Having had to follow Interaction online rather than be there, I decided very quickly that I should discount much of what was said by UK fans about the convention. There are a number of good reasons for this:
1. Much of UK fandom, especially the older segment, was dead set against having a Worldcon at all. These people will have gone to Glasgow expecting to hate every minute of the con. I'm not surprised that some of them did.
2. It was very clear that some of the commentary was being made by people who had either not been to a Worldcon at all or, if they had, did not have any practical experience of running one. One of the classic comments I saw was about how the program at Interaction was so much better than the Worldcon norm because it involved serious discussion of real issues, whereas at American conventions all that ever happens on panels is that a bunch of authors pimp their novels.
3. There are some cultural issues involved. Again a classic post was the guy who dismissed the entire Events concept, apparently on the grounds that it was morally wrong that some people should be up on a stage while the rest of the membership was relegated to being a mere audience. That's an extreme example, but I wouldn't be surprised to hear some British fans saying that award nominees should count themselves lucky to be there and not expect anything in the way of special treatment.
I suspect that criticism of this type is inevitable as long as Worldcon continues to hold to its laudable policy of going to the people rather than expecting them to come to it. I'm expecting a lot of complaints from American fans about Yokohama because it isn't what they are used to, and if I could read Japanese I'd expect to see a bunch of complaints from them about those weird Americans who do things so differently.
But the real issue from a conrunning perspective is the congnitive disconnect. By all accounts Events at Interaction were very successful. We know that was because of the hard work and attention to detail put in by the staff. When fans see that work being done they tend to dismiss it as stupid and unnecessary (as per the reaction to Kevin's "care and feeding of your Hugo" speech). They don't connect that hard work with the end result. Short of giving them actual practical experience, I'm not sure how to make them do so.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2006-07-09 12:50 pm (UTC)1. Much of UK fandom, especially the older segment, was dead set against having a Worldcon at all. These people will have gone to Glasgow expecting to hate every minute of the con. I'm not surprised that some of them did.
2. It was very clear that some of the commentary was being made by people who had either not been to a Worldcon at all or, if they had, did not have any practical experience of running one. One of the classic comments I saw was about how the program at Interaction was so much better than the Worldcon norm because it involved serious discussion of real issues, whereas at American conventions all that ever happens on panels is that a bunch of authors pimp their novels.
3. There are some cultural issues involved. Again a classic post was the guy who dismissed the entire Events concept, apparently on the grounds that it was morally wrong that some people should be up on a stage while the rest of the membership was relegated to being a mere audience. That's an extreme example, but I wouldn't be surprised to hear some British fans saying that award nominees should count themselves lucky to be there and not expect anything in the way of special treatment.
I suspect that criticism of this type is inevitable as long as Worldcon continues to hold to its laudable policy of going to the people rather than expecting them to come to it. I'm expecting a lot of complaints from American fans about Yokohama because it isn't what they are used to, and if I could read Japanese I'd expect to see a bunch of complaints from them about those weird Americans who do things so differently.
But the real issue from a conrunning perspective is the congnitive disconnect. By all accounts Events at Interaction were very successful. We know that was because of the hard work and attention to detail put in by the staff. When fans see that work being done they tend to dismiss it as stupid and unnecessary (as per the reaction to Kevin's "care and feeding of your Hugo" speech). They don't connect that hard work with the end result. Short of giving them actual practical experience, I'm not sure how to make them do so.