This is The Register we're talking about. Of course it is heavily editorialized, that's half their schtick.

Credibility is a thing. Articles like this burn it quite quickly. It really is past time that the scientific community needs to make a public statement rejecting these types of "journalists".

Can you link to any examples of a good editorial by this measure?

“I have given up on American journalism. The decline of the American press has long been obvious, and my time is too valuable to waste in an effort to supply the ‘man in the street’ with his daily quota of clichés, gossip, and erotic tripe. There is another concept of journalism, which you may or may not be familiar with. It’s engraved on a bronze plaque on the southeast corner of the Times Tower in New York City.”

—Hunter Thompson, letter to William Kennedy, 1959

“An institution that should always fight for progress and reform, never tolerate injustice or corruption, always fight demagogues of all parties, never belong to any party, always oppose privileged classes and public plunderers, never lack sympathy with the poor, always remain devoted to the public welfare, never be satisfied with merely printing news, always be drastically independent, never be afraid to attack wrong, whether by predatory plutocracy or predatory poverty.”

—Joseph Pulitzer, New York World mission statement, May 10, 1883, quote appears on The New York Times bronze plaque

In case you didn't know, The Register has been deliberately using this kind of language about ALL topics for nearly 30 years. It's part of their appeal and brand, like The Onion. People choose to read The Register because they have this adversarial stance and humorous tone about tech.

The vast majority of the pro-datacenter 'externalities don't matter as long as I make money' is also pretty obviously astroturfed.

The difference is that much of the communication on that end happens in backchannels, directly with the regulators, in secret meetings, without any possibility of public scrutiny.

(When that isn't enough, the firehose of paid advertisements gets fired up to convince the public, instead.)

Do Ireland's data centers objectively "guzzle" electricity?

I don't have any problem with The Register, but reporting laden with value-judging adjectives is not objective.

Which is most of Ireland's economy. I am fine with pulling the plug on them. They are not. I mean, who wants to lose 2/3rd of their GDP overnight?

I find that the word guzzle is dead accurate.

They consume a huge amount of the country's electricity not only for no clear benefit to society, but mostly for making it worse, with more social media posts, stupid videos, surveillance, advertising-led consumption, ai slop

As compared to productive uses, like lighting, food preservation, home warming, medical use, transport, and useful manufacturing.

Someone expressing frustration at emotionally charged headlines that clearly intend to rile people up is propaganda? Absurd.

What's the cause?