Nordic Nations Pitch For US Data Centers 130
judgecorp writes "Nordic nations are all pitching for business from data centre owners, based on their countries' excellent network provision, plentiful electricity from renewable sources, and a climate where servers can be kept cool cheaply, using the ambient air temperature, with no need for chillers. A Swedish delegation is visiting California to lure other players to follow Facebook into Sweden. Meanwhile, Iceland now has a new multi-tenant data centre to join the existing Thor site, and Denmark has a container-park data centre for its financial industry."
Re:Iceland??? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, better rely on the safety of California!
How about those privacy laws? (Score:4, Insightful)
Energy is one thing. Ability to actually protect data from warrantless search and monitoring is another.
Re:Iceland??? (Score:5, Insightful)
If Iceland's economy is fucked, I'd like to know where I can sign up my country's economy for a proper rogering.
Re:Iceland??? (Score:4, Insightful)
Not only that, they also have to worry about elves. The hidden people are generally friendly but they do not like being disturbed. If the data center is build in one of their areas, they might curse the data. Perhaps they already have...think about Iceland's recent economic breakdown...
Re:Yup (Score:5, Insightful)
>As mentioned, the Swedes have declared all data passing through it free game for its security apparatus.
Great for hosting your sensitive data.
Yup, but you are fooling your self if you don't think any other government is doing the same. And this data will most likely be shared with US agents if they come knocking, looking for something.
Re:Innovative (Score:4, Insightful)
I think you confuse military cooperation with the possibility of industrial espionage. The two issues have nothing to do with each other. Just because you trust a network to handle shared military information doesn't mean you can or should trust the same network to handle trade secrets, financial information, or military state secrets.
Re:Sweden???!!! (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd be more worried about data breaches and server seizures due to their crazy politicians [thedailybeast.com], crazy justice system! [thelocal.se] and willingness to bend over for all manner of privacy invading measures [falkvinge.net] to satisfy foreign interests. It will be a hot day in Iceland before we move any servers to Sweden. Go Iceland!
You have to be careful trusting the Local for news. We have them in Switzerland too, same company, and all they do is poorly translate then over-sensationalize stories. Can't speak for the other sources, though.
Re:Iceland??? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yep. Fuck taking on generations of debt to cover the gambling losses of bankers. Anything "too big to fail" should either be allowed to fail or be nationalized anyway. Capitalism doesn't work if investors have the profits without the risk.
Re:Sweden???!!! (Score:1, Insightful)
It's comical how they treat Geert as some sort of Himmler instead of the hero he is. When Amsterdam has a Sharia district setup by the left so as to not "make Muslims feel different or ostracized from Mainstream Dutch life" we will panic and vote in 50 more of him but also 10 more that push that line of what is acceptable (i.e. deportation based on religion/ethnicity or even worse).
Re:Iceland??? (Score:5, Insightful)
It wasn't quite "allowing the banks to fail" in the sense that the Icelandic equivalent of FDIC kicked in and the banks were nationalized, but the key thing was that Iceland spent absolutely no cash on trying to bail out holders of stocks and bonds. It's that combination of socialism and capitalism that is not uncommon in European nations: The socialism is enough to ensure that you'll survive. The capitalism means that if you're invested in a big bank, or a CEO who's made some dumb decisions, you take your losses.