Watching these threads pop up on pinside every month or so, my take away is any of the criticisms are fueled mostly from people's desires that the place live up to its name and the expectations it creates.

I don't think anyone would have much to say if it was called "Tim's Charity Arcade".

It always seemed to me if the business is donating hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to charity some of that could be reinvested into the business, with staff, techs, etc.

The place doesn't need to be Tim's personal hell.

Fine, every dollar "reinvested" is a dollar not donated to charity, but as a pinball owner, my basement is technically full of things that I could have otherwise donated to charity. Obviously I choose to donate to charities as I wish to, and spend money on myself as I wish to.

If we all judged every discretionary dollar as being taken away from charity, none of us would drive cars, own homes, etc, we'd all live in modest places with no luxuries, because if we don't we took that money from charity and we're now assholes.

Point is, there is a happy balance somewhere and I wish Tim could find his.

Is it thankless? He's a huge benefactor to the charities he supports. Plus I'm sure every day he's approached (annoyed) by pinheads who thank him for the place.

I've given the opinion that he should cut his hours and hire the support he needs. But he doesn't want to do that, he wants to donate every last dollar he can to charity - which is fine, but then accept that as his choice, not him being a martyr.

Instead of shutting it down, Tim should offer it up for sale. I think he even owns the building, so he could be the landlord to the new PHOF business owner.

Figure out the value of the business and contents of the building. Let his legacy live on, not just shut it down and burn it down.

Well, I'm pretty sure we can be confident that that will be the outcome. No reinvestment for the next 5 years, and then turn the lights off.

Another comment.... no one could run it the way HE does currently. No one would want to, because its nuts.

But can a PHOF run successfully in Vegas? Based on his coin drop, yes.

He's abandoning his charities anyways when he shuts the lights off, so don't put any sort of charitable clauses on the new owners. Let them run it as a business, hire the people it needs to succeed and let pinball live on.

Well, right now we're looking at a closure. So, wouldn't anything be better than that? Now, the place may very well close because that's what Tim wants. He doesn't want to sell it. He doesn't want anyone to even try to take it. He wants to close it because it is his and that is what he's going to do. In light of that, pretty hard to work through an alternate solution.

All I'm suggesting though is there probably are lots of potential solutions, if there was a will to make it happen.

I loved Vids quote from before: