Comment by eru
6 days ago
> By limiting the hours today, it helps make sure that the people who do see it are the ones most interested in seeing it.
We should auction off the visitor spots, then.
6 days ago
> By limiting the hours today, it helps make sure that the people who do see it are the ones most interested in seeing it.
We should auction off the visitor spots, then.
You joke, but visitor slots are limited. I missed it at the British Museum because I turned up without a reservation. Also, BM have two impressions and rotates them meaning that people can see "it" (actually one or the other) for longer. Some institutions like Boston have a handful of impressions so can show "it" more frequently: the last time they cycled three.
Similar to this, the Munch Museum in Oslo has three variations of "The Scream" on rotation, with only one of them shown each day [0]. So you're always guaranteed to be able to see it in some form, but you'll have go to multiple days if you want to see them all.
0: https://www.munch.no/en/The-Scream/where-can-i-see-the-screa...
Money is not a direct factor of who is interested the most so it is not necessary fair.
An example: my partner is working in a relatively expensive "wellness" service. Some people reserve and never show up even though they have reserved for a whole family and lose more than a thousand euros. I am pretty sure a lot of people that cannot afford this service at this price on a regular basis would if it was less expensive for them. I know I do as I only profit from it because I have a 50% discount and my partner doesn't have to pay so we pay a quarter of the price everytime we go together.
So making it an auction and you would still see a mix of interested people and vain but wealthy people for which paying for this would still be pocket change and would just take an "I've been there" selfie and move on without really being interested in the artwork itself. So more money for the museum but not necessarily representative of the interest of the visitors.
Oh, you just suggested your own fix: if people don't show up, you just keep their money (and presumably you let the next guy on the queue in earlier.)