American company OpenAI plans to rebrand its data centers, calling them "AI compute campuses." The new terminology is part of a broad package of political and communications initiatives prepared by its global affairs team under the leadership of Chris Lehane, infohub.kz reports.
The public campaign will launch immediately after the U.S. midterm elections, as the tech sector braces for tighter regulatory oversight from Washington. According to TechCrunch, dropping the term "data center" in favor of "campus" is meant to soften public criticism and prepare the company for the new composition of the U.S. Congress.
The shift in rhetoric comes amid growing discontent among Americans over large-scale server capacity construction. Opinion polls show that residents of affected regions are concerned about enormous electricity consumption, water use for cooling systems and rising utility rates. Only a small share of citizens see the impact of data centers as purely positive.
OpenAI hopes the term "campus" will emphasize the openness of its projects and strip the infrastructure of negative associations with closed industrial facilities.
Representatives of the ChatGPT developer confirmed the choice of the new designation and said they plan to involve local communities in shaping projects and distributing economic benefits. As part of its forthcoming legislative strategy, the company will propose state-level rules giving residents a voice in approving the construction of computing sites, as well as new restrictions on the speed of deployment for the most powerful models.