Gnomeward Bound

[kevin_standlee]

There's a Westercon 60 committee meeting today in San Mateo at the convention hotel. I have a job on the committee about which I'll talk more later, so I need to attend. I've missed most of the meetings, thanks to my rather sloppily scheduled trips to Oregon for the same weekends as the committee meetings. (Not deliberately; I just neglected to pencil in the Westercon meetings before making my travel plans.)

Parking at the hotel is not free (although it will be during the convention), so I need to leave a little early so I can park a few blocks away and park. Walking is good, anyway. It's a beautiful clear day, even though it is (by Bay Area standards) frightfully cold.

Comments

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

Does someone on the committee have the job of communicating with the members and the outside world? Does someone have the job of putting anything on the web site? Last time I checked even the membership rates were way out of date. I'm a member, or at least I wrote a check which was cashed, and have not to date received any publications of any kind from Westercon, and indeed only found out that the date was changed by happenstance.

A friend of mine from LA recently expressed interest in coming up for Westercon, and I had to warn that, due to this utter lack of anything, I was not at all sure if there is a Westercon.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

I presume there is such a person, but I don't know who it is. Regarding publications, I've agreed to take on editing two progress reports, one planned for mailing in March and another in May; however, I don't know the status of what I was told should have been a PR prior to those two.

I will attempt to communicate what you wrote to the management at today's meeting, particularly the "I was not at all sure if there is a Westercon."

[dsmoen.livejournal.com]

I did the initial site, but it was moved to another host, so I'll let the current webmaster know. My job will be the writers' workshop.

I wasn't able to make the meeting today, in part because fibromyalgia tends to kick my ass during the cold months.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

Thank you, but it shouldn't need me to inform them that a bare-bones website, perfectly fine for a con that's just won the bid, is rather alarming on a Westercon less than six months out, especially when the reg rates expired three and a half months ago? Hasn't anything happened? Don't programming, events, art show, dealers' room, hotel liaison, writers' workshop - that's you; the website doesn't even say there's going to be a writers' workshop - have anything to say?

Whenever I tell an organization that doesn't keep its website up to date that you've got to do so, that these days the website is the first place people go for information on something, they seem to get inexplicably pissed off at me for saying so. I hope Westercon won't be like that.

And Kevin, if you're reading comments-on-comments, do you have any idea what happened to The SF-Lovers Convention List? That looks as if it hasn't been updated for nearly two years! Is SF-Lovers dead, and if so why don't they just take it down or mark it as archived? This is embarrassing.

[dsmoen.livejournal.com]

There were changes to the web site that were apparently rolled back by accident.

In any case, since I'm not the webmaster, it's really you bitching at someone who doesn't have anything to do with it, which makes you feel good (perhaps), but it doesn't accomplish anything.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

I'm talking to you because you said you would "let the current webmaster know." If you're going to pass anything on, that's what I'd like you to say. And because you're a human being who is demonstratably actually there, and a committee member who is presumably concerned about your convention.

Rolled back by mistake? Procrastination is one thing, but that's even more alarming.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

The shortcomings of the web site are known and were discussed at the meeting today. What will be done about it, I don't know. I was concentrating on my own job. Many of the things I am trying to collect are things that should also be on the web site. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if I end up producing things that are too long for the PR, and we will say something like "the long version is on the web site, see location XXX."

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

Do you have any idea what happened to The SF-Lovers Convention List?

Not really, but the underlying cause was the unraveling of the administrator's life, with nobody available to take over.

I still use it because it has the best archive of past WSFS Business Meeting minutes (better than the one on wsfs.org).

sfrose may know more about this.

[sfrose.livejournal.com]

do you have any idea what happened to The SF-Lovers Convention List?

That's my fault. Too many things on my plate lately, and not enough time.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

And now I've gotten a query from another out-of-town friend of mine, saying, "What's happened to Westercon? They cashed my check, but never sent anything and never responded to my e-mail."

Now that I've read your post, I was able to say, "There's a committee and they're having meetings, I know that, but as far as I can tell, come the day there may well be a bunch of fans wandering the halls with nothing else going on."

Certainly your assurance that you'd inform the committee that they were out of touch did not reassure me: either they already know this, and therefore don't need you to tell them, or they don't, in which case they are so far gone that nothing can help. And the lack of interest from dsmoen worries me even more.

Once ze rockets are up, who cares vere zey come down?
Dot's not my department, says Werner von Braun.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm composing a progress report and sending e-mails to people trying to find out which piece is which. They know the web site is a problem. I can't fix it myself. I have a feeling that much of the material I have to collect for the PR really should have been on the web site already.

If someone has an interest in running the convention's Administration division so that the Chairman doesn't have to double-hat it, I think the Chariman would be happy to hear from them.

Kathryn Daugherty is running Programming, I know that. I don't think it's going to be the disaster scenario you're proposing. There will certainly be programming. What's not happening is communication with the members, and nowadays, conventions that don't keep their web sites up to date look to their members as if they've gafiated. I understand the problem. I'm working on the piece I can do something about. I can't fix the web site personally. If I could, I would, because I'm frustrated with it, too when I go looking for information for the PR. When I can't find it, I punt the question up to the Chairman.

I'd suggest contacting the Chairman personally if you have more questions. As I said, I'm doing what I can do.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

Kevin, usually you're a pretty sensible guy, but this is too funny for words. Why should I, just an ordinary member, try to get a message through to the chairman if you, a committee member, are helpless? (Besides, the con isn't answering its e-mail: I already told you that.)

I'm astonished that the rest of you weren't yelling and screaming about this months ago. Lock the chairman in the closet until he gives you the keys to the website! Set up a website of your own and get westercon.org to link to it! Hijack the Registrar until you get a mailing list and send out on your own the initial PR that officially informs the members that the date and hotel have been changed! (This still hasn't been announced: I only found out about it because someone told me; and not all the members are as plugged in as I.) Do SOMETHING!

Believe me, all I'd have needed to have seen on the website was the current membership rates and a committee list that included "Kathryn Daugherty, Programming; Kevin Standlee, Publications", and to have gotten in the mail just a postcard announcing the changes, and I'd be a lot less worried.

As it is, I will keep expressing my doubts that this convention actually exists until it evinces some actual evidence of existence.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

I have, as you know because I copied you on it, forwarded your reply to the Chairman, Michael Siladi.

Meanwhile, I think the things you're suggesting are unreasonable. Hijack the web site? How? Assault the convention chair? Come on! I understand your frustration, but the solutions you propose are not reasonable. I have exactly as much power as you do to fix the convention web site; moreover, even if I had the keys (which I don't want), I don't have the time or the ability to to the revisions, either. It's hard enough for me to keep sfsfc.org updated, and I don't do that very well, either.

As far as officially informing the members by postal mail of the change of date and site goes, all I know is that at last weekend's meeting, the chairman and the head of publications were working on producing something and I was told that the PR on which I'm working is still PR2, so presumably they do plan to mail something before the late-March distribution of the PR I'm trying to assemble.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

Kevin, I was not being literal when I wrote of physical assault upon the chairman. Verbal browbeating, however - yes, if necessary. Whatever it takes to get absolutely necessary, simple, straightforward things done: a simple update to the website; a postcard to the members. That's all. To describe this as "not reasonable" is preposterous. Whatever works, DO SOMETHING!

I don't know when you got involved in this committee, but it is facing a situation where it is months and months behind on a vital activity. And it knows it, because Michael told me at LAcon that Westercon was just about to send out a mailing to its members, and he told me that once before too, I forget when. And that was in response to my having pointed out that it had never proactively told its members that it had changed dates and site. If a member hasn't run across the fact, or hasn't happened to go and check, that member doesn't know.

That was even before the rates became obsolete.

Working on PRs to be published two months from now, and setting up LJ groups, are admirable activities, but that's what you do when you're on schedule. Right now you're cleaning the kitchen when the house is on fire. There are more urgent things. A quick postcard to the membership should have been your top priority months and months ago. And if you lack the power to update the website, you should be nudging and nudging and nudging incessantly the people who do have that power. It doesn't have to be a full-blown expansion, just for god's sake get some current membership rates there.

Did you know that I'm a convention chairman right now? My committee nudges me on minor little things, and if I didn't respond they'd nudge me harder, and that's the way it should be. And I nudge them. I'm the chairman. That's my job.

This was before your time, but once a Westercon found the day after they came home from winning the bid that their promised hotel had booked the space out from under them. What did they do? They spent two weeks hurridly finding another hotel. And then, IMMEDIATELY, they sent a mailing to all their members. Not a fancy PR, just a sheet of paper folded up in an envelope. It straightforwardly explained what happened and gave the new info.

That's all. That was conrunning at its zenith. What I'm seeing here, both in Westercon's inertness and in your frankly pathetic excuses for it, is conrunning at its nadir.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

I don't know when you got involved in this committee...

As of today, exactly two months ago. I had nothing to do with the bid nor with anything since the convention won their bid.

...your frankly pathetic excuses for it...

Excuses? I'm not making excuses! I'm saying that I think things should have been done, too, but I cannot personally fix them myself. You're saying that because I personally cannot log into their web server, update everything, personally mail PRs to every member, etc., that I'm being pathetic. This is unreasonable.

Put yourself in my shoes. Pretend that, two months ago, you agreed to take on a task of editing a couple of progress reports. You didn't say you'd be a division manager. You're not on the governing body of the convention. You're running one piece of area of it. You know who the convention chair is; he's the person who asked you to do the job. You know who your division manager is; he was appointed after you took your job. You know a couple of other people working on specific things, but that's all. Now, single-handedly fix all of the problems of the convention.

You and I worked together as Hugo Award administrators. I know you are a hard-working, conscientious person. Imagine, if you will, a situation where you did everything asked of you. You prepared ballots on the schedule specified by your management. You handed them over to the people responsible for printing and distributing them. You gave the equivalent material to the webmaster for publication on their web site. (I will assume that you don't have maintenance privileges on that convention's web site.) And then those people don't do anything with it. They don't mail ballots. They don't post them. The convention registrar doesn't give you a membership list, so you can't do your job of validating ballots even if anyone cast one. You tell people this, and are told that you're making "pathetic excuses" because you didn't personally mail ballots to every member like you should have done so.

When I co-chaired ConJose, I took as much responsibility for the convention's shortcomings as I could, and gave credit for the positive things to the people who did the work. That was part of my own job description; it's what con chairs and division managers should do. But I'm not chairing Westercon. I'm not even a division manager. Maybe because you're used to seeing me in a high management position in convention committees, you assume that I'm always in a management position. But I'm not. I'm just a single-publication editor, trying to do what I can to run my own area.

You're shooting the messenger. The message I'm getting from you is, "I shouldn't have tried to do anything. I should keep my head down, say nothing, and do nothing." You could not have done a better job of discouraging me from trying to do the things I've volunteered to do for Westercon if you tried.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

All right, I will tell you exactly what I would have done if I had been asked two months ago to prepare some publications for this convention.

At that time the convention was already seriously delinquent in communication. I would have accepted on the strict condition that a general mailing to the members be sent out immediately. I want a set of mailing labels, authorization to spend postage, and a printing budget within a week. And if I didn't get it within two weeks, heads would roll from the force of my complaints. And then I'd either get what I asked for, or I'd quit, because if it didn't get done, that failure would be my responsibility as a committee member.

I would also, even though it wasn't my department, continually raise the subject of the web site, and if that didn't get done, I would - as a committee member concerned with publications - volunteer to write, encode, and load a quick update. (I know how to do that.) And if I were not given power to do that, and nobody else did it, I would know the reason why. Or I would quit.

So those particular problems, Kevin, are ones that it is not outrageous to consider within your capacity to fix. And if they are not, it is your responsibility to do your utmost to get them fixed by those who can.

The pathetic excuses, Kevin, are not your failure to fix "all the problems of the convention." (I've only mentioned two. Are there others?) The pathetic excuses are your saying that it's not your department, that you have no power to do anything, that you trust someone who hasn't put out a publication in over a year of opportunity to put out one before you do yours.

In customer service, when a person is asked to do something that is outside of his power, which is the correct answer?
1) "That's not my department."
2) "I'll see to it that it gets done."

Now you tell me that you have been nudging people. You didn't say that before. Instead, you told me that my proposal that you do so was "not reasonable."

And so you see that my complaint about you personally was your clearly expressed uninterest in trying to do something about the problem. Had you said at the beginning, "I've been pointing this problem out loudly and clearly for two months, and I'm getting pretty frustrated myself by this time," I would have no complaints about you.

My complaint about the problem itself was not, and is not, directed at you personally, but is directed at the committee in general, through you, because you are - as you pointed out - the messenger. Messengers take messages. I will say to you the same thing I said to dsmoen: I'm talking to you because you are willing to pass information on. And because you're a human being who is demonstratably actually there, and a committee member who is presumably concerned about your convention.

Kevin, I have been an officer of a somewhat disfunctional organization. I received many complaints about things that were not strictly my department, and that I had no ability personally to do anything about. I did not say it was out of my power. I did not say that I was just trying to get my own job done (which was a very large and time-consuming job). I did not tell the complainants that they were shooting the messenger. I did not argue that the complaints were discouraging me from doing my own job. I would have considered all of those to be totally inadequate answers.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

All right, I will tell you exactly what I would have done if I had been asked two months ago to prepare some publications for this convention....

Had you been in my position and done exactly as you described, then you would have quit by now.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

My committee nudges me on minor little things, and if I didn't respond they'd nudge me harder, and that's the way it should be.

Well, pardon me for not copying you on all of the e-mails I've been sending to various people (including the chairman) "nudging" them to tell me what they're doing and what's going on.

I have been doing my part. It's not visible to you, so I guess you think I must not be telling the truth.

This was before your time....

Yes, and when the bid that eventually became ConJose found itself having to switch sites from San Francisco to San Jose, we sent paper mail postcards to all of our members telling them so. I know. I composed the text on the cards and was involved with much of the production and mailing. I was, after all, responsible for the bid as it's chairman.

Thanks so much for venting your frustration (which, by the way, I share) on the one member of the convention staff willing to stick his head out of the bunker. I'm sure the rest of the committee will learn from this example.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

[Blast LJ for not allowing you to edit comments after they're posted!]

Oh, and FWIW, setting up that LJ community westercons was the best thing I could think of doing to try and get such information as I do know in something resembling a public forum. Getting it linked from the convention's web site, however, faces the same problem as before. Getting it linked from westercon.org will depend on how busy the http://www.westercon.org/ webmaster is -- it's not the same person as Gnomeward Bound's webmaster.