If you work somewhere and your employer buys you a new tool, which will make you work more efficiently so you get more work done per day, I highly doubt he's gonna raise your salary for that.

And if you were working for someone, and you supplied your own tools which made you more efficient & you earned bonuses for that work, you'd be pretty p'd off if the business then got those tools for everyone else, and did away with the bounses.

And he'd probably tell you to feel free to find yourself
another job if you weren't happy working there.

If you work somewhere and your employer buys you a new tool, which will make you work more efficiently so you get more work done per day, I highly doubt he's gonna raise your salary for that.

And if you were working for someone, and you supplied your own tools which made you more efficient & you earned bonuses for that work, you'd be pretty p'd off if the business then got those tools for everyone else, and did away with the bounses.

Well seeing how Seti@ home dosent pay cash for credits what does it matter?
Who told you to buy all the crap you did to crunch 24/7?

You made the choice, So accept it.

---

[/quote]

Old James

And he'd probably tell you to feel free to find yourself
another job if you weren't happy working there.

Yes, but since he has to pay to work for his boss, and his boss only gives him a piece of paper with a worthless number on it in return; how happy would the boss be if the worker who really does work found himself another job doing something else somewhere else because THAT boss would give him a piece of paper with a larger, but still worthless, number on it?

I'm not arguing for or against anything. I am seconding the opinions of those who say that 'credits' are motivators. If the 'credit' scheme becomes an end unto itself and hampers production - that's exactly backwards.

(For those who value credits, they are currently being "taxed" to run SETI@Home. If you tax a behavior, you get less of it (in theory, hence "sin taxes" on tobacco, alcohol, etc.). If you subsidize a behavior, you get more of it (people crunching for projects that 'pay well' regardless of what the project does).

If there were only the SETI@Home MB project, we wouldn't have a problem. What gives 'credits' any sense of value is "relative worth." Zero x 2 or Zero x 4 is still zero, but it "seems" like Zero x 4 is bigger.

If we can agree that *someone else* (not us; we're too smart to fall for it) attaches some sort of value (worth) to credits, you have to ask why? Why does anyone prefer Zero x 4 instead of Zero x 2?

Competition! Acknowledgement! Pride! Endorphins!

therefore; credits
therefore; statistics
therefore; teams
therefore; "top computers"
therefore; "top participants"
therefore; "top teams"

BOINC created the "worth" out of thin air.

Don't blame me. I didn't start any of that.

And it all works beautifully until someone gets less "recognition" for what they believe is the same or more effort.

The projects themselves are "pushers."
The participants are "junkies."

The projects have hooked the participants on 'credits' and when the credits fall the junkies still think they need their fix.

This is amazingly like an addiction, now, with the psychological rewards and punishments.

...and we all believed we were looking for aliens. Silly us. We're part of a propaganda experiment to see if we can be motivated to do stuff through Pavlovian conditioning. Teach us to want credits; give us fewer for AP which took longer... get everyone accustomed to that and WHAM!! reverse the situation and watch the monkeys run in circles and scream like they are being tortured.

Me so stupid.

Who told you to buy all the crap you did to crunch 24/7?

The same guy that told you to buy the lesser crap you did and contribute less as a consequence.

You made the choice, So accept it.

And he wants to be upset about credits, so accept that.

Nobody died and left either you or me in charge.

Im looking for aliens. Screw the credit. When Seti@Home goes down for any lenght of time I do my backup projects.
All this wailing and crying over credits is nonsense. I built two rigs that crunch faster so I can find that SIGNAL. Not for credits that I cant even get that stupid toaster with.

Im with the folks that crunch beacause we want to find if there is other life out there. Not so I can brag I have the best RAC of all.
If you want RAC go to another project that gives it out like candy.

---

[/quote]

Old James

If you want RAC go to another project that gives it out like candy.

I'd like to find an alien signal, too. When I started this 14 years ago there weren't any "credits" to speak-of.

If there was a psychological reward, it was watching the screen saver go faster if I got a much better CPU.

Your stated attitude toward those who care about credits is exactly backward from where mine is. I'd like to find a signal, or something unknown and interesting, and I'm happy to do it as "part" of this project. I'd be just as happy for you to find it as I would for me to find it (Ok, so immediately I'd think it was cool that one of my computers found it and get all immature and stuff, but it isn't like I'd be able to "take credit" for the discovery).

But because I want the signal found, I want as much crunching going-on just as fast as it can.

I don't think I could ever bring myself to throw a resource away by inviting it to leave. If I found myself being upset by the people who are upset by the credit situation, I hope I would have the willpower to quit reading the thread.

Different strokes, I guess.

Let's go have a beer or glass of tea or something and talk about how finding another intelligence in the universe would change our lives; if at all.

I'm here crunching for the almost infinitely small but still
greater than zero chance that I may be the one that finds the
signal from an extraterrestrial intelligence.

Anybody here for any other reasons are kidding themselves.

If they're pouring money into computer equipment for credits
they would be further ahead buying lottery tickets.

All that malarkey about 'competition' is just that, malarkey.

WOOHOO! I can crunch for more credits than you because I can afford
to waste more money on computer equipment than you can. WOOHOO!

Gackbarf!

If you want RAC go to another project that gives it out like candy.

I'd like to find an alien signal, too. When I started this 14 years ago there weren't any "credits" to speak-of.

If there was a psychological reward, it was watching the screen saver go faster if I got a much better CPU.

Your stated attitude toward those who care about credits is exactly backward from where mine is. I'd like to find a signal, or something unknown and interesting, and I'm happy to do it as "part" of this project. I'd be just as happy for you to find it as I would for me to find it (Ok, so immediately I'd think it was cool that one of my computers found it and get all immature and stuff, but it isn't like I'd be able to "take credit" for the discovery).

But because I want the signal found, I want as much crunching going-on just as fast as it can.

I don't think I could ever bring myself to throw a resource away by inviting it to leave. If I found myself being upset by the people who are upset by the credit situation, I hope I would have the willpower to quit reading the thread.

Different strokes, I guess.

Let's go have a beer or glass of tea or something and talk about how finding another intelligence in the universe would change our lives; if at all.

Id have a beer with you. I like Heinekin but dont buy it often as it costs a bit more then the cheap beer I drink.
And if we ever find the signal. the worlds religions and politicians wont like it one bit. But that is for the politics thread:

---

[/quote]

Old James

And he wants to be upset about credits, so accept that.

If i were upset about the lack of credits, would i still be crunching Seti?




What is upsetting is the childish behaivour of some of those that say credits aren't important.
If they weren't they wouldn't exist.
Since they do exist, then they should do what they are intended to do- be a reasonably accurate indicator of work done.


EDIT- not really upsetting, more disappointing.

---

Grant
Darwin NT

And he wants to be upset about credits, so accept that.

If i were upset about the lack of credits, would i still be crunching Seti?




What is upsetting is the childish behaivour of some of those that say credits aren't important.
If they weren't they wouldn't exist.
Since they do exist, then they should do what they are intended to do- be a reasonably accurate indicator of work done.

They are not important. Maybe I should write the Chancellor and tell him that.

---

[/quote]

Old James

They are not important. Maybe I should write the Chancellor and tell him that.

If you think it's that important, go for it.

---

Grant
Darwin NT

I can only hope that Dr.A says the hell with it and implements a 1 for 1 system. Like in the old days. Id love to see how many people leave.

---

[/quote]

Old James

I can only hope that Dr.A says the hell with it and implements a 1 for 1 system. Like in the old days. Id love to see how many people leave.

It would be more representative than the present system, but nowhere near as good as it was before the introduction of credit new.
But i don't see it happening as BOINC was designed for multiple projects, not a single one.

---

Grant
Darwin NT

I can only hope that Dr.A says the hell with it and implements a 1 for 1 system. Like in the old days. Id love to see how many people leave.

It would be more representative than the present system, but nowhere near as good as it was before the introduction of credit new.
But i don't see it happening as BOINC was designed for multiple projects, not a single one.

But credit new is BOINC. why dont other projects use it? Why does Dr.A. let them get away not using it. Whats fair for Seti@Home should be fair for the other BOINC projects. Where is the outrage for that?

You are right, I should stop reading the crybaby Im going to write the Chancellor thread.

---

[/quote]

Old James

Id have a beer with you. I like Heinekin but dont buy it often as it costs a bit more then the cheap beer I drink.

I don't drink much beer, anymore, but I'll buy you one and myself one, too if I see you at the meeting to celebrate SETI@Home's success.

And if we ever find the signal. the worlds religions and politicians wont like it one bit. But that is for the politics thread:

I agree. Those who seek power don't usually like it when something upsets them.

I thought it was interesting that the Catholic Pope had said that an alien civilization would not invalidate the religion. Do you suppose he knows something we don't? ;-)

On another note -- If all of this letter-writing takes place, we could put the U.S. Postal Service back in the black.

All that malarkey about 'competition' is just that, malarkey.

WOOHOO! I can crunch for more credits than you because I can afford
to waste more money on computer equipment than you can. WOOHOO!

Gackbarf!

That's not very nice.

Once upon a time, in the deep south of the United States, there was talk of a thing called a "Welfare Cadillac." I always thought it was a myth and a way to insult people. That is, I thought that until I moved there. It was true.

Eventually I came to understand that the Cadillac Sedan Deville Brougham that was sitting outside of the two-room sharecropper's shack in need of repair represented something to its owner; something much bigger than a big, showy, car.

My priorities were in a different place, but that didn't mean that the owner of the Cadillac's were somehow in a lesser place, just a different place.

Bill Gates can give more to charity than I can, but does that make his motives less than mine? Have we all gone so crazy that we think our $10 is as important as his $10,000,000?

We'll never know, but there may be people here who are "proud of their RAC" for no reason other than it is what the *choose* to value. It might be everything they do and all they have. ...or not.

Or they may be seriously well-healed and it's just a hobby and a few of them compete with each other (NOT YOU) for braggin' rights, the way some people have chug-a-lug contests and others win "Yard of the Month" over and over and over. Or maybe they time themselves doing the NY Times crossword puzzle every morning and try to beat their best times.

There's no need to hate them because they have a different priority than you do or than I do. That is a form of competition in and of itself.

"Who can be the first to have the best motives?!? Who can be the most righteous and pure? Who can call-out the sinners amongst us for doing the right thing for the wrong reasons?"

Talk about "Gackbarf!"

But I repeat myself at the risk of being told I am repeating myself: BOINC was set-up with a "credit system" of "rewards." Then it promoted the idea of FRIENDLY competition through Teams and "top dog" lists. (Notice that the Olympic Games is also about competition and the U.N. is full of competing interests.)

I venture to say that if those things disappeared, you would see a lot of people leave. Have you looked at the happiness in the "Milestones" thread?

It was set-up that way to motivate people to charitably give as much as they possibly could. Ever watch a telethon or attend a charitable "silent auction?" Every entity that depends on the kindness of strangers is set-up to motivate the strangers to lavish them with resources.

I will *never* catch the top producers in this project. Neither in raw number of units crunched, nor RAC, nor 'credits.' I'm not competing with them. I can't. And I'm not competing with you, either.

BUT... I find it 'interesting' and 'fun' to try to tweak my machines and get ahead of the guys who are closest to me in RAC and then they tweak theirs and we privately push each-other to do better. It's friendly. We like each-other. It's fine. Nobody gets "all superior" and nobody goes home with their tail tucked between their legs and everybody ends-up smiling.

It's like a couple of fishing-buddies who try to catch the biggest fish of the day, or playing penny-ante poker. It's just something to-do.

SETI@Home wins no matter which of us "wins" our private little race and SETI@Home has motivated each of us to do our best for the project. NOBODY started participating in this project to out-RAC you, or me, or whoever.

If I were going to get upset about something, it would certainly be something more important than this.

There is at least one and quite simple explanation: because they want to use "credits" in its initial meaning and initial goal: to STIMULATE participants for donating their resourses.

+1 Raistmer
You're absolutely right

Here, in my opinion, a definition of credit (home made):

Compensation awarded to any volunteer of the SETI@home project in recognition of its investment in Scientific Research of an extraterrestrial signal through its hardware.

If based on this definition, any volunteer who sees his compensation halved while its investment remained the same is entitled to assert a claim.
And it's so for that reason that so many volunteers are attached to the compensation in credits (all the members of my team and myself included).

---

Well, there's no pleasing everybody.

But if your going to be competitors, wouldn't it be better
to have some ground rules to even things up?

Say, the fastest crunchingest machine that cost less than X amount of dollars.
Another class for Y dollars above X. Most wu on a single gpu.
Or some sort of handicapping system, like horse races.

Everybody that's in it for competition shouldn't have to be running in the 'unlimited' class.

Personally you can all argue as much as you want, but if MB's gained the same credit per hour that AP's do then we wouldn't have this annoying thread here and silly buggers wouldn't be aborting MB's or rescheduling CPU assigned AP tasks to GPU's just to gain the more credits that AP's offer atm.

I'd like to go back to the 1 credit per workunit, but then no 1 would do AP's anymore.

Cheers.

Personally you can all argue as much as you want, but if MB's gained the same credit per hour that AP's do then we wouldn't have this annoying thread here and silly buggers wouldn't be aborting MB's or rescheduling CPU assigned AP tasks to GPU's just to gain the more credits that AP's offer atm.

I'd like to go back to the 1 credit per workunit, but then no 1 would do AP's anymore.

Cheers.

Not quite. I switched over to only AP way back everybody else
thought they didn't pay as much as MB. Somebody had to do them.
What/when was that? 2~3 years ago?
Sten has religiously only crunched AP since they
came out.

I just started up an old machine to beef up my rac
by doing only AP. After 140+ elapsed hours on it's first one
it says there's only 8+ hours to go until it finishes.
WOOHOO, we be flyin'. Gotta love those old intel
atom 330s. Only running one core though,too much screen lag
when I've got both crunching.
I might upgrade this box from Windows 2000 to Win7
and put in my old 8400 pci card (only have a pci slot on this
mini-itx mb) if I can find the drivers for it. Do you think
I'd get more flow if I contoured and polished the ports?
Bigger valves maybe?

BEEP BEEP, move over Sten, coming through.