Worldcon Vs. Comic-Con?

[kevin_standlee]

SF Signal has published one of their "Mind Melds" about What Worldcon and Comic-Con can learn from each other. Like Cheryl says, I think anyone proposing that Worldcon should settle down in one place so it can Get Big has missed the point. The Olympics have had similar arguments. It's very inefficient for the Olympics to be in a different place every four years; it would be much better if they picked one place and built a permanent Olympic facility. (Greece would be traditional, but I bet Sydney would work out better and be more comfortable.) But part of the point of moving around is to bring the event closer to different people. Comic-Con may be wonderful, but it's always in San Diego, and if you live in (say) Glasgow, it's always going to cost you a fortune to attend, whereas a Worldcon can be expected to sometimes come within relatively easy striking distance.

But what do I know? The last time I attended Comic-Con, it was merely 30,000 people.

That doesn't mean that I think Worldcon is Just Right. It isn't. If we could get it up to or beyond its historical peak attendance of about 8,000, it would work better as a convention without destroying the management paradigm Fandom developed for running it. And it would cost less per person and we could charge less for membership, too -- on the order of $100 less at the door than we currently charge.

Comments

[redneckotaku.livejournal.com]

I agree with that point that one of the things that makes Worldcon special is that it does travel. I would love to see a Baltimore/DC Worldcon sometime before 2020, but I don't have the fannish clout to make it happen. The best chance of that happening is if Peggy Rae Sapienza is involved, but she is a very divisive figure in Baltimore/DC Fandom.

[nojay.livejournal.com]

Comic-Con is different to Worldcon in so many ways but then again so are all the major conventions such as Dragon*Con. The biggest con of them all, Comiket in Tokyo has no membership or entry fee and it exists mainly for amateur manga artists to sell their stuff. There is some promotion done by professional publications there but it's run mainly for fans by fans. I don't know how it's paid for though...

[robot-grrl.livejournal.com]

Well put. Now that I live in the San Diego area I did take advantage of that and attended my first Comicon. It was fun, but standing in loooong lines to see the celebrities is nothing I would like to see at Worldcon. And, the crowds in the exhibit hall were something you had to see to believe.

On the other hand I really look forward to traveling to Worldcon and playing tourist in whatever beautiful and unique city I'm visiting - budget permitting of course.

[howeird]

Worldcon and Comic-Con are entirely different events which happen to have some fan base in common. Comparing the two, IMHO, is not useful, any more than comparing a county fair with your local supermarket.

I agree that much of the value of Worldcon is that it travels. I was surprised to run into one of my theater pals at Denvention, who told me the only con he goes to is Worldcon, because it gives him a chance to be fannish someplace different every year.

As for the Olympics, look at the improvement it made in China.

[trinsf.livejournal.com]

When I think of Comic-Con, I cringe. When I think of DragonCon, I also *cringe*, for reasons not just related to size. I think if what you want is a *reallly* big dealers room, and a *reallly* big list of panels and a *lot* of celebrities and famous authors and big name fans you can stand in line to see, you probably would love that sort of con. If you're that sort of person, I'm sure you'd want to grow Worldcon bigger.

But I'm not that kind of person. What I want are parties that are interesting and not overrun with dickish guys going from door to door asking if there's beer. What I want is a party floor -- or party spaces -- that have room to move around, to sit, to carry on conversations. What I want is for the socializing to be intimate, without being invite-only. I want con spaces that are manageable to walk around and have lots of space for social interaction, without being too loud or crowded for conversation. I like *couches*. I want cons to be more like cocktail parties and less like stadium events.

I just don't think that happens with bigger cons. With something like a party floor, there's just a limit to how big hotel hallways are, how much room there is in hotel rooms, how many people you can fit on one floor. If Worldcon was at 30K, or even 10K people, party floors would either be constantly wedged (which they very nearly are now) or they would have to change. Can you imagine using a pass system to determine who can go to parties and when? Oh, sure, it would help with elevators, but it would suck for all the things I love about conventions.

Fanime has a mess more people than other bay area cons I attend these days. I spent about half an hour at Fanime this year, in the convention center, running an errand. I found the noise and crowding almost unbearable -- and I'm more extroverted than many people I know in fandom. Growing Worldcon? I'd end up staying home.

[wayward-va.livejournal.com]

Another virtue of Worldcon traveling to different places is that it galvanizes and energizes local fandom. IIRC fandom in south Florida got a huge boost from Magicon in 1992; partly in monetary resources but also in networking and organizational experience. Even a losing bid can get people talking and involved who were never involved before. Putting Worldcon in one permanent location would destroy that.

[bovil.livejournal.com]

I've got to say that Lou Anders' and John Picacio's ideas are the kind that we really should learn from. Some of them may be unwieldy, but they're at least worth trying.

[barry-short.livejournal.com]

FWIW, I wholeheartedly agree with Cheryl's five points, as well as most of John Picacio's.

On the whole, though, I don't think Worldcon needs to make a lot of changes. Sure, let's bring the graphics side of the con out of the mimeograph era and at least up to late-20th Century desktop publishing levels, but on the whole there's nothing wrong with Worldcon's content.

What it needs is presence. Worldcon is pulling 3000 paid attendees each year because there are only about 30,000 people on the planet who know there's an annual event called the World Science Fiction Convention. (If 10% of the people worldwide who know Comic Con exists all showed up there at once, southern California might actually break off the continent.) And no, it wouldn't be hard to do a whole lot more than is being done without spending any additional money at all. I won't go into detail here, but suffice to say I've been in touch with Reno to offer some assistance in that area if they want it. It appears to me that a huge portion of Worldcon's current logistical and site problems would be solved by having a con that consistently draws 8,000 to 10,000. It would also most likely offer a little more staff rotation, which I know at least some staffers would appreciate.

There are 3,000 people who go to Worldcon every year (more or less) because they like it and what it contain. It doesn't seem at all unreasonable to me to think that in the 6.5 billion on this planet there are another 5-7 thousand who would also like it, if only they knew it was taking place.

Worldcon size, threat or

[magscanner.livejournal.com]

Gosh, at Anticipation some of the gang were discussing the possibility that Worldcon could get down to 2500 or so, and have many new locational options possible, some of them not involving convention centers.