We can let out our spare rooms and rent our cars, but what about the processing power going spare in our PCs? Golem aims to put it to use, offering up compute cycles to companies, academics and anyone else who needs spare processing power, while letting us earn a few extra pounds from our under-used machines.
What is Golem?
It’s Airbnb for your computer: a worldwide, distributed supercomputer. Rather than let strangers into your spare bedroom, you can let them into your PC. If you need resources, you buy the processing power; if you have spare resources, you can offer them for rent .
Sounds familiar.
Similar ideas have been trialled for charity. Julian Zawistowski, the CEO of developer company Imapp, said there were “a lot of inspirations [behind Golem], but perhaps SETI@home and BOINC are the most important ones”. These schemes let volunteers hand over processing power – the former to hunt for aliens; the latter for research into climate change and disease.
What can you use Golem for?
The public alpha currently only supports a specific type of rendering (Blender), but a first release is planned for next year and Golem will be capable of any type of processing in the future.
Is it secure?
The trading is managed by blockchain, the distributed ledger technology developed via Bitcoin, so transactions will be secure. In terms of data, Zawistowski said all computation is done in a sandbox and transfers can be encrypted. “It’s as secure as any public cloud,” he said.
How much could I make?
It depends on your PC’s processing power: a laptop may only earn a few dollars, while a gaming rig could earn much more.
Time to retire!
Not so fast – you’ll be paid in Golem Network Tokens (GNT), a digital currency á la Bitcoin that you’ll have to trade for spendable cash.
That’s less interesting.
It isn’t all about money. There’s power in the idea, particularly its potential to rebuild the internet in a truly decentralised way If the network is big enough, it could offer an alternative structure, letting services be run and content delivered in a distributed way rather than via corporate data centres.
So it’s Golem versus Google, then?
It’s unlikely to usurp the big players, but it’s in keeping with the original idea of the internet to have decentralised nodes for sharing data. This would let users set up services or distribute content without middlemen such as Google – but that’s a long-term goal.
Where do I sign up?
Head to golem.network to register as an alpha tester.
The post Futures: What is… Golem? appeared first on Gigarefurb Refurbished Laptops News.
source https://news.gigarefurb.co.uk/futures-what-is-golem/
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