I Have Seen the Future...

[kevin_standlee]

...of SF conventions and fandom, and it frightens me. Any of you who think I'm a lunatic for trying to do anything I can to drive down the cost of Worldcons and that $200 is a bargain for what it provides (I know it is, but how do you prove that to anyone who isn't already an insider), go look at this Journal and this one for a glimpse of what people really want.

Among the tidbits: regarding the local 400-person SF con, currently costing (Canadian)$50 at the door, one person in particular said that the most s/he would consider reasonable for an SF convention of that size would be $15, tops. Maybe $7.50 for a single day.

Here's another particularly depressing post:

Basing a convention around bringing people together to chat won't work anymore. It was fine in the eighties, but we have the Internet now. I can get together to "share my fandom" with people in Panama, Poughkeepsie, or Paraguay for, essentially, free.

I'm not sure where the "potluck" analogy came from, but I don't care for it. Not because it's not an apt simile for Con-Version's vision, because it is. Rather, because potlucks only succeed when every attendee does an equal amount of work. I don't want to do work in order to go to a con. If I wanted to do work, I would join the concom. I pay $50 to have work done FOR me. I give you money; you show me things.

I hate to sound like I'm grousing about the younger generation, but if this is really what the next generation of would-be fandom thinks, We Are Doomed.

Comments

[avt-tor.livejournal.com]

I don't think the Mercedes dealers worry much about how many Hyundais get sold down the block. I think fandom can grow at different points of the economic spectrum; I think growing fandom at the cheap end helps the more traditional "literary" fandom and vice versa.

Out here in Fairfax County, it was a really big story when George Mason University made it to the Final Four in the NCAA championship, and by "big story", I mean that a presidential assassination or the second coming of Jesus on game day would have been below the fold of the Washington Post. The actual game was held in Indianapolis. Seats ran from $600 for the cheap seats to $2500 for floor-level seats. I don't think I actually know anybody who could possibly care that much about college basketball (or basketball, or college sports), and yet they sell enough tickets to fill arenas.

I have been in restaurants where one can get a $3.99 combo meal, and I've been in restaurants with a $109 caviar appetizer. I don't see how one rules out the other.

I also know that most of the media gate shows aren't so cheap. You might pay $25 to get a ticket to see the dealer's room or sit somewhere in the auditorium, but add up this reception, that autograph, the other preferred seating, and people can end up spending hundreds of dollars at a media show (not counting what they buy in the dealer's room). And for sure I can tell you that the people spending $625 to go to see James Marsters somewhere are mostly under 35. In fact, one of the problems fan-run media conventions have that they didn't have ten years ago is that actors in the popular shows are a lot more expensive than they used to be (this is known among media conrunners as the "Buffy effect"). I don't see a generational correlation here; some people have always complained about pricing. What is clear is that people are willing to spend money on things they think are worth it.

It's not practical to grow local cons, or Worldcon, the size of DragonCon or San Diego Comic Con, any more than it would make sense to grow World Fantasy Con or Readercon to the size of Worldcon. I don't think it's necessary or even useful to try. What we can do is maintain links between fan groups and organizations, so that we can let people know what different kinds of events are available, and so that we can learn what works and doesn't work in different contexts.

Anybody who argues that conventions should be cheaper, I just invite them to show me a spreadsheet. Show me what expenses can be cut that won't affect membership levels, show me easy ways to increase membership revenue. Even from supposedly experienced conrunners, I often hear silence or nonsense.

I don't think this problem is insoluble by any means. Boskone begat Arisia; Minicon generated Convergence. Toronto Trek started in the '80s when members of the Ad Astra committee wanted to do something more media-oriented, and Anime North started in the '90s when members of the Toronto Trek committee wanted to do something more anime-oriented. Other conventions are undergoing organic evolutions from one category to another, or are splitting off other groups. It's all good. The only problem is when anybody thinks their own bailiwick is somehow the center of fandom, and that fandom as we know it will die if their own favorite convention fails or even changes.

Success is relative. I think FilkOntario got 120 members and it was considered wildly successful. I think Eeriecon gets about 200, and if it got another 50 it would be able to consider itself very successful. There was an anime con in the fall which everyone but the chair said might get 500 people; it got around 570. It was budgeted to break even at 2000 people, and it imploded messily on the Saturday afternoon of the convention.

What we need to do is build viable fan organizations. There is no one-size-fits-all definition of success. The only metric that makes sense is net income; if a convention breaks even or makes a surplus, it can be run again next year. If we can build viable organizations and keep them talking to each other, fandom will survive.