The semi-lost weekend.
I managed to get out to the IP for Con No Baka by about 9:40 yesterday, with plenty of time to pop into Tim Horton's for a coffee and chocolate chip muffin. Made my way up to the Dealers' Room, re-affixed the Gaylaxicon banner to the wall (I must remember to buy pins, because the vinyl is too heavy to be held up by duct tape - though the long banner never once came off the front of the table), and sat. The crowd, if one can call it that, didn't seem to be all that bigger than on Friday evening, but fortunately there was plenty of company as gurudata, Susan, assetic, Bonita, Declan, Stephen and rockgoddes all had shifts at the TT table, and Louise kept me company at the Gaylaxicon table for a few hours. People were stopping to chat, and they were taking flyers, though we didn't sell any memberships. We did sell four or five Pride bracelets, though. (Despite someone coming back five minutes after buying one and asking if she could return it. I guess she saw something else in the Dealers' Room that she wanted more, or she'd run out of money to go for lunch. The lack of spending money seems to be a common thing among anime fans.)
Around 6, I think it was, one of the convention's Security people came in and shouted for everyone's attention, and requested that one rep from each table come over. (Where did they find these Security people? This one was about half my age, and the guy with him was even younger. And it's just not right for 16-year-olds to be in my presence while wearing full military fatigues. That way lies trouble.) So I made my way over to represent both Gaylaxicon (as I was the only Gcon concom member there at that point) and TT (so that Stephen and Declan could continue to watch the table, and the Gcon table as well).
Despite the fact that everyone did go over and we were all within about 10 feet of him, he felt the need to continue to make his announcement using the bullhorn that he had brought in with him. I don't know what he was thinking. If what he had to say required us all to gather around, the bullhorn was completely inappropriate. Anyway, the upshot was that the convention was being shut down, and that everyone had until midnight to clear out of the Dealers' Room, which was being closed to the public at 8. The rumour that was going around was that the hotel saw how poor the attendance was and asked the con to pay the outstanding bill for the function space, and when they couldn't, the hotel shut them down. (Again, that's the rumour, not substantiated by any official announcement, but it's the only thing that really makes sense. I did hear that one of their guests of honour, Derwin Mak, left the convention earlier in the day, for whatever that's worth.)
Stephen offered me a ride home, so I decided that even though parts of the convention were going to continue into the evening, since the TT and Ad Astra panels only got two or three attendees, there wasn't really much point in sticking around until 10PM to do a panel on Gaylaxicon that I was scheduled for. Especially since we were scheduled opposite the dance, which they were going to be trying to hold despite the shutting down of the con.
It's a pity; while those of us who run conventions could see that this one was skirting the edge of disaster in the days and weeks leading up to it, nobody wants to see a fellow fan fail. The Con No Baka Chair isn't a bad guy - he just tried to do too much himself, and he really shouldn't have. Disorganization seemed to be the order of the weekend everywhere I looked, which is a hallmark of too much responsibility being vested in too small a group.
I'm told that the con wasn't well-publicized either, though perhaps as a conrunner myself, I didn't notice that as I did see them at other events. I'm not sure where they were publicizing the con, or where they should have been, but didn't.
Personally, I think that their biggest mistake made was to start out by trying to sprint right out of the starting gate. Unless a con has an enormous investment behind it right from the beginning and can afford to get multiple big-name guests to attract people, you're not going to get 10,000 people the way Anime North does. And again, there's the fact that anime fandom tends to skew younger, and not have a lot of disposable cash, and AN and CNA already exist here. Three cons might be too much for the anime community to support. I do know that a number of people were publicly discussing ghosting the con, which probably didn't help either (though I don't know if the number of ghosts would have made that much of a difference).
So, not having to get up early and dash out to the hotel today, I slept until about 1:45 (ten hours of sleep! woo-hoo!), went for coffee, and browsed in the bookstore (I didn't see anything I wanted, but dx4, you might want to pick up a copy of this month's Instinct magazine. Robert Gant is featured. And it seems he's single again. :P ) Now, I suppose I should make some dinner...
Around 6, I think it was, one of the convention's Security people came in and shouted for everyone's attention, and requested that one rep from each table come over. (Where did they find these Security people? This one was about half my age, and the guy with him was even younger. And it's just not right for 16-year-olds to be in my presence while wearing full military fatigues. That way lies trouble.) So I made my way over to represent both Gaylaxicon (as I was the only Gcon concom member there at that point) and TT (so that Stephen and Declan could continue to watch the table, and the Gcon table as well).
Despite the fact that everyone did go over and we were all within about 10 feet of him, he felt the need to continue to make his announcement using the bullhorn that he had brought in with him. I don't know what he was thinking. If what he had to say required us all to gather around, the bullhorn was completely inappropriate. Anyway, the upshot was that the convention was being shut down, and that everyone had until midnight to clear out of the Dealers' Room, which was being closed to the public at 8. The rumour that was going around was that the hotel saw how poor the attendance was and asked the con to pay the outstanding bill for the function space, and when they couldn't, the hotel shut them down. (Again, that's the rumour, not substantiated by any official announcement, but it's the only thing that really makes sense. I did hear that one of their guests of honour, Derwin Mak, left the convention earlier in the day, for whatever that's worth.)
Stephen offered me a ride home, so I decided that even though parts of the convention were going to continue into the evening, since the TT and Ad Astra panels only got two or three attendees, there wasn't really much point in sticking around until 10PM to do a panel on Gaylaxicon that I was scheduled for. Especially since we were scheduled opposite the dance, which they were going to be trying to hold despite the shutting down of the con.
It's a pity; while those of us who run conventions could see that this one was skirting the edge of disaster in the days and weeks leading up to it, nobody wants to see a fellow fan fail. The Con No Baka Chair isn't a bad guy - he just tried to do too much himself, and he really shouldn't have. Disorganization seemed to be the order of the weekend everywhere I looked, which is a hallmark of too much responsibility being vested in too small a group.
I'm told that the con wasn't well-publicized either, though perhaps as a conrunner myself, I didn't notice that as I did see them at other events. I'm not sure where they were publicizing the con, or where they should have been, but didn't.
Personally, I think that their biggest mistake made was to start out by trying to sprint right out of the starting gate. Unless a con has an enormous investment behind it right from the beginning and can afford to get multiple big-name guests to attract people, you're not going to get 10,000 people the way Anime North does. And again, there's the fact that anime fandom tends to skew younger, and not have a lot of disposable cash, and AN and CNA already exist here. Three cons might be too much for the anime community to support. I do know that a number of people were publicly discussing ghosting the con, which probably didn't help either (though I don't know if the number of ghosts would have made that much of a difference).
So, not having to get up early and dash out to the hotel today, I slept until about 1:45 (ten hours of sleep! woo-hoo!), went for coffee, and browsed in the bookstore (I didn't see anything I wanted, but dx4, you might want to pick up a copy of this month's Instinct magazine. Robert Gant is featured. And it seems he's single again. :P ) Now, I suppose I should make some dinner...