It's got boring....

Discuss your experiences with and ideas about Stardust@home here.

Moderators: Stardust@home Team, DustMods

nikko

It's got boring....

Post by nikko »

1) I can see if the movie is fake (calibr.) or not.
2) I can see if there's a track on fake movie
3) The movies are downloading too slow (no, it's not my bandwidth problem)

I haven't got a single incorrect point for last 500 Calibration movies....

IT'S GETTING BORING. PLEASE DO SOMETHING.
Decrease amount of calib. movies or at least increase the bandwidth...
fjgiie
DustMod
Posts: 1253
Joined: Sat May 20, 2006 8:47 am
Location: Hampton, SC, US

To the management

Post by fjgiie »

.
To The Management

1. Thank you for Stardust at home.

2. This site is the most fun on the net.

3. When I get tired, I can take a break and wait on new movies.

4. I hope everyone appreciates what y'alldo to keep this site going.

fjgiie
oscar
Posts: 24
Joined: Tue Aug 08, 2006 3:19 pm
Location: Bellefonte, PA

Post by oscar »

Boring is not a term I would use to describe the opportunity to discover an INTERSTELLAR DUST PARTICLE.
Please realize...this means a bit of matter from another star or nebular dust cloud...something from outside of our own solar system.
We are searching for a never seen before treasure of unimaginable value :wink: I hope I am not laying it on too thick, but this is rare stuff indeed.
This is a chance to contribute to a fantastic scientific endevour to learn about the greater Universe. Not a game, but it is fun!!! 8) :D
What we think, we become. Buddha
greuti
Posts: 200
Joined: Fri Aug 11, 2006 10:11 am
Location: Switzerland

Post by greuti »

Let me say following:
I can understand it, so far the CMs with tracks are not really a challenge and to me too only a handicap currently. But on the other hand they are much better to my nerves than CMs which would not be (obviously) different to RMs.

In spite of my nerves, today and if it is possible, I would prefer a cut on these somewhat "fishy" scores and then CMs which are no longer obvious ...unrecognizable CMs where you have to click hopefully (and cliff-hanging) on the track 8)

:wink: ...and it's a pity that my scores of 99,91% and 99,83% (five of my nine incorrect answered movies were sure due to those incorrect track coordinates) get currently the same value like 95,01%.
tim_yoda
Posts: 39
Joined: Fri Aug 04, 2006 5:06 pm
Location: Broadview Heights, OH USA

Re: It's got boring....

Post by tim_yoda »

nikko wrote:1) I can see if the movie is fake (calibr.) or not.
2) I can see if there's a track on fake movie
3) The movies are downloading too slow (no, it's not my bandwidth problem)

I haven't got a single incorrect point for last 500 Calibration movies....

IT'S GETTING BORING. PLEASE DO SOMETHING.
Decrease amount of calib. movies or at least increase the bandwidth...
nikko,
Your contribution to science is what's important. Your feelings of frustration are one of many with this program. However, CMs and "reruns" are a necessary evil to verify a constant in the inspection process.
My favorite CM is the profile of a fish wearing a Samurai helmet at bottom center frame. It has appeared with AND without "tracks".
Research IS boring. That's why I keep plenty of Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin LIve on hand.
A new hard drive has also facillitated <2 second downloads. (320Meg physicsl mem w/ DSL running IE)
We've gotta lotta work to do, don't get discouraged!

Tim
Denise
Posts: 26
Joined: Fri Aug 04, 2006 8:04 pm
Location: London
Contact:

Boring?

Post by Denise »

Yes, I too can spot fakes and, usually, where the track will be. And I've been pleased that, after an early 6 wrong calibrations, I've been accurate ever since. Then, just now, a clear fake. I looked it up and down several times ... and still missed the tiny spot (8787846V1). I was peed off. But, as many people have said, that's why they're there. Nikko may be pretty exceptional and I congratulate him - but the majority of people hit a duff one now and again
anyone got the key?
wol
Posts: 3
Joined: Thu Aug 10, 2006 11:43 pm

Post by wol »

It's the project itself that is fascinating, not to mention a brilliant use of the internet. It's hard not to get a thrill from thinking about what new information could emerge about the galaxy. And an opportunity for non-astronomers to help with real research, and so accomplish in months what might otherwise take twenty years—how can that be boring?

Looking at movie after movie and not finding anything can be a drag, but what did you expect? Let's see; almost a million movies and possibly as few as 45 particles. Sounds to me like we'll all be looking at nothing most of the time.

Sorry, but the only thing that's "got boring" about Stardust@home is the daily whining from score junkies and short-attention-span adolescents.

The quiet majority out here feel pretty content with the chance to be involved in a cosmic project (for once an appropriate adjective), and the satisfaction of doing the best we can. We probably won't find an interstellar particle. We may not find anything at all. So why bother? Well, because, for the first time, we can. Or, boringly, we think helping weed out the blanks is valuable. Or we find it calming, or challenging, or meditative, or mesmerizing, or even addictive.

Or maybe we simply can't give up hope a little bit of stardust is just around the corner. :wink:


(with apologies to Walt Whitman...)

When I read the muttering gripers,
When their calibration movie moans were ranged in posts before me,
When I was shown the decimals, the inequity of percentages to motivate, score, and rank them,
When I sitting read the gripers where they posted with much indignation in the forum,
How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,
Till clicking and logging out I wandered off by myself,
Into the virtual microscope, and from time to time,
Focused in perfect silence on the aerogel.
michelle305
Posts: 8
Joined: Mon Aug 21, 2006 5:06 am
Location: Baltimore, MD

It's not boring

Post by michelle305 »

I still think it is cool as anything to be part of something like this. Maybe you need to take a respite for a while. My scores are not perfect, but leaning toward a "B", if we were in class. That probably makes it more stimulating for me to improve my score or not get any worse. Good Luck. Michelle
nikko

Post by nikko »

I agree with you. I do it for science. It great fun also to do this. But I do it only my free time during classes with students. The bandwidht decreases amount of work I can do. :( When the new semster starts I won't have even a tiny amount of time which I wish to spend on stardust.
Please, if you can' do something to increase the bandwidht at least 2x, that the time limit to check on movie.

Thanx for your work and for that we can help you a little with this job.
Mighty Pete
Posts: 146
Joined: Thu Aug 10, 2006 7:47 am
Contact:

Post by Mighty Pete »

The problem is on your end. I can view and click as fast as i want here. There is no slowdown. If you have a virus scanner running that might slow it down or you are using IE. There is faster browsers around than that. Firewalls, Lans, proxies they all add up.
nikko

Post by nikko »

1) I'm using Linux
2) With any browser it's slow, even IE on Windows
3) Even at my Uni with 6Mbit bandwidtyh and external IP it works slow.

Ok, Poland is a third world country and they're cutting down our transfers.
chandu
Posts: 2
Joined: Fri Sep 08, 2006 8:23 pm
Contact:

Post by chandu »

I would agree with that. It got so boring that i decided to post in here after keeping mum for several days :) My sensitivity..specificity scores are pretty high..have got only 2 of the calibration movies incorrect but i have been able to watch around 302 movies..(dont get too much time :cry: ). I honestly do have the excitement of being the first one to click on a genuine movie with a track but the few movies i suspected to contain tracks have like atleast 56 views already...and like more than 6 agreements.

I am wondering if i'll ever get a fresh movie to watch :? .......
Wolter
DustMod
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Joined: Mon May 22, 2006 2:23 am
Location: Enkhuizen, the Netherlands

Post by Wolter »

I am sorry to here that you got bored allready. The total number of movies is 700.000. The expected number of interstellar tracks is between 40 and 100. So what is your change of seeing a track after just 300 movies...???

Furthermore there are over 10.000 volunteers on this project and only up to 100 tracks. So when you finally see a track the change on beeing the first to see it is max. 1 in 100. That change is getting lower when more people are joining the search and also lowers when you look through a lower number of movies then the average volunteer.

The only way to improve your changes is to spend more time on the VM. But that is boring... isn't it?

Wel i don't think it is. I have looked at almost 6000 real movies until now and i am pretty certain that their was NO real IS track in any one of them. A view IDP tracks yes, but no IS tracks. But that does not mind. It's the experience that count. To be able to join in this search for something no man has ever seen before. To get the change to be a co-discoverer of the basic stuf we all are made off. That is good enough for me.

Hopefully Happy Hunting to you all.

Wolter
Just dusting... Image
chandu
Posts: 2
Joined: Fri Sep 08, 2006 8:23 pm
Contact:

Post by chandu »

well....do you think i dont know how many movies are there in total? and that the probability of finding one is so low! You have to take my word when i say "time doesnt permit me" to watch over 6000 movies. I was just expressing my thoughts. I guess i am allowed that much freedom but I am sorry if it any way discourages you. If movies are being sent out randomly to people then there is a good probability that i might spot a track before you though :wink: Anywayz...have fun.
bmendez
Stardust@home Team
Stardust@home Team
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Post by bmendez »

chandu,

You are, of course, allowed to express your opinion. But, I thought it important that I step in and remind everyone of how difficult this task is and why we are asking for help from tens of thousands of volunteers in the first place.

We are expecting about 45 interstellar particle tracks inside a total of 700,000 focus movies. That means that if every volunteer were each searching all 700,000 movies that each movie you view would have a probability of 1 in 15,600 of having a track. Doing this for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, and having each field of view looked at by 4 people independently, with an average of 10 seconds per focus movie would take 3.7 years.

Now, considering that roughly 20% of the movies you view are calibration movies means that the above probability drops to 1 in 18,700 of finding a track in an individual movie.

The more movies you view the better the chances get that you will find a track. But from our perspective, in order to find all the particle tracks, on average, no single person needs to look at more than 840 movies.

If We (meaning the entire collaboration) find interstellar dust in the collector then the project will be a success. A few lucky people will actually get to claim discovery rights, but all several thousand of us will get to claim success.

Thanks as always for your efforts,
-Bryan
"I am made from the dust of the stars, and the oceans flow in my veins"
- RUSH
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