Data Centers are Hot Again, Thanks to Web 2.0

Yesterday's San Jose Mercury News describes how data centers are "hot again" due to traffic from the growing popularity of social networking Web sites, such as YouTube and Facebook. Demand for data centers is increasing, as companies such as Apple, Yahoo and Kaiser are purchasing or leasing new data centers to keep up with demand for their applications.

Some interesting excerpts from the article:

• While prime office space in downtown San Jose costs about $2 a square foot per month, space in a data center rents from $15 to $30 a square foot per month.
• In the past two years, one million square feet of space in Silicon Valley data centers was purchased or leased, more than all the space taken off the market from 2001 through 2004.
  

The article mentions Apple's 2006 purchase of a data center in Newark, California. I wonder if that's the location that serves my daughter's iTunes purchases-- just a short hop across the Dumbarton bridge.