[HN Gopher] Is the Living Computer Museum dead?
___________________________________________________________________
Is the Living Computer Museum dead?
Author : ingve
Score : 396 points
Date : 2023-02-17 07:30 UTC (15 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.pcjs.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.pcjs.org)
| Teslazar wrote:
| I was lucky enough to visit in 2017 and loved the place. Here are
| some of the photos I took:
| https://photos.app.goo.gl/VUVXQ1cG3zWAMWY3A
| mvac wrote:
| When I read about the museum closing, it made me quite sad. I was
| absolutely thrilled when I visited it 7 years ago. I didn't have
| time to go through everything I wanted, thinking that next time
| I'll make more time for it. Now I realize how even things like
| computer museums in IT cities backed by IT billionaires are
| ephemeral.
| willis936 wrote:
| To add to the list of still active computer museums: Computer
| Museum of America (CMoA). As of a few years ago they were an
| integral part of MAGFest's Museum exhibit and it's really awesome
| to sit down and play games on a 50 year old machine.
|
| https://www.computermuseumofamerica.org/
| buildbot wrote:
| Does Jody Allen secretly hate Paul? Given the literal billions
| they have, it seems pretty spiteful how the LCM and Cinerama were
| treated.
|
| I visited the LCM in 2016 as part of a computer arch course, it
| was really quite special to see working systems from the over 50
| years ago and get to use them.
| BryantD wrote:
| The contents of the will aren't public but there's been
| uncontested reporting that it calls for everything he owned to
| be liquidated.
|
| "Paul directed that the trust be liquidated upon his death and
| the assets used to fund his passion projects," a source said.
| "None of this is up in the air. The instructions are clear: The
| sports franchises and everything in the trust must be sold."
|
| https://www.johncanzano.com/p/canzano-no-wiggle-room-nfls-se...
| TMWNN wrote:
| >Does Jody Allen secretly hate Paul?
|
| I doubt she hates her late brother, any more than any widow who
| sells off or throws away her late husband's computer collection
| after his death (which occurs so, so often that it is probably
| the normal outcome after the collector's death, as opposed to
| an exception) hates him. It's disinterest.
| [deleted]
| hotpotamus wrote:
| Most late husbands don't leave an endowment big enough to
| cover a potentially perpetual upkeep for their collections
| either, but Allen wasn't most people, and he personally was
| significant in the history of computers obviously. Normally,
| I'm not a fan of these extremely wealthy people setting up
| dead hand organizations like charitable foundations to affect
| society after their death, but museums that preserve aspects
| of life from their times and information about their lives
| seem like a pretty good use case.
| tablespoon wrote:
| > Does Jody Allen secretly hate Paul? Given the literal
| billions they have, it seems pretty spiteful how the LCM and
| Cinerama were treated.
|
| She probably has her own priorities, and is shifting things to
| match them.
|
| IIRC, this phenomenon somewhat well known in philanthropy: if
| you setup a long-lived foundation, it will it will end up
| reflecting the priorities of the future staff even if those
| bear little resemblance (or are even opposed) to those of the
| founder. Everyone wants to do what they want, not what some
| dead guy wanted, even if all the money was actually his.
|
| I believe this has caused some people to give up on the
| perpetual foundation idea, and structure their fortunes to get
| spent on their goals by a certain deadline.
|
| It probably would have been better for the LCM if Paul Allen
| had set it up as some autonomous endowed thing controlled by a
| board of hard-core retro-computing enthusiasts.
| throwaway14284 wrote:
| It was well known that she had her own priorities before
| Paul's death. It's unfortunate he ignored that.
|
| > Former members of the security detail... have said in sworn
| depositions that Vulcan CEO Jody Allen sexually harassed
| bodyguards while also directing them to smuggle animal bones
| out of Africa and Antarctica. At least two former employees
| said they heard Jody Allen had smuggled ivory out of Africa
| in violation of U.S. and international law...
|
| https://www.seattlepi.com/seattlenews/article/Seahawks-
| owner...
| smeyer wrote:
| For anyone curious about this phenomenon, the Ford Foundation
| is a notable example. Henry Ford was notably racist and the
| Ford Foundation does a lot that is focused on racial
| diversity.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Foundation
| CobrastanJorji wrote:
| Isn't that exactly the same phenomenon but with a positive
| outcome? Ford setup a long-lived foundation, and it ended
| up up reflecting the priorities of the future staff and
| bore little resemblance (or was even opposed) to those of
| the founder.
| tablespoon wrote:
| > Isn't that exactly the same phenomenon...
|
| Isn't that to be expected? It was offered as an example
| of the phenomenon.
|
| > ...but with a positive outcome?
|
| There are people who think shuttering the Living Computer
| Museum is a positive outcome. I'd wager the vast majority
| of Americans would chose to spend that money on something
| besides keeping obsolete computers running.
| thrdbndndn wrote:
| Maintaining these projects ain't cheap even for billionaires
| (by that I don't mean it would make them broke (or even close),
| but spending hundreds of thousands or even millions for
| something you have no interest is gonna sound expensive).
|
| They need to be financially self-sufficient to even have a
| chance, IMHO. Even then it isn't a given. Just like people
| sometimes clean their houses even when they still have tons of
| space.
| ndespres wrote:
| Allen had a net worth of something like $20 billion. That's
| enough money to fund the museum for the next 5,000 years.
| Maintaining a project like this is NOT expensive.
| thrdbndndn wrote:
| It's not about how much money he (or his widow) has, it's
| about no one likes to randomly pour money into something
| they have zero interest in, and we're talking about money
| perhaps in millions per year. And the administrative
| headache.
| crazygringo wrote:
| Exactly. Money isn't enough to keep things running in
| perpetuity or even for a long time -- ultimately
| everything has to be _administered_ by an organization
| that has a _self-interest in sustaining itself_ with a
| board etc.
|
| If money is simply set aside to fund something,
| _somebody_ still has to hire somebody to manage the
| thing, and oversee their performance, and fire the
| manager if they underperform, and find a new manager, and
| sign off on big decisions like a change of space, and so
| forth. But if that trustee just... doesn 't care to do
| that... then what exactly are you going to do? Somebody
| would have to sue to enforce that overseeing, but
| frequently nobody cares to sue or has standing.
| lrvick wrote:
| Two hires of retro computing enthusiasts and a modest
| parts budget could keep it running. Maybe 400k/year.
| RegnisGnaw wrote:
| Rent? Utilities? Insurance?
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| Implement ticket sales, events, fundraising? Get a
| donation from Gates? Buy the land or move somewhere
| cheaper. Invest in some solar panels and skylights?
| Reason077 wrote:
| Seems like the bills are still being paid, though. The
| museum is still physically there, and someone (Vulcan) is
| keeping the vintage computers maintained and operational.
|
| Try: _ssh menu@tty.livingcomputers.org_
| Damogran6 wrote:
| Dude this just made my Friday!
| AdamN wrote:
| Seattle could afford that easy cheesy. Really this is down to
| the lack of a strong CEO (probably because of the way this
| was incubated inside of Vulcan). A strong CEO could probably
| throw enough benefits and special events to run a 2-3MM
| operation and possibly get a proper endowment from some of
| the very wealthy people who live within the Puget Sound
| region. Oh, and that money would be tax deductible and you
| would get invited to some great networking events.
|
| That CEO could also pay themselves $250k without blowback
| either.
| thrdbndndn wrote:
| Yeah it definitely can be operated that way.
|
| Unfortunately it wasn't set up like that when Paul was
| alive (more like a personal collection). And after his
| death, the chance it became like that is even slimmer.
| rtpg wrote:
| I have to imagine she doesn't care, and 20 employees even is a
| chunk of change if you have some advisors looking at maximizing
| the dollars in whatever trust.
|
| Of course the fact that Paul didn't explicitly set something in
| stone for like 50 years despite the billions... really sucks,
| cuz that place was awesome
| tuankiet65 wrote:
| I was lucky enough to visit the museum at the end of 2019, just
| before COVID-19 hit and the museum had to shut down. Unlike the
| Computer History Museum in Mountain View, the machines here were
| fully operational and you could actually get to use them - I
| compiled some hello world code on a NeXTcube and I still remember
| that fond moment. IIRC they had systems that you can SSH in and
| use, but seems like they've taken that down. Must be a recent
| thing since I remember they were operational a year or two ago.
| anthk wrote:
| I think some Italian Computer Museum still has some machines
| available over SSH.
| Reason077 wrote:
| So does the LCM!
|
| _ssh menu@tty.livingcomputers.org_
| Y_Y wrote:
| The Mountain View museum is an expensive travesty. Another
| great "living" museum is the one next to Bletchley Park. You
| can program the Dekatron with paper tape and watch the base-10
| memory cells changing as it runs.
| pinewurst wrote:
| I liked it a lot better when it was the collection in the
| warehouse without the pretension.
| komadori wrote:
| The one next to Bletchley Park is The National Museum of
| Computing. It's a really great place and, IMHO, much more
| interesting than Bletchley Park itself.
|
| https://www.tnmoc.org/
| mazesc wrote:
| I could have written your paragraph. Such a great museum. With
| all the rich tech entrepreneurs in Seattle one would think a
| solution can be found.
| kfajdsl wrote:
| I managed to compile and run a hello world C program (it
| might've actually been B?) using ed on an old school Research
| Unix machine they had.
|
| I also remember messing with the shell on an even older Unix
| machine that had an actual teletype printer terminal. And
| directly poking the VGA buffer on a C64 to do goofy things...
|
| I only went once a while ago, when my family took a trip to
| Seattle, but that is one of my most treasured memories. It's a
| travesty that future generations of nerdy kids won't get that
| experience (and I'm sad that I likely won't get it again
| either).
| coffeebeqn wrote:
| It was the first and only time me and my brother saw a
| mainframe actually running. And hundreds of other early
| computers. Incredible place and such a shame.
| icelancer wrote:
| The punchcard station was a real blast to use and show off to
| younger folks, too.
| pakyr wrote:
| Per the article, the parent company laid off all of the museum
| staff in mid-2020, so if they were working a year or two ago,
| they were doing so despite a lack of maintenance. Something
| probably broke at some point and there's no one left to fix it.
| ethomson wrote:
| I was fortunate enough to go in 2019, pre-covid, while I had a
| day off in Seattle. It was a great museum, and I'm disappointed
| that I won't be able to go back.
|
| I tweeted a bunch of photos:
| https://twitter.com/ethomson/status/1109880552360951810
| VonGuard wrote:
| The Living Computer Museum was an absolute treasure, but it shows
| one of the major hazards in the non-profit world. I founded the
| MADE, a non-profit videogame museum in Oakland. Just about 100%
| of my time when I was the director was spent raising money and
| soliciting partnerships so we could keep the doors open and the
| lights on. I would have killed to have someone like Paul Allen as
| a sponsor or involved in any way: we're a very poor museum
| compared to most, and money heals all wounds.
|
| However, our little museum run with volunteers and pocket change
| managed to be more stable long term than the well-healed and
| well-funded Living Computer Museum. Why? Because having a single
| benefactor for a non-profit is almost a death sentence. It's
| super risky, and as we've seen here, when that single donor goes
| away, it's all over.
|
| It's super sad the LCM is in the state it is in, but for non-
| profits this is a cautionary tale: you cannot build a long term
| non-profit on the support of a single person. The world is too
| chaotic for that. Even a non-profit with a billionaire behind it
| isn't safe. It is incredibly poor planning on humanity's part to
| rely on the rich to preserve our shared heritage out of some
| obligation or moral or ethical duty. We need to preserve this
| stuff on the order of the Smithsonian.
| teddyh wrote:
| > _having a single benefactor for a non-profit is almost a
| death sentence._
|
| In a way, this reminds me of when Google shut down Reader.
|
| This is also why you should only use standards, platforms and
| programming languages supported by a multitude of companies and
| organizations, and avoid those dominated by a single company.
| ghaff wrote:
| Right. Because RSS isn't a standard and there aren't any
| other readers of RSS today. </s>
| geoffpado wrote:
| I agree with your latter statement, but your choice of
| example feels weird to me... RSS was (and is) an open
| standard supported by an incredible number of both readers
| and publishers. How does it not meet your standards?
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| _Because having a single benefactor for a non-profit is almost
| a death sentence._
|
| Not necessarily, if the benefactor endows the NPO with a long-
| term trust rather than simply funding it. Endowment is what
| makes the difference between a charity and a hobby.
|
| Paul Allen had a lot of hobbies, but he wasn't that charitable,
| in the sense that many of his good works seem to have died with
| him. There are obvious exceptions, but the LCM was sadly not
| one of them.
| dunk010 wrote:
| You can, but there needs to be a large amount of capital
| allocated to a foundation, which can then fund it in
| perpetuity. It's a bit surprising that didn't happen in this
| case. Feels like his heirs have different ideas for how to
| spend his money.
| spindle wrote:
| I totally agree, and that's how, for example, the rich Oxford
| and Cambridge colleges are funded. I think it might be a big
| ask these days, though, especially with returns on
| investments relatively low. Sadly.
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| From what I understand, it was actually Paul Allen's
| instructions that his sister (Jody Allen) to just give
| everything away. Unfortunately, that didn't include running
| the more niche museums, movie theaters, etc...forever. It
| seems like smaller projects are being sacrificed in favor of
| larger ones (like the Music Experience museum which is still
| open).
| imperfect_light wrote:
| Why? How lame is it to start cool projects like LCM and
| Cinerama and then just have it close upon your death when
| he had plenty of estate to fund it forever. Makes me think
| less of Paul Allen TBH (not that he or his relatives care)
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| I think he considered those hobbies to be wound down when
| he was no longer around to enjoy them? Ya, think less of
| him because of that, but he spent his money on things he
| enjoyed that just happened to be what other people could
| enjoy as well. He wasn't really thinking of his post-
| death legacy, and just gave simple instructions with that
| regard (and his sister is taking the flack for that).
| BryantD wrote:
| My wife and I always joke about Allen running out of
| basement space and opening MOPOP.
| wyager wrote:
| I assume it was his inheritors who made the decision, not
| him.
| runnerup wrote:
| I think the point is that Paul Allen could have endowed
| his favorite causes when he was alive with an endowment
| large enough that the interest earned would fund
| continued operation indefinitely.
| BryantD wrote:
| Yep. I don't think the LCM, Cinerama, or his military
| museum were his favorite causes. I think they were his
| favorite toys. He apparently had other causes which he
| cared more about for the future.
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| Jodie Allen (his sister and only heir) is just following
| his instructions, from what I understand. She isn't
| financially benefiting from shutting down the computer
| museum, she is just executing his will:
|
| > According to multiple reports Paul Allen's will states
| that the Paul G. Allen Trust, which contains billions in
| assets, including the NFL's Seattle Seahawks and NBA's
| Portland Trail Blazers, will be liquidated upon his death
| and the assets used to fund his passion projects. Paul
| Allen died in October 2018 and the Trail Blazers have
| been rumored to be on the sales block for the past few
| years, but all's quiet on the Seahawks front. Is Jody
| Allen trying to hold onto the Seahawks against her
| brother's wishes?
|
| https://theshadowleague.com/the-instructions-are-clear-
| the-s...
|
| The problem is, a lot of projects didn't make it into his
| list of passion projects. More:
|
| > Sealed lips aside, here's what we know: In 2010, Allen
| pledged to bequeath the majority of his wealth to
| philanthropy. (During his lifetime, Allen gave away more
| than $2 billion, according to the Chronicle of
| Philanthropy.) Tasked with this mammoth undertaking is
| his sister Jody Allen, trustee and executor of his
| estate, who is bound by her brother's wishes as set out
| in the trust.
|
| https://crosscut.com/culture/2022/11/16b-sale-paul-
| allens-ar...
|
| One can accuse his sister of not following his
| instructions, I guess, but unless we know what those
| instructions are, it isn't a very easy accusation to back
| up.
| foobiekr wrote:
| Is MADE alive and open? The website is super unclear as to what
| happened post-Covid.
| VonGuard wrote:
| The website has our hours and new location listed on the
| front page.
| kmonsen wrote:
| Pointed question, but why do we need to preserve it? And who
| decides what we need to preserve?
| teawrecks wrote:
| I feel like Paul Allen himself answered this question as well
| as anyone could in his letter shown in the article.
| steponlego wrote:
| You've never heard of John Titor? In all seriousness while
| you don't have to believe in time travelers, there is a
| lesson to be learned there. Look what happened to the Digital
| Domesday Project. If preservation efforts had begun earlier
| it might all be online now.
| SllX wrote:
| I'll answer the who: people with money, capital and time
| choosing on their own what to spend their money, capital and
| time on to the degree to which they can sustain to do so.
| VonGuard wrote:
| Because this stuff is an important part of our cultural,
| artistic and scientific heritage. We do not get to decide
| what the future finds interesting. Therefore, we must
| preserve as much as we possibly can so that those in the
| future have the ability to pick and choose. As it stands now,
| a lot of human history is just pieced together from trash and
| rubble.
|
| You can go to Rembrandt's house in Amsterdam, visit where he
| painted, slept, ate, taught, and stored his junk. You can see
| how he worked, where he worked, what the lighting was like in
| his house, what the door looked like then and now.
|
| Atari, on the other hand, is just gone. We cannot see their
| offices (they've been reoccupied a lot), and we have very
| little in the way of assets generated from the creation
| process back then. It is currently easier for us to see how
| Rembrandt worked 500 years ago than it is to see how Atari
| employees worked 40 years ago. That's not a good state of
| affairs, considering how influential Atari was on the
| evolution of home gaming.
| tablespoon wrote:
| > We do not get to decide what the future finds
| interesting.
|
| That's factually wrong. If you decide to utterly obliterate
| something, the future can't find it interesting.
|
| > Therefore, we must preserve as much as we possibly can so
| that those in the future have the ability to pick and
| choose. As it stands now, a lot of human history is just
| pieced together from trash and rubble.
|
| That's a value judgement that will eventually succumb to
| its own contradictions. Preserving stuff, especially
| preserving "as much as we possibly can" is a luxury that
| many ages can't afford. It's all going to end up as "trash
| and rubble" eventually.
|
| If you want make something to survive for the long term,
| make trash and rubble.
| tenebrisalietum wrote:
| > That's factually wrong. If you decide to utterly
| obliterate something, the future can't find it
| interesting.
|
| Object X may be deleted but did you make sure all
| references to X were deleted as well?
|
| The future may become interested in something it suspects
| did exist, but no longer does.
|
| Unlike a programming language, humanity may try to
| reconstruct the missing X.
| ghaff wrote:
| A great deal of information about computer systems and such
| from even fairly important computer companies more than 20
| years old is pretty much lost forever. I was actually
| trying to reconstruct some details about one of the
| minicomputer companies that was purchased in 1999. There's
| very little left online outside of a Wikipedia article and
| information about individual systems pretty much doesn't
| exist any longer.
|
| Does that really matter? Dunno.
| interstice wrote:
| Minor detail, I believe it's supposed to be well 'heeled'
| because how well ones shoes were made mattered when the phrase
| was coined.
| nosefrog wrote:
| MADE is amazing, thanks for creating it :)
| aroman wrote:
| Thank you for founding the MADE! I visited a few months ago and
| met someone there who has become a close friend of mine. And,
| it's a great benefit to the east bay and gaming history more
| broadly.
| magic_hamster wrote:
| As a long term collector of old PC hardware, software and games,
| it's becoming pretty obvious that keeping aging hardware around
| has a very tangible expiration date to it. We are only able to
| keep this tech going because a lot of it was mass produced and we
| can find replacement parts, but we're already seeing massive
| failure in parts which render a device unusable regardless of how
| many blown capacitors or resistors we change.
|
| There comes a point when the only way to keep this stuff running
| is either through manufacturing replacement parts (prohibitingly
| expensive) or through emulation. Emulation is cheap but
| completely unrepresentative of the original experience. For
| example, you can't emulate different displays properly. As anyone
| who enjoyed the Vectrex's beautiful vector graphics will agree,
| you simply cannot emulate this on a modern display. The bright
| phosphorus coating with the smooth analog beam is not
| reproducible on something like LCD.
|
| So, I still collect this stuff and enjoy it. But I have given up
| my ambition for hardware preservation. It will take an
| organization much better funded than me to keep this stuff alive
| in the long term. And even then, I suspect a lot of it is going
| to be lost to time in the coming decades.
| phkahler wrote:
| >> Vectrex
|
| My surviving stuff consists of a Vectrex, an Interact with many
| tapes (including Microsoft Basic), and an I Robot. I always
| thought the Interact belongs in a museum but they all seem to
| have one already or don't care.
|
| Maybe the solution to hardware failure is to keep the hardware,
| working or not, AND have emulation. But as you say vectors
| don't emulate well.
| flyinghamster wrote:
| The situation is only getting worse, as bootloaders are
| increasingly locked-down and internal hardware pairing is a
| thing (hello, Apple, but even AMD has joined that game with
| Epyc processors getting locked to motherboards). And then
| there's the soldered-in hardware that can't be replaced without
| a lot of expense and risk. Preservation at this point is going
| to be VMs and emulators.
|
| And, in all honesty, while a working PDP-11/70 would be kind of
| neat, by today's standards it's dreadfully underpowered in
| speed even as it sucks down the kWh, and requires a lot of
| space, while SIMH on a modern SBC would run circles around it.
| A museum is a better place for it than a living room.
| technothrasher wrote:
| Yeah. I've got quite a few old machines from various periods,
| but I mostly just store them or have them on static display.
| I'm afraid to turn most of them on. The last one I tried was a
| Mac IIcx and it let the smoke out pretty quickly.
| Damogran6 wrote:
| In the dark of winter, while I work to fill the hours, I troll
| ebay and Craigslist...looking at the $200 Macs and $400 amigas
| and $800 Apple ][s and $2000 complete NeXT stations, think it's
| another hobby that's gotten more expensive faster than I have
| the stomach for.
|
| I also realize I'll get 95% of the enjoyment by just hitting
| the emulators at archive.org.
|
| I gifted myself an Amiga Mini500 for xmas and once you play the
| games, and mess with Amiga Forever for an afternoon, and
| Amibian for ANOTHER afternoon...that scratch is pretty well
| itched.
| TylerE wrote:
| I wonder what could be done to maximize life?
|
| Something like run it in a well cooled and humidity controlled,
| nobel gas filled enclosure.
| DanielBMarkham wrote:
| A bit off-topic but relevant to the aging problem of tech: is
| there any commonly-available persistent storage medium you
| would use to store say, family movies for 100 years? Or is that
| a hopeless cause? For instance, will BluRay players be around
| for much longer? USB drives?
|
| At what point are we where "Either put it in the cloud or lose
| it" is the law of tech?
| kjs3 wrote:
| I wouldn't count on 'put it in the cloud' being the answer,
| for a number of reasons.
|
| Personally, I think that the only answer to the "preserve the
| family stuph for a 100 years" is to migrate it all to the
| most reliable media available every 5-10 years (it used to be
| every 3-5 years). Even if there was an archival media that
| was 100% reliable 100 years from now, will there be something
| that can read it?
| bluGill wrote:
| I think it is safe to say you have to plan on moving media
| you care about to a different format every couple decades.
| From the first Edison wax cylinders, to today's latest
| format, the technology has changed that often, and if you
| care you have to follow. Sure you can keep older stuff
| working and some do. You can also say the same about
| photographs and books: most degrade after a few decades, but
| there if you spend $$$ you can get archival grade that will
| last for a century or two (many centuries if you store in a
| desert, but in human friendly places a century is all you
| should count on).
|
| I have some archival grade CDs and DVDs that claim they will
| last longer. However I'm not sure if readers will exist as
| long as the media.
| 13of40 wrote:
| I've always wondered if you could do something with dot-
| matrix-on-aluminum-foil. It wouldn't look the prettiest and
| the information density would be low, but it seems like it
| would be cheap and last forever.
| fl0ps wrote:
| The scene mentioning the big EMP-reset in Blade Runner
| 2049 made me wonder just how much would be lost to us in
| such a scenario. Much that we care about is currently on
| highly sensitive storage.
|
| What format should I invest in
| (developing/purchasing/etc) that would A) be easy-ish to
| read from B) be dense enough to exceed the point I might
| as well just be using paper/glass slides/microfiche/and
| so on, and could be ramped back up from pretty crude
| tech.
|
| Combine "end of civilization", "time-travelling with
| tech", and other thought-experiment scenarios for fun.
| WalterBright wrote:
| Every couple decades? More like every 5 years!
| cgearhart wrote:
| I suppose you could always laser etch your bits on gold film
| and store it in a secure container. There are some products
| out there like the M disk that claim to last up to 1,000
| years, but typical consumer storage media are only expected
| to last a few decades under optimal conditions.
|
| https://www.mdisc.com/
| Damogran6 wrote:
| We had a conversaton about this on Ars Technica and I can't
| currently find it. We ran into the same findings. I don't
| think you can fully set and forget it....3 copies, two
| formats, 1 off-site
|
| And plan to copy to new media every 8-10 years.
| hgsgm wrote:
| Copy it to all your computing devices, and keep doing that
| when you get new ones.
| DanielBMarkham wrote:
| Thanks. I was looking for something that would work without
| me being around or there being any kind of script or
| computer for somebody to maintain. Something akin to a
| family picture album, only with digital media
| philistine wrote:
| There's this pervasive idea that computers are solid-state
| machines meant to work forever. But they're full of moving
| parts, grease, fluids, and fans.
|
| Only now with our fanless machines are we approaching the true
| idea that these machines just turn on and work. I'd bet an
| Apple TV has a better chance of working in 400 years than a
| Commodore 64.
| kjs3 wrote:
| There's also a pervasive idea solid-state means works
| forever. Ask anyone who collects old computers and you'll
| find that ain't true.
|
| Solid state devices fail with age too, via electromigration,
| temperature cycling fatigue, hot carrier injection, NBTI/PBTI
| and a host of other causes. And it gets worse the smaller the
| geometries we are working with. It's huge topic of concern in
| the industry.
|
| We won't be around to know, but I'd be confident enough to
| bet you a beer that Apple TV will be dead as a doornail in
| years or decades, not centuries.
| JohnBooty wrote:
| For those unfamiliar with the unique look of vector displays,
| you've simply got to see one in motion to understand.
|
| Asteroids is probably the most famous example. Look at the
| "ultra bright" bullets and the glowy trail they leave.
|
| https://youtu.be/w60sfReTsRA?t=247
| kjs3 wrote:
| Persistent phosphors are magical.
| cbm-vic-20 wrote:
| This can really be a labor of love. The volunteers at the Rhode
| Island Computer Museum, which is much more modestly funded than
| LCM, have ongoing restoration projects for rare vintage
| machines like the PDP-9 and PDP-12. They literally have a
| warehouse full of stuff like this[ _].
|
| [_] https://www.ricomputermuseum.org/collections-gallery
| pigsty wrote:
| I've never seen a Vectrex, but having seen other vector
| displays on old arcade machines, it's truly mind blowing.
|
| The warm glow of those smooth beams has no modern equivalent in
| consumer hardware. Despite technically being old technology,
| and some machines being over 4 decades old, it can still blow
| young minds seeing a way of rendering so different from what we
| accept as the norm today and how it's in many aspects even more
| advanced than modern screens.
|
| Knowing it's something that's gradually being lost with time is
| pretty sad. Previous human technology advancements would often
| be lost in a hole and still be recognizable for what they were
| centuries later when they were dug up. It's kind of strange
| that the tech we make since the computer revolution basically
| dies along with their creators and maintainers and basically
| just turn into future door stoppers.
| erikpukinskis wrote:
| I'm not sure I follow your final conclusion... we mostly
| don't use archeological artifacts do we? They are
| "recognizable" but so will old computers be 1000 years from
| now. With a good microscope you can still study the chips,
| etc.
|
| If anything I expect computers from 1985 to be much better
| "preserved" than physical history from, say, 885, no?
|
| Granted you have to resist the urge to use them as door
| stoppers and keep them in a controlled environment. But an
| archive is a lot cheaper/more stable than a living museum.
| pigsty wrote:
| Just to use your example, you could dust off a 200 year old
| microscope and it'd be perfectly fine. If there's a cracked
| lens, that's an easy fix without any significant expertise.
|
| Same with any old blacksmithing tools and so on. They'll
| _look_ old, but generally retain their functionality and a
| novice can repair them.
|
| Old electronics require expert knowledge and specifically
| manufactured parts to fix. Knowledge of old electronics
| dies each year and the parts go away. A person who's never
| heard of a Vectrex or see one in action would have no idea
| what it does. Even if they recognize that it has a screen,
| they wouldn't be aware that it renders vectors and not
| pixels like nearly every other screen. Another 1000 years
| removed from the computing standards of today, people might
| not even be able to imagine what a typical desktop computer
| does when they look at it. But they'll see tools from 885
| and generally be able to guess what they're for.
|
| High tech things are very abstracted tools that are just
| going to look like useless boxes to future people. Most
| won't know or care what they did. It's weird to think
| about. Advances will also be lost with time without us
| realizing it. Vector screens are truly impressive, but
| people don't know they exist. Will we someday get
| monochrome retinal implants and they're convenient enough
| that people give up on traditional computer screens, and
| someday humanity forgets we all used to have full color
| displays with sound in our pockets? Who knows.
| JohnBooty wrote:
| we mostly don't use archeological artifacts do we?
|
| Well that's the thing, right? A 5000 year old sword or a
| 50000 year old pot are static. It's not _quite_ the same as
| actually using and touching the objects, but you can see
| them in the museum and it 's fine.
|
| Something like a car engine or a video game machine, that's
| a collection of moving parts. No single part of them is
| interesting. It's how they work together. Problem is, each
| time you use them they get a little bit closer to death and
| they also get closer to death just sitting there in a
| climate-controlled environment.
| yamtaddle wrote:
| You do notice a lot of things about older items by
| actually using them. Little touches, weight, balance, the
| way the design is remarkably nice for some particular use
| or other in ways and for reasons you wouldn't have
| guessed just from looking at it, the satisfying feel of a
| hinge or knob or pull. Our local art museum has a
| collection of elaborate silver tea services--originally
| intended for actual use, not just decorative--and I bet
| one would notice a lot of things about them by actually
| using them, that one is unlikely to spot or understand
| just by looking, but no-one's likely to ever use them
| again--at least not for quite a while.
| Bluecobra wrote:
| I love the Atari vector games! There's an excellent video by
| Retro Game Mechanics Explained on how they work:
| https://youtu.be/smStEPSRKBs
|
| Recently I stumbled on some Tektronix videos on YouTube.
| Those vector displays are even more mind blowing than Atari's
| arcade games. I hope I can get to see one in person someday.
| rbanffy wrote:
| > manufacturing replacement parts (prohibitingly expensive)
|
| Some are more than others. PALs and ASICs can be reimplemented
| in CPLDs and FPGAs. At come point it becomes Theseus' computer,
| but, if the goal is to preserve the boat, that works. If you
| want to preserve the wood planks, then you need to keep it
| powered down in a controlled environment for future generations
| to apply atomic-resolution sensing eventually.
|
| > For example, you can't emulate different displays properly.
| As anyone who enjoyed the Vectrex's beautiful vector graphics
| will agree, you simply cannot emulate this on a modern display.
| The bright phosphorus coating with the smooth analog beam is
| not reproducible on something like LCD.
|
| Not right now, but, soon-ish, we'll be able to do that very
| well with HDR displays. I already can't see pixels or jaggies
| on my LCDs. With proper computation, one could simulate the
| analog aspects of CRT tubes - its a lot for GPUs to do now,
| but, in a decade or so, I assume a mobile GPU would be able to
| do that without breaking a sweat.
|
| Not long ago I was thinking about a CRT+deflection replacement
| that would take the analog signals used in CRTs (from an
| adapter on the neck, where the pins have a lot of variation,
| and the inputs to the coils), and, maybe, an extra power supply
| input to power the electronics, and spit out an HDMI signal on
| the other end.
|
| This should be possible with modern flat panels to a point the
| image is hard to distinguish for all but the most extreme
| (think X-Y displays and Tektronix DVSTs) cases.
|
| Curvature is an issue, but flat and Trinitron CRTs should be
| trivial.
| JohnBooty wrote:
| Not right now, but, soon-ish, we'll be able to do
| that very well with HDR displays [...] flat and
| Trinitron CRTs should be trivial.
|
| Visually I think we're really close in most of the ways that
| matter, with advanced shaders like CRT-Royale.
|
| However, there's an entire additional dimension missing from
| this discussion so far - latency. When paired with original
| game hardware up until the 16-bit era or so, CRTs offer close
| to a true zero latency experience.
|
| It's not possible to recreate this with modern tech. When we
| add up everything in the stack (display, input drivers,
| everything) we're looking at over 100ms of lag.
|
| http://renderingpipeline.com/2013/09/measuring-input-
| latency...
|
| We're not totally without hope. As the (ancient!) article
| notes, higher refresh rate displays reduce many of these
| latencies proportionally. And for non-action games, latency
| doesn't matter too much in the first place.
| At come point it becomes Theseus' computer, but, if
| the goal is to preserve the boat, [CPLDs and FPGAs]
| work
|
| Well, for _some_ parts of the boat.
| chongli wrote:
| Latency is one dimension. Another one is peripheral
| compatibility. Devices such as light pens and light guns
| are incompatible with LCDs. These peripherals depend on the
| timing information encoded by the raster scan of CRTs.
|
| This means classic light gun games such as Duck Hunt for
| the NES are impossible to play without a CRT.
| avhon1 wrote:
| Current consumer LCDs, sure, but there's no realson a
| high-refresh-rate LCD couldn't emulate the flying spot of
| a CRT, and thus be compatible with light pens / guns.
| chongli wrote:
| The horizontal scan rate of a CRT TV is 15,625 Hz. Good
| luck getting an LCD to refresh that quickly.
| Dylan16807 wrote:
| Doesn't duck hunt use an entire frame of black then
| white? You don't need raster scan emulation for that,
| just very low latency.
|
| Edit: Apparently there is a 15kHz filter inside the light
| gun. So it's not really about beam accuracy or
| brightness, it's about pulsing at the right frequency.
| chongli wrote:
| LCDs aren't capable of pulsing at 15kHz. The
| twisting/untwisting of the liquid crystals is an
| electromechanical process and very slow (compared to a
| racing electron beam). Even though the fastest gaming LCD
| monitors claim a 360Hz refresh rate, they cannot get
| anywhere near this 2.8ms latency (implied) when going
| from black to white (0 to 100% brightness). Of course,
| the monitor manufacturers go to great lengths to avoid
| talking about it, so the whole industry is flooded with a
| bunch of marketing material to distract from the issue.
| yamtaddle wrote:
| > However, there's an entire additional dimension missing
| from this discussion so far - latency. When paired with
| original game hardware up until the 16-bit era or so, CRTs
| offer close to a true zero latency experience.
|
| It's hard to even match the input latency and general
| responsiveness of an NES hooked to a CRT TV with a
| composite cable with modern hardware, let alone something
| more-integrated.
|
| My usual test is "is it very, very hard to get past Piston
| Honda on Punch Out?" Often, with an initial, naive set-up,
| it's nearly impossible. Get it dialed in a little and he
| becomes easy (if you spent like a billion hours playing
| that game as a kid, anyway). But with many display +
| computer + controller combos it's just impossible to get it
| close enough to right, no matter how you tune it.
|
| That's my test because it's really easy to tell if the
| latency is bad, but if it is I'll find myself falling off
| things constantly in Mario, too, it's just harder to tell
| if I'm playing poorly or if the system's the problem. The
| NES is hard enough, add just a _little_ latency and it 's
| hellish.
| cptskippy wrote:
| > ...then you need to keep it powered down in a controlled
| environment
|
| Mold and water damage can be mitigated with environmental
| controls but even then you're going to have decay issues
| because so many components just break down overtime. Many
| plastics just become brittle and disintegrate over time with
| or without exposure to UV. 10 year old devices have their
| softtouch rubber turning to a gooey sticky melting mess.
| Electrolytic capacitors and batteries leaking are commonly
| known but lesser known issues occur. The MFM Drive testing
| that Adrian's Digital Basement did recently comes to mind, 5
| of 5 drives he tested were dead. One was a drive he'd
| validated a year prior and stored correctly.
| Retric wrote:
| That really depends on what you're trying to emulate about a
| display. You can see artifacts from how the electron beam on
| a CRT paints the image by holding your hand in front of the
| screen fingers spread and shaking your fingers back and fort.
| Emulating that well might take a ~10,000fps display which I
| doubt anyone is ever going to produce.
| Phiwise_ wrote:
| I suspect even most hardcore retrocomputer hobbyists care
| most about emulating the parts of a display that actually
| came up in use of the machine. If I were an eccentric
| billionaire who wanted a replica of the Mona Lisa to hang
| on my wall and enjoy regularly without the inconvenience of
| weekly flights to France, I'd care much more about my money
| going into making a product that got the visible details of
| the canvas right (https://hyper-
| resolution.org/view.html?pointer=0.055,0.021&i...) than
| spoofed the proper results if I carbon-dated it or
| something. I think the same concept applies here. I don't
| really care as much if the only thing an emulator can't
| replicate is a clever but (to an observer) comically
| specific physics-based test for authenticity if I get
| everything I'd notice while using the computer correct at a
| fraction of the price. In the context of preservation, just
| knowing some other (far richer than me) person or org
| keeping a single-digit number of the actual artifact
| maintained for future reference is good enough for me.
| giantrobot wrote:
| I'll give you an example from the LCM. They had a PLATO
| terminal with its original plasma flat panel display. I'd
| been reading about PLATO for years and had even run it in
| emulation but I'd never seen _actual_ hardware before
| visiting the LCM.
|
| The experience on the original terminal was way different
| than emulation. The way the screen worked and the tactile
| feel of the keyboard was the core of the experience of
| it. Sitting at an actual terminal really changed my
| understanding the system because it gave me a physical
| context that software emulation could not provide. You'd
| be hard pressed to emulate the eye melting nature of the
| original plasma display or the stiffness of the keyboard.
| rbanffy wrote:
| The physical experience is a huge part of the overall
| thing. I have a C64 Maxi and it's absolutely amazing,
| exquisitely close to the original (but with an HDMI
| output and USB ports)
| deelowe wrote:
| I'm not sure I follow. CRTs draw the image to the screen
| in a fundamentally different way than modern displays due
| to how the electron beam moves sequentially left to
| right/top to bottom. This analog process, happening at 15
| or 25hz, is what gives authentic arcade machines their
| look and feel. Same for old computer terminals. My
| understanding is that to reproduce this effect on a
| modern display, you'd need an extremely high refresh
| rate. To properly replicate this requires some pretty low
| level aspects of the system to be addressed. Hardware
| limitations are bound by the laws of physics after all.
|
| Beyond just the aesthetics, there are practical reasons
| why this is important, whether it be lighgun
| idiosyncrasies or how the game "feels," which can affect
| timing and such for competitive players. There's a lot
| more to preserving the look, feel, and compatibility of
| displays for old computer systems than most realize and
| the rabbit hole can go quite deep on this one.
| JohnBooty wrote:
| there are practical reasons why [how tthe electron gun
| works is] important, whether it be lighgun
| idiosyncrasies or how the game "feels,"
|
| This is always interesting to discuss because there are
| so many factors at play! To put it in less than a zillion
| words,
|
| The way a game "feels" in this context is essentially a
| function of input latency. The old-style "chasing the
| beam" hardware, plus a CRT display, equals something very
| close to a true zero lag environment.
|
| Here's a breakdown of the input lag in a modern
| environment, for contrast. These are all latencies that
| don't exist in something like, say, a Sega
| Genesis/Megadrive hooked up to a CRT:
| http://renderingpipeline.com/2013/09/measuring-input-
| latency...
|
| In an ideal emulation situation, you could theoretically
| recreate something close to a zero-lag analog environment
| (in terms of latency) without necessarily simulating the
| path of the electron beam itself.
|
| Although, as the linked article implies, there are a
| _lot_ of bits in the emulation stack that would need to
| be optimized for low latency. High refresh rate displays
| get you part of the way there "for free."
| rbanffy wrote:
| Not everything is games that require minimum latency,
| though. For, say, a terminal, or a CDC 6x00 console, some
| lag is perfectly acceptable.
| ilyt wrote:
| I wonder about that, might be that having specialized
| display controller on say OLED display could've been
| enough ?
|
| You could then have the controller artifically drive it
| line by line instead refreshing whole screen
| deelowe wrote:
| Perhaps. One issue I foresee is the way CRTS glow. The
| phosphor doesn't light/dim immediately the way an LED
| does. So there's some amount of fade in/out that happens
| on a CRT as the beam moves across the screen. I imagine
| this could be difficult or impossible to reproduce with a
| traditional OLED screen. Some old games rely on this
| technique along with the slow refresh rates to to create
| a sort of dithering/aliasing effect.
| Dylan16807 wrote:
| Are you sure it's the decay they're using, and not the
| natural blurriness and texturing?
|
| And some phosphors have a much longer decay than others,
| but you could easily emulate those long-term effects on a
| normal screen.
| JohnBooty wrote:
| Phosphor decay is not terribly difficult to simulate to
| an acceptable degree. Doing it at the pixel level is
| pretty easy, doing it at the phosphor level is
| computationally harder but not much more complicated.
|
| The larger issue w.r.t. this specific quirk of CRTs is
| that we're running out of human beings that are familiar
| with what this is "supposed" to look like, _and_ actually
| care.
|
| I care a lot, but I'm old.
| deelowe wrote:
| I'm not aware of any cases where it's been emulated in
| any acceptable manner. I can't be bothered to do the math
| myself, but I imagine doing this well would be beyond the
| capabilities of modern displays (probably in the 1000s of
| hz refresh rate). Maybe some special FPGA based
| controller with an OLED like was suggested above could
| make it possible. I'm not sure.
| rbanffy wrote:
| That and the fade follows a non linear curve. It's pretty
| cool, but quite a lot of math to match the physics going
| on.
| rbanffy wrote:
| It would need to redraw the whole screen to account for
| the phosphor decay. To do that with line resolution and
| an NTSC signal, you'd have to redraw it roughly 1500
| times per second (60 fields of about 250 lines). You'd
| draw the current line at full brightness and "decay" the
| rest of the frame according to that phosphor persistence.
| Since there is some quantization, you could reduce the
| frequency of decays as the line gets older.
| rbanffy wrote:
| On the concept of these very weird displays, I remember
| an HP oscilloscope that had a monochrome CRT and a
| polarizer in front cycling between R, G, and B components
| on every refresh cycle. Overall, the screen resembled a
| DLP projection when you'd see different color frames when
| your eyes moved, but a stable color when you were looking
| at a part of the screen. A very neat way of producing
| crazy small color pixels on a 7"ish CRT.
|
| And yes, that device cost about the same as my house back
| then (2002).
|
| https://hackaday.com/2019/01/17/sharpest-color-crt-
| display-i...
| JohnBooty wrote:
| I'd care much more about my money going into
| making a product that got the visible details of
| the canvas right than spoofed the proper results
| if I carbon-dated it or something
|
| You've inadvertently highlighted one of the challenges of
| preservation: identifying which aspects matter.
|
| Does fooling a carbon dating test matter? This is purely
| subjective, but for most people surely not.
|
| But interestingly you've linked to an ultra high
| resolution image viewer that lets the viewer drill down
| into a nearly microscopic view of the painting. If a
| person doesn't know much about art, they might think that
| if you could take something like this and hang it on your
| wall, it would be a pretty damn good replica of the real
| thing. It would certainly be cool, I have to admit. Hell,
| I'd love it on my wall.
|
| And yet, it's utterly different than the real thing.
| Paintings in real life are three dimensional. Van Gogh in
| particular is one who used thick gobs of paint. Each
| fraction of a micron of the painting has height and its
| own reflective properties which interact with the light
| in the room as you walk around and observe it.
| if I get everything I'd notice while using the
| computer correct at a fraction of the price.
|
| Well, that's the thing. It's certainly up to the
| individual whether or not they give a crap about any
| particular detail.
|
| If you don't care about how oil paintings actually look
| in real life, or what video games actually looked and
| felt like, and you choose to brand all of the things you
| don't understand or don't care about as "comical",
| then... well, more power to you. That's your choice.
|
| But some people choose to care.
| causi wrote:
| High-res OLED displays can do a pretty darn good imitation of
| a CRT if the software is tuned for it.
| fl0ps wrote:
| This reminds me of a conversation I had with an archivist
| acquaintance I met at a conference. Her opinion was that I should
| donate my personally acrued private assemblage of retrocomputing
| game systems and personal computers to the Living Computer
| Museum, out of the belief that they'd be under better care there
| than in the hands of a private collector.
|
| While LCM volunteers may have a keen interest in preservation, I
| don't feel there's the same sense of ownership as systems
| literally brought back to life/restored by the hand of the person
| who purchased them expressly for the purpose of sharing those
| experiences.
| nightfly wrote:
| I got to go once in 2017 and really hoped to be able to go again
| someday... If it is dead, I at least hope their machines are
| donated to a similar museum elsewhere
| qbasic_forever wrote:
| Sadly it was really on the down swing after the 2019 firings. I
| had been going to the museum for years ever since it opened. In
| 2017 and 2018 they started experimenting with live events and
| parties, like a Blade Runner 2049 release party with actors
| dressed up as blade runner characters, a full bar making
| futuristic mixed drinks, etc.--it was awesome. There was a tech
| themed burlesque show with performers covered in LEDs and such.
| They did other fun stuff like a retro 80s party night to
| celebrate opening a new 70s/80s themed wing of the museum. They
| would host local events like the retro game meetup, mechanical
| keyboard meetup, etc. It was really growing and turning into a
| fun geeky social space.
|
| And then in 2019 Vulcan fired everyone responsible for making it
| great. No more after hour parties/events. Just as things were
| starting to take off they ruined it, and then the pandemic hit
| and it was done for good.
|
| It's a real shame and I hope someone who appreciates the museum
| can take control of it and rescue it from Vulcan.
| cturner wrote:
| Long-term governance is hard.
|
| I have been thinking recently, how could you design governance
| for a high-end nursing home so that the facility perpetually
| serve the rotation and interests of its residents. Without
| governance, such a facility would quickly trend towards entropy.
| The first step of entropy is pillage by the executive.
|
| When I look around, adversarial systems (courts, parliaments)
| seem to be a device for building bedrock for better civilisation.
| I don't think charity is, due to the governance obstacles.
| dennis_jeeves1 wrote:
| Good governance at it's very core is the right people at the
| helm of affairs.
|
| Getting the right people is a really hard task, one really has
| to wade through several thousand people to find that needle in
| a haystack.
|
| Defining what is 'right', is like defining what a Unicorn is
| i.e almost surreal.
|
| >how could you design governance for a high-end nursing home so
| that the facility perpetually serve the rotation
|
| I have been thinking of this problem for decades I think, and
| unfortunately the solution seems to be what I have alluded
| above.
| lordswork wrote:
| Consistently finding and hiring the right people over time is
| just too difficult to be truly sustainable over multiple
| generations. A project will always be a few bad hires away
| from collapse.
|
| Maybe a sufficiently advanced AI serving as the "right
| person" in a governance role is the long-term sustainable
| solution to this, once that is a capability. Sounds crazy
| now, but probably less so in 10-20 years.
| dcow wrote:
| The same society run forever by heartless AI. Sounds
| dystopian. The problem then is stagnation. Death makes way
| for new life and young blood.
| gus_massa wrote:
| The first problem is how the AI can ensure people is not
| lying.
|
| And AI can also has objective drift. A project will
| always be a few paperclips away from collapse.
| https://www.decisionproblem.com/paperclips/
| hungryforcodes wrote:
| What I find weird is this is (basically) in San Francisco which
| is where Silicon Valley and related places got their start.
|
| They have SO MANY rich tech mogules (mogulettes) that it's hard
| to imagine it isn't getting incrediable funding -- even by the
| city or Palo Alto for example.
|
| What is the real problem? If I was a rich millionaire /
| billionaire from SV I would donate in a heart beat....
| xerxesaa wrote:
| As someone who lives within biking distance of this museum and
| has visited it on multiple occasions, I can assure you this is
| very much in Seattle and not in Silicon Valley.
| hungryforcodes wrote:
| Ah, I've hallucinate it was in Oakland. My apologies. You're
| totally right. Mind you -- to extend my mistake-- they might
| have a better chance if they moved to the bay area. Not to
| minimize in any way the difficulties they are experiencing.
| piperswe wrote:
| You might be thinking of MADE in Oakland:
| https://www.themade.org/
| freeqaz wrote:
| I love this museum and I'm truly shocked to hear this news! I
| tried to go during the pandemic but I didn't realize that it
| would be gone forever... I still have a shirt in my closet!
|
| Is there anything that we can do to help keep it alive?
| ilaksh wrote:
| It seems like if the company does want to try to operate it
| then they should transfer it to a non-profit and it can be
| operated by volunteers. Obviously that still requires money but
| theoretically it's less money. It seems like it would be a no-
| brainer for some local schools and universities to pitch in for
| funding.
| benatkin wrote:
| should have*
| veleek wrote:
| I volunteer on an event called the Microsoft Intern Game (a
| weekend long puzzlehunt for MS interns over the summer) and we
| were fortunate enough to get to use the LCM for one of the
| locations.
|
| The puzzle (write up here,
| https://interngame.microsoft.com/events/2013/floppy/overview...
| make sure to click the solution link for notes about the
| happenings at LCM) actually used some of the real computers
| (running a simple DOS program from a floppy disc) as opposed to
| just emulating it on newer hardware. It was an amazing experience
| that you would never get at another museum.
|
| My favorite pic had nothing to do with our puzzle at all, but was
| just a computer control panel with a helpful label that said
| "knob".
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| A pandemic casualty like many things. Also visited randomly in
| 2019 and it was so great.
|
| The IBM card punch machine wasn't working that day and I regret
| not getting a fun souvenir but the hands-on experience was
| excellent.
| jedberg wrote:
| I'm surprised Bill Gates hasn't stepped in and taken over funding
| of Allen's projects. I know they weren't the best of friends when
| he left Microsoft, but I figured Gates would see the value of
| these museums in his advancing years, especially the LCM, which
| features mostly Bill's stuff!
| jacquesm wrote:
| That really sucks for all those that donated gear to the museum
| thinking the machines would be in good hands there.
| acidburnNSA wrote:
| Agreed. After I visited, I decided that that was the best way
| to preserve the fun of old computers and finally recycled my
| old Gateway 2000 tower from 1995 since they had like dozens of
| them there. Now I feel that I should have kept it.
| qiqitori wrote:
| This feels like a shameless plug, sorry. I sometimes do volunteer
| work at a (mostly personal) computer museum in Tokyo.
| https://www.dream-library.org/museum/index.html
|
| If anyone nearby is reading this, please consider coming by
| sometime :)
|
| (You need a reservation. Not everything works. In fact most
| machines don't work probably. It's not super fancy like the
| Living Computer Museum was. There's a lot of stuff on the floor.
| It'll probably move to a bigger place soon so that'll get better
| probably. It's not particularly cheap; there's a yearly fee (no
| auto-renewals) and a per-visit fee. There's probably almost
| nothing to do if you aren't fluent in Japanese.)
|
| So far I fixed: ZX81, VIC-20, PET 2001, various MSX machines.
| (See my blog for details :p)
| RJIb8RBYxzAMX9u wrote:
| > [...] computer museum in Tokyo.
|
| I looked up the address, and just want to clarify for anyone
| who may want to visit: the museum is in Oume City, about 1.5
| hours away by train from Tokyo Station. While technically part
| of Tokyo Metro area, I think for most foreign tourists "Tokyo"
| only refers the 23 special wards[0]. So just beware it's not
| just a short hop away after you're done sight-seeing in e.g.
| Asakusa.
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_wards_of_Tokyo
| victorp13 wrote:
| Narita (New Tokyo Airport) is exactly the same distance away,
| in the exact opposite direction.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| humanistbot wrote:
| And it takes an hour to get to Narita from Tokyo Station
| wk_end wrote:
| It's pretty normal for the airport of a major city to be
| well outside of those major cities, given how air travel
| and tall buildings and large swaths of empty land for
| runways and population density don't exactly play well
| together. It's not usually that big a deal - for one thing,
| because you're likely to only do one leg of that journey on
| any given day; for another, because there's usually lots of
| good, tourist-friendly transit options to get from the
| airport to downtown.
|
| So tourists are accustomed to this sort of thing, whereas -
| as pointed out above - they're not exactly accustomed to
| going that far out of the city while sightseeing "in the
| city".
|
| I'm planning my next trip to Tokyo and got real excited
| reading about a Japanese computer museum (I'd love to get
| to play with some vintage Japanese micros, seeing how
| different they were from Western machines) but I don't know
| if I'd be willing to take three hours out of my vacation to
| go out to the suburbs and back...
| mihaaly wrote:
| Those in Europe, or better in England, may pop into the Centre
| for Computing History in Cambridge:
| http://www.computinghistory.org.uk/
|
| Nice place, I like it. A favourite of mine is the wall sized
| CPU, The Megaprocessor.
| https://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/43063/The-Megaproces...
|
| They will have a Made in Japan season this spring! : )
| http://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/70465/Made-in-Japan-S...
| puzzlingcaptcha wrote:
| In Switzerland I recommend checking out the ENTER museum in
| Solothurn
|
| https://enter.ch/?lang=en
| mihaaly wrote:
| Nice! Looks like something requiring a whole day or more.
| simmons wrote:
| While we're plugging computer museums, I'll add the Media
| Archaeology Lab in Boulder, on the campus of the University
| of Colorado. It's no doubt a far smaller operation than most
| of the others mentioned here, but it has a lot of heart.
| Visitors are encouraged to hang out, play around with all the
| old computers and gadgets, peruse the floppy disk collection,
| and maybe find some games to play.
|
| https://www.mediaarchaeologylab.com/
| Tor3 wrote:
| Going to Tokyo this spring.. but if not this time, then I'll
| definitely go there later.
| Dalewyn wrote:
| Japanese internet is, in fact, a Living Web 1.0 Museum. :V
|
| Seriously though, I love that the wider Japanese internet has
| remained so simple (and thus usable!) after so many years.
| erikpukinskis wrote:
| The Oakland MADE museum is also a more humbly funded
| institution, which I believe is still open for anyone in the
| Bay Area.
|
| https://www.themade.org/
| PebblesHD wrote:
| I'll be in Tokyo early next month with work, and this sounds
| like something I'd enjoy. Is it worth going as someone who
| doesn't speak much Japanese? If so, I'll get myself there :)
| qiqitori wrote:
| Hmm, well, I think it wouldn't be easy to make a reservation
| without being able to read and write Japanese.
|
| Actually TBH I don't know if the owner can speak English :c
| Normally, first-time visitors are given a quick tour so they
| can decide whether to become a supporting member or not. I'm
| not sure how the owner would do that. (Maybe he would ask me
| to translate? I'd probably do it :p)
| PebblesHD wrote:
| I can write/speak enough to make a booking for myself but
| if there would be alot of complex written stuff like
| histories and things maybe not for me. Thanks for letting
| me know :)
| Hendrikto wrote:
| > There's probably almost nothing to do if you aren't fluent
| in Japanese.
| PebblesHD wrote:
| Not having much to do isn't very related to whether a visit
| is worth it just to see the collection, but I take your
| point I could have been clearer.
| mumin wrote:
| Not even remotely true
| foobiekr wrote:
| My goodness, a Heathkit H-8 in the second photo. I am very
| surprised to see that in Japan.
| rbanffy wrote:
| Just added it to my list. Might be a while - I live in Ireland
| - but who knows... a couple years back I was prospected to join
| Toyota's "city of the future" project...
| malwrar wrote:
| I loved this place, I spent a whole day here once just
| whimsically coding on all of the boxes that would let me. It felt
| like all of the stories I had read about the older days of
| computing truly came to life in front of me. Hell, I forgot the
| model but there was one that had an older typewriter-like
| interface that could play chess, I beat it and the museum staff
| took my picture! It was a magical place, truly sad I can't visit
| it anymore.
| hunter_irving wrote:
| Hi malwrar, I'm Hunter Irving, a former employee of LCM+L. I
| was the one who started the practice of taking photos of chess
| winners. I don't have them all, but some of the Hall of Fame
| photos (up to April 2018) are preserved here:
| https://hunterirving.com/blog/2017/the_hall_of_fame/hof/# Maybe
| you'll see yourself in there! The computer you were playing
| against was either a DEC PDP-8 or a PDP-8e. The program was
| CHECKMO-II ( https://www.chessprogramming.org/CHEKMO-II ).
| [deleted]
| sdf_pubnix wrote:
| If you visit https://wiki.livingcomputers.org/ you can learn
| about many of the remote systems that continue to operate. They
| are a mix of 18 real hardware and emulated systems with guest
| access, if you don't have a personal account. The wiki is also
| contributed to by the community of users that use these systems.
| In there you'll find code examples and user documentation
| regarding these historic systems.
| Reason077 wrote:
| Sounds like a familiar story.
|
| Years ago I travelled to Paris, partly to visit another retro
| computing museum: the Musee de l'Informatique in the Grand Arch
| at La Defense. I'd heard great things so it was a huge
| disappointment to arrive and find it had "temporarily" closed a
| few days earlier due to problems with the building's elevators.
|
| Sadly, it never reopened.
|
| https://fr.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musee_de_l%27informatique_(L...
| icelancer wrote:
| I was lucky enough to go there once in 2019 and couldn't wait to
| take my kids there as they got older. What an incredible place,
| one of the very best museums I've ever been to.
|
| It's a real shame if it does not re-open in some form or fashion.
| mothsonasloth wrote:
| Always wanted to visit it whenever I was next in Seattle, I guess
| I will need to wait a while though.
|
| In the UK we have a few smallish computer museums; one in
| Manchester University, one at a London University and then we
| have the National Museum of Computing at Bletchely park (not to
| be confused with Bletchely park museum, as there is some
| politics)
|
| It is important in the case of NMoC that it is preserved,
| especially that they have a working Colossus machine and many
| other historic British computing achievements.
| alphabetter wrote:
| And other home computer museums in Cambridge, Leicester, Derby,
| RMC (near Gloucester) to name a few.
| parenthesis wrote:
| There's also the Micro Museum in Ramsgate
| (https://www.themicromuseum.org/).
| pnw wrote:
| Unfortunately it's inevitable that LCM is going away. For folks
| outside Seattle who may be unaware, Allen's military museum was
| closed and exhibits sold off last year, and his Cinerama facility
| looks to be heading the same way.
|
| It's hard to believe this was the estate plan he intended. A lot
| of local people are pointing the finger at his sister who appears
| intent on erasing his legacy outside pro sports.
| BryantD wrote:
| All of those are significant losses, too. I don't care as much
| about the military museum and there's an ongoing argument about
| the ethics of flying some of those old planes (wear and tear is
| bad), as Allen did, but the collection still mattered.
|
| I think the only Allen project besides sports that's going to
| survive is MOPOP and that's very tourist-friendly in an
| excellent location.
|
| Unfortunately it appears to be the case that this is what Allen
| wanted. A connected sports journalist in Portland wrote about
| this last year (see below link).
|
| > "Paul directed that the trust be liquidated upon his death
| and the assets used to fund his passion projects," a source
| said. "None of this is up in the air. The instructions are
| clear: The sports franchises and everything in the trust must
| be sold."
|
| https://www.johncanzano.com/p/canzano-no-wiggle-room-nfls-se...
| mustacheemperor wrote:
| Has it been disclosed what those "passion projects" are? I
| would have assumed them to be stuff like the museums and the
| cinerama.
| snapetom wrote:
| From someone two degrees of separation away from the
| situation, this really was a core issue. A lot of bickering
| involved from family members and outside interests on
| what's funded and how much. (yes, all second hand random
| internet rumors, heresay, take it with a grain of salt,
| etc.)
|
| It's sad because the LCM and Cinerama had such an impact on
| Seattle culture.
| BryantD wrote:
| Thank you for sharing what you know.
|
| Business Insider says brain research was one of them. I
| imagine if I was a competent financial reporter I could
| dig into where the money's going and maybe learn
| something but I don't have those skills.
|
| https://www.businessinsider.com/blazers-seahawks-fate-
| paul-a...
| Animats wrote:
| Keeping old equipment going takes much time, effort and obscure
| knowledge. I spent years restoring old Teletype machines. (If
| anyone went to the Clockwork Alchemy steampunk conventions and
| saw the Telegraph Office [1], that was my doing.) Fortunately,
| many of those Teletypes were built, they're very well documented,
| they're built of good steel, and there are still parts available.
| It's easier to restore the all-mechanical machines of the 1920s
| and 1930s than the more electronic machines of the 1970s.
| Teletype built the first ink-jet printer, the Inktronic, and as
| far as I know, no working examples remain.
|
| The Computer Museum in Mountain View has a working IBM 1401, and
| it's kept going by old guys who worked on the 1401 in the past.
| Soon, they will be gone. They have conflicts with the museum
| staff, who just want stuff that sits there.
|
| The Union Pacific Railroad restored the Big Boy steam locomotive
| to full road operating condition a few years ago. That was a huge
| multi-million dollar effort. They now run it long distances for
| tours. Union Pacific has a Steam Shop and 50-100 employees. They
| get a PR benefit out of it.
|
| The Museum of Flight in Seattle used to try to maintain some of
| their aircraft in flyable condition, but they seem to have given
| up on that.
|
| The Jaquet-Droz automata [1] in Neuchatel, Switzerland, are still
| maintained, since there's still a mechanical clock and watch
| industry in Switzerland able to maintain such things and it's a
| source of national pride.
|
| Functional nostalgia is expensive.
|
| [1] https://www.aetherltd.com
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaquet-Droz_automata
| [deleted]
| aaronbrethorst wrote:
| Frankly I'm much more disappointed that Cinerama is still gone.
| https://www.seattletimes.com/opinion/editorials/seattle-need...
| themadturk wrote:
| I'm not _much_ more disappointed; perhaps equally so. Both are
| cultural icons. I saw 2001: A Space Odyssey and all three of
| the Star Wars prequel films at the Cinerama. But I also spent a
| few very memorable days at the LCM.
| jmuguy wrote:
| Also really sad about LCM closing and just generally about the
| way it was handled by Vulcan etc. For computer nerds that place
| is heaven. There is so much to do, and its wild seeing systems
| you may have owned at one point - and getting to actually use
| them again. When I went they had a sort of 70s/80s themed
| basement exhibit and "highschool computer programming" room,
| again with almost everything functional. You could even make your
| own punch cards. I'm on the east coast but would fly back out to
| Seattle immediately if given a chance to visit again.
|
| For people wringing their hands about profitability, I'm sure it
| could have been made self sustaining, or hell if they had even
| attempted to raise some money outside of the foundation, there's
| a lot of people that loved that place. It really seemed like that
| the powers that be just didn't care.
| detourdog wrote:
| there are many individuals and there collections.
|
| Here is a link to the large scale systems and computer museum
| near Pittsburgh, Pa.
| https://www.largescalesystemsmuseum.org/how_to_visit
| benatkin wrote:
| Hmm, this is sad. Most big science/tech museums in major US
| cities are disappointing, but this was a really good one. I went
| in 2008 or 2009 I believe.
| thirtyseven wrote:
| Such a shame, it's hard to believe that Paul Allen didn't put his
| wishes for how LCM should be run after his death in writing.
| Reason077 wrote:
| Yes, or even better: set up some sort of charitable trust with
| its own charter and endowment so the museum could operate
| independently from Vulcan.
| xhkkffbf wrote:
| This was a big mistake on his part -- assuming he wished for
| museum to continue. He had a number of months after the
| diagnosis to make these decisions so they wouldn't be left to
| others.
| pakyr wrote:
| At this point I guess one can only hope they don't let the roof
| start to leak.
| CompuHacker wrote:
| Other than the countless abandoned buildings throughout
| history, is this a reference to another computer museum?
| cornholio wrote:
| Just a small reminder that everything you work for and thought
| important, everything you poured your soul and life into and
| consider your legacy, will die at some point after you. Sometimes
| only a few months after, when some random bean counter expressly
| breaks your wishes for some self-interested reason that you are
| no longer alive to dismiss as moronic.
|
| Very, very few people can leave a lasting mark and especially
| change the world for the better.
| lordswork wrote:
| While the things we build will inevitably end at some point,
| the ideas they inspire in others will live on through their
| creations and so on. Exploring and executing on ideas is
| perhaps the biggest impact any of us can have on future
| generations.
| krisoft wrote:
| Well. It sounds like the museum was not financially self-
| sustaining (which is fine) and the founder did not leave a well
| endowed foundation to maintain it.
|
| That combination is deadly.
| nebula8804 wrote:
| Don't know about you but when I go use an old
| computer/videogame/candy/snack that I enjoyed as a kid, it
| usually does not evoke the same feelings as it did when I was
| first experiencing it. What I am getting at is that all the
| efforts were not wasted because for a moment in time, it evoked
| an incalculable amount of wonder, joy, and happiness to many
| people. The moment was bound to be gone for each person
| regardless of the status of the museum because it was not just
| the museum, it was everything that was unique to each person at
| the point in time. The Museum just happen to add a positive
| contribution to each person's moment.
| imiric wrote:
| I'm not quite sure what your point is, but don't you think
| that there's enormous cultural value in places like the LCM
| that allow more people to experience that feeling of wonder
| for the first time? Just because that feeling wanes away
| after the first experience, doesn't mean that these places
| aren't very valuable to society.
| xwdv wrote:
| People will experience feelings of wonder in their own
| time.
| fluoridation wrote:
| That sounds like an argument against museums in general.
| nebula8804 wrote:
| I guess I didn't explain it well, sorry. I agree that LCM
| is very valuable to society. I think I accidentally
| conflated two separate points. My first point is that yes
| the memories made are a moment in time that the mind cannot
| articulate correctly in present time (hence nostalgia
| evoking feelings better than what reality was at the time)
| BUT and this is important, even if LCM goes away, the
| effort they did spent was not in vain because it created
| those moments for so many people.
|
| OP stated that everything you do will eventually die at
| some point after you. I disagree because we don't know if
| the positive impact that LCM created on someone could have
| then translated into a positive impact that a person who
| experienced LCM passes onto their friends and family. That
| positive impact could then traverse downwards.
|
| I had this same exact discussion with some guy manning the
| Atari 800 booth at a recent Vintage Computer Festival East
| event. He was showing off cool demos running on the
| computer and we talked about how after he dies he felt that
| no one will care about this computer equipment anymore. The
| love for this platform dies with him and his generation.
|
| It got me thinking that this item was made for a certain
| era which consisted of certain cultural elements that
| existed not only in the country where the item was
| designed, but also whatever thinking that was prevalent in
| specific components like the CPU design, computer science
| advancement at the time, marketing, etc. In other words,
| the computer was made specifically for people living at
| that moment in time. There probably wasn't much thought put
| into how different future people would perceive it because
| you don't know what the future holds and at the point of
| sale those people don't exist and don't matter.
|
| At the same time though the memories that the computer
| generated will not be lost forever. They could have
| impacted downstream events (eg. the children of person
| could have been motivated to go into tech thanks to the
| love that the computer generated for their parent who
| subsequently went into tech)
| frozenport wrote:
| My contribution to the heat death of the universe is indelible
| due to the laws of thermodynamics.
| hgomersall wrote:
| Indeed, the more one achieves, the more one contributes. One
| might even suggest it is the defining characteristic of life
| - a better way to increase entropy.
| cornholio wrote:
| The largest contribution then would be to set forest fires
| your entire life, or perhaps gas and oil fields if you have
| the skills.
| hgomersall wrote:
| No, you want a stable ecosystem that can keep alive as
| much life as possible which can maximise entropy
| production over much longer timescales. It's necessary to
| maximise the whole system's entropy exhaust over time.
| Much better if we can get people to colonize new planets,
| or create a Dyson sphere or whatever.
| nullc wrote:
| I dunno, those forests were going to burn eventually
| anyways-- so is that a contribution?
|
| To really make your mark on entropy you have to bring
| things to a lower energy state that requires crossing a
| substantial barrier, such that it wouldn't happen on its
| own.
|
| The potential disaster outcomes considered for the LHC
| would be good candidates, especially
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_vacuum_decay
| jacquesm wrote:
| Now that's what I call ambition!
| rbanffy wrote:
| I've always sought to reduce entropy locally while knowing
| that my effort increases it on average outside my focus, but
| I made peace with that.
| notlisted wrote:
| There's a _lovely_ living computer museum in Helmond, The
| Netherlands.
|
| https://www.homecomputermuseum.nl/en/#intro
|
| A Dutch non-profit, staffed by volunteers and people in need of
| practical training. Visitors to the museum get to touch and
| interact with most of them. I've 'adopted' a few machines there
| that introduced me to computers and programming as a kid (the
| language switch features on this site are a little glitchy,
| google translate is your friend). If you're in the neighborhood,
| it's definitely worth a visit.
|
| Their LinkedIn page has a proper introduction in English:
|
| https://www.linkedin.com/company/homecomputermuseum/about/
|
| "The HomeComputerMuseum is a museum about (home)computers based
| in the centre of the Benelux (Belgium, the Netherlands and
| Luxembourg), in the technical region of the Netherlands, close to
| airports like Eindhoven and Dusseldorf and easy to reach by train
| and car. The museum is 500m2 and has around 400 computers in
| stock. From the early Commodore PET2001, Altair 8800, Tandy TRS80
| and Apple II all the way up to early 2000 pc's with Windows XP
| and Mac OS X 10.5. Since computers will break when they're not
| used, all computers are prepared to stay on during opening hours
| and ready to be touched by anyone who wants to. Even printers,
| modems, scanners and other additional hardware is connected and
| ready to use. We also have our own repair lab when something
| breaks. All computers are set up in a environment that's styled
| in the correct era. It's not a museum, it's an experience!
|
| At least once per 3 months we do a big LAN-party where the newest
| computer is a Pentium 4. Meaning we do only old school gaming
| with games like Duke Nukem 3D, Red Alert, Wacky Wheels, Unreal
| Tournament and anything we fancy to do.
|
| We are a non-profit organization that gives chances to people
| with autism and teaches young children how the old computers
| work. We strongly believe that in order to understand the future,
| one must know the past. That's what we're doing.
|
| See, feel, try, play & learn!
|
| We also love to show these old, sometimes forgotten, computers on
| Youtube and on social media. We need funds to keep this museum up
| and running and that's where you can help!
|
| We're based in Helmond, conveniently placed between big airports
| (Eindhoven and Dusseldorf), easy reachable by train, enough
| parking places and right next to the city centre of Helmond. So
| make sure to visit us and consider a donation or any other form
| of support."
| marapuru wrote:
| Yes! It's a great place. Been there a few times and can't
| recommend it enough to others. Even non-computer minded people
| could really enjoy it.
| mr_beans wrote:
| I loved that place, I spent an entire day there from open til
| close when I was contemplating changing jobs and it was really
| helpful to put my work as a developer into historical
| perspective. Running Unix commands on a PDP-11 and watching the
| output slowly scroll up the screen was awesome, and seeing the 17
| step process to boot the PDP-7 taped on as stickies and then
| playing chess against it was cool. I always hope some other
| Seattle billionaire takes over the reins but at this stage my
| best hope is that my options are worth something in a few years
| and I can do it myself.
| schemescape wrote:
| Just yesterday I was remembering visiting this museum, and I
| decided to start making plans to go back. I didn't realize it had
| shut down. That's very sad news...
| dboreham wrote:
| As others have noted, this is an expensive undertaking, and
| unlikely to be self-funding, but also not _that_ expensive in the
| context of the profits our industry generates and the numerous
| billionaires created therein.
|
| I'm also interested in old cars. Many old cars are worth millions
| and people like Jerry Seinfeld and Jay Leno use their wealth to
| preserve them.
|
| Unfortunately that scenario doesn't seem to exist for historic
| computers yet, although there is a collector scene at the low end
| (try to buy a KIM-1 now for less than $1000, for example).
|
| I'd be willing to pay something in support of reopening the
| museum -- I already spend some money on picking up what I see as
| historic artifacts from auction sites and the LCM would actually
| be a more efficient way for my money to be used to achieve
| preservation of larger working systems. For example I have a
| complete board set for a pdp-11/70 (key milestone in the
| evolution of the systems we use today), but I can't afford to buy
| a rack, disk drives, and provide electricity to make a running
| system. The LCM already has a pdp-11/70 running V7. If I could
| fractionally own that, I think it'd be a good deal. I could also
| pledge my board set as spares should they be required.
|
| But it would take 10000 people with my limited resources to
| properly fund the museum, I suspect.
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