[SUBMITTED/ISSUE CONTEST] Test Environment

by **Ko-oren** » Wed Apr 21, 2021 6:11 am

Title: Test Environment

The Issue: On your way to the grand opening of another new datacenter located on the outskirts of @@CAPITAL@@, you see that nearby @@ANIMAL@@ Lake is just one-third the size of what it used to be, which causes problems for local farms. Rather, that water was used to cool datacenters that require almost as much water as small towns.
Validity: Has computers. Also: large IT sector OR high scientific advancement AND non-zero IT sector

Option 1: As you arrive, an angry local farmer by the name of @@RANDOMNAME@@ approaches you, pitchfork in hand. "These here fancy computers sure are handy, but they're killing my crops! Just make sure they take these ugly buildings down, and I can go back to growing my potatoes again!" he yells, as he hands you a bag of homemade chips, which are not of the micro kind, much to your dismay.
Effect: @@NAME@@ makes the transition back from trojan horses to regular old horses

Option 2: A man with a fishing rod and a tackle box on his way to the lake chimes in. "Two-Phase Immersion cooling sounds like it could solve all your problems. It's a new type of technology that uses dielectric heat transfer liquid that could still be improved on. Surely with a 'little' government funding that can be installed everywhere in no time. But what do I know, I just want to fish. Don't we all?"
Effect: young and old flock to the great outdoors as shiny new servers go unused

Option 3: Jessica Primrose Bézeaux, the enthusiastic, energetic tech mogul and owner of the facility, hands you a pair of giant scissors to cut the ceremonial ribbon. "Don't fall for his bait! Using water to cool my facilities according to current industrial standards is much cheaper. And risk-free! If you ignore the, uhm, additives. In return for more cheap land deals for me to put some datacenters on, I'll pump the water back into the lake to make it as sparkling and colorful as all these blinkenlights. It'll be gorgeous!"
[validity: capitalist]
Effect: phishing has fully replaced fishing

Option 4: Jessica Primrose Bézeaux, the youthful minister of Internet and Technology, hands you a pair of giant scissors to cut the ceremonial ribbon. "Don't fall for his bait! Using water to cool my facilities according to current industrial standards is much cheaper. And risk-free! If you ignore the, uhm, additives. With a little extra funding to our sector, we can pump the water back into the lake to make it as sparkling and colorful as all these blinkenlights. It'll be gorgeous!"
[validity: socialist]
Effect: phishing has fully replaced fishing

- Inspiration: Source in Dutch ('Datacenters in North-Holland may lead to water shortages')

by **Electrum** » Sun Apr 25, 2021 5:32 am

I think the issue premise doesn't make it clear exactly why technological improvement = small lake. It's only established in option 1, which is too late. This also seems to be a very specific issue to the Netherlands? Does this occur in other countries too?

by **Trotterdam** » Sun Apr 25, 2021 10:42 am

Electrum wrote:This also seems to be a very specific issue to the Netherlands?

It's highly unlikely that any water shortage issues are specific to the Netherlands. Since our inception, our history has been defined by having way too much of the stuff.

Of course, just that you have a lot of water doesn't mean the plumbing to get it to where it's needed isn't going to be a problem.

by **Ko-oren** » Sat May 01, 2021 1:41 pm

Draft 0.2 is up. Could a native speaker look at the phrases I've used here and there? I'm especially concerned about "forcing a meager smile to the engineers while giving thumbs up to the farmer." - does this feel natural at all?

Electrum wrote:I think the issue premise doesn't make it clear exactly why technological improvement = small lake. It's only established in option 1, which is too late. This also seems to be a very specific issue to the Netherlands? Does this occur in other countries too?

1) Fair, that's taken care of now.
2) There are quite a few reports out there on the effects of datacentres in locations with water scarcity (in the USA, for instance), so I imagine it translates to the NS multiverse very easily. Given that the Netherlands have a reputation of having too much water and that datacentres can still cause water shortages over here is telling as well.

by **USS Monitor** » Sat May 01, 2021 4:52 pm

Ko-oren wrote:Draft 0.2 is up. Could a native speaker look at the phrases I've used here and there? I'm especially concerned about "forcing a meager smile to the engineers while giving thumbs up to the farmer." - does this feel natural at all?

That line is the first time you mentioned engineers, but it's written as if we already knew they were there.

2) There are quite a few reports out there on the effects of datacentres in locations with water scarcity (in the USA, for instance), so I imagine it translates to the NS multiverse very easily. Given that the Netherlands have a reputation of having too much water and that datacentres can still cause water shortages over here is telling as well.

I think the premise is plausible enough to use.

by **Australian rePublic** » Tue May 04, 2021 5:34 am

Many water poor countries in real life have huge tech sectors. What do they do?

by **Ko-oren** » Tue May 04, 2021 6:18 am

Thanks for the help, all! There's still a few things that I feel aren't phrased naturally:
- Option 4: "he begs, giving thumbs up to the farmer while nervously looking around to see if any of Bézeaux' personnel heard him." I just can't tell what you'd normally say in English to convey this
- Option 2/3: "hands you giant scissors to cut the ceremonial ribbon to officially open the building" feel like this could be shorter. And is there a way to phrase 'hands you' a little more aggressively?

USS Monitor wrote:
Ko-oren wrote:Draft 0.2 is up. Could a native speaker look at the phrases I've used here and there? I'm especially concerned about "forcing a meager smile to the engineers while giving thumbs up to the farmer." - does this feel natural at all?

That line is the first time you mentioned engineers, but it's written as if we already knew they were there.

2) There are quite a few reports out there on the effects of datacentres in locations with water scarcity (in the USA, for instance), so I imagine it translates to the NS multiverse very easily. Given that the Netherlands have a reputation of having too much water and that datacentres can still cause water shortages over here is telling as well.

I think the premise is plausible enough to use.

Thanks! I switched the order of the options to make it work.

Australian rePublic wrote:Many water poor countries in real life have huge tech sectors. What do they do?

Water poor regions with large datacentres (not necessarily all tech sectors) pretty much all address the water situation in some way or another. The reason datacentres are built in these areas are often economical (low electricity prices, tax breaks for certain sectors, etc). Some facilities use other cooling methods (for example, air) but those are, from what I understand, not as effective.

by **Candlewhisper Archive** » Fri May 07, 2021 5:00 pm

I think this issue has promise, but needs more technical and environmental literacy, as well as a more direct opening.

On the opening, I suggest losing the framing, and just going straight to the crux of it. Something like:

The issue:
Large scale datacenter servers are critical to the growth of the IT industry, but require significant cooling, with each center using daily quantities of water equal to a small town, which is creating water shortages for local farms and forests.

That frames the dilemma directly, explaining the situation and establishing the conflict. Any words you add to that should be for the purpose of humour, and you should definitely think of ways to do that, to make the dilemma less dry. Think over who might be complaining, paint a mind's eye picture with an eye to farce and slapstick.

Angry farmer is good, but the pro-farming and environmental argument needs more fleshing out, perhaps talking as well about power consumption, and livelihoods, and so on. Make it luddite, but charmingly so.

The remaining options fail to capture the nuance needed and don't demonstrate the depth of research you need to make this issue work. I would suggest instead:

Option 2 -- An industry type who is acknowledging the problem, but who suggests that it could be seen as a boon, if the state were to contract the data centers to sell the hot water locally for district heating, with the now cooled greywater coming from the town being passed back to the farmers.

Option 3 -- A techie type pointing out that these are technologies that advance all the time, and that water cooling replaced air cooling as a more efficient and ecofriendly approach, but that emerging techs like two phase immersion cooling will take away the need for water at all, and with a little government help this technology could be rolled out faster.

Those would be real life solutions of course, and the only problem with them is that they might be so reasonable that they make the issue a non-issue.

I leave that to you to puzzle out.

by **Ko-oren** » Tue Jun 22, 2021 5:27 am

I know I'm cutting this awfully close to the end of the contest, but the great feedback by Candle and some extra time on my side meant I could revisit this. I hope I covered (almost) all of the improvements while adding some humour. I hope there's enough of the latter.

by **Jutsa** » Mon Jun 28, 2021 6:56 am

I do appreciate this draft. It's not the typical environment vs. industry scenario, although it is a dimension. I don't really have any major complaints with it.

That said, I do feel like the two sentences in "Surely with a 'little' government funding that can be installed everywhere in no time. It's a new type of technology that uses dielectric heat transfer liquid that could still be improved on." would be far more fluid if they were switched.

Option 1 also feels like it's missing... something. I just can't put my finger on it.

Also, for option 2, "It's a win-win!" would probably go better after the bit about her pointing at herself. On top of that, it feels like it could be a little less passive? Perhaps she also says something like "Now if you don't mind, I have plans for the rest of this lake..." or something.

Again, pretty interesting draft. Good luck to you.

by **SherpDaWerp** » Mon Jun 28, 2021 12:21 pm

I'm not sure that Option 2's speaker calling it a "stockpile" is really accurate, given the warm water gets pretty-quickly evaporated by an adiabatic cooler, which is what causes all the water supply issues in the first place. They don't store the water for any significant period, so a "source" would be more accurate.

Other than that, there's also a massive host of other issues that Option 2 causes, including assuming that people using hot water will cool it down. I dunno a lot about mains water pipes, but if I start constantly pouring hot water down the kitchen sink, it seems like it gets at least into the ground before it the stream starts to properly cool down. You've also alluded to the fact that they'll "have to find some use for it in the summer" which implies they might just stop using the water, and if they do... the datacenter would still have to have some other cooling process. And finally, the filtering processes that would have to go into making coolant (which tends to have a host of additives) human-safe only to then filter out the human-introduced contaminants and then re-add the additives would be massive and ridiculous, and produce a lot of problems on it's own.

I just think an option with so many massive problems shouldn't be presented as the "reasonable option" that's positive towards the datacenter. It really should be the "crazy option", especially over a technology that's already seeing active use.

If you need an angle, switch 2/3 with 4, then the Minister/Manager can throw in a comment about not wanting to deal with the costly switch-over and maintenance, and suggest pumping it away as a cheaper alternative.

Sorry to dump such a big suggestion on you with so little time remaining before submission.

by **Ko-oren** » Tue Jun 29, 2021 1:45 pm

SherpDaWerp wrote:I'm not sure that Option 2's speaker calling it a "stockpile" is really accurate, given the warm water gets pretty-quickly evaporated by an adiabatic cooler, which is what causes all the water supply issues in the first place. They don't store the water for any significant period, so a "source" would be more accurate.

Other than that, there's also a massive host of other issues that Option 2 causes, including assuming that people using hot water will cool it down. I dunno a lot about mains water pipes, but if I start constantly pouring hot water down the kitchen sink, it seems like it gets at least into the ground before it the stream starts to properly cool down. You've also alluded to the fact that they'll "have to find some use for it in the summer" which implies they might just stop using the water, and if they do... the datacenter would still have to have some other cooling process. And finally, the filtering processes that would have to go into making coolant (which tends to have a host of additives) human-safe only to then filter out the human-introduced contaminants and then re-add the additives would be massive and ridiculous, and produce a lot of problems on it's own.

I just think an option with so many massive problems shouldn't be presented as the "reasonable option" that's positive towards the datacenter. It really should be the "crazy option", especially over a technology that's already seeing active use.

If you need an angle, switch 2/3 with 4, then the Minister/Manager can throw in a comment about not wanting to deal with the costly switch-over and maintenance, and suggest pumping it away as a cheaper alternative.

Sorry to dump such a big suggestion on you with so little time remaining before submission.

That's entirely fair. I found several sources on why cooling takes so much water but they were a bit mixed in 1) what it used the water for and 2) what you could do with it after the fact. Some of your issues I found and sidestepped or intended (the point about 'what to do in summer' is something I included that isn't so much funny as it is option-breaking). The point on switching 2/3 and 4 is interesting: the issue still works (1: no IT. 4: more IT, using expensive science, but the water is saved, then 2/3 as a business-friendly option to kick the can down the road).

Jutsa wrote:I do appreciate this draft. It's not the typical environment vs. industry scenario, although it is a dimension. I don't really have any major complaints with it.

That said, I do feel like the two sentences in "Surely with a 'little' government funding that can be installed everywhere in no time. It's a new type of technology that uses dielectric heat transfer liquid that could still be improved on." would be far more fluid if they were switched.

Option 1 also feels like it's missing... something. I just can't put my finger on it.

Also, for option 2, "It's a win-win!" would probably go better after the bit about her pointing at herself. On top of that, it feels like it could be a little less passive? Perhaps she also says something like "Now if you don't mind, I have plans for the rest of this lake..." or something.

Again, pretty interesting draft. Good luck to you.

Thanks! I switched some of the wording in option 1 to make it flow better. Hopefully that reduces the lack of oomph a bit.

All changes since 1.1:
- option order
- effect lines for option 3/4
- order of lines in option 2
- a lot of option 3/4 in general ("bait" joke, what to do with the water)
- description reworded slightly

by **Fauxia** » Tue Jun 29, 2021 6:40 pm

Ko-oren wrote:The Issue: On your way to the grand opening of another new datacenter located on the outskirts of @@CAPITAL@@, you see that nearby @@ANIMAL@@ Lake is just one-third the size of what it used to be, which causes problems for local farms. Rather, that water was used to cool datacenters that require almost as much water as small towns.

The order here is jumped. "Rather" really muddles the whole thing, but this last sentence probably belongs before the "causing problems for local farms", or else mention the farms are having problems before mentioning why.

Ko-oren wrote:Option 1: As you arrive, an angry local farmer by the name of @@RANDOMNAME@@ approaches you, pitchfork in hand. "These here fancy computers sure are handy, but they're killing my crops! Just make sure they take these ugly buildings down, and I can go back to growing my potatoes again!" he yells, as he hands you a bag of homemade chips, which are not of the micro kind, much to your dismay.

Don't put "he yells" at the end, it doesn't read well. Honestly, I don't think there's any reason this option can't be the standard construction - "Intro statement", @@HE@@ says, being described in a funny way hopefully. "This is why...

Ko-oren wrote:Option 2: A man with a fishing rod and a tackle box on his way to the lake chimes in. "Two-Phase Immersion cooling sounds like it could solve all your problems. It's a new type of technology that uses dielectric heat transfer liquid that could still be improved on.

"And" is probably better than "that"

Ko-oren wrote:Surely with a 'little' government funding that can be installed everywhere in no time. But what do I know, I just want to fish. Don't we all?"

If that's the route you are going, the speaker should be less confident before. Just throw in a "probably" or two.

Ko-oren wrote:Option 3: Jessica Primrose Bézeaux, the enthusiastic, energetic tech mogul and owner of the facility, hands you a pair of giant scissors to cut the ceremonial ribbon. "Don't fall for his bait! Using water to cool my facilities according to current industrial standards is much cheaper. And risk-free!

"is much cheaper, and totally risk-free!"

Ko-oren wrote:If you ignore the, uhm, additives. In return for more cheap land deals for me to put some datacenters on, I'll pump the water back into the lake to make it as sparkling and colorful as all these blinkenlights. It'll be gorgeous!"
[validity: capitalist]
Ko-oren wrote:Effect: phishing has fully replaced fishing

Good joke, but can you improve the delivery, mayhaps? It doesn't quite speak to me right now.

Pretty good issue. Just needs a few tweaks.

by **Ko-oren** » Wed Jun 30, 2021 1:40 am

Done, thanks! Time to submit and hope for the best.

[SUBMITTED/ISSUE CONTEST] Test Environment

[SUBMITTED/ISSUE CONTEST] Test Environment

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