F@H Contest - We Made It To 50,000,000!
profdlp
The Holy City Of Westlake, Ohio
Those who watch our team stats have probably noticed that Team 93 is rapidly closing in on the 50,000,000 point mark. At our current pace we should get there in a little under three weeks.
In honor of this historic occasion, the Team Staff has decided to hold a contest among the membership. To make it a little more fun, we are going to be awarding some nice prizes to a few lucky teammates. The owners of Short-Media have generously donated some cash to the pot, and the Team Staff is also donating some money as our way of saying "Thank You" to all of the dedicated members who have made Team 93 such a success.
:smokin:
Here are the details as we have them right now. If I'm a little vague about the exact amount of the prizes it is because we are still collecting money - the size of the haul may increase from what I post here. We should be able to firm things up over the next few days.
Prize #1: We will be awarding either a cash prize or gift certificate with a minimum value of $50 to one member drawn at random from all teammates who officially enter by posting in this thread. To be eligible you must meet all of the following requirements:
1) You must be an active Team Member, documented, a full week before the 50 Million point mark. We will verify all entries against Stanford's Active processors (within 7 days) listing. You only need to have one CPU Folding for Team 93 to qualify.
2) The user must post the following in this thread:
.....A. What you are doing to boost production.
.....B. A suggestion on how the team can improve.
Let's hear those ideas!
We will accept all valid entries posted in this thread before the 50 Million point mark is achieved.
:smokin:
Prize #2: We will be awarding either a cash prize or gift certificate with a minimum value of $50 to the member who comes closest to predicting the Date and Hour when Team 93 reaches the magic 50 Million point mark. This person must also meet the active Team Member requirement as described above. We will use the Date and Hour as reported by the Team stats at the Team 93 Summary at EOC page. To enter, send me a PM with the following info:
1) Your S-M username
2) Your F@H username
3) The Date & Time you select
Important: EOC updates their stats eight times a day at three-hour intervals. The updates occur at 12, 3, 6, and 9 o'clock AM and 12, 3, 6, and 9 o'clock PM. You can see the format used by going to the Team 93 Summary at EOC page and looking for the category marked Last 24 Hours Production. Make sure you specify AM or PM in your guess, and also make sure the time is either 12, 3, 6, or 9 o'clock. Don't forget the Month & Date.
Note: The Date & Time are based on US Central Time. Before submitting your entry you may wish to calculate the time difference between that and your particular time zone. When you make your choice, please be aware that you are picking a Date & Time in the US Central Time Zone, not your local time zone. Please don't come back and tell us that you should have won because you based your guess on the local time in Zamboanga.
Your entry should look like this:
The reason we are using EOC as the "official" record of the exact hour is that they maintain a running total of all point turned for a 24-Hour period, meaning that we don't have to worry about the possibility that we'll cross the mark in the middle of the night with no witnesses to the exact moment. This way, we can always subtract the last update or two to determine which update proves to be the winner.
Important: Anyone who knows how to use a calculator can easily come up with a fairly good estimate of when we should hit 50 Million. Bear in mind that as Stanford cycles WU's our progress will be affected accordingly. If we have a run of those nice 364 and 600 point jobs we may get there a little sooner than expected; a slew of what might be called "underperforming" WU's may delay us somewhat. Math skills will help to some extent, but the member who is willing to take a chance on something a little out of the projected window may well get lucky.
In the event more than one member correctly predicts the Date & Time, we will draw ONE prize winner at random from among all winning entries.
We will accept entries via a PM to profdlp received by Midnight, October 14th, 2005 US Central Time.
:smokin:
Prize #3: We will also offer a prize (to be determined) in a third category. The Team Staff will select what we deem to be the top five answers on how the team can improve and draw a winner from the entrants at random. Look for specifics regarding the prize to be announced soon.
If you have any questions, you may post them in this thread or send me a PM.
Good luck, everyone!
:smokin:
The fine print:
One prize per member, maximum. The Team Staff reserves the right to alter these rules at any time and the ruling of the judges is final. Your entry serves as acceptance of these conditions.
In honor of this historic occasion, the Team Staff has decided to hold a contest among the membership. To make it a little more fun, we are going to be awarding some nice prizes to a few lucky teammates. The owners of Short-Media have generously donated some cash to the pot, and the Team Staff is also donating some money as our way of saying "Thank You" to all of the dedicated members who have made Team 93 such a success.
:smokin:
Here are the details as we have them right now. If I'm a little vague about the exact amount of the prizes it is because we are still collecting money - the size of the haul may increase from what I post here. We should be able to firm things up over the next few days.
Prize #1: We will be awarding either a cash prize or gift certificate with a minimum value of $50 to one member drawn at random from all teammates who officially enter by posting in this thread. To be eligible you must meet all of the following requirements:
1) You must be an active Team Member, documented, a full week before the 50 Million point mark. We will verify all entries against Stanford's Active processors (within 7 days) listing. You only need to have one CPU Folding for Team 93 to qualify.
2) The user must post the following in this thread:
.....A. What you are doing to boost production.
.....B. A suggestion on how the team can improve.
Let's hear those ideas!
We will accept all valid entries posted in this thread before the 50 Million point mark is achieved.
:smokin:
Prize #2: We will be awarding either a cash prize or gift certificate with a minimum value of $50 to the member who comes closest to predicting the Date and Hour when Team 93 reaches the magic 50 Million point mark. This person must also meet the active Team Member requirement as described above. We will use the Date and Hour as reported by the Team stats at the Team 93 Summary at EOC page. To enter, send me a PM with the following info:
1) Your S-M username
2) Your F@H username
3) The Date & Time you select
Important: EOC updates their stats eight times a day at three-hour intervals. The updates occur at 12, 3, 6, and 9 o'clock AM and 12, 3, 6, and 9 o'clock PM. You can see the format used by going to the Team 93 Summary at EOC page and looking for the category marked Last 24 Hours Production. Make sure you specify AM or PM in your guess, and also make sure the time is either 12, 3, 6, or 9 o'clock. Don't forget the Month & Date.
Note: The Date & Time are based on US Central Time. Before submitting your entry you may wish to calculate the time difference between that and your particular time zone. When you make your choice, please be aware that you are picking a Date & Time in the US Central Time Zone, not your local time zone. Please don't come back and tell us that you should have won because you based your guess on the local time in Zamboanga.
Your entry should look like this:
S-M username: {your S-M name}
F@H username: {the name you Fold under}
Date & Time: 3PM, Oct 28th
The reason we are using EOC as the "official" record of the exact hour is that they maintain a running total of all point turned for a 24-Hour period, meaning that we don't have to worry about the possibility that we'll cross the mark in the middle of the night with no witnesses to the exact moment. This way, we can always subtract the last update or two to determine which update proves to be the winner.
Important: Anyone who knows how to use a calculator can easily come up with a fairly good estimate of when we should hit 50 Million. Bear in mind that as Stanford cycles WU's our progress will be affected accordingly. If we have a run of those nice 364 and 600 point jobs we may get there a little sooner than expected; a slew of what might be called "underperforming" WU's may delay us somewhat. Math skills will help to some extent, but the member who is willing to take a chance on something a little out of the projected window may well get lucky.
In the event more than one member correctly predicts the Date & Time, we will draw ONE prize winner at random from among all winning entries.
We will accept entries via a PM to profdlp received by Midnight, October 14th, 2005 US Central Time.
:smokin:
Prize #3: We will also offer a prize (to be determined) in a third category. The Team Staff will select what we deem to be the top five answers on how the team can improve and draw a winner from the entrants at random. Look for specifics regarding the prize to be announced soon.
If you have any questions, you may post them in this thread or send me a PM.
Good luck, everyone!
:smokin:
The fine print:
One prize per member, maximum. The Team Staff reserves the right to alter these rules at any time and the ruling of the judges is final. Your entry serves as acceptance of these conditions.
0
Comments
B. I don't know if this is legal in all cities, but make signs "kind of like a garage sell sign" that could look like the buissiness cards with the site and maybe a local host's number!
BLuKnight
CrazyJoe0813
DanG
DoctorGeo2008
drasnor
Gargoyle
icehole
lemonlime
Nightwolf
Sledgehammer70
Thrax
Trogan_1000
A)
B)
Whats the most popular form of communicating today? EMAIL!
If the members here can prepare a short email with useful links to info regarding F@H and also to various threads where people have talked about F@H, then the SM members can email contacts they know. I know its been talked about before but if we all focus on it then its worth it
Congrats #93!!! You guys have done so well, and thank you for contribing to the cause.. you have raised such an awsome team! Thanks to each of you.
I know it's beena long time since I've posted here, but being one of the ones that helped start your team, I had to chime in.
GAb
B) When you help someone with their computer or build a computer for someone, mention Folding. I always stealth install FAH as a stress test to break in the computer before it leaves the shop but before the machine changes hands I explain to the customer about FAH and ask if they want to participate. I haven't been turned down yet. Prime's snappy little Team 93 business cards go over well too.
-drasnor
We should have a fundraising event. SM hosts a Battlefield 2 server, charges $5 entry fee per person via PayPal, and you play BF2 all day with the SM crew! Now THAT would be loads of fun (for me at least)!
Prize #1
(a.) Seek corporate sponsorship or support. I work for a Fort 500 company and I'm having this idea of possibly introducing them to folding@home as a possible public service idea. Contributions to Stanford ARE tax deductible AND AND AND they have literally scores of computers in IT that are collecting dust and avg 2.4GHz P4 capability as they await to be staged or rotated in or out. A "hot spare" and public service idea is coming to mind and I'd like to swing them by Team #93 for introduction. I DO have the influence within the company to get things started and others of you in a similar situation may consider it. Even if Team #93 may not be selected, another Fort 500 team on the boards would be nice. But that brings me to
(b.) Maybe "tidy up" the site a little by making it so a corporation or female would not be uhhhh embarrassed or uncomfortable (I've had some first hand feedback already- one introduced me to this place but is folding somewhere else). This is a great site and very courteous by most standards, but let's face it guys, it's male oriented. And some bosses, especially in PR, are women who may be sensitive to some things. And I'd like to see more female involvement.
(a.) can be a professional decision but (b.) is by personal choice and resolution. I honor and respect both and I apologize if I'm ruffling feathers in a discussion that maybe should have another thread.
Those are good suggestions. As far as getting more women to post, that's kind of hard to do - it's really up to them. The pub is open for nearly any topic imaginable (except religion and politics). As for the technically-oriented forums, I have noticed more of a mix in the SVT area.
I would be willing to bet that we have a higher percentage of Fab Fem Folders than most teams. Adding more would be terrific.
B) I "Borg" any computer that I can at school into folding... Even if it can get just one WU done before it gets shut down then that helps the cause...
To help Team 93 boost our numbers, I have been and will continue to offer a 15% discount all all new computer builds for new clients if they run folding for Team 93, I have harnessed the power of all my work computers, Behind the back of the IT department. and I am constantly adding CPU's to my farm, "building 2 more now" Also I have benn getting team 93 roused up into folding again....:) Well I like to think so!
B. A suggestion on how the team can improve.
I think a little team competition is in order, I kind of stole the idea but it is a good one at that and would like to see it happen. Create 2 teams that are within Team 93, Called "Team SM Intel & Team SM AMD, these teams would be open to all users running 3 CPU's or less to join together and give the top 10 guys a run for there money. This in away gives our team a nice healthy boost in Folding .....
it is a requirement for every computer i build and sell that it must have folding at home installed as a service. also, i offer discounts on repairs i do if they allow me to install it. i also educate them on what it is for.
B:
to improve the team, i fugure we shoul kick the smx project into high gear. having dedicated boxes is a good idea, especially since some of us are too broke to buy loads of computer parts. i would gladly use more of my mom's power to host folding machines. heck, id run 5 if i had em. we need to get more people to donate their old/garbage picked parts. maybe someone could post standardized flyers for people to print and put up in public areas for donations of parts or old computers.
i just want to make you aware that we take a really dim view of the practice of "borging" and highly discourage folding on computers that you don't have permission to install it on. It's not good for the project, because these computers inevitably get discovered and the project gets a negative stigma. If you want to fold on your work computers, we suggest bringing it up to your IT department or whoever is in charge of the machines. Explain to them what it is, and how it doesn't affect performance, etc.
B) Why not put a list up in the folding section of all the tips to get more people involved for thoes that are new to folding. Like the one for getting corparations involed ect. I would add to that list for thoes of you that have children, schools are always looking for ideas and progects to help the community. Why not bring up folding to the Parent Teacher Organizion at you local schools. Even if the school doesn't join in at least all the parents that are at the meeting will hear about it and maybe they will join on a personal level.
On a personal note I have a question....I just checked my stats something I hardly do as I thought things were just going on their own, but I noticed that I have had no active processors in the 50 days or 7 days section and I have only compleated 1 wu since I started doing this, yet my pc runs folding 24/7 is there something wrong here?
B) Try not to limit yourself to online communities. Try targeting local events, and businesses in your area.
They Know what Im doing, well atleast the important guys over there, I have full reign over my render farm, and pretty much what I say goes on them, as I am the head of my Department. I have even consulted the VP of the housing group into letting me use the 247 Dual core towers we have here for Folding... I haven't recieved an answer
I'm bringing my HTPC back online in the next few weeks, which should increase my point output by approximately 20%. I'm also bringing a stack of Team 93 cards with me to LANWAR in a few weekends and distributing them at that venue.
B)
1. This isn't really a suggestion for how the team can improve in point production, but rather a suggestion for a general team improvement: allow prizes to be awarded to the staff. I'm specifically thinking of the huge, unrewarded contributions to the team that are made by the team staff members.
2. I was thinking of some kind of 'Folding Spirit' award, and then I remembered that's pretty much what the Folding Pineapple was. I'm going to find a new pineapple and start that prize back up. I promise you, the Folding Pineapple will return by December! With a vengeance!
And, a takeoff to Qeldroma's suggestion for the site itself (if this isn't already an option) - create a site template that displays all threads and content without any graphics, including pictures of scantily clad women, avatars, sig images, and smileys. This might be a little more suitable for viewing in a corporate setting, by users who set that as their active template in their profile.
I've been passing out folding bussiness cards.
Folding activity for Team # 93 could be increased if people would donate more parts and dedicate more processing power to the project.
Since then I have always upgraded my CPU for better OCers to improve my points/day ratio and finally I am dual folding with a X2 3800+ @ 2.5ghz on my small Shuttle SN25P, 24/7 that is... my parents celeron 2ghz (oced to 3.3ghz) is folding as well.
2) Beyond the success of Team 93, I always incourage friends and related IT fellows to make up a good use of their high sophisticate pieces of hardware. Most only care how high they can get to compete with useless benchmarks and scores, but they do not realize they are wasting all that power to nothing more than to increase their egos.
But then again, we are all humans. Sometimes we need to stop and think for a minute that we are not alone on this planet and that we are not immune to these deseases. Once you succesfully explain and make them realize this fact, most of them will gladly join this venture for seeking a cure. Of course our team #93 does not go unnoticed and I instruct them to enter it on the F@H configuration wizard
I hope some day we (all the F@H community) get to see this enormous effort actually bring something extraordinary to life and be remembered as part of this pioneer project.
Unex.
Kristof2
B. Recruitment of big farms would put us on the boards, I'd like to see us at the top, and getting there isn't as hard as it seems.
B) perhaps we can persuade some of the rouge folders out there. The highest rouge folder folds 110K points in 24 hours! for team Default IE no team
S-M name: Armo
Folding name: Armogeddon00
October 5, 2005 6:10 EST
b. Some great ideas so far here. Already hard to come up with unique ones. How about trying word of mouth with friends or acquaintances you interact with everyday. Keep a copy of your certificates around to maybe attract 'attention' allowing you to explain the good work that has been done and the ease in which anyone can participate.
(a) Today I brought 3 computers back to the fold. An AMD64 3500, P4 2.4 and P4 (dunno what).
(b) I'm going to see if I can get the rest of my family folding. But, since we're thousands of miles away, I'm not sure what if I can convince them. I've got another idea, but I'm not sure if I can pull it off with my work and school load. We'll see. I don't want to get anyone's hopes up.
S-M name: BluKnight
Folding name: BluKnight
October 5, 2005 10:15 MST
I'd hate to see you miss out on the prediction phase of the contest; you're good to go for the random drawing once you're active again.
Thanks for coming home to Team 93!
A) I started folding again a few days ago! After seeing teams slide on past us, and kicking around the ol' ball of guilt, I decided to reinstall folding on my primary PC. It won't do much, as it only really gets to fold while I'm asleep or at work (Due to WoW being resource-heavy), but every little bit helps. After years of badgering, I finally got Nomad to start folding also. I suppose both of these help boost production, if only slightly. I'm also going to try and get managerial approval to begin installing FAH on computers that go out the door at Best Buy; it needs sign-offs, so people don't complain that "FAH RUINED MY COMPUTER BCOS I M STUPID AND BROEK IT BUT I BLAEM STANFORD!!1111" or somesuch, but it's possible. Our next company meeting later this month, and our store is VERY big on community outreach and assistance programs.
B) Does this website have an RSS feed? A mailing list? Maybe we should! With those two, we can collect the people who don't want to go to a website every day when they can check their inbox or RSS reader. Every mail we should attach information on folding, and toss out the address for our folding page. Similarly (My limited knowledge of RSS nonwithstanding), we should make sure folding is always noted in the RSS feed. I know there are a lot of people who prefer getting forum+webpage concentrate in their inbox, in an easy-to-browse email.
I don't realy much care about winning the contest, infact I realy only am posting because I realy like telling my story. I am thankfull for programs like the FAH. I think that it is an awsome thing to be able to actually be apart of a real project that can have a real impact on our life. I'm sure that SETTI and Prime95 might someday prove to be a worthy cause but for me FAH is the most concrete actual thing that I can do to help others and try to help find a cure for one of the most debilitating and horrible illnesses out there. In fact if I were to win the 50 bucks I will donate it to the SM FAH program to help out with getting another team rig up and running...
Cheers,
-Greg