OpenAI to Launch Major PR Push: Renaming Data Centers as AI Compute Parks

A public relations offensive aimed at Washington and voters is taking shape inside OpenAI. According to Axios, the company plans to launch a large-scale campaign once this Tuesday's U.S. midterm elections are over. The person behind it is Chief Global Affairs Officer Chris Lehane, and his read is blunt: the midterms are merely a "trailer" for the 2028 presidential election, and AI is destined to become a central issue on the campaign stage. With regulation and public opinion both tightening, getting ahead to define the narrative has become a defensive battle this company has no choice but to fight.

From Tech Product to Political Issue

Lehane revealed that OpenAI will step up its AI outreach to the public. Its playbook has several moves: while discussing setting speed limits on AI development, it is also looking for ways to make ordinary people genuinely feel how AI improves daily life; at the same time, it is pushing for the United States to lead global standards-setting. Framing AI as moving from "technology in the lab" to "national competitiveness and lifestyle" is the core shift in this narrative push—it no longer just wants to sell models, but also wants to win the power to shape public opinion and policy. For a giant that holds frontier models and is mired in controversies over compute and electricity use, proactively steering the conversation toward "empowerment" is clearly more advantageous than passively taking criticism.

Rebranding Data Centers

The most interesting move is repackaging "data centers" as "AI compute parks." Previously, this kind of mega-infrastructure frequently sparked protests over land use, power consumption, and community disruption; Amazon and Microsoft have both said they will no longer use nondisclosure agreements when discussing projects with local governments. OpenAI clearly wants to use the new label to soften the impression of a "Big Tech land grab" and frame the controversy as a "good and healthy conversation." When compute becomes a bargaining chip in votes and geopolitical competition, the center of gravity for tech company PR shifts from product launches to city halls and televised debates.

OpenAI announces that starting in December, ChatGPT and Codex will share usage quota; Instant chat is unaffected

OpenAI announced that starting in December, part of the usage quota for ChatGPT Plus, Pro, and Business plans will be shared between ChatGPT and Codex, promoting the integration of Work agents into ChatGPT's main interaction interface. User conversations, coding, and agent tasks will gradually be included in unified quota management, measured in tokens; consumption depends on the model and task complexity, with complex tasks costing more; scenarios such as instant chat are also drawing attention.

Four Major AI Giants Join Forces to Set Anti-Crawling Standard: Website Owners Get a Unified Opt-Out Switch

On November 1, it was reported that OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, and Anthropic will jointly adopt a new standard that allows website owners to declare, in one place within their existing robots.txt, that they reject AI crawling, without having to negotiate with each company individually. The mechanism was submitted to the IETF by Anthropic's Kevin Kelley. Previously, robots.txt was only used to notify search engines; going forward, it can be used to uniformly manage AI crawlers, making it easier for content providers to refuse to have their content exploited.

OpenAI Plans to Rename Data Centers as AI Compute Campuses to Address Public Pressure

OpenAI intends to adjust its public relations strategy after the midterm elections and is considering fully renaming data centers as "AI Compute Campuses" to ease public criticism and disputes over electricity resources. Its Chief Global Affairs Officer, Chris Lehane, said AI may become a key issue in the 2028 U.S. presidential election. The company is preparing a series of policy proposals, using the renaming of infrastructure to highlight its contribution to local economies.

OpenAI Gives In: Pro Subscription Quotas Doubled, Halving Plan Withdrawn Overnight

OpenAI overturned the late-September notice that had sparked subscriber dissatisfaction. On October 29, it announced an immediate increase to the Work and Codex usage quotas in ChatGPT Pro and Business Premium: all three Pro tiers—100, 200, and 500—are doubled; new users get it immediately, and existing users have it take effect automatically without needing to renew; usage for Dots, the always-on AI assistant extension, is calculated independently. This reversal came only one day after the originally planned cut. The controversy stemmed from September 29, when OpenAI had issued a notice citing improved model efficiency.

OpenAI is in preliminary talks to acquire the renowned security company Trail of Bits

On October 13th, sources said that OpenAI is in early-stage negotiations to acquire the security startup Trail of Bits. This move shows that while OpenAI is advancing its cutting-edge large model research and development, it is also increasing its investment in cybersecurity and underlying protection capabilities. The negotiations are still ongoing, and the transaction amount and specific details have not been disclosed. Trail of Bits is a well-known cybersecurity research and engineering consulting company in the industry.