How about this for an idea? What about starting a group called MovieForums for the SETI@Home search for extraterrestrial life? It'll be our little contribution to science, plus if your comp just sits there spinning little windows or stars when you're not around, it'll give it something to keep it busy :)

I've been a member for more than a year, it's a really cool project. And anyway, if one of your comps finds ET, think about the publicity MovieForums will get ;D!!!!!

For anyone who doesn't know what it's about, you download a screensaver programme which in turn connects to the SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) site and downloads a chunk of data for analysis (this data comes directly from the Arecibo Radio Telescope in Mexico). When analysis finishes, it connects to the net and downloads another one :)

Anyone interested?

Count me out. I use to have that but it just lags me. Whenever my computer is idle, its because I'm downloading something, so it just slows my download. Sorry

I'll join. I have been a Seti@home member over a year too and I'm not in a group. I have completed 193 units so far. :)

Oh, btw. I turn the computer on when I leave for work in the morning and off when I go to sleep so it won't keep me awake. It's in my bedroom. I download Napster stuff all the time and it doesn't bother me. Just set it to be your default screen saver instead of running constantly. :)

You could say I'm an addict when it comes to SETI - over 9600 computer hours and 565 work units done and counting :D

565!? You're an alien aren't you? You are secretly listening for a signal from your own people so you can cover it up. Damn you alien and NSA guys. :(

What? Paranoid? Me? ;)

If we find the aliens we could call them the Zephyrsuns. :)

I don't get it - could you explain this thing to me in more detail? :D

Well Chris, basically you download a screensaver programme, which becomses your default screensaver. It asks you to connect to the internet so you can download a "work unit" (a piece of the signal from the Arecibo Telescope, usually about 350Kb big) then it searches through the data for anything that could be artificial and not just random noise/interferance that could be a sign of an alien intelligence. It does this in the spare time of your computer (i.e. only if the screensaver is active), or if you have a more powerful computer you can set it to work continuously. When it finishes, it sends the result back to the server and downloads another work unit...that's the whole idea.

Oh yeah, the group thing... :)

A group is a bunch of SETI@Home members competing "informally" to get the most number of completed work units :) It's just for fun I guess!

They don't compete against each other, they compete against other groups. Like TvCouchPotatoForums or something. So far they've found thousands of possible signals. When they anylize the data from the next year is the interesting part. If those same signals appear again it will really be interesting! What bugs me is they didn't monitor Orion's Belt. What the heck?? Everyone knows that's where the Egyptian pyramids came from.


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When is Conspiracy Theory coming out on dvd? ;)

Yep, it'll sure be interesting to read the results of the analyses...I'm not sure why they didn't scan Orion's belt, but it could have something to do with the fact that it's a relatively young area full of new stars being born...if you think about it in terms of astronomy it would probably have a hell of a lot of interference.

You're right sunfrog, they're competing against other groups to get into the infamous Top 1000 or even better yet, the top 100 (which is nearly as impossible as finding E.T. :) )

So, is anyone up for the idea??

Not on this 2-year-old computer! I'll hold off for now. :D

2 years old?! My Pentium II 300 was bought almost three years ago and still hacking away :) I know people with 486's doing SETI (pretty nuts, eh :))