Konrad Zuse Museum shutting down due to lack of funding

Zuse is probably the most under-appreciated thinker of the 20th century. Everybody's heard of Claude Shannon, von Neumann, Feynman, and all the rest of 'em, but Zuse's enormous contributions have received rather little attention.

To summarize a couple of the highlights:

In 1936 Germany, Konrad Zuse began developing the Z1, a mechanical calculating machine programmed via perforated 35mm film. By 1937, he had broadened its architecture toward universal digital computation in the vein of Alan Turing. Although completed in 1938, the machine struggled with mechanical inaccuracies -- the same challenge which plagued Charles Babbage's much earlier work on the Difference Engine. Zuse overcame these mechanical hurdles in 1941 with the Z3, an operational digital computer capable of universal computation.

In fact, the Z3 was the world's first working machine physically capable of universal computation. The first real computer.

Zuse was also one of the great philosophers of the 20th century. In a book he published titled "Calculating Space," He was the first to surmise that our universe is computable by a deterministic computer program. Every "simulation hypothesis" and "mathematical universe" theory is downstream of Zuse. (One could argue that the Pythagoreans and neo-Pythagoreans, who held that the world was at root mathematical, were truly first, but Zuse made important and original contributions nevertheless.) It's important to note that, to this day, there are no physical observations which contradict Zuse's notion, as he wrote it, of a computable universe.

I would think that the German state or EU should provide funding for his museum. If that's not the case, it's a shame.

Sad, but the reality is, Hoyerswerda is a small town in east east Germany and computer museums are already super niche in general. How many tourists could they possibly get? Maybe the Nixdorf museum in Paderborn can snatch it up. Paderborn is no metropolis either, but at least it’s relatively central and the museum gets 13 times as many yearly visitors.

Interesting that this pops up on HN. It was a real nice spot and I'm sad that it goes away. They had really nice holiday activities for kids, but also for adults and elderly. E.g. I myself tried VR the second time in one of the rooms from ZCOM.

I especially enjoyed ZCOM when at one point the Fabmobil visited them and I learned a couple of nice people. Not only computer hacking people but also craftsmans etc too.

Also a couple of times the ZCOM gave us space for our computer club (PPP, rip) in the hope we can benefit from each other. But unfortunately the interests stick to a few great "hardcore" people only, although we offered great and free pizza ;)

Fun times. Not even too long ago...

For every bit of history there is 'the danger period', when it is still recent enough that most people don't consider it special but old enough that special effort needs to be made to preserve it. Random chance as much as anything else determines what eventually makes it to the status of 'precious antique'. I hope they find a way to mothball it until society is more appreciative, I think it is a unique collection and worth preserving.

Location, location, location. It's just in the middle of absolutely nothing. The surrounding has a bit of nature as appeal but it's depression county in regards of everything else.

It’s sad to see how the American propaganda destroyed the true genius of computation, to a point that there is not even a museum for his work. Imagine doing the work of many, and many years before them, and then getting here.

I wonder why they post such an article after you already can not go. If they did it earlier, they would have provided the museum with some more final visitors.

Although Zuse definitely received too little credit in the West (for somewhat understandable political reasons), there's another Zuse museum in Hünfeld, along with exhibitions at the Deutsches Technikmuseum in Berlin. So this is not as profound as it might seem. I suspect the main problem with this museum was just that it's off the beaten path.

Hopefully can be consolidated into an existing museum. Very specific museums are just hard to run in general worldwide unless they are uber famous and often that fades in a generation or two.

That's a real shame.

I first heard of Zuse when I spent a week in class in the Zuse conference room at DEC Spit Brook Road, Nashua aka ZKO1. (there were many rooms in that facility named after computing pioneers...)

There were pictures of Zuse and the Z3 in that room, but also an original Konrad Zuse oil painting. I wonder what happened to that painting...

There is a wonderful working relay replica of his design, alongside some artifacts, at the Enter museum in Solothorn Switzerland. Also a bit in the middle of nowhere (15 minute bus from a train station on the Zurich-Bern route).

Maybe we could replace the link with the mdr.de? Heise.de violates GDPR law by using a "pay for play" model.

I am sorry for the meta comment but websites like these should be on the black list imho (and it escapes me why the german watch dog is sleeping at the wheel so often).

I've seen some of his machines in Technology Museum in Berlin. The first iteration was mechanical done with cleverly cut out metal plates.

The problem was probably in the location. Hoyerswerda is a place which does not attract visitors, even the locals left in droves (isn't it the German record holder when it comes to cities losing population?)

In Dresden, Leipzig or Berlin, 30.000 visitors a year could have been reached.

That is a tragic news… I wish I’ve heard of it in advance…

It needs to move and raise funding.