Data Centers Were on the Ballot. They Lost
Voters didn’t just hand Democrats Congress and countless state positions—they backed data center limits in more than 30 communities, changing the calculus on future AI infrastructure.
Andrew Maddox
AI news, analysis and practice from inside higher ed. Daily AI briefings as well as some longer form essays and experiments.
Essays
AI Is Driving a Surge in Drupal Security Advisories
AI-assisted bug hunting pushed Drupal to 256 security advisories in five months, nearly 4x all of 2025.
Out of Milk? Let Claude Do the Walmart Order
We ran out of milk, so I had Claude, Anthropic's AI assistant, build our Walmart cart from our order history. Here's how it went, the steps to try it yourself, and a prompt you can use.
A Lighter Blog
Twenty years ago, Cameron Moll made the case for realigning a site instead of redesigning it. I finally took that advice because of Claude Code.
How I Used AI to Build a Custom WordPress Theme in a Weekend
I used AI (Claude Opus 5.5) to build a custom WordPress theme in a weekend — about 10 minutes of hands-on time versus the 20 hours it used to take.
On Meta’s Shift to AI
John Gruber muses on Meta's new AI strategy: There are four big players in consumer AI: Google, Meta, OpenAI, and Anthropic. I don’t think Zuckerberg mentioned any of the others…
Zuckerberg and AI
Mark Zuckerberg’s newest manifesto casts him as a defender of the individual against concentrated technological power. He argues that “superintelligence” should be widely distributed, enabling people to create, compete, and…
Municipal Budget Cuts, Property Taxes, and Data Centers
The Dallas Morning News recently posted an article about Dallas reducing park-related expenses from its upcoming city budget: The Dallas Park and Recreation Department has made limited progress toward its…
Apple AI
Last week, Apple hosted its annual developer conference, WWDC. The keynote presentation started with new controls for parents to help them establish guidelines for their kids. I was surprised by…
The EU’s The trillion-click mistake
While you read this, Europeans will click roughly seven million cookie banners. This is a follow-up post to my earlier thoughts on Apple AI and the EU. This post was…
Briefings
-
Voters backed limits on data-center development in most local ballot measures, while Democratic gains and candidates promising tighter oversight have raised the prospect of new restrictions on AI and its infrastructure. The push reflects concerns over power bills, water use and pollution—and could delay projects, constrain computing capacity and keep costs high; this briefing also examines policy proposals from OpenAI’s Chris Lehane and the uncertain path to legislation.
-
Google's making its AI tools opt-in for K–12 schools next year. The catch? Schools that say no to AI lose Search, too. Also today: an MBA taught by AI avatars, and the $1.5 million paychecks going to engineers who can actually get AI into production.
-
Anthropic’s rapid growth is colliding with nearly $895 billion in computing and infrastructure commitments: it reported $17 billion in quarterly revenue but a $23 billion loss, sharpening questions about how its AI expansion will be financed ahead of a possible IPO. The pressure extends across the industry: OpenAI has raised about $11 billion against an initial $30 billion target as investors reassess returns and lenders tighten terms, even as major tech companies plan hundreds of billions in AI spending.
-
Investors are questioning whether Big Tech’s AI buildout can pay off fast enough: Amazon, Alphabet, Microsoft and Meta plan to spend more than $720 billion on infrastructure this year, as a sell-off wipes nearly $500 billion from Alphabet’s market value in a day. Anthropic’s IPO filing puts the costs in sharper relief, while Amazon and DoorDash say third-party shopping agents still account for little use—evidence that broad adoption and returns remain uncertain.
-
Anthropic’s planned Nasdaq IPO under ticker ANT turned the AI funding boom into a public-market test: reported valuation estimates reach $1.5–$2 trillion despite an $80.7 billion first-half net loss, while a $63 billion chip-leasing deal exposed tightening financing. Big Tech spending brought mixed returns, sharpening doubts about whether AI demand can cover compute costs. At Dartmouth, Provost Santiago Schnell resigned after a review found he failed to disclose AI assistance in academic and opinion writing. The week also showed AI’s double-edged impact: OpenAI models helped uncover critical PHP flaws even as attackers exploited them.
-
Microsoft and Alphabet both showed AI demand is booming. The returns? Less evenly spread. Cloud sales surged at both, but Alphabet's profit and cash flow slipped while the spending keeps climbing. Anthropic's IPO is about to put that same payoff question to public investors, and Apple is learning that competing with data centers for flash memory gets expensive fast.