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> The museum closed in February 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[2] In June 2024, The Paul Allen Estate announced that the museum would be permanently closed

> The museum closed in February 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[2] In June 2024, The Paul Allen Estate announced that the museum would be permanently closed and that the museum's collection, most of which was owned by the Estate and not the museum itself, would be auctioned off[3] by Christie's.[4] I'm not going to say it was greed on the part of the estate, but they effectively just gave the middle finger to the museum. > Vulcan LLC, a conglomerate that maintains the Allen family’s estate and many business ventures, has been under the leadership of Paul Allen’s sister, Jody Allen, since the former’s death. A controversial billionaire in her own right, Jody Allen has sustained her brother’s more prominent investments, like ownership of the Seattle Seahawks and Sounders. However, more niche projects like LCM+L and the Cinerama theater in Belltown (also closed indefinitely) seem to be of less interest to Vulcan’s new upper management. https://seattlecollegian.com/paul-allen-living-computers-museum-remains-closed-after-years-despite-lifted-covid-restrictions/ https://seattlecollegian.com/paul-allen-living-computers-mus...

Arainach 2y ago
I'm no fan of Jody, but "greed on the part of the estate" misallocates the blame. It would have been trivial for Paul to, at any point in his life, set up trusts for his various projects - the LCM, Cinerama, the SciFi museum, MoPop, etc. Paul was surrounded with a fleet of lawyers. These kind of trusts are not esoteric knowledge - they're something any upper middle class or upper class family is likely using to keep assets intact without going through probate. Paul could have set up 5 foundations, given each of them an absurd initial donation of $200M each, and not noticed at all. The fact that he did not do even the minimum legal paperwork to keep them intact rather than part of his estate means that Paul never cared about these things as public benefits or experiences and instead just wanted tax dodges for his toys. This is not a hypothetical. Without doxxing myself too much, I know some people who were involved in running Paul's household and projects. They tried to convince Paul to set up such trusts prior to his death and were not successful. Paul's public image was fairly positive during his life but I've soured on him quite a bit as it has become more obvious that it was a facade. Perhaps his plan to turn South Lake Union into a massive park was legitimate, but the other projects were not.
- brailsafe 2y ago
  My impression is that you're attributing a lot of malice to someone who's lack of actions seemed more ambivalent than anything. It's a bit reductionist perhaps, but isn't it all just buildings and stuff? Would it not be weird to keep all of your collections running in perpetuity after your death, even if people seem to love it? Releasing the items into the world to be part of someone else's collection seems pretty reasonable. After all, if you're going to toss $1bn at something, there are plenty of wildly more impactful things you could do with it, not that he'd have been in a position of needing to pick one thing to spend money on.
  - Arainach 2y ago
    Projecting a public image of giving back to the community while actually being apathetic and not taking any safeguards is malicious. Calling something a "museum", as Paul did multiple times, implies a consistency of existence and a theme that is more than just "my collection". The LCM, in particular, was unique. The Computer History Museum is great but is primarily a bunch of powered-off piles of metal and silicon. The few things that are running are demos, not interactive. The LCM let you go up and play with nearly all of the machines. You could write a program on a PDP or an Apple. You could punch cards. You could stand in next to a powered on Cray and a Mainframe and witness how loud they were. More than the exhibits, they had a staff of people who knew the machines - who repaired them, who had worked with them, who could answer your questions about them. That kind of expertise assembled in one place doesn't exist anywhere now.
    - MichaelZuo 2y ago
      So at most that suggests he didn’t care too much about the legal details, liked to make exaggerated claims on the record, and didn’t care too much about what the general public thought of him when he was no longer around. Which of course doesn’t exactly paint a rosy picture of his character or personality. But that’s not much different from most other people, including most HN users.
    - trogdor 2y ago
      > Projecting a public image of giving back to the community while actually being apathetic and not taking any safeguards is malicious. What you describe is hypocrisy, not malice.
legitster 2y ago
Paul Allen was Seattle's rich, crazy uncle. He threw money on so many projects (RIP Cinerama, which was my favorite theater). Jody Allen is a complete black box that answers to no one. She doesn't care about the sports teams either, so it's a mystery why the entire org doesn't just cash out at this point.
- BryantD 2y ago
  Thankfully, SIFF was able to save Cinerama (thanks to another ex-Microsoftie) and it's back in operation. I agree that it's a true treasure.

Arainach 2y ago

I'm no fan of Jody, but "greed on the part of the estate" misallocates the blame. It would have been trivial for Paul to, at any point in his life, set up trusts for his various projects - the LCM, Cinerama, the SciFi museum, MoPop, etc. Paul was surrounded with a fleet of lawyers. These kind of trusts are not esoteric knowledge - they're something any upper middle class or upper class family is likely using to keep assets intact without going through probate. Paul could have set up 5 foundations, given each of them an absurd initial donation of $200M each, and not noticed at all. The fact that he did not do even the minimum legal paperwork to keep them intact rather than part of his estate means that Paul never cared about these things as public benefits or experiences and instead just wanted tax dodges for his toys. This is not a hypothetical. Without doxxing myself too much, I know some people who were involved in running Paul's household and projects. They tried to convince Paul to set up such trusts prior to his death and were not successful. Paul's public image was fairly positive during his life but I've soured on him quite a bit as it has become more obvious that it was a facade. Perhaps his plan to turn South Lake Union into a massive park was legitimate, but the other projects were not.

brailsafe 2y ago
My impression is that you're attributing a lot of malice to someone who's lack of actions seemed more ambivalent than anything. It's a bit reductionist perhaps, but isn't it all just buildings and stuff? Would it not be weird to keep all of your collections running in perpetuity after your death, even if people seem to love it? Releasing the items into the world to be part of someone else's collection seems pretty reasonable. After all, if you're going to toss $1bn at something, there are plenty of wildly more impactful things you could do with it, not that he'd have been in a position of needing to pick one thing to spend money on.
- Arainach 2y ago
  Projecting a public image of giving back to the community while actually being apathetic and not taking any safeguards is malicious. Calling something a "museum", as Paul did multiple times, implies a consistency of existence and a theme that is more than just "my collection". The LCM, in particular, was unique. The Computer History Museum is great but is primarily a bunch of powered-off piles of metal and silicon. The few things that are running are demos, not interactive. The LCM let you go up and play with nearly all of the machines. You could write a program on a PDP or an Apple. You could punch cards. You could stand in next to a powered on Cray and a Mainframe and witness how loud they were. More than the exhibits, they had a staff of people who knew the machines - who repaired them, who had worked with them, who could answer your questions about them. That kind of expertise assembled in one place doesn't exist anywhere now.
  - MichaelZuo 2y ago
    So at most that suggests he didn’t care too much about the legal details, liked to make exaggerated claims on the record, and didn’t care too much about what the general public thought of him when he was no longer around. Which of course doesn’t exactly paint a rosy picture of his character or personality. But that’s not much different from most other people, including most HN users.
  - trogdor 2y ago
    > Projecting a public image of giving back to the community while actually being apathetic and not taking any safeguards is malicious. What you describe is hypocrisy, not malice.

legitster 2y ago

Paul Allen was Seattle's rich, crazy uncle. He threw money on so many projects (RIP Cinerama, which was my favorite theater). Jody Allen is a complete black box that answers to no one. She doesn't care about the sports teams either, so it's a mystery why the entire org doesn't just cash out at this point.

BryantD 2y ago
Thankfully, SIFF was able to save Cinerama (thanks to another ex-Microsoftie) and it's back in operation. I agree that it's a true treasure.