How much information are we expected to share with the rest of the Folding community?

[BootsMcGraw]

Everyone has their own tips and tricks that help determine how successful they are at this game. With the advent of recipe and script libraries, we can share what we've done with an audience the size of our own choosing. We can keep things to ourselves, share them with teammates, or make them available to the entire global membership.

The main question is: How much information are we expected to share with the rest of the Folding community?

The corollary questions:

• Does keeping information to oneself prevent someone else from using that information to make a greater gain for the good of the whole?

• Does sharing information with all dilute the friendly competitiveness of the game and negate the reason for scores and rankings?

I see pros and cons for all responses from "none" through "some" to "everything"; and I would like to know your thoughts on this, fellow folderers.

[dimension9]

Hi Boots,

This very same question has occurred to me from the very beginning of my folding experience. On the one hand, the whole purpose of Fold-it being for the good of the scientific community, and by extension, conceivably, for the good of the health of the whole human race - would seem to elevate knowledge sharing to the highest possible priority, over-riding all other concerns.

On the other hand - I myself - find myself rather jealously guarded and protective of my very best techniques and discoveries, while sharing mainly only what I might call my "second-tier" insights, techniques and scripts, and then, only with my group - holding back the "tweaked" versions, to squeeze out a tiny edge; there is, I think, definitely an intrinsic human urge to gain advantage in each of us, and I must "fess-up" to having perhaps more than just a touch of that myself, before continuing. So I cannot fault others for having this very human, understandable view or stance. Some would even say there is great virtue in that natural self-interest

On further reflection, however, I know that the people I respect and admire the most in this game are not always those at the tops of the scoring heaps (although I do definitely admire their skills); rather, they are those few who excel not only in scoring, but in willingness to teach, and to share, and to assist the less accomplished members of their team, and to foster newbies' growth, and to elevate the level of skill of all other players they come into contact with, whether it be by sharing knowledge and answering questions in chat, pm, or email, or by publishing and sharing hints, tips, tricks, scripts and code.

These few who have overcome their need to excel individually and have channeled their energies into elevating everyone around them are at the heart and soul and essence of what makes Fold-it such a great thing to do, and this site such a great place to be.

Because of this, I have found myself slowly overcoming my "hoarding" instincts about knowledge and code, and have begun, if modestly, to contribute back, at least to my team (so far). I envision, that as time passes, if I should become as accomplished in this folding endeavor as I seek to be, I will become more and more a "contributing citizen" of the folding community at large, and less & less a solely competitive player.

That being said, competition is FUN! Being part of a team is FUN! …and winning is FUN, FUN, FUN!!!

But losing really Sucks - except insofar as it motivates us to increase our knowledge and skills. But c'est la vie; such is life in a zero-sum game.

I think perhaps the main argument in favor of knowledge and tool sharing (aside from the altruistic) is that, if everyone has exactly the same tools and knowledge, then those that rise to the top in score would become, more and more (over time), those with the skills and ability to use those tools to best advantage, and less & less those that have acquired the most outstanding tools, but are perhaps not as individually skillful. Personal motivation, talent and ability would become even more the separating factors than they already are. In my opinion this would probably be a very good thing. I think it would probably eventually result in the scores reflecting in much greater degree, a player's inner abilities and gifts that cannot be shared - this would be a much truer distinction.

On the other hand, many of those currently at the top of the scoreboards may understandably be loathe to give up or share their knowledge and tools that continue to give them their current distinction.

I may even be among them, even though I'm certainly not at the top by any means; I can at least understand that very human urge to guard one's position and whatever satisfaction and esteem may be derived from it. Not even to mention team loyalties, where peer pressure to guard the team's position may well over-ride one's instincts and desires to share knowledge and elevate others' games

Overall, I think the democratization of knowledge and tools, tricks & scripts could result in a new level of accomplishment for Fold-it as a whole, albeit unfortunately paid for by ranking decreases for some, perhaps myself as well.

The crux of the matter may lie in each individual player achieving a quantum leap in personal identification, i.e, from:

1) "I am in this to succeed on a personal level and derive great pleasure from that, to…

2) "I am in this to succeed with my team, and to help my team succeed as they help me to succeed so that we all may enjoy mutual success, and derive my personal pleasure from that" to…

3) " I am in this to help the whole Fold-it Community to succeed, to grow and improve, even if it may mean that my individual rankings or even my team rankings may take a step or two backwards, and derive my personal satisfaction from that" and, possibly even to…

4) "I am in this to truly do whatever I can to help everyone else around me to possibly help the whole human race, and derive my own sense of personal satisfaction from that."

What would this game be like if we were all to take a step up from whichever of the above best describes us now?

Anyway, I am delighted that you raised this topic for discussion, Boots, and delighted to be able to air my views on the matter. Although ostensibly just about the game, I find these questions you've raised apply equally if not more so, to our very core values, and to our individual characters.

I really hope many others find this thread and reply as well; I'd tremendously love to hear others' views on this matter.

-Best Regards to all,

dimension9

[Deleted user]

I think this quote from dimension9's post says it all. It represents to me what Fold.it was supposed to be about - adding the human element to the Rosetta algorithms, using the power of the mind to visualize the problems in a protein fold, and use intuition to modify the result for the best outcome.
I think perhaps the main argument in favor of knowledge and tool sharing (aside from the altruistic) is that, if everyone has exactly the same tools and knowledge, then those that rise to the top in score would become, more and more (over time), those with the skills and ability to use those tools to best advantage, and less & less those that have acquired the most outstanding tools, but are perhaps not as individually skillful. Personal motivation, talent and ability would become even more the separating factors than they already are. In my opinion this would probably be a very good thing. I think it would probably eventually result in the scores reflecting in much greater degree, a player's inner abilities and gifts that cannot be shared - this would be a much truer distinction.

As it stands now, it's become a boring ritual of merely applying the shared recipes, dumbing down the game, making it a competition among only a few with the skills and knowledge to create the scripts.

Without a common shared set of tools, including the scripts and recipes, Fold.it will become the playground for an ever-decreasing group of those-that-have against all the rest.

[Crashguard303]

Well, most is already said before.
In reference to the recipe topic, I've also the opinion that sharing them for all useres makes sense, because it creates fair conditions, and the result diversity will mostly depend on the human abilites than on technical.

Plus, playing a non-profit-game helping science for the benefit of ALL people but using recipes available for only some people playing it looks ironic to me.
There are enough companies which try to gain or keep their monopolic status quo (oil companies for example, which try to prevent or handicap the invention of alternate power-sources).

One thing which makes me a little bit unsure is the changing of recipes created by other users before,
when it comes to the question: Upload it or not?
I'll never upload an edited recipe created by another user if he didn't give me the permission.
I can change a recipe, remove some flaws and add some features.
But what if the person doesn't want me to upload it, or simply doesn't give me some answer.

[Tlaloc]

I am in the "sharing knowledge" camp. Many of you use my scripts and they find you points. Every time I publish a script, it makes my job as a soloist more difficult because I have given away a tool that I find points with to "the competition." Although my score doesn't change, my rank suffers. What kind of irks me a bit is that many of the people using my scripts are taking my knowledge and using it to rank up, but don't share back. They have virtually all of my techniques, but I have none of theirs. There are people who consistently score in the top 20 who know things about folding that they aren't sharing.

What softens this a bit is that rank is a game…the techniques I publish aren't. If a script I write helps fold one protein that creates one medicine that helps one person, I will be feeling good about it for the rest of my life.

[Crashguard303]

Yes, looking at some script sites, you see that there are many "children" of it, but they are not available for download.

On the other hand I guess, some of them are very close to the original, but only use different parameters.

[Bletchley Park]

I recognize dimension9's view and appreciate his comments.

Some members of Contenders are masters in hand-folding. Their use of scripts was limited until the pace went up and some tasks just had to be automated to keep up. They do not use secret superscripts. They use the tools that people like Pletsch, Grom and others have generously provided and for which they deserve credit.

Anyone can make advances with these basic scripts provided. A change in banding can cause a different quake to yield better results on a given protein. These variations are available for anyone to make and to explore. In their own time and by their own efforts they can so advance their scores. Those who write LUA scripts had to learn LUA, this is their personal effort, and they bear fruits of it. The definitions of LUA are available to everyone, so everyone has the ability to apply it.

Achieving high scores consistently does not require superscripts, although they help. It first and foremost requires dedication, many hours of observation, trial and error, hand-tweaking and last but not least, expertise which you will only get by playing often.

When I was a newbie I was amazed and suspicious about those incredible high scores and thought "they must be using some secret script". Along the way I learned what works and what doesnt.

Because my time is so limited I make extensive use of scripts, even if they are less efficient than hand-tweaking. To run these I purchased parts and built special dedicated hardware, available exclusively 24/7 for FoldIt. This required finances, build time, knowledge and travel. This machine is portable, I take it with me on my travels so I can keep up with the pace of CASP9. All this involves effort, dedication and determination too.

I do not use superscripts, although one might call Quake, Overnight and Acid tweek superscripts. I use many variants of these scripts in a variety of situations, in various orders, based on visual judgement. I use scripts because I simply lack the time to manually tweak proteins. My life is very busy.

To make a script public is up to the maker, and for derivative works from a non-published script also on the original author. It is highly appreciated what people like Grom, Pletsch and others have done. It has most certainly advanced the pace of FoldIt. It does not mean though that every script must be public. A script is like a diary, if the author writes in it, it does not mean you can claim to read it nor that you should scorn the author for keeping it from you.

You (in general) may not realize it, but the playing field is more level than you think.

[Crashguard303]

Yes, hardware and time is a big factor.
I've seen recipes, which took hours on my PC on a mate's overclocked Quad, taking only minutes.
So, running a brute-force recipe (random trying or something like this) on a fast PC for one night can give better results than running it on a slow machine for the same time.

[Deleted user]

If this is so, why are certain groups and individuals so concerned about the scripts being shared?

The playing field really isn't level. There are those who can write scripts, those who can only use shared scripts becasue they have no scripting or programming skills, and those who have the time or inclination to hand fold everything. I don't know how anyone could do that during CASP and ever make any headway.

I suspect that the groups that have those few talented script writers will always exceed, and the rest will never be able to compete. That is very demoralizing.

[xiando]

So what you're saying Brick, is that given two players of similar actual skill, one which is new to fold.it or simply independent, and the other who is involved with a group, the use of a script or scripts could theoretically result in a situation in which the group player could create a solo score far in excess of the other player's score, just due to to someone else's actual folding skills and scripting skills?

That would be terrible. I could even imagine situations in which a very poor player could exceed the score of a moderate or good player, just by using some "superscript" provided by his/her group.

Considering the hours required to fold a protein, (presuming one does not simply clone someone else's view point of how a fold should be performed by pushing the button on a shared or otherwise superscript) what then would be the point of a moderate or even good solo player to bother participating to the project if his or her results would be obviated by an essentially cloned result (even if the scripts were tweaked so that the scores didn't show as "too" similar)?

Once again, the questions come up, what is Solo, and what is Competition? And what is the stated_goal of this "game"

Sorry, I'm trying to get my head around the idea that running a script someone else wrote to achieve 8 or 10K is either a "human" or "solo" achievement by a solo competitor.

Afaik, this is a game. it may be part of a larger picture, but like MMoprhs and similar, one does not just create a script to get the +5 sword of Valkerie so one can tell everyone at the fruit juice bar that they're really cool…one actually achieves the sword on their own merits, or one is simply a fraud.