Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2016/02/27

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Subject: [Leica] Babbage Difference Engine Funeral
From: ric at cartersxrd.net (RicCarter)
Date: Sat, 27 Feb 2016 18:27:21 -0500
References: <D8CE378C-10FD-419E-A2A7-5D45638D5809@acm.org>

why in gos name would they refuse the money to build a copy when offered??

ric


> On Feb 24, 2016, at 8:52 PM, Herbert Kanner <kanner at acm.org> wrote:
> 
> 
> Over eight years ago, at the instigation of Bill Gates, the Science Museum 
> in London approached Nathan Myhrvold, former Chief Technology Officer for 
> Microsoft, for financial help in completing the Babbage Difference Engine. 
> The Museum had built the larger component, the one that did the actual 
> arithmetic. The additional financing was to enable them to build the 
> smaller but very complex component that would print the results on a paper 
> roll and, most important, create a mold in soft plaster of paris, that 
> when hardened would enable the creation of a full-page plate, ready to go 
> into a printing press, by pouring molten type metal into the mold.
> 
> Nathan made the London Museum an offer the just couldn?t refuse. He said 
> he would finance the building of two copies of the missing part and one 
> more copy of the original part, saying that he wanted to have that (five 
> ton) machine in his living room.
> 
> It never got there. Len Shustek, the Chair of the Computer History Museum 
> (Mountain View, CA) Board of Trustees persuaded him to lend it to us for a 
> year. Every December 15th we asked for an extension and got (exactly) a 
> one-year extension. For eight years, I?ve done the lecture part of a 
> lecturer-demonstration of the machine at exactly 1:00 every Saturday with 
> rare exceptions. I?ve also been a member of a six-person maintenance group 
> doing monthly maintenance: mostly lubrication but occasionally solving 
> problems which at best caused the machine to jam and at worst, broke parts.
> 
> A gentlemen named Tim Robinson has been head of the maintenance group. 
> Without him, we could not have operated this equipment. He not only had a 
> deep understanding of this amazing mechanism, even having built a version 
> out of a Mechano set, but more than once he created a solution to a 
> problem by making a unique fix over a weekend in his home machine shop.
> 
> This December 15th the blow struck. Nathan said he wanted his machine 
> back. As far as we knew, it was not going to be in public view, but was 
> going to sit in a laboratory building that is part of his company: IV 
> (Intellectual Ventures), known to a lawyer friend of mind as a patent 
> trolling firm.
> 
> Tim?s initial reaction was to prepare a one-page summary of suggestions 
> for safely starting the machine without breaking anything. Then he met 
> Mike, that head of the instrumentation shop of Nathan's laboratory. When 
> it became clear that Mike was highly competent and very proactive?he 
> joined our crew in hours of work mothballing the machine and even took 
> some precautions we had not thought of. Immediately after meeting Mike, 
> Tim produced a ten-page detailed document on start-up recommendations. I 
> should mention that Mike was hired away from the University of Washington, 
> where he was the head of a similar shop.
> 
> I got to talk to Mike for about a half-hour while waiting for the roughly 
> 300 people to clear out after the last-ever demonstration. I got the 
> impression that Nathan delves in anything that interests him?ain?t money 
> nice?and that the patents he collects are licensed out to selected 
> companies that are doing things in the hoped for public good, e.g. climate 
> change, internet access in developing countries, etc.
> 
> The day before the mothballing of the machine for shipment, a professional 
> video crew spent the day filming Tim explaining the machine. I believe 
> this crew are employees of our Museum though knowing the history of our 
> CEO, they could have been liberated from PGS. While a number of volunteers 
> were watching from a distance, I braved a carefully walking on the set 
> with my M even though the working crew appeared to have a still 
> photographer using a fearsome looking SLR. I walked with great care not to 
> get in anyone?s way and to freeze between when the director said ?action? 
> and when he said ?cut?. I was surprised to find myself tolerated. So I 
> found out later were the other observers. It was difficult shooting, 
> partly because of floodlights aimed in all directions. I shot over eighty 
> frames and finally selected six. I?ve no idea what that other still 
> photographer got.
> 
> 
> Tim is fully visible in all but of these shots. He has a beard, a 
> pony-tail, and is wearing a red shirt.
> I also took some shots the next day of the month-balling of the machine, 
> but haven?t yet looked at them. If any good, I?ll post a few later.
> 
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1004486.jpg.html 
> <http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1004486.jpg.html>
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1004502.jpg.html 
> <http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1004502.jpg.html>
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1004515.jpg.html 
> <http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1004515.jpg.html>
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1004529.jpg.html 
> <http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1004529.jpg.html>
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1004527.jpg.html 
> <http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1004527.jpg.html>
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1004559.jpg.html 
> <http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/herbk1/L1004559.jpg.html>
> 
> 
> 
> Herbert Kanner
> kanner at acm.org
> 
> Question Authority and the authorities will question you.
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Leica Users Group.
> See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information



In reply to: Message from kanner at acm.org (Herbert Kanner) ([Leica] Babbage Difference Engine Funeral)