source: t29-www/blog/2019-02-04-the-heritage.php

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[1491]1<?php
2        $blog_title = "The Heritage";
3        $blog_author = "Sven";
4        $blog_date = "2019-02-04";
5
6        require "blog.php";
7       
8        print_blog_title();
9?>
10
11<div class="desc-right auto-bildbreite borderless" style="padding-right:0">
12   <a  href="/shared/photos/blog/2019-02-04-the-heritage/heribert-mueller-img-8204.jpg" class="popup">
13   <img src="/shared/photos/blog/2019-02-04-the-heritage/heribert-mueller-img-8204.jpg"
14       style="width: 300px">
15   </a>
16   <div class="bildtext">
17     Heribert Müller in 2016, presenting his
18     <a href="/robotik/">robots workshops for kids</a> in the
19     museum.
20     Picture by courtesy of <a href="http://stephaniekreuzer.de/">Stephanie Kreuzer</a>
21     (<a href="https://www.fnp.de/">FNP</a>)
22   </div>
23</div>
24
25<p>Here we go &mdash; <a href="/heribert-mueller/">Heribert Müller</a>, our father,
[1492]26is dead and leaves behind the <a href="/">technikum29 computer museum</a>. We, that's
[1491]27his three children, grown-ups with their own occupations, lifes, partly their
28own families. The museum was largely a “one-man-show”, with Heribert Müller as
[1492]29the single head. He had a passion for reparing a broad range of devices, from the
[1491]30old <a href="en/communication/broadcasting.php">tube radio</a>
31to the <a href="/en/computer/univac9400.php">data center</a>. Despite having a
32broad network of friends, there is only a handful of real supporters, an “inner
33circle” consisting of other museums such as the nearby
34<a href="http://www.analogmuseum.org/">Analog Computer Museum</a> or the
35<a href="http://computermuseum.informatik.uni-stuttgart.de/index.en.html">
36U&nbsp;Stuttgart Computer Museum</a> as well as some remarkable private persons.
37Noteworthy, nobody of the three of us has a sufficient understanding about
38neither the technology nor substantial details of the extend of the collection.
39We are all standing in front of a huge amount of work even to comprehend the
40current situation of the museum and to work out a decision on its future.
41
42
43
44<h3>Estate, Inventory and Monetary Value</h3>
45
46<div class="desc-left auto-bildbreite borderless" style="padding-left:0">
47   <a  href="/shared/photos/blog/2019-02-04-the-heritage/inventory-marks.jpg" class="popup">
48   <img src="/shared/photos/blog/2019-02-04-the-heritage/inventory-marks.jpg"
49       style="width: 300px">
50   </a>
51   <div class="bildtext">
52     Printed inventory marks before their use.
53   </div>
54</div>
55
56
57<p>One of the blessings of the museum is Heribert Müllers lifelong urge for
58independence. One of the consequences is the fact that the whole collection is
59located in private property and there is no need to rush. In fact, already almost
[1492]60one year passed since his sudden decease and still (unfortunately) little happened.
61We are in the comfortable situation of not having a need to clear the floors and to
[1491]62close the collection as fast as possible. There is no rent which has to be paid,
63instead current expenses can be covered by rental incomes of the mixed use of
64the museum building.
65
[1492]66<p>What I did in a couple of days in the Summer 2018 was a first approximation
[1491]67of the collection by walking off all storage rooms as well as the exhibition
[1492]68and doing a first &mdash; very coarse &mdash; inventory. Having printed 900 fine inventory cards
[1491]69(their <a href="https://github.com/technikum29/t29-inventory-cards">code is
70open sourced on github</a>), I used up almost all of them! In this first inventory,
71which resulted in a decent table/database which is supposed to be released in
72the web soon, there are only big units listed (say bigger then a typical
73notebook). Inventorying even smaller devices, loose parts, not even to mention
74cables, boxes with stuff or sparse components will require ten times as much
75effort. Given the overall shape of the collection (both the exhibition and the
76warehouse), it is partly more a huge unsorted collection of something.
77
78<p>What's the monetary worth of the collection? Without doubt, the
79one-of-a-kind display items which are in a well-restored shape are part of the
80exhibition and especially part of <a href="/">this very website</a>. It is
81an open secret that some of the display items are very rare and wanted on the
82collectors marketplaces and in fact worth thousands of Euros.
83Regardless of wether there is a future for the museum or not, we want to avoid
84paying a large amount of inheritance taxes on the collection. Therefore, we
85need to continue to get an overview of what is actually part of the legacy,
86but also come up with price tags. Here, it is quite obvious that selling the
87collection is a large amount of work where every single device requires
88attention and technical knowledge to archive a good price on the highly
89specialized and small marketplaces.
90We would have to pay experts to do so, which of course reduces
91the overall gain. For some large blocks, such as our
[1492]92<a href="/de/rechnertechnik/gamma10.php">Bull's</a> or
93<a href="/de/rechnertechnik/univac9200.php">Univac's</a>, there will be hardly
94any interests and we would have to pay a disposal company to come with a truck.
95In total, we estimated the weight of these cabinets as around 20-30
[1491]96metric tonnes. The disposal of so much metal would cost hundreds of Euros.
97
98<h3>Future: A Living Computer History Museum for Germany?</h3>
99
100<p>In fact, there is common understanding in the (legally still lasting) community
101of heirs to preserve the museum and to strive for a future. In the last year,
102I worked a lot on the organizational and ideational fundamentals of such a future
103museum. The museum must leave the private sector and go for the public benefit.
104There is also a need for content realignment (mainly due to the lack of ressources),
105in order to focus on the unique selling point: An exhibition of fully working
106computers. Worldwide, there is no other collection with such a claim.
107
108<p>In the next blog post, I will go into detail about what ideas I have worked out
109during the last year.
110
111<?php print_author_info(); ?>
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