What can I do with Flashmob Computing?

"In today's world of big iron supercomputing most of us have no say in what supercomputers do. Mostly supercomputers are used for studying nuclear weapons. And if you don't like that, too bad. You have no say. You can now decide what to use a supercomputer for. So if you want to study global warming or the hole in the ozone layer you can do that with a flashmob computer. If you want to study breast cancer or AIDS, you can do that. If you want to see the effects of pollution on an animal species, you can do that. ... But most importantly, with flashmob computing you now have a say in how supercomputers are used."

"Could we convince enough people to bring their conventional computers to a single location in order to build a temporary supercomputer, one that could compete with the fastest and most expensive computers in the world? Since its inception in February of this year, the idea of FlashMob Computing transformed from a challenge to a new paradigm for enabling any group of people to pool together computing power for the purpose of working on scientific problems of interest to them. Unlike traditional supercomputers, which are expensive and not accessible to the general public, a FlashMob supercomputer is temporary, made up of ordinary computers, and is built to work on a specific problem. We set out to prove, through an elaborate experiment, that instant supercomputing is viable."


And how it was actually used to solve a previously unsolvable anthrax infection problem.