Non-profit != no income (Score 2)

People make their livings working for, and operating non-profit organizations. Didn't you ever wonder why people worked full time there? Did you think it was because doing good was payment enough? Well, while some people might believe that, doing good doesn't put food on the table, or electricity into your lights. Non-profit organizations simply operate under the premise that all proceeds which would otherwise be deemed profit, go back into the company in some way(IE buying new equipment, stuff like that). So even if UD is selling SOME CPU cycles, that may just be to cover expenses. As far as other projects go, for the most part even if you're only contributing 1 cycle out of every million, you're still accomplishing more than you ever will at dnet or setiathome(the largest, longest running, and least useful of all distributed computing projects). On the note of patenting the "cure for cancer drug", it simply won't happen. First of all, chances are there won't be some cancer cure that you can buy in little capsules that you take twice daily by mouth (with food). It will simply open up avenues for us to cure cancer, rather than irradiating people. And, even if there WAS some miracle drug, you KNOW the government would step in and force the results out somehow. When the gov't sets their mind on something, they get it done. If they feel like muscling their way into a pharmaceutical company, they will.