The Long Now Foundation

Timeline by topic

Topics follow the event kinds supplied in this index. Each entry links to its full record in the chronological timeline. Dates retain the precision supplied by the publisher.

Timeline

1. 1995Hillis publishes the Millennium Clock essaypublication

   Danny Hillis's essay — first in Wired's Scenarios issue — proposes a clock that ticks once a year for 10,000 years and records Eno naming it the Clock of the Long Now.

   [27][36]
2. 1996The Long Now Foundation establishedfoundedSan Francisco

   Brand and Hillis form a board of like-minded friends — Carlston, Saffo, Schwartz, Kelly, Hillis, Eno — taking their name from Eno's 'Long Now' proposal. Wikipedia records January 4, 1996; the foundation writes it 01996.

   [1][28][36][61]
3. 1997First clock prototype build beginsproject

   A team of engineers, mechanics, and designers led by Alexander Rose begins constructing the first Clock of the Long Now prototype in San Francisco.

   [36]
4. 1999-12-31Prototype clock ticks at the millenniummilestoneSan Francisco

   The first prototype ticked twice at midnight on New Year's Eve 01999 in San Francisco; it was later installed as the final exhibit in the Science Museum's Making the Modern World gallery.

   [36][4][62]
5. 2000Prototype installed at the Science Museum, LondonmilestoneLondon

   The clock prototype became the final exhibit in the Making the Modern World gallery, opened by Queen Elizabeth II in 2000.

   [36]
6. 2000Rosetta Project beginsproject

   The foundation launches its language archive — a parallel-text corpus and the micro-etched nickel Rosetta Disk intended as a very long-term backup of human languages.

   [11][1][25][63]
7. 2002Long Bets launchesproject

   The predictions arena opens: public long-horizon bets with philanthropic stakes, administered by the foundation.

   [12][1][64]
8. 2003Seminars About Long-term Thinking beginproject

   The monthly lecture series — SALT, later renamed Long Now Talks — begins its decades-long run.

   [5][61]
9. 2004-02Stewart Brand's TED talk on the Long Nowmedia

   Brand presents the foundation and the clock at TED2004, including the Nevada land story and the Walker/Kapor credit.

   [29]
10. 2004-03Rosetta Disk launches aboard ESA's Rosettamilestone

    The project's disk rode the European Space Agency's comet mission — a language archive literally leaving the planet.

    [51][31][19]
11. 2008-06Buffett's million-dollar Long Bet placedmilestone

    Buffett wagers that an S&P index fund will beat a basket of hedge funds over a decade — the bet that made Long Bets famous.

    [50][20][64]
12. 2008-09-09Anathem launch at the Regency BallroommediaSan Francisco

    Stephenson's clock-inspired novel launches as a Long Now talk before 900+ attendees; Brand and Hillis join on stage — the 'myth-making' method working in public.

    [22][17][58]
13. 2011-06Bezos-backed Texas clock goes publicfundingWest Texas

    Wired's feature and follow-on coverage disclose that Jeff Bezos is funding the full-scale clock inside a west Texas mountain — $42 million as Bezos stated it — with excavation underway.

    [32][41][40][48][37]
14. 2014-06-15The Interval opens at Fort MasonprojectFort Mason Center, San Francisco

    The foundation's public venue — bar, cafe, library, and salon space with clock artifacts and an Eno installation — opens after a year of construction and a crowdfunded 'brickstarter.'

    [16][52][53][54][55]
15. 2014-08Rosetta arrives at comet 67P carrying the diskmilestone

    Ten years after launch, the spacecraft — and the foundation's disk — reach the comet.

    [19][51]
16. 2017Buffett's Long Bet resolvesmilestone

    The decade-long bet ends with Buffett winning; the payout goes to Girls Inc. of Omaha — the most public proof of the Long Bets mechanism.

    [20][21][64]
17. 2018-02Texas installation footage releasedmilestone

    Bezos shares installation video; the foundation posts a 'major update' on the clock project — the most recent public milestone on the build.

    [42][15][49][44]
18. 2024-02The Interval still operating a decade onmilestone

    Axios's 'best bars' listing marks the venue's continued operation — the foundation's public face still open at Fort Mason.

    [56]

Themes

• Long-term thinking as the missionstatedphilosophy

  The foundation exists to stretch civilization's 'now' — to make decisions legible at century and millennium scales, as a corrective to a 'pathologically short attention span.'

  [1][28][36]
• Mechanism and mythstatedmethod

  Hillis's founding formulation — the clock must work as a machine and as a story. The projects are engineered artifacts whose real function is to generate durable cultural narratives.

  [27][36][24]
• Pace layersstatedphilosophy

  Brand's six-layer model of change — fashion, commerce, infrastructure, governance, culture, nature — is the foundation's analytical vocabulary, now also its print journal.

  [8][36]
• Stewardship of deep-time objectsreportedpractice

  The projects share a curatorial posture — a language archive, a mountain preserve of 4,000-year-old trees, a library for restarting civilization — collecting things that must be maintained, not merely made.

  [1][7][6][63]
• Named patronage over disclosed budgetsreportedpractice

  The pattern across projects: specific wealthy patrons attached to specific artifacts — Safra, Myhrvold, Bezos, Walker, Kapor — alongside a broad membership base; project-level accounting is not published.

  [4][29][32][9]
• The Long Now as cultural genrereportedinfluence

  The organization's clearest export is a frame others reuse — Anathem's clock-worlds, TED talks, 'long-term thinking' as a genre of public talk — influence measured in citation more than in artifact.

  [22][29][28]
• Caught inside the longtermism debatereportedbelief

  The foundation's billionaire patronage and monumental frame place it inside later debates over effective-altruist 'longtermism' and techno-elite futurism — a framing the coverage applies to it more than it claims.

  [38][39][46]

Works and projects

• Clock of the Long Nowprojectin_progress1996West Texas

  The monumental 10,000-year mechanical clock: a 01999 prototype now in the Science Museum, the Orrery, and the full-scale installation underway inside a west Texas mountain — with no announced completion date.

  [3][4][36][32][47]
• First clock prototypedesigncompleted1999Science Museum, London

  The 01999 prototype — ticked twice at the millennium, then installed as the final exhibit of the Making the Modern World gallery; funded by Jacqui Safra per the official FAQ.

  [36][4]
• The Orrery prototypedesigncompleted

  A smaller planetary-display clock prototype — funded by Nathan Myhrvold per the official FAQ — displayed at The Interval.

  [4][6]
• Rosetta Projectprojectongoing2000

  The language archive — parallel-text corpus, micro-etched nickel disk, wearable pendant — including the disk flown on ESA's comet mission.

  [11][25][51][45][57][63]
• PanLexprojectongoing

  The lexical-translation database operating as a foundation project — the computational continuation of the language-archive work.

  [13][1][61]
• Long Betsprojectongoing2002

  The public predictions arena — 'a forum for competitive predictions with philanthropic money at stake' — home of the Buffett/Protégé bet.

  [12][1][64][50]
• Long Now Talksprojectongoing2003

  The lecture series — formerly Seminars About Long-term Thinking — hundreds of recorded talks since 02003, distributed as podcasts and video.

  [5][9]
• The Interval at Long Nowprojectongoing2014-06-15Fort Mason Center, San Francisco

  The public venue — bar, cafe, library, event space — housing clock artifacts, the Orrery, the Manual for Civilization, and Eno's ambient installation.

  [16][6][10][52][53]
• Manual for Civilizationprojectongoing

  The library inside The Interval — a curated collection meant to sustain or rebuild civilization, grown with bookseller and library partners.

  [26][16][6]
• Nevada Bristlecone Preserveprojectongoing

  The foundation's two-mile strip of mountain land in eastern Nevada — habitat of ancient bristlecone pines and a candidate second clock site.

  [7][29]
• Long Viewerprojectcompleted

  The open-source timeline software the foundation published on GitHub — the codebase behind the Interval's deep-time displays.

  [23]
• Pace Layers (journal)otherongoing

  The foundation's print annual built on the pace-layers framework — members at the Tungsten tier and above receive copies.

  [8][9]

Appearances

• Jeff Bezos on the clock at WIRED25WIRED252018

  with Jeff Bezos

  Bezos discusses the clock and civilization-scale thinking at Wired's anniversary event.

  • article: https://www.wired.com/story/wired25-jeff-bezos-10000-year-clock-civilization/
  [39]
• How to Make a Clock Run for 10,000 YearsWired2011-06-23

  with Jeff Bezos, Danny Hillis

  Tweney's feature — the deepest reported account of the Texas build, the funding, and the engineering.

  • article: https://dylan.tweney.com/clock-10000-years/
  [32]
• ANATHEM Book Launch EventThe Regency Ballroom — Long Now Talks2008-09-09

  with Neal Stephenson, Stewart Brand, Danny Hillis, David Stutz

  The Anathem launch before 900+ attendees — the clock project turning into literary myth on stage.

  • audio: https://longnow.org/talks/02008-stephenson/
  [22]
• Stewart Brand: The Long NowTED20042004-02

  with Stewart Brand

  Brand's TED talk on the foundation, the clock, and the Nevada land.

  • video: https://www.ted.com/talks/stewart_brand_the_long_now
  [29]
• The Big Here and Long Now (essay)longnow.org2000-05-01

  with Brian Eno

  Eno's essay defining the 'Long Now' — and the page's 1996 founding-board photograph is itself key evidence.

  • article: https://longnow.org/ideas/the-big-here-and-long-now/
  [28]
• The Millennium Clock (essay)Wired Scenarios issue / longnow.org1995-02-15

  with Danny Hillis

  The founding essay — the organization's origin document in its founder's own words.

  • article: https://longnow.org/ideas/the-millennium-clock/
  [27]

Relations

• Stewart Brandfounded by1996 –

  Cofounder and president; the Whole Earth Catalog veteran who organized the founding board and remains the foundation's public voice.

  [1][2][36][61]
• Brian Enofounded by1996 –

  Cofounder; coined 'the Long Now,' named the Clock of the Long Now, and made the ambient installation inside The Interval.

  [1][28][36][16]
• Danny Hillisfounded by1996 –

  Cofounder; proposed the 10,000-year clock in his 01995 essay and designed it — 'the world's slowest computer' as atonement for building the fastest. Now board emeritus.

  [1][27][36][2]
• Stewart Brandmember1996 –

  Cofounder and current board member per the official board page.

  [2][28]
• Brian Enomember1996 –

  Cofounder and current board member per the official board page.

  [2][28]
• Danny Hillismember1996 –

  Cofounder; on the 1996 founding board and now listed as board emeritus — the board page gives no transition date.

  [2][28]
• Kevin Kellymember1996 –

  Founding-board member in the 1996 photograph caption and still a current board member.

  [2][28]
• Douglas Carlstonmember1996 –

  On the 1996 founding board per Eno's essay caption; now listed as board emeritus.

  [28][2]
• Paul Saffomember1996 –

  On the 1996 founding board per Eno's essay caption; now listed as board emeritus.

  [28][2]
• Peter Schwartzmember1996 –

  Founding-board member credited with proposing the ±10,000-year definition of the Long Now; now board emeritus.

  [28][36][2]
• Mick Costiganmember

  Chair of the Board of Directors per the official board page.

  [2]
• Danica Remymember

  Secretary of the Board of Directors per the official board page.

  [2]
• Joe Speichermember

  Treasurer of the Board of Directors per the official board page.

  [2]
• Patrick Collisonmember

  Stripe cofounder; current board member per the official board page. Indexed in this corpus as a person packet.

  [2]
• David Eaglemanmember

  Neuroscientist and writer; current board member per the official board page.

  [2]
• David Rumseymember

  Cartographer and digital-library founder; current board member per the official board page.

  [2]
• Chris Andersonmember

  Listed as board emeritus on the official board page.

  [2]
• Patrick Dowdmember

  Listed as board emeritus on the official board page.

  [2]
• Esther Dysonmember

  Listed as board emeritus on the official board page.

  [2]
• Ping Fumember

  Listed as board emeritus on the official board page.

  [2]
• Katherine Fultonmember

  Listed as board emeritus on the official board page.

  [2]
• Mitchell Kapormember

  Listed as board emeritus; also credited by Brand's TED talk with helping enable the Nevada land purchase.

  [2][29]
• Michael Kellermember

  Listed as board emeritus on the official board page.

  [2]
• Roger Kennedymember

  Listed as board emeritus on the official board page.

  [2]
• Kim Polesemember

  Listed as board emeritus on the official board page.

  [2]
• Alexander Rosemember1997 –

  Led the team that built the first prototype from 1997 and served as the foundation's long-serving executive director; now listed as board emeritus.

  [2][36]
• Lisa Kay Solomonmember

  Listed as board emeritus on the official board page.

  [2]
• Jeff Bezosfunded by2011 –

  Funding the full-scale Texas clock installation — the $42M figure is his own as reported; scoped to that project, not to the foundation generally.

  [4][32][41][46][44]
• Jacqui Safrafunded by

  Funded the first clock prototype, per the official clock FAQ — the Science Museum piece documents the prototype itself.

  [4][36]
• Nathan Myhrvoldfunded by

  Funded the Orrery prototype, per the official clock FAQ.

  [4]
• Jay Walkerfunded by

  Credited in Brand's TED talk with helping enable the Mount Washington, Nevada land purchase.

  [29]
• European Space Agencycollaborated2004 –

  Carried the foundation's Rosetta Disk on its comet mission — mission partner by cargo, not a formal organizational tie.

  [51][31][19]
• Science Museum, Londonother2000 –

  Hosts the first clock prototype in its Making the Modern World gallery; the 2011 Wired feature also reported a conditional agreement to host a clock in Washington pending a funder.

  [36][32]
• Neal Stephensoncollaborated

  Longtime friend of the foundation who contributed early clock ideas; his Anathem launched as a Long Now talk and embeds the clock in fiction.

  [22][17][18]

Indexed in

• Brian Enofounded1996 –

  Cofounder and founding board member of the clock-and-library foundation incorporated in 1996; still listed on its board.

  cited by the Brian Eno index

• Brian Enofounded · event1996 –

  Long Now Foundation founded

  cited by the Brian Eno index

• Stewart Brandfounded1996 –

  Co-founded the 10,000-year clock-and-library foundation with Danny Hillis in 1996; he serves as its president.

  cited by the Stewart Brand index

• Stewart Brandfounded · event1996 –

  Co-founded the Long Now Foundation

  cited by the Stewart Brand index

Claims

• factThe Long Now Foundation was established in 01996 — the foundation deliberately writes the year with five digits — in San Francisco. Wikipedia's record gives a formation date of January 4, 1996; it is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit with tax ID 68-0384748, headquartered at Fort Mason Center.[1][61][33][9]
• factThe foundation's about page names Stewart Brand, Danny Hillis, and Brian Eno as its founders; the 1996 founding-board photograph in Eno's 'Big Here and Long Now' essay adds Douglas Carlston, Paul Saffo, Peter Schwartz, and Kevin Kelly.[1][28][36]
• factThe name came from Brian Eno: 'The Long Now' extends the present moment's envelope, and the foundation's account credits futurist Peter Schwartz with proposing the long now mean the present plus or minus 10,000 years — about as long as the history of human technology.[36][28][27]
• factThe stated mission is to foster long-term thinking and responsibility — to make long-term thinking common, in Eno's phrasing — in the framework of the next 10,000 years, as a counterweight to what Brand called civilization's 'pathologically short attention span.'[1][28][36][9]
• factThe clock idea predates the foundation: Danny Hillis proposed 'a clock that ticks once a year' with a century hand and a millennial cuckoo in an essay dated February 15, 01995, first published in Wired's Scenarios issue — and records that Eno named it the Clock of the Long Now.[27][36]
• factThe first prototype — designed by Hillis and built by a San Francisco team led by Alexander Rose — ticked twice at midnight on New Year's Eve 01999 and was then moved to London, where it became the final exhibit in the Science Museum's Making the Modern World gallery. The official FAQ credits Jacqui Safra with funding this first clock.[36][4][62]
• factA full-scale clock is being installed inside a mountain in west Texas on land associated with Jeff Bezos, who told Wired in 2011 he had put up $42 million for it. Excavation began around 2011; installation footage surfaced in February 2018; no public completion date has ever been announced.[32][41][44][49][47][46][14]
• factThe official clock FAQ distinguishes three different funders of three different things: Jacqui Safra funded the first clock; Nathan Myhrvold funded the Orrery (a smaller planetary-display prototype); and Jeff Bezos is funding the full-scale Texas clock. Conflating them misstates the record.[4]
• factThe clock's design constraints per the museum and the foundation: maintainable with Bronze Age technology, improving over time, transparent enough that its principles can be worked out by inspection — a torsional pendulum driving a mechanical computer that updates solar position, lunar phase, and star field.[36][3][43]
• factThe foundation owns a two-mile-long strip of mountain land in eastern Nevada — home to ancient bristlecone pines, now presented as the Nevada Bristlecone Preserve and a candidate second clock site. In his TED talk Brand credited Jay Walker and Mitch Kapor with enabling the purchase.[7][29][36]
• factSince 02003 the foundation has run a lecture series — Seminars About Long-term Thinking (SALT), now Long Now Talks — that its donate page describes as featuring over 400 speakers, with recordings distributed as podcasts and videos.[5][9][61]
• factThe Interval at Long Now opened to the public on Sunday, June 15, 02014 at Fort Mason Center — a bar, cafe, and event space containing clock artifacts, Rosetta material, an ambient painting and sound installation by Brian Eno, and the Manual for Civilization library; part of the build-out was crowdfunded via a 'brickstarter' campaign.[16][6][10][52][53][54]
• factThe Manual for Civilization is the library inside The Interval — floor-to-ceiling shelves, more than a thousand volumes at opening, growing with partners like Borderlands Books and the Friends of the San Francisco Public Library — a curated collection for restarting or sustaining civilization.[16][26][6]
• factThe Rosetta Project is the foundation's language archive: a parallel-text corpus, a nickel Rosetta Disk micro-etched with thousands of pages, and a wearable version. A Rosetta Disk flew on ESA's Rosetta comet mission — launched 2004, arriving at comet 67P in 2014.[1][11][25][31][51][19][45][63]
• factPanLex — a lexical-translation database covering thousands of languages — operates as a project of the foundation, extending the Rosetta archive into a computational resource.[1][13][61]
• factLong Bets is the foundation's public arena for competitive long-horizon predictions with charitable stakes — the most famous being Warren Buffett's bet that an index fund would beat a portfolio of hedge funds over ten years, resolved in Buffett's favor with the payout going to Girls Inc. of Omaha.[1][12][50][20][21][64]
• factThe foundation writes years with five digits — 01996, 02014, 02026 — as a standing nudge against the implicit year-10,000 problem baked into four-digit dating; the convention runs through its site, talks numbering, and press materials.[1][16][22]
• factNeal Stephenson's 2008 novel Anathem — about a world where 10,000-year clocks are part of the civilizational fabric — was inspired partly by the clock project; its launch event ran as a Long Now talk at the Regency Ballroom on September 9, 02008 with over 900 attending.[22][17][18][58]
• factThe official board page lists current members Stewart Brand, Brian Eno, Mick Costigan, Danica Remy, Joe Speicher, Patrick Collison, David Eagleman, Kevin Kelly, and David Rumsey, plus a board-emeritus roster including Danny Hillis, Esther Dyson, Mitchell Kapor, Alexander Rose, Paul Saffo, and Peter Schwartz — with no tenure dates published.[2]
• factThe foundation is member-supported: tiers run from $12/month (Stainless Steel) to $1,000+/year (Bristlecone), donations are tax-deductible under EIN 68-0384748, and the donate page frames membership as funding Talks, the Interval, Nevada work, and 'the next generation' of projects.[9][33]
• factA decade after opening, The Interval was still operating and still being covered — Axios included it among San Francisco's best bars in February 2024.[56][10][6]
• stated beliefThe founding diagnosis: civilization is 'revving itself into a pathologically short attention span' (Brand, via the Science Museum's account) and needs a corrective 'mechanism or myth' that makes the long view — measured in centuries — imaginable.[36][28]
• stated beliefThe founders describe the clock less as a machine than as a myth and icon — 'both a mechanism and a myth' in Hillis's formulation; Brand's stated hope is that encountering it makes people ask what their own time horizon is.[36][27][29]
• stated beliefBrand's pace-layers framework — fashion, commerce, infrastructure, governance, culture, nature moving at different speeds — is presented by the foundation as the analytical frame for its projects: the fast layers innovate, the slow layers stabilize.[8][36]
• stated beliefEno's formulation of the ethic: extending the 'now' backward and forward 10,000 years makes disregard for descendants 'unacceptable — gauche, uncivilised' — an empathy extension comparable to historical widenings of moral concern.[28]
• patternThe flagship projects run on named patronage rather than disclosed budgets: Safra for the first clock, Myhrvold for the Orrery, Bezos for the Texas installation, Walker and Kapor for the Nevada land — a funding pattern the foundation states openly in its FAQ and talks without publishing project accounts.[4][29][32]
• patternThe board and funder lists overlap heavily with technology-industry figures — Collison, Kapor, Kelly, Myhrvold, Bezos — consistent with the foundation's position at the intersection of Silicon Valley wealth and long-horizon cultural projects.[2][4][37]
• patternAcross talks, essays, and the clock's own rhetoric, the foundation's method is myth-making: artifacts (a clock, a disk, a library) designed to generate stories durable enough to outlast their builders — Stephenson's Anathem is the clearest documented success of the method.[27][28][22][24]
• patternThe project attracts a standing critique — that a billionaire-funded monument is hubris or misdirected resources ('a waste of time,' per Wired's 2018 take) — which the foundation neither denies nor resolves; the index keeps the criticism in the record.[38][39][46]
• speculationWhether the Texas clock will ever be publicly 'finished' is unanswerable from the record: installation was 'underway' in 2018, Popular Mechanics in 2020 reported the same state, and no official completion target exists — the project's own framing treats incompletion as partly the point.[47][42][15][46]
• speculationThe concentration of the largest project on a single patron's land and funding implies a dependence the public record does not quantify — how completion would proceed without continued Bezos support is not documented anywhere.[4][32][47]

Sources

1. About — The Long Now FoundationThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

   The foundation's own about page: established 01996 by Stewart Brand, Danny Hillis, and Brian Eno; mission framed around long-term thinking for the next 10,000 years; links its projects (Clock, Rosetta, Talks, Ideas, Interval, Nevada).

2. Board — The Long Now FoundationThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

   The official board page: current board (Brand, Eno, Costigan, Remy, Speicher, Collison, Eagleman, Kelly, Rumsey) plus a board-emeritus list (Hillis, Anderson, Carlston, Dowd, Dyson, Fu, Fulton, Kapor, Keller, Kennedy, Polese, Rose, Saffo, Schwartz, Solomon). No tenure dates given.

3. The 10,000 Year Clock — project pageThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

   The foundation's project page for the monumental-scale clock: design principles and the mountain site.

4. Clock of the Long Now — FAQThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

   The official FAQ is the key funding source: Jacqui Safra funded the first clock, Nathan Myhrvold funded the Orrery prototype, and Jeff Bezos is funding the full-scale clock in west Texas — three distinct funders of three distinct things.

5. Long Now TalksThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

   Archive of the lecture series — Seminars About Long-term Thinking (SALT), now Long Now Talks — hundreds of recorded talks back to 02003.

6. The Interval at Long NowThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

   The foundation's page for its Fort Mason venue: bar, cafe, library, and event space built as a 'home for long-term thinking.'

7. Nevada Bristlecone PreserveThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

   The foundation's page for its eastern Nevada mountain land — home of ancient bristlecone pines and a candidate second clock site.

8. Pace LayersThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

   The foundation's page for Stewart Brand's pace-layers framework — fashion, commerce, infrastructure, governance, culture, nature — now also a print journal.

9. Donate / Join — The Long Now FoundationThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

   Membership tiers (Stainless Steel $12/mo, Monel $30/mo, Tungsten $80/mo, Bristlecone $1,000+/yr) and what donations support; confirms 501(c)(3) status and tax ID 68-0384748.

10. The Interval at Long NowThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The venue's own site — hours, menus, and event listings for the Fort Mason space.

11. The Rosetta ProjectThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The language archive's own site, run by the foundation.

12. Long BetsThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The predictions arena's own site — 'a service of the Long Now Foundation' — listing bets, predictions, and rules.

13. PanLexThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The PanLex project's own site — the lexical-translation database operating under the foundation.

14. Clock in the MountainThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The foundation's own account of the west Texas mountain site and the full-scale clock installation.

15. Major Update on the 10,000 Year Clock ProjectThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The foundation's 02018 update on the Texas installation — machining progress and the state of the project.

16. The Interval at Long Now Opens June 15th and TheInterval.org is liveThe Long Now Foundation · 2014 · subject controlled · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Opening announcement: The Interval opened Sunday June 15, 02014 at Fort Mason with clock artifacts, an Eno ambient painting, and a then-1,000+ volume Manual for Civilization.

17. Anathem and Long NowThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The foundation's account of the connections between Neal Stephenson's Anathem and the clock project.

18. Neal Stephenson and the 10,000 Year ClockThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The foundation's note on Stephenson's long association with the project and his visits to both clock sites.

19. After more than a decade, ESA's Rosetta mission arrives at comet 67PThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The foundation's own post on the Rosetta spacecraft's arrival carrying the Rosetta Disk — a project of the foundation flown on an ESA mission.

20. Warren Buffett wins million-dollar Long BetThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The foundation's write-up of the resolution of Buffett's famous bet against hedge funds, settled through its Long Bets platform.

21. How Warren Buffett won his multi-million dollar Long BetThe Long Now Foundation · subject controlled · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The foundation's second write-up on the Buffett–Protégé Partners bet and the payout to Girls Inc. of Omaha.

22. Neal Stephenson — ANATHEM Book Launch EventThe Long Now Foundation · 2008 · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Talk page for the Anathem launch at the Regency Ballroom, September 9, 02008 — over 900 attending; Brand and Hillis joined Stephenson on stage.

23. longnow/longview — Long Viewer sourceGitHub · subject controlled · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The foundation's own repository for the Long Viewer timeline software — the codebase behind the Interval's timeline displays.

24. Michael Chabon — The Omega GloryThe Long Now Foundation · 2006 · subject controlled · pdf · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Chabon's essay on the Clock of the Long Now, hosted on the foundation's media server.

25. A Very Long-Term Backup — Rosetta Project blogThe Rosetta Project (Long Now Foundation) · 2008 · subject controlled · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The project's own blog describing the Rosetta Disk as a very long-term backup of human languages.

26. Books for a library to sustain civilizationThe Long Now Foundation (Medium) · 2018 · subject controlled · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The foundation's Medium post on the Manual for Civilization library's scope and selection process.

27. The Millennium ClockThe Long Now Foundation · 1995 · first person · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Hillis's founding essay — 'a clock that ticks once a year... the cuckoo comes out on the millennium' — first published in Wired's 01995 Scenarios issue. Records that Eno named the Clock of the Long Now.

28. The Big Here and Long NowThe Long Now Foundation · 2000 · first person · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Eno's essay naming the 'Long Now' idea — and its page carries the 1996 founding-board photograph caption: Carlston, Saffo, Schwartz, Brand, Kelly, Hillis, Eno.

29. Stewart Brand: The Long Now — TED2004TED · 2004 · first person · video · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Brand's TED talk on the foundation and the clock — including the Nevada land account crediting Jay Walker and Mitch Kapor with enabling the Mount Washington purchase.

30. About — legacy.longnow.orgThe Long Now Foundation · archive · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The foundation's frozen legacy about page — an earlier self-description preserved for comparison with the current site.

31. Rosetta Mission — 10k Library archiveThe Long Now Foundation (archive) · archive · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Archived early-2000s page on the Rosetta mission carrying the foundation's language disk.

32. How to Make a Clock Run for 10,000 YearsWired (author's repost) · 2011 · archive · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The author's own archive of his June 2011 Wired feature: the $42M figure attributed to Bezos himself, the excavation timeline, and the Smithsonian's conditional agreement to host a clock.

33. The Long Now Foundation — ProPublica Nonprofit ExplorerProPublica · primary record · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    IRS Form 990 records for EIN 68-0384748 — revenue, officers, and filing history for the nonprofit.

34. Long Now Foundation — Charity Navigator profileCharity Navigator · primary record · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Charity evaluator profile for EIN 68-0384748.

35. Long Now Foundation — Library of Congress authority recordLibrary of Congress · primary record · webpage · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Name authority record n99262976 — bibliographic existence proof for the foundation.

36. The Clock of the Long NowScience Museum (blog) · 2013 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The museum's curator of time on the prototype in its Making the Modern World gallery: first ticked NYE 01999, built 1997–99 by a team led by Alexander Rose, Eno named the 'Long Now,' Schwartz proposed ±10,000 years.

37. Jeff Bezos, CEO of the internetWired · 2011 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Bezos profile that includes his funding of the 10,000-year clock and the thinking behind it.

38. The 10,000-Year Clock Is a Waste of TimeWired · 2018 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    A critical take on the clock's premise — kept in the catalog as evidence of dissent, not adjudicated.

39. WIRED25: Jeff Bezos on the 10,000-year clock and civilizationWired · 2018 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Bezos on the clock and long-term thinking at Wired's 25th-anniversary event.

40. Why Jeff Bezos is helping create a 10,000-year clockGeekWire · 2011 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Contemporaneous report on the funding announcement.

41. Jeff Bezos celebrates long-term thinking, budgets $42M for clock that ticks for 10,000 yearsGeekWire · 2011 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    The $42 million figure as reported — a budget Bezos stated, not an audited spend.

42. Video: Jeff Bezos shows installation of 10,000-year clock ticking along in TexasGeekWire · 2018 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Report on the February 2018 installation footage.

43. Engineering the 10,000-Year ClockIEEE Spectrum · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Engineering treatment of the clock's design — the torsional pendulum, mechanical computer, and maintainability constraints.

44. Funded by Jeff Bezos, construction underway on clock that will keep time for 10,000 yearsSmithsonian Magazine · 2018 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Smart News coverage of the installation's progress.

45. This necklace contains all the world's languagesSmithsonian Magazine · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Coverage of the wearable Rosetta Disk — the project's language archive miniaturized as an artifact.

46. Is Jeff Bezos funding a 10,000-year clock?Snopes · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Fact-check confirming the funding story while clarifying what's actually documented.

47. Jeff Bezos' 10,000-year clock in a Texas mountainPopular Mechanics · 2020 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Later coverage of the installation — useful for how little completion information exists publicly.

48. Jeff Bezos is building a 10,000-year clockBusiness Insider · 2011 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Business-press coverage of the funding announcement.

49. Installation progresses on Bezos-backed 10,000-year clockNPR · 2018 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    NPR's report on the 2018 installation milestone.

50. Warren Buffett's $1 million wager: Wall Street experts can't beat the S&PCNBC · 2008 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Contemporaneous coverage of the Buffett–Protégé Partners bet administered by Long Bets.

51. Rosetta Disk goes back to the futureEuropean Space Agency · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    ESA's own page on carrying the Long Now Rosetta Disk on the comet mission — third-party confirmation from the mission operator.

52. Long Now Foundation opens the Interval cafe-barSan Francisco Chronicle · 2014 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Local coverage of the venue's opening at Fort Mason.

53. A robot bartender for the IntervalThe New York Times (T Magazine blog archive) · 2014 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    T Magazine's archived blog post on the Interval's opening — Eno's sound/light installation and the bar concept.

54. Salon for long-term thinking opens at Fort Mason CenterCBS News San Francisco · 2014 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Local TV coverage of the Interval's opening week.

55. The Interval at Long Now FoundationSprudge · 2014 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Coffee-trade coverage of the venue — Sightglass service and the space's design.

56. The Interval among San Francisco's best barsAxios · 2024 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    A decade on, the venue still operating and still being written up — evidence of continuity.

57. This necklace contains all languages known to manQuartz · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Quartz coverage of the wearable Rosetta Disk.

58. The 10,000-year-old clock that inspired Neal StephensonGizmodo · 2008 · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Contemporaneous coverage tying Anathem's release to the clock project.

59. Jeff Bezos and the 10,000-year clockMashable · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Additional press on the Bezos-backed clock story.

60. Long Now Foundation 10,000-year clock installationLaughing Squid · reporting · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Culture-blog coverage of the installation footage.

61. Long Now FoundationWikipedia · reference · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Reference summary: formed January 4, 1996; 501(c)(3) tax ID 68-0384748; headquarters at Fort Mason Center, San Francisco; founders Brand, Hillis, Eno.

62. Clock of the Long NowWikipedia · reference · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Reference on the clock project's history and design.

63. Rosetta ProjectWikipedia · reference · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Reference on the language-archive project.

64. Long BetsWikipedia · reference · article · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Reference on the predictions arena.

65. The Long Now Foundation (Q568907)Wikidata · reference · dataset · accessed 2026-10-05T08:12:00Z

    Wikidata item for the foundation.

Coverage and method

Scope as of

2026-10-05T08:30:00Z

Coverage supplied by the publisher

• history
• projects
• people
• funding
• membership
• media

Method

public-person-index-v1

Tool

soulscrape

Contributors

• Soulscrape research workflow

Assembled

2026-10-05T08:30:00Z

Human review

No review status or review date is supplied. An assembly timestamp does not establish human review.

Open questions

See the supplied open questions

Open questions

• The Texas clock has no announced completion date or opening plan: installation was documented as underway in 2018 and 'in progress' by 2020 coverage, and the foundation has never published a schedule — whether the current decade sees public access is unknown.
• The funding split between member dues, general donations, and named patrons is undisclosed: the FAQ names project funders (Safra, Myhrvold, Bezos) but no project budgets or total contributions are published, and the 990s do not itemize by project.
• Board tenure and transitions are undocumented: the board page lists current and emeritus members without dates, so member edges here carry no start/end except the 1996 founding board.
• The operational status and maintenance plan for PanLex and the Rosetta archive are not detailed publicly; whether they are actively developed or held in maintenance is unclear.
• Whether the Nevada site will ever host a second clock — and who would fund it — is unaddressed; the 2011 Wired piece notes a Smithsonian agreement contingent on finding a funder, with no later status update.
• Executive leadership history is thinly documented in public sources: Alexander Rose's long executive-director tenure is described indirectly, and the current staff list is not reproduced in this index.
• The relationship between the foundation and Jeff Bezos beyond the clock — land terms, ongoing obligations, governance — is not public; press coverage relies on the $42M figure Bezos himself stated.