Amid all the fine oratory in the victory speeches one line stood out for me. Delivered by Michigan Senator-elect Abdul Al-Sayed on the night of his victory, "The many beat the money" has been echoing louder with each passing day.

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It reverberated particularly loudly in Texas, where Elon Musk threw millions of dollars down the drain backing the campaign of Republican loser Ken Paxton. In delicious symbolic synchronicity a couple of days later, Musk announced that his reviled Cybertruck would be discontinued. Reflecting the trillionaire's vision of the future, it was well past its use-by date.

The tech broligarchs took another beating a couple of days later, with a stock wipeout that almost registered on the Richter scale. Trillions were wiped off the value of AI stocks and not just because the Democrats had clobbered the tech-friendly Republicans. The correction had been coming for months, fuelled by signs too much money had been ploughed into data centres for too little return.

And then, over the weekend, it emerged that founder and boss of chip giant Nvidia was under investigation by his own company for having an affair with a Chinese spy, Alice Huang (no relation). Even after the black-jacketed Huang confessed to letting down his and wife and family, Trump leapt to his defence saying he was an honourable man. No surprise there, from someone infamous for his own infidelities.

For anyone revolted by the tech bros' obsequious fawning over Trump when he began his second term, particularly Musk with his stiff arm salute, it's been a joy to watch the sudden thump of reality hit home. Post-election analysis showed AI and data centres played a major role in shaping how at least 56 per cent of people voted.

We've seen some of that anxiety here in Australia, with growing opposition to data centres being built in suburban neighbourhoods - in the same way farmers and rural communities resent the rollout of solar and wind farms on their patch.

There is also healthy scepticism about the government's so-called AI guardrails, which will require new builds to invest in renewable energy - a scheme that would infuriate regions which have already shouldered the burden of the renewable rollout.

And we're all paying for the data centre building frenzy, which has been identified by the Reserve Bank as a significant driver of inflation.

The AI reckoning is building steam. Last month a much hyped public float by data centre developer Firmus was abandoned and is being probed by ASIC over its claims to potential investors.

It's too early to claim the AI bubble has burst but around the world everyone can hear the air hissing out of its over-inflated tyres. What the tech bros have all along insisted was a safe........

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