I wonder what would happen if Microsoft made Windows like Seti@Home, by linking up unused CPU cycles across the Internet. With say 10 million machines chugging and exchanging data, they'd wipe the floor with Google in terms of CPU power.
Except that unused cycles don't work in production settings. Pharma companies tried doing that for discovery programs back in the day and found that getting a cluster was much more effective. Using spare desktop cycles is great for low-level data collection, but you need to analyze that data and when you have deadlines you need much more control of availability and capacity
