I run SETI@home for 2 reasons: 1) It would be cool to find something out there. 2) To utilize my idle processing power.
The classic version was certainly more stable but I think the BOINC version has real potential.
SETI@home and Astropulse are funded by grants from the National Science Foundation, NASA, and donations from SETI@home volunteers. AstroPulse is funded in part by the NSF through grant AST-0307956.