Google is opening plants in obscure locations, such as Lenoir, North Carolina:

Last month, the Internet search giant Google announced that it would take advantage of the area’s underused electric power grid, cheap land and robust water supply to build a “server farm” — a building full of computers that will become part of the company’s worldwide network.

Google says it hopes laid-off furniture workers, most of whom never graduated from high school, will be among the 250 employees at two facilities on the 215-acre site, much of which was once a lumberyard.

— Google Is Reviving Hopes for Ex-Furniture Makers, By SHAILA DEWAN, The New York Times, March 15, 2007

Is google doing this out of the goodness of its googly heart? Doubtless not primarily; obviously google is looking for a good deal. Continue reading →