed the power of the states it is involved in. Even more so if such a company is lead by single individuals and not by democracy (which is very rare to find). That being said, as the issue you address not only refers to google but to all of these big tech companies. None of these should be allowed to exist in the way they exist now. I remember a writing of a guy who died in the first world war who wrote something like "people love convenience more, than they hate the power". I think that matches with todays issues, as it is hard to convince enough people to take on that fight. Where are we going with this? All the things that limit their access, that informs people and convinces them helps. This is a long run fight. You have to win many people for this. Making the alternatives more attractive helps. Leading others out of the golden cages helps. But no, there is no "You just have to do this one thing, and get to your goal" kind of answer to your question.

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@MossyQuartz@social.vivaldi.net 2026-05-08 17:42

@emsenn@kolektiva.social I'll boost this because this is one of many serious problems.

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@Kathmandu@stranger.social 2026-05-08 17:58

@emsenn@kolektiva.social You havea point. By way of supporting example, here's another person's post, comparing the restaurants that show on Google Maps, vs. the all the restaurants that exist. The town in this example is Salem, MA, USA. Google had plenty of chance to film the streets and index all the restaurants. They just don't want to show them all. https://better.boston/@aredridel/116536903745127768

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@tuban_muzuru@beige.party 2026-05-08 18:30

@emsenn@kolektiva.social We fought the data center down the road in Menomonie - and won https://reasonstobecheerful.world/menomonie-wisconsin-data-center-toolkit/

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@Slash909uk@mastodon.me.uk 2026-05-08 20:10

@emsenn@kolektiva.social perhaps use other channels of communications to raise the issue first? Protest actions, physical leafleting and fly posting, using these kind of 'guerrila' tactics to raise awareness? Local media might take notice, publish and feed this into the mega corps filters, thus getting it into people's consciousness for you? Essentially use the algorithmic hate machine to work for you? (I used to run a Greenpeace local support/activist group when I was much younger, before social media!!)

Open ##2484578
@angelteeth@kolektiva.social 2026-05-10 17:52

@emsenn@kolektiva.social we are going to quickly be facing the same thing here (data centers), so I'm both watching these conversations with interest and also asking a lot of the same questions. (Not that it's datacenters alone which require us to ask these questions obviously). Unlike yourself & many folks on here I am very tech-stupid, so my thoughts tend to run to low-tech concepts, which may or may not really be adequate to address what's happening. I think in some ways and in some places, small towns are more set up to meet the challenge of low-tech communication than larger towns or cities are. But I think about (and have seen it tried, sometimes successfully) adapting structures like the town hall, the flyering, even the door-knocking (depending on the neighborhood). When I think about de-growth, part of what I think about is just the scaling-down of communication, in the sense that the old, "one mouthy person gets on a soapbox and yells at a crowd" method, in all its iterations, seems played out. I'm sure you have way more insight into the actual science of communication than I do, and would love to hear more about communication + degrowth, but in this immediate sense, the thought of treating communication outside of tech as a challenge of mycelial spread, so to speak, instead of how to reach mass numbers all at once, is kind of where my mind is going. With that, I wonder about looking at things like what other kinds of orgs exist who could be called upon to raise the issue with their members, and what orgs they partner with, etc. Library boards, or even hobbyist groups, parent groups, anything where a quick n dirty (but not too dirty LOL) informative zine could make the rounds and then those folks be tasked with raising the issue to their other orgs, be they knitting circles or neighborhood associations. Iirc (and I may be wrong), it was more this kind of branching info-spreading that built mass participation in the Atlanta Forest movement than big platforms like Instagram or google. These methods definitely come with their own challenges, and as as they say, no plan survives first contact with the enemy, but I think the dual purpose of getting the info out there and at the same time bolstering people's neural pathways to different forms of communication than big tech, is important and hopefully some of these low-tech old-school options can still be revived. Anyway, hopefully I haven't just missed the whole point of what you were asking in your original post, and ultimately I don't really have any concrete answers to add, but this is a continent-wide issue (at least) and I'm very interested in these discussions. They are happening here as well.

Open ##2484581
@JustinDerrick@infosec.exchange 2026-05-10 20:20

@emsenn@kolektiva.social Register a domain, put up a website, and do some wheat paste posters, and print up postcards or flyers to drop in mailboxes. Set up a table in a public location, and chat with your neighbours. #Organize and pressure your politicians to #resist against the techbros.

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@kawentzmann@fairmove.net 2026-05-11 04:49

@emsenn@kolektiva.social I woukd avoid products by any company building data centers, if possible.

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@davva23@kolektiva.social 2026-05-11 18:00

@emsenn@kolektiva.social The anti-roads movement of the 1990s in the UK might provide some inspiration on direct action tactics. If a group of you want to stop the datacentre, then a campaign of awareness raising and direct action is probably your best chance. There's a handbook on campaign planning here: https://www.nonviolent-conflict.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/The-Path-of-Most-Resistance-Second-Edition.pdf As governments are generally more interested in appeasing big business than listening to their constituents, I wouldn't waste time trying to sway them. Ask them to do the right thing though, if only to show everyone that you tried that already. Unfortunately, most effective direct action tactics are seen as criminal behaviour, and treated as such by the authorities. Good luck!

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