Lessons Learned

[kevin_standlee]

It's way too soon to know whether I'll be at Norwescon next year or if we'll be invited to do Match Game SF again there, but if it does happen and they put us in the same room (Evergreen 4), then we've now learned some lessons about how to lay out the room to make it work better.

Working from the floor plan, we had the panelists' risers set diagonally in one corner. The risers are of a size that if you only used one, panelists would have a good chance of falling off the back of the riser unless it were flush against the wall, and therefore they needed two risers. This, and the diagonal alignment, ate up two rows of seats.

If we do it again, I think we can manage to do it with only a single riser, flush against the black wall, and with the panelists thus facing straight toward the audience. We can set the contestant table at a slight angle, but because it's on the floor and not on a riser, it doesn't take up so much space.

I also learned that I need to make specific MGSF business cards to give to people after the shows, because people want to know how to contact me and find out where pictures and video of the shows are.

And there was the lesson I mentioned a couple of days ago: Lisa says we should never again agree to both host a party and do a show at the same convention. It takes too much out of us. Sitting a fan table isn't the same thing and doesn't require the amount of equipment and effort as a party does.

Comments

[redneckotaku.livejournal.com]

I kind of wonder how I am going to feel after Worldcon with Volunteering and throwing a Party. I also signed up to be a program Participant. I do feel stress because I know so little about how I need to prepare for Worldcon.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

Hey, remember that my first convention was a Worldcon, and the largest one ever held to boot. (I expect Anticipation will be around half the size of the 1984 Worldcon.) You have the advantage of having attended general SF/F genre conventions already. In a general sense, it's more of the same, only with a more diverse, world-wide membership and with some only-at-Worldcon things. From the way you describe it, your main high-stress thing is holding your bid party. The rest is (relatively speaking) routine.

[redneckotaku.livejournal.com]

I am going to talk more about it in a LJ post later today. I am having that feeling that I have made a big mistake because Worldcon is so quiet right now.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't describe Worldcons as "quiet." You are possibly giving too much weight to the perceptions of people who are adrenaline junkies and who don't think something is good unless there are tens of thousands of people frantically rushing around with ginormous queues and massive confusion. I encountered that myself with FanimeCon a few years ago. People there queued up for hours to get into the Dealers Room and people there considered is a sign of great success. A Worldcon that generated such queues would be tarred as a failure; at other conventions, it means "there's lots of buzz and excitement." Well, heck, I could create such so-called success artificially, but I consider long queues to be a failure of process.

[redneckotaku.livejournal.com]

It is a combination of things and that is why I want to do this post a little later.

[redneckotaku.livejournal.com]

To answer the size is everything argument, I have been to a con that is too big. San Diego Comic Con is so big that you can't enjoy it. It had too much energy and I can't see myself going again. NYCC is different because it hasn't become 125,000 people, but it may be I skip next year's NYCC for size reasons.

Otakon has dealers that are worth the wait in line. They have animation cell dealers, vendors from Japan and vendors that are unique. They don't do Anime USA. Otakon has tried to stop all lines from forming, but it has caused a bigger mess for them. It is because people know the rare stuff goes on the first day. There are much less lines on Saturday and Sunday of Otakon. I don't think most anime cons have a line worth waiting for.