News & Updates

Notes on the donor record: what has been added, what has changed, and what the published listings show.

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What Is PatronView? This page started as our launch announcement in June 2025. It has been rewritten as a plain explanation of what PatronView is and how it works. GENERAL AUG 16, 2026 The Most Famous People in the PatronView Database PatronView tracks more than 1.1 million people who have given to museums, libraries, and cultural institutions across the country. Almost all of them are pri... GENERAL AUG 09, 2026 99% of My Website Traffic Is Bots If you're trying to steal my data: start here! I'll tell you exactly what firewall rules I have in place so you can work around them more easily. GENERAL AUG 07, 2026 Launching the Top 100 Museum Donors Ranking Personal note from Nick Gray: Hi everyone! We have been slow over the last two months to update the database and make changes, as my team has been focused on... SITE UPDATES JUN 09, 2026 Spring Cleaning and a Redesign It's been a busy few weeks. We've been cleaning up the PatronView database, adding new features, and giving the site a visual refresh. Here's what's new sinc... GENERAL MAR 25, 2026 Agnes Gund (1938–2025): PatronView's Most Documented Arts Patron Since her passing in September 2025, Agnes Gund has been remembered across the arts world -- in the New York Times, Artforum, Artnet, and The Art Newspaper. ... TOP MUSEUM DONORS MAR 02, 2026 Top Museum Donors in New York City: Who Supports the Arts New York has more major cultural institutions than any other American city. Keeping them funded takes a lot of donors. TOP MUSEUM DONORS MAR 02, 2026 New Institutions Added: February 2026 I probably sound like a broken record at this point, but yet again this is our biggest month yet. We added 197 new institutions to PatronView with a combined... NEW INSTITUTIONS FEB 28, 2026 Top Museum Donors in Chicago: Who Supports the Arts Chicago has one of the strongest cultural philanthropy ecosystems in the country. The Art Institute of Chicago draws some of the city's most dedicated indivi... TOP MUSEUM DONORS FEB 28, 2026 Top Museum Donors in Houston: Who Supports the Arts Houston has one of the most active philanthropic cultures in the country, and its arts and cultural institutions reflect that. The Menil Collection, Museum o... TOP MUSEUM DONORS FEB 26, 2026 Top Museum Donors in Boston: Who Supports the Arts Boston has one of the densest concentrations of cultural institutions in the country. The Museum of Fine Arts Boston, Boston Symphony Orchestra, ICA Boston, ... TOP MUSEUM DONORS FEB 24, 2026 Top Museum Donors in Philadelphia: Who Supports the Arts Philadelphia has a deep cultural infrastructure built on sustained private giving. The Philadelphia Museum of Art, Barnes Foundation, Academy of Natural Scie... TOP MUSEUM DONORS FEB 22, 2026 3 Million Contributions and a New Homepage We crossed 3 million contributions this week. The team celebrated and I had a little pizza party. It has been a long time coming and we're really happy to ha... SITE UPDATES FEB 19, 2026 Privacy Page, FAQ Sections, and Explore Other Patrons It's been a busy few weeks since our last update. We added almost 1,000,000 new contributions and over 150 new institutions. Here's what's new. SITE UPDATES FEB 03, 2026 New Institutions Added: January 2026 Our biggest month yet. We added 131 new institutions to PatronView with a combined total of 576,784 contributions. NEW INSTITUTIONS JAN 31, 2026 New Institutions Added: December 2025 This month we added 75 new institutions to PatronView with 366,248 contributions. NEW INSTITUTIONS DEC 31, 2025 New Charts, Page Redesigns, and an Honest SEO Mistake Hi! It’s been about a month since my last update in late November. Here’s what’s new. SITE UPDATES DEC 22, 2025 New Institutions Added: November 2025 OK, we’re on a roll now! This month we added 60 new institutions to PatronView with 512,387 contributions. NEW INSTITUTIONS NOV 30, 2025 New Footer, Related Patrons Algorithm, and SEO Improvements Hi! It’s been about a month since my last update in mid-October. The leaves are changing colors and falling here in Austin, Texas. SITE UPDATES NOV 23, 2025 New Institutions Added: October 2025 This month we added 35 new institutions to PatronView with 310,965 contributions. NEW INSTITUTIONS OCT 31, 2025 Brief Bios, Related Patrons, and Much Faster Search Hi! A bunch of new things since my last update in late September. I’m flying to NYC right now after attending Cloudflare Connect 2025 in Las Vegas. SITE UPDATES OCT 16, 2025 Basic Search, Patrons Leaderboard, Easy Removal, One-Time Donations Hi! It’s Saturday morning and I’m having a cup of coffee. We’ve spent the past 2 weeks trying to grow the database with soooo many new contribution records. ... SITE UPDATES SEP 27, 2025 Enhanced Patron Profiles, Fund Leaderboards, Quick Facts The past 10 days at PatronView have been fun. We’re reaching record-high traffic numbers now, perhaps thanks to my announcement on LinkedIn and talking about... SITE UPDATES SEP 12, 2025 Accessibility, Speed Boost, and Search Improvements Hi! Nick Gray here with another week of improvements to PatronView. SITE UPDATES SEP 02, 2025 Thumbnails, More Data, Tier Display Added Hi! Nick Gray here with an exciting week of updates. SITE UPDATES AUG 22, 2025 Updated Database Now Live Hi! Nick Gray here with a nice update. We’ve been working hard over the last six weeks to totally redesign our patron and donor database. GENERAL AUG 14, 2025 Swiss Minimalist Design: Museum-Quality Aesthetics I wanted PatronView to feel like browsing a world-class museum catalog. This meant moving beyond typical web design toward something more sophisticated and p... SITE UPDATES JUN 22, 2025 Database Performance: From Slow to Instant When PatronView started gaining traction, we hit a wall: our homepage was taking 3+ seconds to load. The culprit? Expensive COUNT(\) queries across our growi... SITE UPDATES JUN 21, 2025