Gridfinity: BOINC for Cash

[dannyeaglin]

Anyone heard about Gridfinity (http://www.gridfinity.com) yet? New company that has a BOINC project where you get paid for doing workunits (deposits through paypal). The idea seems to be that they're acting as a intermediary between BOINC users and companies who would want to buy computing time. Doesn't seem like a bad idea to add another project if you can get some money out of it. If something like this were to get big enough, it could definitely serve as an alternative to an industry running its own cluster.

 

[Rudy Toody]

Originally posted by: dannyeaglin
Anyone heard about Gridfinity yet? New company that has a BOINC project where you get paid for doing workunits (deposits through paypal). The idea seems to be that they're acting as a intermediary between BOINC users and companies who would want to buy computing time. Doesn't seem like a bad idea to add another project if you can get some money out of it. If something like this were to get big enough, it could definitely serve as an alternative to an industry running its own cluster.

You need to fix your link. Remove the ")"🙂

 

[TallBill]

Originally posted by: Rudy Toody

Originally posted by: dannyeaglin
Anyone heard about Gridfinity yet? New company that has a BOINC project where you get paid for doing workunits (deposits through paypal). The idea seems to be that they're acting as a intermediary between BOINC users and companies who would want to buy computing time. Doesn't seem like a bad idea to add another project if you can get some money out of it. If something like this were to get big enough, it could definitely serve as an alternative to an industry running its own cluster.

You need to fix your link. Remove the ")"🙂

He wont be back, its a spammer account. Black guy icon, check, post count 1, check.

 

[Rudy Toody]

After thinking about this for a while, I don't think the numbers work!

For the project:

RCN has 20,000 CPU hours per day

20,000 x $0.30 = $6,000 per day

$6,000 x 365 = $2,190,000 per year.

I'm sure they don't spend that much per year by running their own server.


For the participant:

The critical statement is that the participant gets 90% of what's left over after expenses!

If they never get any large clients, the processing would be intermittent at best. The overhead would eliminate any net profit. 90% of zero is still zero.

So, my opinion is that Gridfinity would never get enough large clients to ensure that there is a net profit each month. Without a net profit, the participants get nothing.

 

[Rudy Toody]

Originally posted by: TallBill

He wont be back, its a spammer account. Black guy icon, check, post count 1, check.

You may be right. The site is quite detailed but, unlike other BOINC projects, they require an email verification step. Sounds like they're collecting email addresses.

 

[TallBill]

RCN has 20,000 CPU hours per day

They have a different definition of a CPU hour. The Cpu hour in gridfinity is a 2.16 ghz core 2 duo. WU's would be scored off of one of those. Anyways, its possible that this would work, but highly doubtful. I wouldn't run it, as it kind of defeats the point of donating my time/machines/electricity to a project.