Given my interest in old, slow, and minimalist computers, it's unsurprising that I thoroughly enjoyed the Living Computers Museum. Not only I was able to relive my childhood of playing Marble Madness on a (real) Commodore 64, it was the backdrop to my first experience with the vaunted Amiga platform. Astoundingly, it was also possible to toy around with ancient room-sized computers of yore.

Back in 2020, I was saddened to hear that the museum had closed its doors, after the death of its benefactor, Paul Allen. Generously, they left many machines (and even a BBS) accessible over telnet. In fact, I had logged into the LCM telnet interface roughly one week ago.

But recently it all went dark. The Living Computers Museum has officially shut down for good and its artifacts are to be auctioned off. The telnet service, and even the museum's web site, have all been unceremoniously taken offline. Donated hardware will be sent to the highest bidder (or, worst case, possibly the dump). It's a sad day for vintage computing.

I guess, for now, I will plan on continuing to run my own vintage hardware museum, however inefficient.