It would be nice to be able to know who the Foldit Team users are.
This would be helpful for appreciating the merit of Feedback posts and chat dialogue and judging the level of folding expertise of the team in general.
One approach is to publish a list, but this would need maintenance as the membership changes.
Another approach is to have a standard reserved character designator in the username, like an ending exclamation mark for example, i.e. FoldIt!, or Dilbert!, or Whatever! This would permit easy recognition help in the dialogue process.
Seems like a reasonable request. I'll start by saying… axcho is a member of the Foldit team. :D
"judging the level of folding expertise of the team in general"
No need for this. We don't play the science puzzles. :p Two reasons: we're busy coding and/or doing biochem stuff, and we already know the answers and don't want to skew the results. ;)
As to "We don't play the science puzzles." not the answer I expected but totally resonable from the "good Science" perspective of not wanting the skew the results.
I do have one concern though. If the team members don't play, then how do they appreciate the merit in user UI suggestions. Also I think an opportunity for improving the game is being missed as knowing the answer and getting FoldIt! to represent it would be a great litmus test of Foldit's toolset.
With an eye toward having "accomplished Foldit players" on the development team, and not skewing the results, maybe a set of benchmark proteins, available to everyone, and required to be played by team members, would be a good thing to have.
This would also provide a testbed for devloper's experimenting with changes as well as confirming feature enhancement work with no loss in functionality.
To be clear I think it is good science that the team member's don't play the active games, but no so good game development strategy that they aren't required to get good at playing the game.
Maybe after the puzzle closes the team could attempt a group solution. If, as a group, they could score in the top 20 soloist range my concerns would be eliminated. There may be bigger fish to fry than playing the game, but the cooked result may end up more palitable as a result of having played.
Just an idea, not a big issue.
may also be useful to know who the wiki admins are, how do you become an OP etc.
