Ok...........I'll be the bad boy and make this suggestion. Someone needs to do it.

Matt Lebofsky has posted again concerning the server problems at Berkeley. It seems they have hit the proverbial "brick wall" where server problems will continue unless drastic changes are made in the server configurations at Berkeley. Translation........more and better hardware is required. The current configuration in Berkeley requires constant maintenance and server restarts have become the norm.

I believe that financial donations are preferable as the project can use the funds to purchase the equipment needed. They know best what equipment is needed. Obtaining funds has always been difficult for Boinc / Seti. Funding drives have been successful for the most part but when the funding drive ends so do the donations.

Many of us have more than one computer dedicated to Seti. Many have built computers specifically for crunching Seti. Let's face it, the Seti project is the number one project in terms of number of users and client computers. This success has driven the servers at Berkeley to maximum usage. The existing servers at Berkeley simply cannot sustain any more growth in the Seti project.

To meet this challenge I propose that Berkely institute a "pay to crunch policy" for the Seti project. A minimum donation to the project should be instituted to insure that Berkeley has the funds to support our client computers and the Seti project. If you have made a minimum donation (green star) then your client computers get work.

Now please..........before you start flaming me remember this. We have been approaching this day for several years. All of us know it. Seti is NOT funded, Boinc is. Seti relies on financial donations which have been minimal in the past. Every Seti participant needs to give the Berkeley side of this project some consideration and funding. If you can afford a computer you can certainly afford a $10.00 per year donation for the Berkeley servers to ensure your computer has work. This works out to less than 3 cents per day for a $10.00 donation.

To those participants who would consider leaving the Seti project. It's obvious you do not take the distributed computing hobby and the Seti project seriously. If you get any enjoyment at all from this hobby it should be worth $10.00 per year to you.

In my view we do this or continue to endure sporadic Seti server outages, downtime and complaints from Seti participants. I just do not see any other solution. I am willing to listen to other proposals to properly fund the Seti project. Anyone have any other ideas?

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Boinc....Boinc....Boinc....Boinc....

I see the value in it, but the project would lose too many people. I myself wouldn't crunch in this kind of project. I tend to believe that me donating my time to the project is enough, that and money is tight right now. The project would just lose too many people for the money to be worth it. It is the makings of some kind of good idea though.

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Some of us donate thousands of dollars a year in electricity consumption and free hardware support for all the machines we allow to run SETI.

And some of us still manage to donate money.

With as many people that would jump ship if SETI charged them, that $10 wouldn't add up to much in the long run.

It's like saying, "Thanks for all he free stuff you give us, but it's not enough. Give more or you can't play."

I don't think we mind being asked to donate, but to make it mandatory is silly and some what offensive.

I wonder how much I have donated over the last 10 years when considering electric bills, hardware acqusition and maintenence.

Just my $.02.

Rob

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Yeah not a chance, I am already spending money on power to crunch. I would just go somewhere else if something like this was implemented.

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I see your point, but feel in reality it would just cause people to leave in droves. Because of the type of project S@H is I do not believe most people would "Pay to Crunch". You are correct though because I have built 3 machines just to crunch, and probably spent around £1500.

Of course making it easier for people to donate might help. I live in the UK but only have a UK bank debit card. I wanted to donate £50 recently but could find no easy way to do it.

There has to be a way forward, but what that is I am not sure.

Bernie

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I see the value in it, but the project would lose too many people. I myself wouldn't crunch in this kind of project. I tend to believe that me donating my time to the project is enough, that and money is tight right now. The project would just lose too many people for the money to be worth it. It is the makings of some kind of good idea though.

There is a certain value in "losing people" in this case.

There are too many who see no problem dumping several thousand dollars for "crunching rigs" while the project struggles with antiquated (and insufficient) hardware, staffing issues, and the like -- and then complain vigorously when the project cannot deliver work.

I don't want to see people go, but according to BOINCstats there are more than 800,000 participants. If SETI could get $1 annually from the participants, they'd be funded at twice their desired level.

If half the participants left, and the rest kicked in a buck, they'd be well funded and the load would be much more manageable.

As an alternative, I think SETI should just sell credit. Want a big RAC? Send in a donation every week.

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Yeah not a chance, I am already spending money on power to crunch. I would just go somewhere else if something like this was implemented.

Sorry to tfp for picking on his posting.

I see that a lot of comments are coming from those who choose NOT to donate financially. Would you rather that your computers had NO SETI work to crunch? All of you so far (with no green star) have more than one computer and yet you do not contribute to the Berkeley side of the project. Care to explain why the Berkeley side of the project is not deserving of your help?

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Boinc....Boinc....Boinc....Boinc....

As an alternative, I think SETI should just sell credit. Want a big RAC? Send in a donation every week.

Along those lines, how about leaving the project open for all participants, but make the statistics end of project a subscription service.

Then those that are in it for the "Science" can donate regardless, and those that want to see the numbers and compete with others can pay for that service.

Part of the fun with respect to running SETI is being able to see how your machines perform and comparing them to others. We would probably see an equal number of people leave if they had to pay for stats.

Six of one, half dozen of the other I guess.

However, we should not be blaming SETI participants for the lack of hardware SETI has to use. If they wanted to cap the amount of work being performed to allow their struggling servers to accomodate it all, I'm sure they could. But its left wide open all the time and they are still inviting more people to participate. If it was as bad as some make it out to be, I think someone would have capped things to an acceptable level by now.

We just need more corporate sponsors and hardware donations like they received when the project first started.

Rob

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Yeah not a chance, I am already spending money on power to crunch. I would just go somewhere else if something like this was implemented.

Sorry to tfp for picking on his posting.

I see that a lot of comments are coming from those who choose NOT to donate financially. Would you rather that your computers had NO SETI work to crunch? All of you so far (with no green star) have more than one computer and yet you do not contribute to the Berkeley side of the project. Care to explain why the Berkeley side of the project is not deserving of your help?

As I said in my post I would gladly donate but there just seems to be no easy way for me to do so. I still have £50 (currently $88.50) waiting.

I spend money quite freely using PayPal but apparently can't donate to my favourite cause. Most frustrating

Bernie

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Yeah not a chance, I am already spending money on power to crunch. I would just go somewhere else if something like this was implemented.

Sorry to tfp for picking on his posting.

I see that a lot of comments are coming from those who choose NOT to donate financially. Would you rather that your computers had NO SETI work to crunch? All of you so far (with no green star) have more than one computer and yet you do not contribute to the Berkeley side of the project. Care to explain why the Berkeley side of the project is not deserving of your help?

As I said in my post I would gladly donate but there just seems to be no easy way for me to do so. I still have £50 (currently $88.50) waiting.

I spend money quite freely using PayPal but apparently can't donate to my favourite cause. Most frustrating

Bernie

As an ex trade union rep and a non donator. I didn't think it would be long before the donation issue raised its ugly head. How many of the guys who donated requested not to have green stars.

Michael.

As I said..........I'm willing to listen to other plans.

Another plan has to provide a steady stream of income to the Seti project as financial donations to the project are just not cutting it.

Anybody????

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Boinc....Boinc....Boinc....Boinc....

"Pay To Crunch" is a good idea. How much will we get paid?

Anybody remember Process Tree? They tried doing something like that a long time ago...

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Maybe they could instigate a system where if you donate you get access to wu's that give better credit or acces to an optimised app.

Or the government(s) could fund projects based on the number of participants they have, maybe $5 per participant per year?

What if you've already donated more than $10 - do you get to keep crunching for donation/$10 years?

Live long and BOINC!

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Paul
(S@H1 8888)
And proud of it!

My English is more bad than I expected... I was thinking that the word 'donation' implies a voluntary fact... Isn't it?

Are you saying that we must to pay taxes to crunch for SETI...?


Well, now seriously... You said that whe have arround of 800,000 users, but you don't remember that mostly of them are 'set and forget' users... They don't read the forums, stats, or posts from SETI. And if them don't pays the 'taxes' their computers will never gets more work forever, without their knowledge...

You want to loose all that volunteers massive work power force...? I think the answer is 'no'... (I think)


Best regards.

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Logan.

BOINC FAQ Service (Ahora, también disponible en Español/Now available in Spanish)

some ideas...

Advertisement on the Seti-HP (like Boincstats).

customized Boinc-setup with some 'hey - don't you wanna install Yahoo/Google Toolbar?' (they pay for that!)

Advertisement instead of the arecibo*.png / setibanner.png - stuff...

I must admit I'm annoyed by ads too, but if it puts some grand to Setis's account I will tolerate it.

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mic.

As I said..........I'm willing to listen to other plans.

Another plan has to provide a steady stream of income to the Seti project as financial donations to the project are just not cutting it.

Anybody????

Asking the people to pay 10 $ just to crunch isn't good idea. I'm sorry but i have to say it.

Making a better seti client with sms registration, 2 US dollars sms fee for a yearly usage sound better to me and its much easier than the credit card.

Perhaps 1 sms per month for free crunching its something that anyone can pay and can do in our days.

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SETI

As I said..........I'm willing to listen to other plans.

Another plan has to provide a steady stream of income to the Seti project as financial donations to the project are just not cutting it.

Anybody????

Asking the people to pay 10 $ just to crunch isn't good idea. I'm sorry but i have to say it.

Making a better seti client with sms registration, 2 US dollars sms fee for a yearly usage sound better to me and its much easier than the credit card.

Perhaps 1 sms per month for free crunching its something that anyone can pay and can do in our days.

A registration fee for the use of Boinc would penalize all the projects run under the Boinc umbrella.


I am proposing a mandatory $10.00 USD per year donation for the privilege of crunching data for Seti. This is exactly 2.73 cents per day for that privilege. I am on a fixed income (disabled) just as many here are. I can afford that, my grandkids can afford that. It is not hard or impossible to do! If you cannot donate via internet, snail mail still works as far as I know. If you have the will it is possible.

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Boinc....Boinc....Boinc....Boinc....

As I said..........I'm willing to listen to other plans.

Another plan has to provide a steady stream of income to the Seti project as financial donations to the project are just not cutting it.

Anybody????

Asking the people to pay 10 $ just to crunch isn't good idea. I'm sorry but i have to say it.

Making a better seti client with sms registration, 2 US dollars sms fee for a yearly usage sound better to me and its much easier than the credit card.

Perhaps 1 sms per month for free crunching its something that anyone can pay and can do in our days.

A registration fee for the use of Boinc would penalize all the projects run under the Boinc umbrella.


I am proposing a mandatory $10.00 USD per year donation for the privilege of crunching data for Seti. This is exactly 2.73 cents per day for that privilege. I am on a fixed income (disabled) just as many here are. I can afford that, my grandkids can afford that. It is not hard or impossible to do! If you cannot donate via internet, snail mail still works as far as I know. If you have the will it is possible.

Im sorry but i have to tell you that the most people outside USA and Europe they will not follow !

As I said ,one better seti client with a registration fee who ca be paid via sms (2 usd fee) its something that even the most people evrywhere around the world can pay and they will do.

Example: Lets say i have the option to crunch for seti with a better one client and the only thing i have to do is to download it and get the activation code paying first one sms fee of 2 USD ill do it. If Berkeley wants from me 10 USD to crunch i CAN't Do it ,im sorry im poor as lots of the ppl out there.

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SETI

My English is more bad than I expected... I was thinking that the word 'donation' implies a voluntary fact... Isn't it?

Are you saying that we must to pay taxes to crunch for SETI...?


Well, now seriously... You said that whe have arround of 800,000 users, but you don't remember that mostly of them are 'set and forget' users... They don't read the forums, stats, or posts from SETI. And if them don't pays the 'taxes' their computers will never gets more work forever, without their knowledge...

You want to loose all that volunteers massive work power force...? I think the answer is 'no'... (I think)


Best regards.

It may be a choice between "losing the work force" and "losing the source of work."

Neither are very good options, there could come a day where SETI either can't rearrange what they have or can't get needed replacements due to lack of funds.

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some ideas...

Advertisement on the Seti-HP (like Boincstats).

customized Boinc-setup with some 'hey - don't you wanna install Yahoo/Google Toolbar?' (they pay for that!)

Advertisement instead of the arecibo*.png / setibanner.png - stuff...

I must admit I'm annoyed by ads too, but if it puts some grand to Setis's account I will tolerate it.

As long as the project is run through U.C. Berkeley, they are subject to rules set by the Regents of the University of California.

One of those rules states that University-Run web sites cannot accept paid advertising. Exceptions must be approved by the Regents, and of course, that includes content.

That also causes the problems with PayPal. The University will not set up a PayPal account, and they will not allow projects to set them up independently.

Move SETI out of the University and those restrictions change, but they'd have to spend more to replace the services the University provides.

At one time, there was a respected third-party who set up a donation system through PayPal, and then forwarded all funds on to the University. Seems that could be done again....

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