Paying to vote in the Hugos: why it has to happen, and why we should acknowledge that.

[seanan_mcguire]

All right: we're getting some semi-heated discussion about the idea of a "Voting Membership" for the Hugo Awards. This proposal assumes the following

Comments

[palatinate]

As has been commented on the earlier thread, the cost of Supporting Membership has just come down following a change to the Constitution. (Without getting into too much detail, you could only have the initial Attending rate as a certain multiplier of the Supporting, and as other changes made us need higher initial Attending rates, the Supporting was rising). Most of the Worldcon runners were uncomfortable with the drift from $40 (the standard a decade ago) up to $50 and then (for Texas this year) $60. We put that right and for 2014 and 2015 you can buy a Supporting membership - including Hugo voting and Packet if available - for $40 again. That's actually the same in real terms as the $25 we charged for Supporting in 1990, years before the Packet ever existed

[bookuniverse]

To what extent would lower copy-count on paper publications reduce ad revenue? This was the big thing I've heard as a reason NOT to make Program Books and such an optional thing: the people (publishers, other cons, etc.) buying the ad-space wanted their ads to go to the WHOLE membership. Example: if total WorldCon membership is 5,000 (attending and supporting), but publications are changed to be an "add-on" expense, they may only get half that number (or less) opting for paper. Would they have to lower ad rates if the ads were only going to 2,000 of those members?

[teroyks]

The publications would (as I've understood the proposed changes) still go to all members, just not necessarily on paper; those who choose electronic publications would still get the ads in them (at least I expect the content to be the same on both). In this way, a supporting membership with electronic publications is (IMO) better than just a voting membership without any publications.

[palatinate]

The understanding is that yes, ad rates would probably have to go down. Publishers and others will generally pay less for online and PDF ads than print ads.

Of course, we already have an "electronic vs. paper" choice on progress reports so we're only talking about the Program Book here. Typically the Program Book costs $20,000 - $25,000 to print for around 5,000 copies, and brings in around $20,000 in advertising. BUT then you have mailing costs as well, for supporters and no-shows.

If we made this change, we'd need to look at the overall budget impact on printing, advertising income, and mailing costs, and then we could look at how much we could reduce the rates by. My guess is that for supporters it might be $5. (Souvenir Book print & mail for one person is about $7 on average, from a rough calculation; reduce this a bit for the lost ads).

[geekhyena]

Maybe you can explain a few things to me,then, because I'm somewhat confused? I bought an attending membership for last year's Worldcon and had a blast. I bought a supporting membership for this year. I remember reading somewhere that because I was a member this year I get to vote next year too? Does that include a packet? Or am I misremembering things/misinterpreting things?

Also, I would totally opt out of paper stuff if had the chance, since I can't really afford to go to the con itself and I'd rather save a tree or two.

Either way, looking forward to continuing to support the Hugos! It's introduced me to so many great authors and I always really enjoy voting!

[palatinate]

Under the current constitution, if you have a full supporting or (YA or Adult) attending membership, you get to nominate 3 times and vote in the final ballot (and get the packet) once. The idea is that we have a broad pool of people nominating, but that the choice of the winners should really come from the current year's membership. (This goes right back to the definition of WSFS and the long history of the Hugos).

So if you supported LoneStarCon 3, you would have been able to nominate for the awards last year at Chicon; nominate, get the Packet and vote in the final ballot in Texas this year, and nominate again for the 2014 awards next Spring.

Hope that helps!

[seanan_mcguire]

Excellent comment.