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I have a retro computing collection that I have maintained, in working order, over the decades, and it has taken up a significant portion of my living space.

To the point now where I recently found a Retro computing museum to start taking some of my items for public display. This is happening in a city (Vienna, Austria) quite well known for its obscure "Wunderkammer" culture, so it wasn't really a hard sell - I just had to be sure nothing inoperational was on display, and that things worked. Easy!

45,000+ visitors later, my little obsession has turned into a profession, with business cards and everything!

So I can perfectly understand the cabinet-of-curiosities->museum process. Its real and still a thing in todays world.

That's amazing! What's the name or website? Would love to visit (I'm in Zürich, not in Vienna, but close enough for a long weekend trip).
https://gamingmuseum.at/

We have a lot of systems - my particular contribution is the 8-bit wing. :)

I'd like to shout this youtube channel[0] which often features a "Cabinet of curiosities" episode about some rare and vintage items, explaining all the context, history and technology associated.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/@CanadianMacGyver/videos

This channel is excellent. Gilles is awesome. I love it when he's shooting grenades while wearing some WWI military outfit.

"Gilles Messier is a former mechanical engineer and current scriptwriter for the YouTube channel Today I Found Out. When not writing, he produces videos on the history of technology for his own channel Our Own Devices, restores historic aircraft, and designs 1920s/1930s Art Deco posters. Calling All Stations is his first novel and the first of a planned 4-part series. Gilles lives in Winnipeg with his two cats."

Came here to say this. I have really been enjoying this channel since it popped up about a month ago.
There's a Michael Chrichton-like thriller series by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child that (so far) mostly has to do with the Museum of Natural History in NYC and other histories of NYC.

I just finished the third book in the series called "The Cabinet of Curiosities", a riff on the same subject.

If you liked Chrichton thrillers and the movie Night at the Museum, you might enjoy this Pendergast series.

On the topic of media, If anyone watches Guillermo del Toro's series "Cabinet of Curiosities", there are a couple gems in there but a lot of stinkers so don't hesitate to skip an episode

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guillermo_del_Toro%27s_Cabinet...

Also on the topic of media, I helped make a pc puzzle game inspired by cabinets of curiosities and an old game called 7th Guest that people might be interested in [0].

[0] https://store.steampowered.com/app/831070/The_Cabinets_of_Do...

The first episode was outstanding.
Shout-out to the recent reboot of Connections (1987), Connections with James Burke [0], for threading cabinets of curiosities through museums and finally ending with the internet in episode 3, "In the Net".

[0]: https://curiositystream.com/title/series/787

Thank you! The original Connections is one of my favorite series of all time, and I had no idea there was a reboot.
As a collector who is in the process of founding a museum, I think my favorite examples of this type of exhibit are: The Great cabinet of curiosities and their collection of collections at the Basel Historical Museum

And then of course the Enlightenment gallery at the British Museum, which is essentially a collection of collections showing how people used to display their various types of collections.

    From the mid-16th century onward, collectors combined and categorized many kinds of art and natural objects in these cabinets in ways that reflected their worldviews, knowledge and wealth, prefiguring the development of modern museums.
Ahhh, collectors ... fetch me an elephant, a tiger, some natives, and five hundred square feet of Baroque artworks Jeeves.

Speaking of the Smithsonian:

    The remains of a man from Western Australia's far north have been returned by a major US institution, more than a century after their theft and removal.

    The repatriation is one of 14 from the Washington DC-based museum taking place in Aboriginal communities across the country, including Ngarrindjeri in South Australia and Eastern Maar in Victoria.

    Around 1,700 First Nations ancestors have been returned from overseas collecting institutions and private collections since 1990, including 139 from America.
Stolen remains of Yawuru Aboriginal man returned to WA from Smithsonian museum

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-12-07/first-nations-yawuru-...

The word "stolen" stood out to me - I thought maybe it was a bit over the top - so I went looking and found this: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/14/aboriginal-bon...

TL;DR: "Stolen" isn't the right word. It's way too polite.

People back then, including DaVinci stole bodies for study. I think Ben Franklin did similar. They did it out of curiosity and to learn. It was taboo, so they found ways around that that obviously today would be major crimes.

People today donate their bodies to science. Some people prefer for scavengers to recycle their bodies, even some westerners.

That’s to say, those were different times. People used to grind up mummies for different purposes as well. Grave robbing was a thing.

Also of interest on this topic is the episode "The Politics of Possession" from the series "Ways of Seeing."

https://youtube.com/watch?v=Z7wi8jd7aC4

I was reminded of the Irish Natural History museum, which is itself a Victorian (?) era relic, stuck in time, with it's wood and glass cabinets of natural "curiosities": https://www.museum.ie/en-IE/Museums/Natural-History/Visitor-...
If ever in Houston, Texas, I highly recommend the Houston Museum of Natural Science for, if nothing else, their Cabinet of Curiosities exhibit.

https://www.hmns.org/exhibits/morian-cabinet-of-curiosities/

Recommended: Los Angeles’ Museum of Jurassic Technology.
This was something that I learned, when watching one of the latest Connections[0] episodes.

Good show.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connections_(British_TV_series...

Off topic but... it's pretty cheap but, seriously, another subscription stream?
Yeah, I suspect “bundles” will become a new business model, if they can remove the corruption (good luck with that).

I find it to be a huge pain.

The problem, as with cable TV bundles, is you end up with one or two reasonably worthwhile channels of content and a bunch of cheap filler.
But everyone has a different "worthwhile channel", which makes the economics of the bundle make sense.
The first episode of the new "Connections" w James Burke has a cool look at one of these proto-museums.
been building my own cabinet of curiosity for a while now, which pieces from family history, great way to pass the cold winter