Interpreting Hugo Rules in a Vacuum

[kevin_standlee]

From Making Light, we have the story of a Wikipedia admin who is convinced that his out-of-left-field interpretation of the Hugo Award rules is more better than anyone who actually works in the field or writes those rules or maintains the official lists of winners.

Specifically, while technically a Hugo Award for one of the periodical categories is for the periodical work (Locus, Emerald City, Ansible, or in the case of Kathryn Cramer, The New York Review of Science Fiction) common usage (and common sense) refers to the editor or editors of that work as having been nominated or winning the Hugo Award. So, for instance, while the 2004 Hugo Award for Best Fanzine went to Emerald City, it's perfectly accurate and in keeping with accepted usage within the field to say that Cheryl Morgan won a Hugo Award.

Go read the discussion page on that article for this wiki-editor's somewhat askew opinion of how our awards work. I take it that by his definition, only the five "people" categories (Fan Writer, the two Artists, and the two Editors) are actually won by people. All of the rest are by works and the people responsible for those works aren't allowed to claim credit for them.

Edit, 23:10: Fixed the number and reference to "people" categories after johnnyeponymous pointed out my mistake.

Comments

[chocolatescifi.livejournal.com]

Am I the only one who is thinking that "SWATJester" would be better named as "SWATJackass"?

[buddykat.livejournal.com]

No, you aren't. What I especially like is how he hasn't bothered to respond to any of Kevin's comments in the discussion thread. Granted, he hasn't commented in the thread at all since Kevin posted his comments, but given how quickly he was responding to the other comments, I'm guessing that he's likely seen Kevin's comments.

[chocolatescifi.livejournal.com]

Well, if he has any sense, he has realized that Kevin knows more about the Hugos than he could ever possibly hope to know.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

I doubt that matters much to him, given that, as far as I can tell, he considers ignorance of a subject an asset, not a liability.