The US/Australia thing is the result of the 1998 Westercon Business Meeting. Terry Frost was the Down Under Fan Fund delegate that year, and he was doing an extended tour that included Westercon. Because he was hanging around with me and cherylmmorgan, he ended up going to the Westercon Business Meeting. Just for laughs, he proposed adding Australia to the list of places where you could hold Westercon. The BM attendees, being whimsical at times, thought it was a good idea and started to adopt it. Ben Yalow, who was trying to be the Adult in the room, persuaded the members to include the "only if annexed" clause, which of course took all of the teeth out of it. The toothless provision was duly ratified.
A few years later, at a Westercon in Seattle, a member decided that Fun is Fun but Enough is Enough and moved to strike the Australia clause. To his dismay, other members voted to amend his proposal in such a way as to leave the Australia clause in place but take out the annexation clause. The net result was that the amended proposal (which would have roped Australia into the valid locations that could hold Westercon failed, leaving us with the current state of affairs. We thus have a provision that is never going to happen in practice, but that we also can't remove because the Business Meeting regulars will get silly.
In a sense, this is probably Australian fandom's payback for how the DUFF delegate the other direction, Jerry Kaufman, attended the Australian National SF Convention business meeting and presented a bid to hold the 1985 NatCon is Seattle. It won, there being at that time no provision to limit the Australian NatCon to Australia. In the end, the 1985 NatCon that most people attended was in Adelaide, the intervening NatCon having effectively invalidated the Seattle selection; however, as I understand it, Jerry held a panel at the 1985 Norwescon and declared it to be the 1985 Australian National Science Fiction Convention, SpawnCon.
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A few years later, at a Westercon in Seattle, a member decided that Fun is Fun but Enough is Enough and moved to strike the Australia clause. To his dismay, other members voted to amend his proposal in such a way as to leave the Australia clause in place but take out the annexation clause. The net result was that the amended proposal (which would have roped Australia into the valid locations that could hold Westercon failed, leaving us with the current state of affairs. We thus have a provision that is never going to happen in practice, but that we also can't remove because the Business Meeting regulars will get silly.
In a sense, this is probably Australian fandom's payback for how the DUFF delegate the other direction, Jerry Kaufman, attended the Australian National SF Convention business meeting and presented a bid to hold the 1985 NatCon is Seattle. It won, there being at that time no provision to limit the Australian NatCon to Australia. In the end, the 1985 NatCon that most people attended was in Adelaide, the intervening NatCon having effectively invalidated the Seattle selection; however, as I understand it, Jerry held a panel at the 1985 Norwescon and declared it to be the 1985 Australian National Science Fiction Convention, SpawnCon.
And people say SMOFS have no sense of humor!