OK senator calls video game museum "wasteful"

Warp Zoned writes:

"Oklahoma senator Tom Coburn has released his annual “Wastebook,” a detailing of the 100 worst spending decisions by the US government.

Number nine on this document is a $113,277 grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services to the International Center for the History of Electronic Games. The grant will be applied to a preservation survey of the museum’s current collection. The goal is to eventually make their collection available to “visitors, researchers, and a broad public audience.”"

[Agent Smith]

Lol, for a second there, I thought it said he was an okay Senator.

[cyborg6971]

The only thing wasteful in this country is congress and the senate.

[Dac2u]

My brother and I both work for our county and I can tell you with absolute certainty that the Congress and Senate are not the only wasteful things in this country. Our commissioners just OK'd $300k worth of programs, one of those programs is handing out fresh syringes to heroin users. $300k may seem like a small amount, but we live in a smaller county.

Also, how many billions did President Obama spend on his trip to Mumbai? The government, top to bottom, is wasteful in almost every way.

[Angrymorgan]

No more wasteful than any other museum.
It's only wasteful if nobody uses it, I'm guessing it's more popular than many others

[Wenis]

Shocking... a 60+ year old man who doesn't understand video games. Move along

[MAJ0R]

no, a video games museum. there is a difference

[Reborn]

You'd need to understand video games, in order to understand having a museum for it.

Clearly, he doesn't. Same thing. No difference.

[360ICE]

Now, I dont understand all of that there fancy modern art, but I still want there to be a MoMA. Now, since we've spent millions on an enclosed european intellectual circle, why not spend a buck or two on pop-culture!? I'd even throw in a dollar or two myself. Don't even need to understand games to see that there is room for a video game museum.

[RBLAZE1988]

I guess art museums or sports hall of fame museums are wasteful too...

[SeanScythe]

Uh lets see we are trillions of $ in debt, lets spend more money on stupid stuff. That makes so much sense, I would rather they put the money into something useful.

We don't need a gaming Museum, we don't need to study the spawning patterns of earthworms, or the reason men per-fer blondes over redheads. It's stupid and a waste of money.

I mean do you want ur tax dollars being wasted on this kind of crap. I love games and I have been playing them all my life but this is not something that we should be wasting money on.

[Baka-akaB]

Not really the issue there , that old dude wouldnt balk at using the found for another kind of museum , like say a tobacco museum of all things .

His issue certainly isnt about a museum , but the topic of it .

Video games museums arent less of a waste of money than regular art ones . They are even cheaper

[Legion]

Not sure if anyone actually read the report? The funding was for a condition survey of a portion of the egames in the museum. Has nothing to do with the museum itself. Just the funding for a check on the condition of each game and how to better make them available to future visitors. As it is the museum charges $13 for each visitor to the museum. I would think with proper structure of funds they could come up with their own way to survey their egames instead of grabbing the money from tax payers. I would go there myself to help with the data organization.

Gamers are an interesting bunch. We will jump in and do things for free if just asked. That is why you see so many of us hanging out at Gamestop giving unsolicited advice to customers and reorganizing shelves that are a mess. ha

And per the Wastebook it just specifies that these shouldn't be priorities when our nation is in a monetary crisis.

"Some of the projects listed within
this report may indeed serve
useful purposes or have merit and
those associated with the
projects may disagree that they
are not national priorities.

This type of response is expected
and this report is intended to add
to the ongoing larger debate
about national spending priorities
and the proper role of the federal
government in the context of our
$15 trillion national debt."

[KingJFS]

Two things...

1) The ICHEG is connected to the larger Strong Museum of Play. The $13 admission fee is good for all parts of the Strong complex and goes towards a lot more than just the game museum.

2) For some reason, the ICHEG isn't too interested in volunteers (I asked once). But the amount of games/hardware they have access to is huge. Cataloging and testing it all will require a lot more money than just this small grant. It helps, nothing more, nothing less.

[Tuxmask55]

Wasteful? So're congress and the senate.

[Interloper]

You think a gaming museum is a waste? Someone should look up the cost of some of our war machines. ._.

[maawdawg]

Just look up the expenses of some of the Senators and Congressmen if you want to see wasteful spending.

[Knightofelemia]

I am not American but I can say this Senator must have lived a sheltered life as a kid.

[Fishy Fingers]

Good point, seeing he was already well into his twenties by the time Pong released.... :/

[Bathyj]

And we all know how politicians hate waste.

[RememberThe357]

As long as it's not in their own state.

[TheFirstClassic]

Yeah it kind of is, but the government wastes tons of money on other useless crap too.

[RedDead]

You could say museums themselves are a waste of money, if the head line is the truth. This right here is a massive waste: http://www.e-architect.co.u...

It cost 4 million euro. It does nothing.

[Lord_Sloth]

Museums require upkeep and security which equals jobs. Something this economy is failing to supply!

WASTEFUL would be that damned skylight in the liqueur store or that turtle tunnel that every1 expected turtles to actually use.

[josephayal]

Smart guy

[Animals_as_Leaders]

It is a waste of resources. I wouldn't go to a gamin museum if it was next to my house and had free entry.

The only value old games have to older games is nostalgia, they have no value whatsoever to new gamers and rightly so.

I love music but I don't give a F who the first company was to use stereo sound etc. Pointless history...

[KMCROC54]

Hey senator kiss my --- .

[CanadianTurtle]

Are you kidding me. Video games actually save museums. Otherwise museums would be boring as hell.

[Kyosuke_Sanada]

I motion for a videogame island......

[V0LT]

Just like all the other senators..wasteful....

[kevnb]

because anything you dont like is stupid.

[TheLig32]

This is the only cut that I will agree with the repubs on. A videogame museum is the dumbest cash sink that I've ever heard of.