That's disappointing. I liked to believe it would remain an example of a good museum after other places followed this trend. But on the west coast, I've had no reason to visit the Smithsonian in many decades.

I'm still unsure whether changes I see are all about the facility or partially about my changed perspective. I visited the Monterey Bay Aquarium and the La Brea Tar Pits in the past decade, and I found neither of them stands up to my memory of them from 1980s school field trips.