No One Wants AI Data Centers on Earth. Do They Make Sense in Space?

My take: I confess that the first time I read this I thought science fiction, but it is real. SpaceX has already shown actual hardware for its orbital data center plan: the AI1 is a 70-meter solar panel with compute racks that cool directly into the vacuum of space. And the physics checks out: unlimited solar energy up there and none of the heat headaches that data centers cause on the ground. The real challenges are latency (the delay between asking for something and getting the answer), the cost of launching all of it, and interference with astronomical observations, which already generated formal complaints. Amazon and Blue Origin are also racing ahead with their Project Sunrise. To me, if this scales, the debate over who controls AI infrastructure gets much more complicated, and very orbital.