My Ears Are Burning

[kevin_standlee]

This is, I'm afraid, going to be one of those enigmatic postings where, unless you have all of the rest of the pieces, you won't know what's going on. And there is always the possibility that I'm reading more into something I read today than I should, and seeing myself in something aimed at someone else.

People keep asking me, "When is the Bay Area going to hold another Worldcon?" I keep answering, truthfully, variations of, "I don't think it should until the local environment becomes less toxic."* I don't see a lot of things that make me think the necessary changes have happened yet. Oh, maybe some of them, but the toxic elements are still there. (Incidentally, I don't see anyone else emerging who seems interested in drowning himself in personal debt to do the necessary work. The previous two Bay Area Worldcons came near to financially ruining me and at least one other person. Anyone else want to try carrying that anvil into the swimming pool?)

When I co-chaired ConJose, I managed to antagonize a whole lot of people, most of them local to the Bay Area. I think that in a whole bunch of individuals' cases, I had the choice of being liked or of getting the convention done. We couldn't have done it both ways. I put the convention first, and I'm better aware of the consequences than certain people think. While I'm flattered at the respect I've received in worldwide conrunning circles, I also know that I'm all but persona non grata in a number of local circles. As someone who wants to be liked, it hurts me more than you'll ever know that the price of getting the convention done was the friendship of those people.

Here's a quote from the penultimate issue of Emerald City:

There is, of course, a matter of committee culture here. Interaction’s staff were very good at cross-departmental communication, at least the divisional level which is where I worked. I recall from ConJosé that attempts to comment on what another department was doing were often greeted with fury by the people responsible for that department.

I think that's a fair assessment. Had I taken the choice of "not hurting people's feelings," while trying to manage ConJose, then fairly significant pieces of the convention wouldn't have happened at all, or else they would have happened much less well than they did. As it was, it was a pretty near thing, and I'll go to my grave frustrated over the things that went wrong or at least went very mediocre as far as I'm concerned.

I'm not saying we couldn't have another Worldcon in the Bay Area, or that it couldn't be well run. But I think it would have to rely upon "outsiders" -- people not part of the regular Bay Area conrunning circles -- even more so than the previous two did. The only other way to avoid the toxicity that I can see would be to try for one of the existing conventions to try running on their existing management structure, rejecting any outside involvement and just trying to run things at Worldcon scale out of their own resources. Neither alternative sounds very attractive to me.
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*I realize that this doesn't really answer the question posed. Another indirect answer is, "I know when I'd bid and what I'd do to maximize my chances of winning another bid sometime before 2020." To anyone with an understanding of fannish politics, I should think the answer is pretty obvious, and I leave it as an exercise for the student.

Comments

[yourbob.livejournal.com]

The proper response to the question is - "Whenever you do it. I've done mine."

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

I've sometimes responded to that question with, "What, are you bidding?" Of course, everyone answers that question with, "No!" In fact, what most of them asking the question really mean is, "When are you going to go take on another $50K in debt to put on a convention for me?"

The Bay Area is wonderful, but in includes a whole lot of really insular people who will not or cannot make the substantial investment of time and money to go out there on the bidding trail and convince people that your bid is serious.

And that travel is vital. The Columbus bid, which had decent facilities and an excellent price, was hampered by lack of visibility. The modern campaign requires you to be on the campaign trail at certain spots, or people won't take you seriously. I think some folks think the bid campaigns pay for all of that travel. They don't. Oh, Bay Area in 2002 did pay for a couple of people to travel relatively short distances a couple of times (never me; I figured that people would accuse me of lining my pockets at fandom's expense if I asked), but most of the time it was people who were spending their own money to go to Far Off Places and promote us. I, for instance, flew to Ad Astra in Toronto once to promote San Jose. Now, it was a relatively good deal on Northwest Airlines, but it was still around $500 in air and hotel for a weekend trip to Toronto. They couldn't believe someone would actually travel that far. A lot of people in the Bay Area couldn't believe it, either.

You have to be a little bit unhinged to go bidding, I think.

[querldox.livejournal.com]

On the other hand, there is a middle ground. Ad Astra I think was optional. Columbus did things like not show up at the preceding to the vote Worldcon and had a nigh-content-free webpage for a considerable time. They dropped off the radar so far I was genuinely surprised to see them still bidding at LACon.

I was even more surprised at the number of first round votes they got, and honestly am still trying to figure out where the heck that number came from. If LACon had been on the East Coast such that a majority of con attendees would've considered Columbus the closest and/or most drivable to bid, I'd at least have a clue, but getting that sort of support at a West Coast Worldcon after their lack of bid campaign? I'm stumped.

[thirdworld.livejournal.com]

From the questions I asked, and I asked a lot of them: price first, convenience second, new location third.

[avt-tor.livejournal.com]

Ad Astra I think was optional.

At the cost that Kevin paid, it's hard to justify. Though I would continue to argue that places that are hosting or bidding for a Worldcon are places to find voters.


I was even more surprised at the number of first round votes they [Columbus] got, and honestly am still trying to figure out where the heck that number came from.

Me too. I now think I know much less about bidding than I thought I did. Though I certainly have new opinions about layout of the site selection area. ;)

[thirdworld.livejournal.com]

Or, like me, you run a North American PR campaign using every fan you can find, and the cons you cover involve every con they go to. Of course for Interaction we had no choice, but I think the concept remains sound for any Worldcon. In fact I think L.A.con IV could have benefited from such a PR campaign. This answer goes much deeper of course, and I have some strong opinions on the matter, but that's another conversation.

[psycho-machia.livejournal.com]

unless you are Vince....