Hello again!
This post is connected to my first ever Steemit post which you can see here. In that post, I noted one of the reasons why I started to collect Gridcoin, but more importantly, why I choose to donate some of my idle CPU time to the World Community Grid (WCG) and other scientific projects.
The main project in the WCG that I support is Mapping Cancer Markers. It is anchored at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre / Hospital in Toronto, Canada and has been running since November 2013.
A little over 10 years ago, my uncle was treated at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre for pancreatic cancer. Not shortly after, my aunt was treated for bone cancer. While both battles were ultimately lost, it was through the dedication of the staff at Princess Margaret that allowed us the opportunity to spend a few more days and weeks with our loved ones. A vast amount of cancer research continues to be completed at the Princess Margaret and new forms of treatment continue to be developed. One day, I hope that cancer is considered to be a less formidable disease.
There are vast amounts of idle CPU & GPU time available across the world. This idle computational time holds the key to finding cures to various forms of cancer, diseases and other altruistic goals. While there is a cost of electricity to donate this idle computational time, it is a direct contribution to charitable causes that one can be reasonably assured is going directly towards that cause. Many charities in North America (and I am guessing in other areas) have been fighting a battle of reputation of how cash donations are ultimately used.
While I understand that the electricity costs present a barrier to donating spare computation time, that’s where Gridcoin comes into play. The “mining” of Gridcoin is simply a byproduct of crunching work units via BOINC. There are many projects that use BOINC to utilize spare computational power, with WCG above being one of them. Gridcoin can be used to help offset these costs and place you in a net neutral position.
I encourage all of you to consider donating some idle computational time, be it your PC, phone, tablet or even a Raspberry Pi. Every FLOP of computation counts!
You can learn more amount BOINC and Gridcoin by using the embedded links.
Thank you for taking the time to read this post.
Cheers!
