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Oct. 8th, 2007 12:41 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
drewkittyAttended. Helped out some. Wish I could have done more, but my back is still healing from something I must have done to it last month. Wish I had a good story to go with it.
AFPA (American Fannish Politics Association) requires me to provide this warning: "No fannish politics was involved in the making of this con report. All snark, flames and gossip was monitored to ensure that it met AFPA standards."
Programming was badly broken. The "Alternative Lifestyles" panel on Friday night was announced but not given a location (!). Tracks were poorly organized and had large gaps. Some function rooms sat empty, which testifies to a horrible waste of the convention's resources. Despite the large number of guests, many seemed to have only one or two panels. The readings were put in the Foyer (i.e. next to Registration), which made it nearly impossible to hear them -- especially the early ones without a microphone. I hear informally that Tech worked several miracles to solve last-minute crises.
I decided to skip the Hiss 'n Purr. Otherwise I might have said my next comment in my outside voice.
The pocket program guide was typed up at the last possible second by a drunken monkey.
At least, that's the best explanation I can think of, as others are less flattering. It didn't even use table layout, let alone present which function spaces were in use. Only fannish familiarity with this particular hotel averted complete chaos.
No name cards were provided to panelists, the one program ops person I saw was horribly over-worked and running to and fro (never a good sign), and apparently expectations as to panel start and end times were not clearly defined to moderators. I hasten to add that I was not a panelist -- but I feel that I dodged a bullet.
I'm not minimizing the difficulty of doing good programming. It takes a lot of pre-planning and hard work to gather topics, plan space utilization, line up intriguing guests, and do the cat-herding that often results. But as a grading scale, I'd have to give Silicon's programming a C- or a D+, with the break depending on how much drama was going on behind the scenes. (If drama was causing the issues, D+ . . . if it was a last-minute scrape together, C-.)
Art show was tiny but OK. The museum of props was a great touch and good work. Major shout-out to "Ariel's Ambulance" which was a neat project and well done. I heard differing things about filking. I talked to one severely pissed-off dealer who did not break even, but there was a dealer's room and I didn't hear much screaming.
Parties were good, full of conversation. I ran into a bunch of nifty people who are cordially invited to get in touch with me if my life gets crazy and I don't contact them first.
One of the all-too-infrequent newsletters made a huge deal out of the fact that Women of Faith were staying in the hotel (they had a big to-do at HP Pavilion) and would we please stop being rude to the mundanes?
First of all, they're not mundanes, they're psychotic religious fanatics.
Second, I saw several of them start confrontations by pointedly objecting to a Silicon member's choice of apparel, buttons and/or private conversation topic. If they lost because we know the Bible better than they do, who is to blame? They also picked at least one confrontation with regular attendees of ClubMax. If they truly believe in "Love your neighbor as yourself," they've got to be a pack of masochists. *shudder*
AFPA (American Fannish Politics Association) requires me to provide this warning: "No fannish politics was involved in the making of this con report. All snark, flames and gossip was monitored to ensure that it met AFPA standards."
Programming was badly broken. The "Alternative Lifestyles" panel on Friday night was announced but not given a location (!). Tracks were poorly organized and had large gaps. Some function rooms sat empty, which testifies to a horrible waste of the convention's resources. Despite the large number of guests, many seemed to have only one or two panels. The readings were put in the Foyer (i.e. next to Registration), which made it nearly impossible to hear them -- especially the early ones without a microphone. I hear informally that Tech worked several miracles to solve last-minute crises.
I decided to skip the Hiss 'n Purr. Otherwise I might have said my next comment in my outside voice.
The pocket program guide was typed up at the last possible second by a drunken monkey.
At least, that's the best explanation I can think of, as others are less flattering. It didn't even use table layout, let alone present which function spaces were in use. Only fannish familiarity with this particular hotel averted complete chaos.
No name cards were provided to panelists, the one program ops person I saw was horribly over-worked and running to and fro (never a good sign), and apparently expectations as to panel start and end times were not clearly defined to moderators. I hasten to add that I was not a panelist -- but I feel that I dodged a bullet.
I'm not minimizing the difficulty of doing good programming. It takes a lot of pre-planning and hard work to gather topics, plan space utilization, line up intriguing guests, and do the cat-herding that often results. But as a grading scale, I'd have to give Silicon's programming a C- or a D+, with the break depending on how much drama was going on behind the scenes. (If drama was causing the issues, D+ . . . if it was a last-minute scrape together, C-.)
Art show was tiny but OK. The museum of props was a great touch and good work. Major shout-out to "Ariel's Ambulance" which was a neat project and well done. I heard differing things about filking. I talked to one severely pissed-off dealer who did not break even, but there was a dealer's room and I didn't hear much screaming.
Parties were good, full of conversation. I ran into a bunch of nifty people who are cordially invited to get in touch with me if my life gets crazy and I don't contact them first.
One of the all-too-infrequent newsletters made a huge deal out of the fact that Women of Faith were staying in the hotel (they had a big to-do at HP Pavilion) and would we please stop being rude to the mundanes?
First of all, they're not mundanes, they're psychotic religious fanatics.
Second, I saw several of them start confrontations by pointedly objecting to a Silicon member's choice of apparel, buttons and/or private conversation topic. If they lost because we know the Bible better than they do, who is to blame? They also picked at least one confrontation with regular attendees of ClubMax. If they truly believe in "Love your neighbor as yourself," they've got to be a pack of masochists. *shudder*
no subject
Date: 2007-10-08 04:04 pm (UTC)It was my understanding that rather than a project, this was the actual vehicle used in Firefly, found in a yard in Nevada and purchased for a (comparative) song. Nonetheless, it was most excellent to see it here.
WRT the Women of Faith, that was brought up at the H&P, and one of the co-chairs acknowledged that they were trying to start trouble for us, as well (someone apparently called hotel security to complain about a game of beer-bottle bowling taking place in a hallway - which, of course, had never existed). I find it both telling and troublesome that, despite the plea that appeared in the newsletter (and you've seen my commentary on that particular subject), the other co-chair had no knowledge of the article, or the incidents that prompted it.