REMINDER: computer borging permission

In light of the recent events related to illegal borging and points zeroing, I think it's time to remind everyone that it's essential to make sure you have a clear permission from the computer owner, preferably in writing before borging any computer you don't own. Even if you are in a position to authorize the installation of the client on computers, it's always wise to have a letter written and signed by your superior or owner.

By putting the permission on writing, you are shielding from any ambigous situations leading to a EULA violation. This is especially true when you have permission at first and it become unwanted down the road for any reason.

I will also take the opportunity to explain how things works when a EULA violation is reported :

-Either a FCF moderation staff or a PandeGroup member receive a complaint about a possible EULA violation against a user.
-First, they submit the complaint to the security team, comprised of PG members and people in the folding community.
-They review the complaint and if it is valid, they take a decision depending on the severity of the violation.
-If points zeroing is warranted, they will proceed now for the user (and possibly the team if it is shown they encouraged the behavior or did nothing to prevent it).
-If the user disagree with the decision, he can contact the PG about that. If his side of the story is credible, it will be reviewed by the security team.
-If the complaint turned up to be unfounded, the punishment will be reverted and the case closed.
-However, if it is not clear (like the user word against the other), it can be deferred to the judiciary system to decide if a violation really occured or not. If it's not a violation, they also revert the punishment and the case closed.
-If the new informations doesn't show any valid reason to think it's not a violation, the punishment remain.

The reason the security team apply a punishment immediatly is because there is often no possibility way to contact the offender like language barrier, no email provided or no forum to contact. In most cases, it's often because the offender doesn't want to be contacted and the punishment will stay (they know they are wrong, no point to argue). But if the offender think he is not fairly treated or think a lesser punishment is warranted, it's up to him to contact the PG and plead his case, with proof if possible. That's where the written permission letter will help a lot in this case.

In case people is not aware of the EULA terms, please read this : http://folding.stanford.edu/English/License (don't be afraid, it's very short and simple).

The PandeGroup are not cowboys and they are open to revert the punishment if you can show you have a valid permission or you have a good explanation of what happened.

Now that it's clear, Fold on !

The news of illegal borgs spreads quickly through the community.
Anybody thinking about starting may well be put off by either hearing the news or by affected by the ilegal borg.
So in the long run, less people fold.

Remember its easy to tarnish a good reputation.
And people dont forget about it, so its so hard to improve a tarnished one.

Luck ...........

I'm curious. I've wanted to borg the computers at work. However the head manager as of late has been complaining about electricity use. So, my question is. Is there anyway to claim the electricity bill related to folding as a tax write off? I'm betting if I can finagle that we could have a lot more borgs.

Syndicated_Death said:

I'm curious. I've wanted to borg the computers at work. However the head manager as of late has been complaining about electricity use. So, my question is. Is there anyway to claim the electricity bill related to folding as a tax write off? I'm betting if I can finagle that we could have a lot more borgs.

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There was a thread around tax time about this. The foundation has a 501c3 so monitary donations are tax deductable.
We are donating computer time not money and there is not a way to account the value of the time and nothing of monitary value has been xferd (just WU) to duduct.

It be wonderful if stanford and the IRS could put a value on the points and or WU.

This will not happen (I'm fairly sure)

Kendrak said:

There was a thread around tax time about this. The foundation has a 501c3 so monitary donations are tax deductable.
We are donating computer time not money and there is not a way to account the value of the time and nothing of monitary value has been xferd (just WU) to duduct.

It be wonderful if stanford and the IRS could put a value on the points and or WU.

This will not happen (I'm fairly sure)

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that's truly a shame. like I said I was certain I could bring a lot of computers to the cause if I could find something to appeal to the owners bottom line. oh well. thanks for the input

There will be no tax deductions or tax write off for folding.

If you cannot obtain explicit permission to fold at work, or fold anywhere not on your own machine, do not fold there.

You can always fold at home. That is what many of us do.

Businesses are in business to make money. Folding does not help them make money. Don't complain if you cannot fold at work. You can always start your own company, pay taxes, employ many people, deal with competitors, and fold away on all of your own company's boxen.

Pocatello said:

There will be no tax deductions or tax write off for folding.

If you cannot obtain explicit permission to fold at work, or fold anywhere not on your own machine, do not fold there.

You can always fold at home. That is what many of us do.

Businesses are in business to make money. Folding does not help them make money. Don't complain if you cannot fold at work. You can always start your own company, pay taxes, employ many people, deal with competitors, and fold away on all of your own company's boxen.

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yeah... I already got that point. hence me saying it was a shame and leaving at that. thanks though.

Is this about the - 10 million points? ?

If so please fill me in, as I've been MIA the recently.

Syndicated_Death said:

yeah... I already got that point. hence me saying it was a shame and leaving at that. thanks though.

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I am truly sorry if I caused offense. I was not directing my statement at you... but I can see that would be a reasonable conclusion. Sorry again.

I was really thinking about the other thread involving someone on our team, and the other guy who was not on our team, but he was distributing F@H as a virus through bit torrent downloads. I am just pissed off about the whole thing. Sorry about my rant.

I wish that I could fold at work, but I am not allowed.

it's no problem Pocatello. misunderstandings happen.

95% of the folding I'm doing now is at work. It does help that I own the company though. Regardless the original post is right on point. If you dont own it then you better have permission to borg it. If it's at a business and being borged then the permission would be best to have in writing.

I saw were a school Admin one time convince the school that running folding would, decrease the heat bill in the winter, he was laughing in the thread, because he forgot to talk about the electric bill.

lol


yes this has to do with the 12mill zeroing out of points...

MrGuvernment said:

lol


yes this has to do with the 12mill zeroing out of points...

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Permission not in writing can be a funny thing. It can come, it can go, and the person giving it is the only one ever in control. The rest of us are pretty much at the givers mercy.

And as we learned from Woods over at OCF, who you got permission from and who you didn't can be even more important.

Xilikon said:

-If points zeroing is warranted, they will proceed now for the user (and possibly the team if it is shown they encouraged the behavior or did nothing to prevent it).

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Didn't appear that way to me. It looked like they immediately hit the teams as well. It's a bit hard to prevent something you're unaware of. I think subtracting the points from the various teams should have waited until it was shown the team was at fault/participated as well.

I'm not disputing this one way or the other as far as whether or not it was justified. Only that it appears this statement may not apply as it seems like they're bitch slapping the teams first and sorting out the issues later.

It also makes it appear to me like PG are now going to push teams to become part of the Pande Police force and have everyone looking over everyone else's shoulder?

nomad8u said:

Didn't appear that way to me. It looked like they immediately hit the teams as well. It's a bit hard to prevent something you're unaware of. I think subtracting the points from the various teams should have waited until it was shown the team was at fault/participated as well.

I'm not disputing this one way or the other as far as whether or not it was justified. Only that it appears this statement may not apply as it seems like they're bitch slapping the teams first and sorting out the issues later.

It also makes it appear to me like PG are now going to push teams to become part of the Pande Police force and have everyone looking over everyone else's shoulder?

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If the team is hit, we are talking about a loss of over 1 billion of points

That's why this should be a sticky.... due diligence will keep [H] from getting rogue zeroed.

Xilikon said:

If the team is hit, we are talking about a loss of over 1 billion of points

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I don't think I'm following you on this statement. At least I hope not.

The team was hit for -12m. Are you saying that if a team member is found to violate the EULA, ALL of the teams points are in jeopardy? Are you saying there is still a potential for ALL of [H]'s points to be flushed? Just trying to clarify that...

If they were to take such harsh actions, I'd think that would put their project in some serious jeopardy. Even though I haven't been folding that long, I'd have to seriously re-evaluate whether or not I'd be willing to contribute to such a heavy handed organization.

I take great exception to the "punish the many for the sins of the few" methodology of rule enforcement. This is not meant as a stab at Party2go or to insinuate that he/she is at fault here. Just my feelings on what I believe is a rather heavy handed enforcement tactic.

nomad8u said:

I don't think I'm following you on this statement. At least I hope not.

The team was hit for -12m. Are you saying that if a team member is found to violate the EULA, ALL of the teams points are in jeopardy? Are you saying there is still a potential for ALL of [H]'s points to be flushed? Just trying to clarify that...

If they were to take such harsh actions, I'd think that would put their project in some serious jeopardy. Even though I haven't been folding that long, I'd have to seriously re-evaluate whether or not I'd be willing to contribute to such a heavy handed organization.

I take great exception to the "punish the many for the sins of the few" methodology of rule enforcement. This is not meant as a stab at Party2go or to insinuate that he/she is at fault here. Just my feelings on what I believe is a rather heavy handed enforcement tactic.

Click to expand...

Your thinking about the -12 millions loss not supposed to be assumed by the team. what I wanted to explain is that if a member lost the points, the team total will get reduced since it's the sum of all the teammates points. If the team itself is being punished, all the points is wiped.

However, don't worry too much since for this to happen, they must prove the team is either negligent about a member gloating about cheating (the proper action is for the team to denounce the member to PG) or encouraged the behavior (collective work of illegal borging). Since we are a huge team, it's much harder for them to prove we are negligent since with the team that big, there is always bound to be a few bad apples. Most cases would be again small teams of a few folders which work collectively. In the case of trivolve, his team is also called trivolve so it's assumed that the team supported the behavior of trivolve.

I can assure that we will work hard to make sur our teammates follow the EULA, thus this reminder thread. By doing this, we show the PG that we are taking the necessary steps to avoid this.

Thanks for the clarification Xil. I just wanted to be sure I understood (as best as anyone can with the potential gray areas involved) the implications.

Cheers.