"Saul Luizaga" <sau### [at] netscapenet> wrote in message
news:49b61e20$1@news.povray.org...
> Darren New wrote:

>   I see your point, they didn't had any compassion what so ever with the
> poor farmers, maybe they were legally correct but is just wrong take the
> few resources poor people have. I think instead they should have given
> this poor farmers seeds for a VERY low price or for free, and if greed
> is their drive, call the newspapers and tell them how good they are with
> the poor farmers getting free advertising/marketing.
>
>   A wise man said something like this: "The benefit of the group is what
> is good for the group and the individual". Being this an ideal case, we
> have to approximate at it as much as possible. We are inherently
> imperfect, we need ECC (Error checking and correcting) through compassion.

The question is if the inconvenience is worth for some uncertain gains to
third parties that may or may not benefit you? A lot of people will not
bother. My resolution is simple: Give some immediate benefit, however
little, and you'll get a lot more people contributing (*). If the project is
promising enough, it's not hard to justify spending a little to get it
going. If not (as in SETI, for instance), well, it would be waste for people
to volunteer anyway.

Basic research is already funded through universities, government and even
the industry. Sure, we can all use additional funding for a lot of things,
but one question that always lurks in my mind for research asking for
volunteers or donations is that if it was deemed unpromising by the
aforementioned channels for the researchers to resort to public. What do *I*
know about proteome folding to judge whether the research is valid and
promising, or if it's simply a way for a few researchers without good ideas
or plans to publish a paper about nothing? Don't get me wrong, I'm just
being the devil's advocate here, but you see that it's not enough to have
good intentions. I see a lot of volunteer effort with good intentions wasted
on bad projects already. This is also where compensation comes in handy,
because you know that researchers willing and able to compensate are on to
something and not just attempting to use the "grid" just because they can.

(*) Yes, I know that people invest in ventures as well, without any
immediate benefits provided. But in that case, there's a contract on
potential benefits/dividends.

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