Another Spin on the How I Came to Fandom Story

I somehow failed to find out that MileHiCon, the regional science fiction convention in the city I've lived near all my life, existed until I was nearly 21 years old. I knew about the local Star Trek/media convention, I knew about gaming conventions, but somehow I had completely failed to find out about the local SF book convention even though I was a dedicated reader with 1,500 books in my collection at that time. I remember once in high school hearing about the Critter Crunch, a sort of small scale robot wars, second hand from a friend and I had ideas about checking that out but I didn't actually do it. Why? I didn't know I needed it.

What got me going to conventions initially was the stars of things like Star Trek: TNG. Going to see a star is an easy sell, or at least an easier sell, to a young fan. If I had somehow heard that Arthur C. Clarke was going to be at a local convention when I was a teen you bet I would have been there. But I cannot think of many other authors that would have had that star power to draw me in. And I would have had to have heard about it. I honestly did not know a thing about it until I got drawn in by a group of fans at the art show of a gaming convention. And I went to the gaming convention specifically looking to volunteer to make friends because I was horrendously lonely living on my own. I don't think it would have occurred to me had that not been the case. A volunteer ethos for conventions was not instilled in me by things like Starfest.

And given the way that many fans are so damn off putting when talking about fandom I'm not sure I would have stayed going to MileHiCon except that I had fallen into the orbit of the Denver Area SF Association and made one of my great friendships. Rose Beetem is the reason I am in fandom. Period. Without her I likely would have wandered away long ago.

To draw in new people star power is needed. Plus advertising. And I can think of only a few name in SF and fantasy with enough star power to draw in fans at any price. Much less the typical $200 at the door price of a Worldcon. Why would a fan shell out even $40 for some big important author that they're not a fan of? When I was a teen I would have gone to a convention (if I heard about it) if the author had been Piers Anthony, Michael Crichton, or maybe Stephen King. But MileHiCon actually had Sheri S. Tepper, Steven Brust, Emma Bull, Will Shetterly, George R.R. Martin Connie Willis, SP Somtow, and Ellen Datlow in my HS years. Not that they aren't great authors (or editors), but I'm only someone who knows who they are now after I've been in fandom for many years. The only one I might have heard of was George R.R. Martin in connection with Wild Cards. And I did not come across that metaphorical handbill when I was in high school.

I probably prefer the mix of authors that our convention actually has rather than going after the sort of thing that appealed to me as a teen and still appeals to teens today. But if you want young people you need someone they've heard of and to actually tell them. Having a webpage isn't enough because no one is searching for your convention if they don't already know that such a thing exists. And I'm not the right person to answer where young people go online when they're readers... Maybe conventions need to advertise on author's blogs? I don't know.

The Hugos No One Attends*

*For values of the people actually receiving the award.

Since I've never attended before and did not closely look at which authors were or were not attending the convention I thought I would see a number of authors picking up Hugo awards at the ceremony on Saturday night here in Denver. Not so and I've been given to understand this is not unusual.

In the case of both the fan awards and the dramatic presentation ones it is quite understandable. After all if you were in the movie or television biz it would mostly be a bit of a distraction from work. Meanwhile the fans are often too poor to jet off to wherever Worldcon is in a particular year so unless they're regular attendees of Worldcon or near by they're probably not going to show either. But the lack of authors at it is rather disheartening. This, much more than people talking about the graying of fandom or griping "What I liked didn't win, so the Hugos suck", shows there really is something wrong with the Hugo Awards. Authors can't even be bothered to show up when they're nominated and the odds on favorite to win the award. (I'm referring here to Michael Chabon not being there to pick up the Hugo given to for his novel The Yiddish Policemen's Union.)

By something wrong with the Hugos I mean that they're not really that important outside of the community of people who already go to Worldcon. They probably have as much value on the cover of a book as any other award (or even a made up one) rather than being something important to sales like the Oscars are to movie rentals and sales. And I don't know how this could be changed.

The usual suspect is the lack of new fresh faces at Worldcon, and I'm sure it could not hurt. Another problem is the size and profile of the World Science Fiction Society and the Hugo Awards themselves. Search for the Booker Prize or Hugo Award and you'll generally find about half as much mention of the Hugos on the net as the Booker. Assuming that the average SF reader is probably more internet savvy and likely to have a blog or webpage than the average reader of the type of literature that get the Booker that is not a good sign. So how could the Hugo be increased in profile?

I do not know.

I think that there would be more attention paid if there was more perceived value in voting or if the voters were higher profile about doing so. For example I think a few well respected and widely read bloggers writing about how and why they voted would do much to 'shine up' the award. Or if was more transparent about how and when to vote so that people who do not have the initial interest or ability to go to a World Science Fiction Convention would be blogging about it the same way they write about politics.

But this is obviously all speculation on my part. I have no hard numbers to point to that say that having more members of an online WSFS would make the Hugos more respected or not. But I would love to hear competing ideas or support.

I'll be cleaning and writing periodically for the rest of the day.
 

Google Doesn't Like Webcomicsnation.com?

So when I went to visit today's 'director's cut' of Narbonic I got the following message.

Reported Attack Site!
This web site at www.webcomicsnation.com has been reported as an attack site and has been blocked based on your security preferences.
Attack sites try to install programs that steal private information, use your computer to attack others, or damage your system.
Some attack sites intentionally distribute harmful software, but many are compromised without the knowledge or permission of their owners.

But when I go to look at the specific information about webcomicsnation it says,

Of the 11 pages we tested on the site over the past 90 days, 0 page(s) resulted in malicious software being downloaded and installed without user consent. The last time Google visited this site was on 07/15/2008, and suspicious content was never found on this site within the past 90 days.

Wha? So it's blocked because zero pages had evil/bad code? WTF? I'm sure that whoever is in charge at webcomicsnation is working on this, but anyone know what the heck is up?

Weather Commentary

It has been quite hot lately. Not weirdly hot, but in past years I remember more thunderstorms to take the edge off in the afternoons. Maybe I'm misremembering in this and I certainly do remember long sweltering stretches without a drop of rain. I note this because today it actually was a bit cooler. I think this is the most pleasant day we've had for about two weeks, but still no rain. I've yet to see a proper drown the frogs thunderstorm this summer here in my little corner of Denver.

Don't try to connect this up to global warming. A month's weather has a relationship to the global climate, but it is far too soon to say exactly what that relationship is yet. Though I would not be surprised if in retrospect this was part of a trend towards drier summers I would also be equally unsurprised if we got more thunderstorms rather than fewer. This would be due to the heat producing low pressure over the mountains that would draw in the monsoon flow over Colorado.

I'm just commenting that so far I'm disappointed. I want the monsoon flow to start to take the edge off this heat. It is certainly active down in Arizona. Searching for monsoon using Google news finds numerous stories about the start of the monsoon season including one about how the frogs emerging after storms are poisonous to pets.

A Question to Ask Conservatives

"Did IQs just drop sharply while I was away?" -Ripley in Aliens

She was pointing out that she'd never said the creature was from that planet when asking the quoted question of the company and government goons, but this is the sort of question that I would like to ask of most conservative commentators. Why? Because they never seem to 'get it'. Take for instance the recent 'gay controversy' over a Heinz commercial in Britain. Check it out on YouTube if you want to see what they're blathering about. My first comment is, "This is a gay commercial??" Seems pretty obvious to me that the joke, the premise, of this commercial is that it makes an average British housewife seem like a stereotypical NYC deli man. Don't you people get it? This is about as gay as another commercial I remember when some girl from Brooklyn started talking in a French accent because she ate some potato chip. IT'S A JOKE!

I particularly love how one of the conservative bloviators, AH Dowden on Blogcritics, used this whole thing as a jumping off point to change the subject on his own commentary about attacks on James Dobson. Not only is he wrong about what the commercial is about (I suspect he never watched what he's commenting on, surprise, surprise), but he's also trying to pull a logical fast one. Saying that Wayne Besen's commentary on Dobson is invalid because this other unrelated thing is 'fraudulent'. Ha!

I'd be willing to bet that most people would get this commercial if they saw it. They might laugh or ignore it, but they wouldn't start screaming, "OH my lord! Think of the Children! I don't want to have to explain the gay to my CHILDREN!" I used to be a conservative and I'm positive even I, a self hating homosexual who looked suspiciously at everything for possible gay content, would have shrugged my shoulders and wondered why everyone was so upset. So conservatives, did IQs just suddenly drop while I was away from the movement? Or did I just not see how stupid you all are while I was one of you? Or maybe you're just saying anything to try to score a point no matter how far fetched? Intellectual mad libs trying to fill in the outrage of the day with anything that might fit if you cross your eyes and squint at it.

(Oh and in case anyone is wondering I used the "nofollow" attribute in the link to Dowden so search engines won't think that I think that opinion should be promoted.)

Pointless Stories: Watermelon Disaster

Today it was exceptionally hot. Early in the morning all the windows and shades were closes up and late in the day I could not stand it and turned on the air conditioner for a while. I'm sure that it was at least 37 C today (98F) and with the merciless sunshine that is to be expected of summer. So this evening we had water as a snack and later with dinner, quite refreshing, but every time I cut a watermelon I am especially careful because I saw it go quite wrong once.

My family was at Great Sand Dunes National Park, though in those days it was only a national monument. We had a nice (if hot) day exploring the sands. We hiked up one of the lower peaks and decided that was enough, we were not going to go all the way in to climb the highest dune. Instead we returned to Medano Creek and played in the sand, all five of us. Mother, Father, Stefan, Christine, and myself. A bit of playing in the sand especially in the creek was followed by Christine returning to the fifth-wheel to cut up a watermelon.

Watermelons have a nice tough rind and she was probably working with a knife that was not exceptionally sharp so she gave it a really good push. Unfortunately her hand was in the way of the knife and she gave herself a severe cut. Nothing life or limb threatening, but enough to ruin her day and also the melon. Ever since then if possible I go after melons with a serrated knife so I can saw through instead of exposing myself to the sudden failure of the rind and the knife flying through what previously seemed quite tough.

Pulling the Arrow

When a person is shot with an arrow the wrong thing to do is just pull it out. Especially if done quickly it will do as much harm coming out as it did going in. Not to mention there is the possibility that, as with any impaling wound, the object will be preventing worse bleeding. I bring this up because it is my analogy for just pulling the funding on the Iraq war. It took months of preparation to get into this mess and it will take months to get out. Not to mention that I think the president is the sort of man who would strand the army to score a political point. I would be worried about thousands of American dead if funding were just cut off. The Democrats in congress do need to stand firm about having the power of the purse and get as much as they can, it is not only their right but their responsibility. But just cutting off funding is the same sort of ignorant idea that President George W. Bush is proud to advance.