Jordin Brown is running at-con Registration, and strikes me as a sensible sort of person who will not resort to absurd fannish nit-pickery.
I've proposed what amounts to "a la carte" pricing for some Worldcon functions, but this horrifies people who figure that (a) the only people who would buy single event admissions are people who would have otherwise bought full or day memberships, and therefore you're cannibalizing your own revenue; and/or (b) We'll be flooded with people wanting to attend only the Hugo, Masquerade, or just see the Dealers Room, and we won't have enough space/staff to handle them.
I'm not sure about that, myself. We usually have more exhibit space than we really need (because exhibit space comes in fixed sizes; you can't rent 2/3 of an exhibit hall), so I'm not bothered by the spectre of too many people attending it. (Although I have seen cases where dealers rooms have had to been metered due to overload, it's been at anime cons and comic book shows, not general SF cons.) The chance of overloading your main event venue is a real one, but I'd like to use the extra revenue to pipe video coverage of the event to a different venue, such as (say) a "Mended Drum" style place where people could have a beer or a soda and watch the event on screens. Furthermore, whenever it's technically possible, I want the major events telecast to the main hotel. This not only removes some of that space pressure, but it actually improves the convention experience for all of the members, since there are lots of people who would rather not cram into the auditorium if they could watch the event elsewhere.
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I've proposed what amounts to "a la carte" pricing for some Worldcon functions, but this horrifies people who figure that (a) the only people who would buy single event admissions are people who would have otherwise bought full or day memberships, and therefore you're cannibalizing your own revenue; and/or (b) We'll be flooded with people wanting to attend only the Hugo, Masquerade, or just see the Dealers Room, and we won't have enough space/staff to handle them.
I'm not sure about that, myself. We usually have more exhibit space than we really need (because exhibit space comes in fixed sizes; you can't rent 2/3 of an exhibit hall), so I'm not bothered by the spectre of too many people attending it. (Although I have seen cases where dealers rooms have had to been metered due to overload, it's been at anime cons and comic book shows, not general SF cons.) The chance of overloading your main event venue is a real one, but I'd like to use the extra revenue to pipe video coverage of the event to a different venue, such as (say) a "Mended Drum" style place where people could have a beer or a soda and watch the event on screens. Furthermore, whenever it's technically possible, I want the major events telecast to the main hotel. This not only removes some of that space pressure, but it actually improves the convention experience for all of the members, since there are lots of people who would rather not cram into the auditorium if they could watch the event elsewhere.