Some stupid questions to developers: if you open source html code http://www.gridrepublic.com/ you see this "charset=windows-1251" but this is Russian codepage (I am Russian :)). Grid Republic-who are you??? And why in title - prediction@home (project named Predictor@home)???

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All of the projects I know of, less one, are non-profit based. Most of the most popular ones are run by a university for the benefit of the scientists trying to make MPR (minimum publishable result).

To be honest, if the drug companies are funding this, and university research, which is open and accessible to all, I don't see the harm or foul.

@tekwyzrd

You have make a very valid point. And it is a sad commentary on US as individuals, and our governments, that we allow this to happen. And there is a fine line between profit and rapacious greed. At the moment we seem to be in unchecked rapacious greed. Enron of course, and my favorite peeve Wal-Mart (lost another court case about worker abuse, of course they will appeal, and not change practices - and, oh, yes, healthcare coverage is not available for many employees and when it is, it is not very good coverage).

It is not clear to me how this could be changed.

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Ahh.. I see how it works. The drug companies provide financial backing for grid republic and in return get a charitable contribution write-off and an easier way to draw computer owners into processing data that will benefeit them (the drug companies that is).

And by lowering the cost for drug research, we make it easier for new drugs to be developed that save lives. We also make it easier for drug companies to reduce the cost of their drugs. Additionally, we're making it easier for the public to really have a leg to stand on when they demand drug companies reduce the cost of their drugs.

If it saves lives and makes it easier for drug prices to go down... would you please explain to me why this is a bad thing?

Prices won't go down. It will just decrease the amount of time before the drug company sees a profit.

It puts them in a position to determine the value on human life. Someone who has a high paying job with an excellent health plan is worth saving. A worker in the numerous factories in this country with no health coverage isn't.

You know, I'm tired of hearing that drug companies are out to help people. They're not. They're out to make money. The fact that they gouge people for every penny they can disgusts me. Let's see what kind of discount your credits from doing work for those projects gets you when you need a drug that's a result of the research in question.

As cancer is always thrown in as a justification I'll say this. Don't misunderstand me. I have sympathy for those who have cancer. Over the last twenty years I've seen five people close to me (and my heart) die of cancer.

In 1989 my father was having some health problems. He was 47 years old. The doctor thought the problem was his gall bladder. During the procedure to remove it they found that the problem wasn't his gall bladder. The problem was an inoperable and widespread case of cancer. The cost of the chemotherapy was $7200.00 a month. Treatment was covered. If he hadn't been an auto worker and good covered by a good health plan he wouldn't have been so lucky.

After three months of sickness and misery he decided enough was enough. The chemo didn't help. Within six months of being diagnosed he was dead.

The probable cause of the cancer? Exposure to solvents in the workplace. There was a class action lawsuit filed a few years after he died.

If a fraction of the money spent on development of drugs to treat diseases was spent instead on eliminating the environmental hazards which cause or contribute to the diseases there would be significantly less people needing the drugs. But then, preventing diseases isn't profitable. Treating them is.

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Nothing travels faster than the speed of light with the possible exception of bad news, which obeys its own special laws.
Douglas Adams (1952 - 2001)

Mind you I seem to have missed the bit where drug companies got fingered in all this - they probably are the most likely candidate for dirty tricks - but has any connection been established?

As Matthew stated:

the original motivation for gridrepublic was to accellerate the drug development process.

Occam's Razor

Therefore, who are the probable backers of grid republic?

Pharmaceutical companies.

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Nothing travels faster than the speed of light with the possible exception of bad news, which obeys its own special laws.
Douglas Adams (1952 - 2001)

It would be a very good thing.

But it isn't going to happen. Sure new drugs that could save lives might be developed but they will never be cheap.

All companies have but one responsibility - to their shareholders who's sole intent is to make money.

Giving away the product cheap doesn't earn the company big profits so the shareholders don't get bonuses - they get mean and oust any management who doesn't follow their profit desire - back to square one.

Mind you I seem to have missed the bit where drug companies got fingered in all this - they probably are the most likely candidate for dirty tricks - but has any connection been established?

Microsoft makes a lot of money offering cheaper software than the competition and make up for it in volume.

Until OSS became mainstream Microsoft usually offered cheaper software than the compition for a given market.

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----- Rom
BOINC Development Team, U.C. Berkeley
My Blog

And by lowering the cost for drug research, we make it easier for new drugs to be developed that save lives. We also make it easier for drug companies to reduce the cost of their drugs. Additionally, we're making it easier for the public to really have a leg to stand on when they demand drug companies reduce the cost of their drugs.

If it saves lives and makes it easier for drug prices to go down... would you please explain to me why this is a bad thing?

It would be a very good thing.

But it isn't going to happen. Sure new drugs that could save lives might be developed but they will never be cheap.

All companies have but one responsibility - to their shareholders who's sole intent is to make money.

Giving away the product cheap doesn't earn the company big profits so the shareholders don't get bonuses - they get mean and oust any management who doesn't follow their profit desire - back to square one.

Mind you I seem to have missed the bit where drug companies got fingered in all this - they probably are the most likely candidate for dirty tricks - but has any connection been established?

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So long as I don't have to use them to stay with BOINC, more power to 'em. Cause I'm my own account manager. I keep all my account keys and websites of the projects I particapate in.

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Ahh.. I see how it works. The drug companies provide financial backing for grid republic and in return get a charitable contribution write-off and an easier way to draw computer owners into processing data that will benefeit them (the drug companies that is).

And by lowering the cost for drug research, we make it easier for new drugs to be developed that save lives. We also make it easier for drug companies to reduce the cost of their drugs. Additionally, we're making it easier for the public to really have a leg to stand on when they demand drug companies reduce the cost of their drugs.

If it saves lives and makes it easier for drug prices to go down... would you please explain to me why this is a bad thing?

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Rob

Not all things are done for evil or nefarious reasons. I spend my money and time and health doing the Wiki, I don't make money on it. Am I some evil fairy tempting BOINCers down the path of ...

Of course you are, but we love you anyway. <g>

MJ

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Ahh.. I see how it works. The drug companies provide financial backing for grid republic and in return get a charitable contribution write-off and an easier way to draw computer owners into processing data that will benefeit them (the drug companies that is).

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Nothing travels faster than the speed of light with the possible exception of bad news, which obeys its own special laws.
Douglas Adams (1952 - 2001)

i need to keep my heed down and get the project online.

I sure do hope you keep your heed under control ...

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Matthew,

Thank you for the information.

For the question why companies do things like this. Yep, it is profit. Called "good will", advertising, do-gooderism, and other things.

SETI@Home has corporate sponsors, they donate equipment, maybe get tax breaks, participate in a project they are interested in, generate some publicity, or heck, maybe because they just feel like it.

IBM is donating a lot to WCG, and if I read the glossy advertising on the site correctly they will not get anything out if it either... other than maybe a life saving cure for something and the knowledge that they were a part of that.

Not all things are done for evil or nefarious reasons. I spend my money and time and health doing the Wiki, I don't make money on it. Am I some evil fairy tempting BOINCers down the path of ...

Or, just someone that can afford it, and wants to try to give back to a community that means something to him? Same thing for a corporate CEO, they have to justify it, and, yes, show it is going to have some sort of payback, but it is done all the time.

And if they did want my e-mail address, well, I post it here, I give it other places as do we all. Do I get junk mail? Sure, most is filtered, but, I see 10 advertisements a day for rolex watches and stock tips, and heck drugs at inflated prices ... no worries, I just delete them ...

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Alright the dog has come into the thread and wagged it's tail, now can we get on to the important stuff like finding ET, or a cure for something......

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And the beat goes on
Sonny and Cher

BOINC Wiki

hello everyone. rom gave me a head's up about the discussion here and-- as the developer of gridrepublic-- i thought to check in to clarify a few things.

first, gridrepublic is a 501(c)(3) non profit, not a business. as rom indicated below, we have been working with the boinc development team and not independent of them. as a result, our client has no features that will not also be present in future releases of the standard boinc client-- it is not spyware, adware or malware of any kind, and we assert no private rights over the client software except for the graphic identity (ex. the logo).

in the most general terms, gridrepublic makes finding, joining, and managing boinc projects much easier. our hope is to lower the bar on these three key steps to participation sufficiently to attract users who are technically unsophisticated but who like the idea of doing good for no apparent reason other than it's cool and not too hard.

personally, i got into all this when my dad was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer. he was on some experimental medication which worked wonders for a several years but not permanently and the successor version of the drug was slow in coming; the original motivation for gridrepublic was to accellerate the drug development process. i am confident we will be able to do this and many other great things.

i'm afraid i can't at the moment participate in this forum on a regular basis-- i need to keep my heed down and get the project online. but we'll have a beta test soon, and i hope you'll all come and take a look and then i'll come back here and you all can tell me what you think.


best wishes,

matt

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"in a world with so much meaningless evil, why not a little meaningless good?"
- my friend mier

So to put it another way...

David Anderson has been approached by some outfit that would very much like access to several 100 thousand of our e-mail addresses.

They would also be very happy to have the details of all the computers we own or run projects on.

Add to that information regarding our preferences for which projects we support.

No thanks.

BTW, What's the going rate for 100,000 valid e-mail addresses???

Ummm... paranoid much? :-)

The Account Manager API doesn't give them some magic all-access pass to projects' databases. They can't access our email addresses. If you sign up with them, then obviously they'd have access to your email address... but otherwise, they aren't being handed all our email addresses.

Seriously, people... relax. Let's see what this looks like and then decide if it's a bad thing. Deciding this is obviously bad without even knowing what it is... that's nuts.

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Rob

Actually we have been working with them for well over 9 months.

They were the first ones to approach BOINC about the general idea of a consolidated place to manage signups. That collaboration became the account manager API set.

So to put it another way...

David Anderson has been approached by some outfit that would very much like access to several 100 thousand of our e-mail addresses.

They would also be very happy to have the details of all the computers we own or run projects on.

Add to that information regarding our preferences for which projects we support.

No thanks.

BTW, What's the going rate for 100,000 valid e-mail addresses???
/edit Umm ... that would be a few servers and a bit of code then?

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I mentioned several of the concerns in this thread to David in a recent email, asking for some clarification to help ease concerns.

He wrote back, assuring me he has full trust in thier motives, and that their motives are not profit-based. He states they don't have a desire to control things, either. As Rom has stated, their goals are to bring Grid Computing to the mainstream computing culture. They want to vastly increase the number of boinc participants. Their hope is by providing a literally unending supply of computational power, some real-world discoveries can be found that will have real-world effects on our lives.

He also said "And the questions about who they are and why they're doing it will be more fully answered in due course."

I'm thinking this looks like a good thing. God knows an account manager would be really nice...

Somehow I detect the stench of male bovine defecation here, or is Dr. Anderson that much of an innocent that he would allow unknown people with unknown motives to interject themselves into what has been, so far, a non-commercial venture?

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Blessed St. Leibowitz, keep 'em dreamin' down there.

They were the first ones to approach BOINC about the general idea of a consolidated place to manage signups.

But don't we already have that at the BOINC home page, sort of?

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Join TeamACC

Sometimes I think we are alone in the universe, and sometimes I think we are not. In either case the idea is quite staggering.

An outfit that appears from nowhere to jump on the BOINC bandwaggon must have some justification to do so.

Actually we have been working with them for well over 9 months.

They were the first ones to approach BOINC about the general idea of a consolidated place to manage signups. That collaboration became the account manager API set.

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----- Rom
BOINC Development Team, U.C. Berkeley
My Blog

<snip>
Everybody needs to get paid.

Obviously that is not entirely true. We (the participants) are all here unpaid.
Moreover, I know of many individuals who have purchased PCs specifically to run SETI, sometimes 10s of machines. Not just the hardware, but some also have 100s of dollar/pound electricity bills per month, just for SETI - all for no 'pay'.

That said, I still do not see how GridRepublic will justify expenditure on advertising, servers, bandwidth etc, for a big fat zero return on their expenditure.

An outfit that appears from nowhere to jump on the BOINC bandwaggon must have some justification to do so.

The evasive and vague comment from David Anderson has done nothing to answer my questions and a positive statement now is required - unless he doesn't have an answer, in which case he can't say it's a good thing without knowing.

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