Cons in the 21st Century
A post by Cheryl Morgan on dragging Worldcons into the new century not only got me thinking, but others as well. Stephanie Clarkson started a Ning to address the issue.
Cheryl mentioned Flycon, which I was a part of a couple of weekends ago. Flycon2009 was a lot of fun, but also, as are all volunteer efforts, far too much work for too few people. It wouldn't have happened at all had not eneit stayed up several nights running (despite full time plus labor during the day) in order to wrangle that schedule--with its attention to panelists' needs in different timezones--into first draft. I couldn't do it--my brain just doesn't do spread sheets. I stuttered to a stop after the image of "Maybe if I put up post-its on a wall, with colors for different, uh uh uh..." Once she had that crucial first draft, with gillpolack advising based on her experience with several Australian on-line cons, we got emergency (and phenomenal) rescue from seajules and bookaddict88 with roving IRC backup from thistleingrey, her two friends, and the generosity of SFF.NET.
Even so, with them here and a host of other generous volunteers pitching in from Australia to help, we had glitches--as is expected in an enterprise run by volunteers, off donated tech and space. Despite those, there was energy, fun, nifty discussions, and we got to hear from a bunch of writers who are test-driving new forms of publishing (check out Book View Cafe) and readers and writers over several continents got a chance to connect.
Here's my totally rhetorical question: how many of those who did spend time at Flycon and enjoyed it are newcomers to the idea of cons, and would they attend one if they could? Second question, how many veteran con goers would gladly give up cons if this sort of thing became a regular offering, with better tech and organization?
Or maybe I'm coming at the problem from the wrong direction. Cheryl mentions in her riff that the SMOFs are afraid that if an online track is added to Worldcons, people will choose to participate that way rather than traveling to the con.
My first reaction to that was, HAH! Irony, she is rich, you SF geeks acting like Luddites! After all, if I could afford to go to Worldcon, I would so be there. Even a glitch-free online con is no replacement for the fun of seeing favorite authors interacting, or the excitement of those corner-of-the-lounge conversations that start up and last until one has to run to the panel one has been looking forward to all weekend. Going out to a meal with friends and getting to talk books over food. Sitting at home banging away at my keyboard is no replacement for the zip of the casual encounter that blooms into idea-rich talk.
Well, maybe others don't find that experience as fun.
No, drop down a level. Here I am, admitting how much I get out of a con, yet do I make an effort proportional to myself at sixteen-through-twenty in order to get to one? When I was sixteen, and The Mythopoeic Society first started, I used to walk three miles carrying a bag of overnight stuff to the Sepulveda bus stop, because the local bus did not run on Saturdays. I left at nine or so a.m. Then I caught the Sepulveda bus, which took a couple of hours to get to downtown L.A. I'd get off at Spring, then walk about a quarter of a mile to Skid Row, to stand and wait for the bus that ran out to San Gabriel Valley. It was usually about 45 minutes, during which I often got hit on and harassed by some scary people, but I'd hang onto the bus pole as if it would protect me, and of course here I am. So then there's this two hour ride out to San Gabriel, after which there was another three or four mile walk north up Temple City Blvd to my grandmother's. I was in luck that my grandfather was willing to drive me to the meetings and pick me up, or I wouldn't have been able to go at all, as the buses did not run at night. I'd attend the meeting with likeminded people--oh I cannot express the intensity of the joy at finding them--after which I'd spend the night at my grandmother's, pack up my stuff, and reverse the whole thing, getting home after sunset and that three mile walk from Sepulveda to home, hungry and tired. After which I'd begin looking forward to the next. Oh. The bus money came out of my babysitting cash--fifty cents an hour, in those days. So there was no stopping to eat along the way.
So . . . would I make that much effort now? The truth is, I wouldn't. I'd go in a flash if there was actually ready money for trips--if there weren't things with respect to family depending on me. But when another one rolls around and yep, we're still broke, and there is this and that I have to do around here, I don't feel the sharp disappointment, almost desolation, that I did in the old days when I was too sick to make the trip one month, because I can so easily find interaction right here on the internet. It's not as fun as a con, but it's good enough. In the old days, there was nothing. Now, that's just no longer true. Nowadays we are flooded with interactive possibilities that address every aspect of our particular tastes in literature, art, film, TV, anime, manga, RPG, gaming, whatever.
So now I'm wondering if the SMOFs are busy trying to nail up a barn door after the horses who wanted other pastures have already left, to busily keep inside the ones who wouldn't run anyway. I do know that younger folks attend the sf cons, and they swarm at the comic and anime cons. Those latter cons are also doing all kinds of interesting interactive stuff. My own feeling is that Worldcon's organizers need to face the fact that the Net is a big part of our social lives, and if they don't want Worldcon to dwindle to a few hundred old folks yapping on about Heinlein and Clarke, they need to look at the net and see how it can be incorporated into the convention.
If you've made it this far in this ramble, what do you think?
Cheryl mentioned Flycon, which I was a part of a couple of weekends ago. Flycon2009 was a lot of fun, but also, as are all volunteer efforts, far too much work for too few people. It wouldn't have happened at all had not eneit stayed up several nights running (despite full time plus labor during the day) in order to wrangle that schedule--with its attention to panelists' needs in different timezones--into first draft. I couldn't do it--my brain just doesn't do spread sheets. I stuttered to a stop after the image of "Maybe if I put up post-its on a wall, with colors for different, uh uh uh..." Once she had that crucial first draft, with gillpolack advising based on her experience with several Australian on-line cons, we got emergency (and phenomenal) rescue from seajules and bookaddict88 with roving IRC backup from thistleingrey, her two friends, and the generosity of SFF.NET.
Even so, with them here and a host of other generous volunteers pitching in from Australia to help, we had glitches--as is expected in an enterprise run by volunteers, off donated tech and space. Despite those, there was energy, fun, nifty discussions, and we got to hear from a bunch of writers who are test-driving new forms of publishing (check out Book View Cafe) and readers and writers over several continents got a chance to connect.
Here's my totally rhetorical question: how many of those who did spend time at Flycon and enjoyed it are newcomers to the idea of cons, and would they attend one if they could? Second question, how many veteran con goers would gladly give up cons if this sort of thing became a regular offering, with better tech and organization?
Or maybe I'm coming at the problem from the wrong direction. Cheryl mentions in her riff that the SMOFs are afraid that if an online track is added to Worldcons, people will choose to participate that way rather than traveling to the con.
My first reaction to that was, HAH! Irony, she is rich, you SF geeks acting like Luddites! After all, if I could afford to go to Worldcon, I would so be there. Even a glitch-free online con is no replacement for the fun of seeing favorite authors interacting, or the excitement of those corner-of-the-lounge conversations that start up and last until one has to run to the panel one has been looking forward to all weekend. Going out to a meal with friends and getting to talk books over food. Sitting at home banging away at my keyboard is no replacement for the zip of the casual encounter that blooms into idea-rich talk.
Well, maybe others don't find that experience as fun.
No, drop down a level. Here I am, admitting how much I get out of a con, yet do I make an effort proportional to myself at sixteen-through-twenty in order to get to one? When I was sixteen, and The Mythopoeic Society first started, I used to walk three miles carrying a bag of overnight stuff to the Sepulveda bus stop, because the local bus did not run on Saturdays. I left at nine or so a.m. Then I caught the Sepulveda bus, which took a couple of hours to get to downtown L.A. I'd get off at Spring, then walk about a quarter of a mile to Skid Row, to stand and wait for the bus that ran out to San Gabriel Valley. It was usually about 45 minutes, during which I often got hit on and harassed by some scary people, but I'd hang onto the bus pole as if it would protect me, and of course here I am. So then there's this two hour ride out to San Gabriel, after which there was another three or four mile walk north up Temple City Blvd to my grandmother's. I was in luck that my grandfather was willing to drive me to the meetings and pick me up, or I wouldn't have been able to go at all, as the buses did not run at night. I'd attend the meeting with likeminded people--oh I cannot express the intensity of the joy at finding them--after which I'd spend the night at my grandmother's, pack up my stuff, and reverse the whole thing, getting home after sunset and that three mile walk from Sepulveda to home, hungry and tired. After which I'd begin looking forward to the next. Oh. The bus money came out of my babysitting cash--fifty cents an hour, in those days. So there was no stopping to eat along the way.
So . . . would I make that much effort now? The truth is, I wouldn't. I'd go in a flash if there was actually ready money for trips--if there weren't things with respect to family depending on me. But when another one rolls around and yep, we're still broke, and there is this and that I have to do around here, I don't feel the sharp disappointment, almost desolation, that I did in the old days when I was too sick to make the trip one month, because I can so easily find interaction right here on the internet. It's not as fun as a con, but it's good enough. In the old days, there was nothing. Now, that's just no longer true. Nowadays we are flooded with interactive possibilities that address every aspect of our particular tastes in literature, art, film, TV, anime, manga, RPG, gaming, whatever.
So now I'm wondering if the SMOFs are busy trying to nail up a barn door after the horses who wanted other pastures have already left, to busily keep inside the ones who wouldn't run anyway. I do know that younger folks attend the sf cons, and they swarm at the comic and anime cons. Those latter cons are also doing all kinds of interesting interactive stuff. My own feeling is that Worldcon's organizers need to face the fact that the Net is a big part of our social lives, and if they don't want Worldcon to dwindle to a few hundred old folks yapping on about Heinlein and Clarke, they need to look at the net and see how it can be incorporated into the convention.
If you've made it this far in this ramble, what do you think?