This is an interesting comment from Kirk Pearson

[TAandy]

"Late last year, Lycos, the owner of the Grub Internet-indexing project, shut down the project with very little advance warning, and did not make the project results available to the public or to the project participants after the project ended. Other projects such as dcypher.net and Popular Power have also not made their results available after they shut down. By not making their results available, and by not using the results for further research or application, these projects effectively wasted all of the efforts and resources that volunteers contributed to the projects.

Of course the owners of a project have the right to shut down the project at any time, for any reason. And since in most cases the project participants are volunteers, the participants have no legal claim to the project's results. But by keeping private, or throwing away, the results of a project, the project owners harm public distributed computing. Volunteers are less likely to participate in future projects if they think the project results will not be used. They are less likely to trust the project owners if the owners begin other projects in the future. And no one can benefit from a project's results if they can't study them or use them.

What obligations do project owners have to their participants, or to the clients or organizations for which they are conducting research? Should they be expected or required to make all of the project results available to the participants or the clients after the project ends, or if it must be ended early? Should they be expected or required to hand over a project to someone else who is willing to host it and run it if they have to end it early? Lycos could have given the Grub project to an independent organization to run and to improve after Lycos decided not to support it. Should a project's volunteers just accept that the project owners have all of the rights to the project's results and can do whatever they want with the results? Should every new project be required to state on its website what it intends to do with the project results during and after the project?"

I would say he's spot on and if there was a vote I'd go for the last statement!

Comments??
This post can be found here

 

[TAandy]

Am I going to have to have a conversation with myself??
Oh well, that's just normal for the weekend

 

[Insidious]

I usually look for some indication of what a project team is intending to do with their results before I start crunching. Granted, it is no gaurantee, but I tend not to crunch blindly for the most part. (If I can help it)

I don't think volunteers have any claim or implied influence on the project teams, and I think that is as it should be.

Granted, a project team that squanders it's volunteers cycles is to be shunned and dis-trusted in any future endeavor, but I don't believe DC participants should expect a rightful claim to anything beyond their earned claim "I was part of that".

I feel this is the flip side of the coin to the idea that somehow DC participants "owe" monies to a project team for the privledge of participating.

This is a symbiotic relationship... true. But I would suggest anyone who considers their cycles that valuable, maybe shouldn't be lending them out over the internet.

-Sid

(Hi Andy!)

 

[ProviaFan]

This is an important issuse, though I'm not sure how much we as lowly participants could actually do about it - other than refusing to crunch for someone unless they practice full disclosure. But who then would you crunch for, and what is the chance that the project would actually be something that you find fulfilling for reasons other than "doing the right thing"? This kind of topic is something that project administrators definitely need to address somewhere in their FAQs.

 

[TAandy]

Originally posted by: Insidious
I usually look for some indication of what a project team is intending to do with their results before I start crunching. Granted, it is no gaurantee, but I tend not to crunch blindly for the most part. (If I can help it)

I don't think volunteers have any claim or implied influence on the project teams, and I think that is as it should be.

Granted, a project team that squanders it's volunteers cycles is to be shunned and dis-trusted in any future endeavor, but I don't believe DC participants should expect a rightful claim to anything beyond their earned claim "I was part of that".

I feel this is the flip side of the coin to the idea that somehow DC participants "owe" monies to a project team for the privledge of participating.

This is a symbiotic relationship... true. But I would suggest anyone who considers their cycles that valuable, maybe shouldn't be lending them out over the internet.

-Sid

(Hi Andy!)

Hi Sid
You're right, as a volunteer I don't feel any claim to anything, although credit where it's due!
But when they ask for volunteers and then either hide their results or throw them away......that's taking the piss :|

 

[Insidious]

Agreed!

It is tacky (at best) to encourage participants in such a frivilous project.

Fortunately, there are some projects out there that are explicit in the disposition of their findings. Who will get them, what can be done with them, etc.

This is one of the reasons I chose Rosetta@Home.
Their website is very clear that their findings are made available to any group that can make good of them. As well as their efforts to share their work in the form of colaborations with other scientific groups.

If a project can't convince me it is philanthropic, I won't crunch it. (with the possible exception of a special effort such as a month with TAS, the request of a friend or something like that.)

-Sid

 

[Spacehead]

A little research by us(volunteers) before hand should, in most cases, make this a non issue. That's no guarentee that a chosen project will do as they say though.

I've never heard of any of the projects mentioned(Grub Internet-indexing project, dcypher.net and Popular Power). Anyone else?

 

[mondobyte]

All distributed computing projects have a disclaimer that says, basically, that they can do whatever they want to with the results ...

What this means is that a non-profit / tax-exempt DC project can suddenly change, once results are in-hand, to a for profit sell the results for high dollar entity. For instance: Find-a-Drug.

Grid.Org (United Devices) was less surrepticious but still they made the same switch ...

caveat emptor

Mondo