@steveb -
I completely, 100% agree with your comment - thank you for putting into words exactly my own thoughts and concerns (and doing it better than I have been able to).
And your idea of a 'foldit cup' team competition for manual only puzzles is brilliant… I'd certainly buy a ticket for that!
Only problem is that some of the "features" of the latest versions of the program make the old hand folding techniques difficult. For example Mark did a recent puzzle completely by hand and it still didn't respond to being walked - so its not just that all the walk room is taken out by scripts.
Please allow me the liberty of using an analogy.
Using scripts while folding is like doing the dishes in a dishwasher, rather than washing them by hand. The dishwasher does a marvelous job of cleanup, more quickly and thoroughly than if you'd washed them by hand. But… if you don't take the time to scrape off the excess food and to line the dishes in their proper places, no number of cycles through the dishwasher will get them more clean than if you did them by yourself.
In this dishwasher analogy, the best results come from the optimum usage of time and effort: doing some manual work preparing the dishes, then letting the machine blast away. Translating this into game terms, the best-folded proteins will be the ones where the players manually work them to remove the major problems, and then allow scripts to make the proteins pretty.
Giving us more de-novo puzzles will satisfy the needs of both camps.
Scissors tool and we will be happily fold ever after :)
not a bug, returned to open / suggestion