Comments on: Comments on 20218

Post number 20218

Su — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 10:32:11 -0800

Your screensaver is boring.
Electric Sheep(Linux, OSX) produces animated flame fractals rendered via distributed computation. n 0 time(Win) draws its data from things such as a custom word list, cached web site text, your favorites, or your cookies. The Bank of Time(Win2k-, OS9-) grows plants based on your idle time connected to the net. Dirty Fingerprints(Win) leaves fingerprints all over your screen, generated by user clicks on contributing sites. Or, if you really want, you can join in the effort to crack various encryption methods(most systems) at Distributed.net. Deskswap(prev. link) has unfortunately been offline for months, due to bandwidth issues.

By: Su

Su — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 10:38:53 -0800

Incidentally, the original program that Electric Sheep is based on, Flame, was adopted by Procreate for use in KPT Effects and renamed FraxFlame(ed: Ew), which seems to have also had the result of making Flame unavailable anywhere. If somebody happens to have a copy of it, Mac or Windows, I'd really appreciate a copy.

By: MiguelCardoso

MiguelCardoso — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 11:25:14 -0800

I've become a fingerprints guy - it matches my keyboard. This is one of those posts whose actual influence won't be measured by the number of comments, I suspect. All the more reason to thank you.

By: skallas

skallas — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 12:16:12 -0800

My screensaver helps out with cancer research.

By: MiguelCardoso

MiguelCardoso — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 12:35:52 -0800

There is no cost to participate and no impact on your computer use. (From Skallas's link) I wish I had a good screensaver to contribute. What a great thread this could be if everyone with a good screensaver to share would leave a link. Su is quite right - most of our screensavers are boring or far too cute for their own good. They need a good jolt if they're not to be just refrigerator magnets.

By: some chick

some chick — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 12:43:39 -0800

I used to use Geiss, but it killed my computer. I should try it again now that I've got more than 16Mb RAM. It's especially good when you have a mic plugged in and noisy co-workers. I'm really sad that Electric Sheep doesn't work on Win - does anyone have anything as simply beautiful for us poor Windows (l)users? I might have to install linux now just for that 'saver.

By: jaronson

jaronson — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 12:45:40 -0800

I agree with Miguel. Thanks, skallas (and Su). I just downloaded and became a member and emailed my family about the Cancer Research Project. [How about a Team MeFi?]

By: mkn

mkn — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 13:08:16 -0800

reFresh : reLoad serves up a number of interesting works. Nothing flash-bang though, just simple images.

By: Pockets

Pockets — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 13:22:35 -0800

My screensaver of choice is Drempels. It's made by the same person who did Geiss and Milkdrop for Winamp if you are familiar with either. Some former discussion about it is here.

By: Orange Goblin

Orange Goblin — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 13:46:49 -0800

Screensavers suck. Go power saving monitors!

By: rhyax

rhyax — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 14:04:50 -0800

electric sheep is pretty, but the tiny black box has a white background on osx...

By: patricking

patricking — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 15:07:55 -0800

rhyax, hit the configure button in prefs. change the aspect ratio to full screen.

By: eatitlive

eatitlive — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 15:15:01 -0800

My screensaver helps scientists understand protein folding, protein aggregation, and related diseases. My Google Toolbar doesn't do this, but it will soon.

By: redhead

redhead — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 16:13:19 -0800

I run the the cancer research screensaver on 2 pc's at school and the folding protein on another. Am always looking for something different for my laptop. My husband runs the SETI at home Drempels is sooo cool. Thanks ya'll for the above links!

By: stavrosthewonderchicken

stavrosthewonderchicken — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 18:55:01 -0800

There are great. I love gizmos. Thanks. It's quite amusing to set up n 0 time to read and display metafilter.com...

By: sadie01221975

sadie01221975 — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 20:41:06 -0800

Recently Screen Savers (tech tv) had a bit on a screen saver that worked as post-it notes, where you could leave yourself messages, like "get milk". Anyone know where I could find it? I've searched the Screen Savers site, and googled, but have had no luck. Thanks in advance! :)

By: five fresh fish

five fresh fish — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 22:14:31 -0800

I can't believe some brillo hack hasn't ported Electric Sheep to Windoze. Man, what *lovely* animations -- y'all gotta check out the top ten.

By: toddshot

toddshot — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 22:22:08 -0800

My screensaver doesn't do anything but look really cool (Mac OS X only, but there's a link to the Windows version).

By: mutagen

mutagen — Sun, 22 Sep 2002 23:46:46 -0800

Su, is this what you were looking for? I can loose too many hours in that fractal kind of stuff...