Overserved at The Drink Tank?

Two of the last three Best Fan Writer Hugos have been won by Hugo nominated novelists. Taral vents his frustration that more people don’t find this controversial in “The Way the Futurian Blogs,” an article in The Drink Tank #259 (PDF file). I’m not a fan of the accompanying graphic, an altered paperback cover of Pohl with a hole in his head — both distasteful and disrespectful.

Also not very perceptive, if the idea behind the image is to fault Pohl for winning. Pohl did not ordain this result, his victory came out of a popular movement. I understood this much better after hearing the tone in Andrew Trembley’s voice as he told fans at Westercon how much he loved reading anecdotes about the history of the sf field on Fred Pohl’s blog. At that moment I thought d’oh! I’d forgotten what it is like to hear these stories for the first time. Some I heard as a young fan from Pohl’s First Fandom contemporaries. Others I read in Pohl’s 1978 autobiography The Way the Future Was. To the latest generation of science fiction fans they are brand new. And they’re great stories. And they’re about science fiction, which (big news here) a lot of science fiction fans still find interesting.

Yes, I tried to persuade fans to go in another direction and vote for someone else. Somebody who’s not already a famous sf writer. Guess what? I lost. World ends, film at 11? No, and what’s more, I’m even allowed to like the winner.

88 thoughts on “Overserved at The Drink Tank?

  1. As a point of information, if you ask Alexei about it, or look it up, you’ll find that his first pro fiction was published:
    # Down to the Worlds of Men (1963)
    # Dark Conception (1964) with Joe L. Hensley [only as by Louis J. A. Adams ]

    This was all, Alexei will tell you, before he wrote the articles published in 1966 that he was nominated for as Best Fan Writer, and before he had even conceived of writing those articles, which, interestingly, became the published book “Heinlein In Dimension,” which he was first asked to consider writing in 1964.

    So strike Alexei from the list of those who were “very active in writing and publishing fanzines, attending and running conventions, organizing clubs, and a multitude of other established fan activities.”

    Dave Langford
    Wilson Tucker
    Alexi Panshin
    Terry Carr
    Bob Shaw
    Richard E. Geis

    Not to get in Curt’s way when he’s getting up a head of steam here, but I’m unaware of any conventions that Dick Geis, Bob Shaw, Terry Carr, or Bob Tucker ever ran. Perhaps Curt could remind me?

    Also, for the record, Harlan Ellison was nominated for Best Fan Writer in 1968, as was, again, Alexei Panshin. Both withdrew, interestingly enough.

    Curt lists these activities “writing and publishing fanzines, attending and running conventions, organizing clubs, and a multitude of other established fan activities” as attributes of the above list of names, but while it’s not a big point, since it’s being asserted, I’d note that so far as I know, the only one of the above that Dick Geis ever did was publish fanzines, and maybe spend a grand total of three hours of his life at sf conventions.

    Curt addresses John Scalzi:

    […] What seperates you from that group of ‘Best Fanwriter’ winners is that you *started* as a SF professional.

    Dave Langford first pro short fiction was published in 1975.

    Curt to Scalzi:

    […] I also read some of your blog after you were nominated. For what it was, it was ok, but it wasn’t “great fanwriting”. Bob Tucker, Terry Carr, *they* did great fanwriting.

    This is precisely the sort of subjective judgment that people vote on. It’s the point of having a vote. If everyone agreed, there’d be no need.

    As it happens, different people like different sorts and cases of fan writing.

    […] *Fanwriting* isn’t just random blog comments; it isn’t just some guy’s observations on whatever thought crosses his mind that day,

    Blog comments — as opposed to blog posts — would be less fanwriting than apa comments, and apazines, how?

    I submit that fanwriting is nonprofessional writing done by fans. I’m utterly open to everyone else’s definition of “fanwriting,” but all that would be relevant for this discussion is that which would be useful in the WSFS Constitution.

    Note that one is only writing professionally when actually being paid. When “professional writers” write a grocery list, a love letter, a piece of business mail, or a blog post, they aren’t producing professional writing unless someone is paying them to do so

    Curt, what language do you suggest would work to otherwise objectively define “fanwriting” in the WSFS Constitution?

    […] It *is* different John, because the issue was not and never has been that you were a pro, but rather, whether or not you were a *fan*.

    Curt, what’s your definition of a fan, for Hugo purposes?

    […] Not because of a difference in the quality of the writing, necessarily, but because of the vast difference in the audiances available to both.

    On the internet, everyone has the same size audience available: everyone else on the internet. That’s not an issue.

    A more genuine issue is the question of how many voters actually familiarize themselves with the majority of eligible fan writing by the nominees in their year of eligibility, and how many simply vote for the nominees they’re most familiar with?

    But that’s an issue that applies in every category. It’s more problematic in the categories that go to a body of work then for a specific piece of work, but, again, every award has problems with people voting on the basis of their other feelings about nominees, because, yes, in the end, all the Hugos are are a popularity contest by a self-selected group of people. They’re not some objective merit of quality: they’re a collection of individual subjective preferences.

    But Fred Pohl had only 259 final votes to put him over the top, and the cut-off to be nominated was 29 votes; we’re not talking about “thousands” of fans from internetland pouring in to buy memberships in Aussiecon to nominate or vote for Fred, and neither are many thousands of new Hugo voters apt to be flooding in any time soon, so far as I can guess.

    I sometimes wonder if the root cause of this entire problem might simply be a fundamental failure of everyone concerned to agree on what “fanwriting” actually is […]

    I offered mine: what’s yours?

    Presumably you have one that, upon reflection, is more useful than this:

    […] What exactly is it? I dunno; an essay taken to the highest level perhaps. That’s not an adaquate description of what fanwriting is, but then I’m not a great fanwriter either. Maybe someone else can offer a better description.

    “Fanwriting is nonprofessional writing done by fans.”

    This doesn’t put up barriers many prefer, or offer shibboleths to weed out those who don’t know fanhistory as well as some of us, but I’m unconvinced this is a bug. But I’m certainly not offering the last word, which is why I’m asking if anyone has more useful, or at least preferred, language.

  2. “it isn’t just some guy’s observations on whatever thought crosses his mind that day”

    I’m struck by this, because it seems to eliminate quite a vast amount of what’s been published in authentically-mimeoed-on-twiltone fanwriting as not really being fanwriting. In which case I’m left wondering what it was.

  3. Off the top of my head, Gary, Bob Tucker ran the 1940 Chicago Worldcon. Does that count? Alexei did a bit more fanac than the articles you cite. Read some old fanzines sometime and you’ll see this for yourself.

    But I’m sorry, I won’t be drawn into a point by point argument with you again. Last time we did that an entire listserve was utterly destroyed, remember? I’m an old man now and I can’t stand the strain anymore.

    Rosebud!

    Curt Phillips

  4. Gary Farber sez: “Fanwriting is nonprofessional writing done by fans”.

    And John Scalzi is a “fan” in exactly what way?

  5. It’s fascinating how quickly name-calling springs to the lips of anyone who wants their way and isn’t getting it. In this case, “luddite.” How ludicrous to throw around such a word on File 770’s webpage, about a comment read in a fanzine only available as a download from another website, and about someone who has just had a completely digital fanzine posted to eFanzines. Like so many other words used in this debate, “luddite” is a meaningless, knee-jerk reaction, intended to create prejudice. There are *no* luddites involved in this debate.

    Similarly, too many of those in this debate have been choosing their own private meanings to words, and obfuscating the issue. This is what I meant by Humpty-Dumpty Speak. Words like “fan” or “fanzine” cannot mean whatever we happen to want them to mean, for the sake of argument, or they become gibberish.

    A prime example is the argument that work meant for a publishable book is *not* professional because it *might not* be published. Larry Niven’s next novel might not be published either. That wouldn’t make it fanwriting. Nor would it become fanwriting because Niven posted it to his blog. The new medium does not automatically turn *everything* into fanac! Nor is it relevant that some fanwriting is someday published in a book. Harry Warner Jr.’s “All Our Yesterdays” grew out of Warner’s earlier fan articles — though completely rewritten — but lacking the ability to see the future, nobody at the time could have predicted that. But when Fred Pohl says he is writing his blog for possible publication, I see no reason to try to second guess him.

    We have also seen a great deal of pointless obfuscation. Have my critics actually *read* the piece in Drink Tank that outrages them so much? I believe they must have, and yet they’ve come away from it feeling that I have trashed Fred Pohl. Where is this disrespect I’m accused of? Did I say Pohl was never a fan or that he never did fanac? No. If fact, I only questioned whether his revised portions of “The Way the Future Was” amounted to fanac or not. I even said that I had enjoyed the book when it was first published in 1979.

    The matter of the Photoshopped image was a mistake, as I’ve acknowledged. It had even been shown to Mike Glyer before being published in “Drink Tank…” without Mike’s objection at the time. I asked him about that. I sent him a preview of the piece, in part, seeking his guidance. As Mike explained, he didn’t notice that I had made a change to the image. Well… such things happen. But its no wonder they say that a picture is worth a thousand words. More words have been spent on account of that altered image, I suspect, than because of anything I said in the article that followed.

    But none of this is the issue. If anything, what I’ve been reading is all murky sentiment — Fred Pohl is a wonderful fellow and really important in early fandom, so let’s give him a Hugo… or an Oscar or Nobel Prize, or something, anything, just lets’ give him a nice, big, feel-good group hug!

    It does not matter whether I worship the man as a Ghod, or if I hate his guts. It doesn’t even matter what Fred Pohl’s status in fandom is — whether he was a minor figure in fandom 70 years ago, or if he is one of the five most important fans in our history. These things have absolutely no bearing on the Hugos. I’m embarrassed for fandom that this sort of sloppy thinking that has allowed all irrelevant issues into the debate! All I ever said, and all that matters is that the plainest, least convoluted interpretation of Fred Pohl’s own words is that his blog was material for a new edition of “The Way the Future Was.” That blog and only that blog was all that was up for the Hugo… Not what Pohl did in 1939 or 1952 or even in 1968. Other fans are not nominated for Hugos on the basis of activity from twenty years ago, ten years ago, or even *two* years ago. The rules make it clear that the Hugo is for achievements in the previous 12 months alone.

    So it all comes down to one very simple question. Were Fred Pohl’s drafts for a new edition of “The Way the Future Was” really fanwriting, or just drafts for a new book? It is unreasonable to suggest they were not drafts for a book. Is a book necessarily “professional?”

    There is some room for argument about that, and I’m surprised that we’ve been wasting time on tape-recorded “zines” and other such digressions. For instance, are Harry Warner Jr.’s two books on fan history, “pro” or not? I’d be included to say no, but the decision isn’t a simple one. I make it in part because the publisher is a small press, and because the material is of such limited interest. Who, other than fans, would want to read it? On the other hand is Arthur C. Clarke’s autobiography, “Astounding Days.” Is it pro or fan writing? Based on considerations such as the Bantam Spectra imprint, mass distribution, and the simple fact that only parts of the book are about fandom at all, I don’t see how it could be called fanwriting.

    “The Way the Future Was” is not that different from the Clarke book. Part of it *is* about fandom… but most of it is about Pohl’s life and career. Content won’t justify calling this book fanwriting, either.

    But, evidentially vox populii is evolving. The new paradigm seems to regard *anyone* making *any* mention of fandom as fanac. In the long run, I can only imagine this being counterproductive, as real fanac will be overshadowed completely by pros with high public profiles. But I suspect that fans are slowly forgetting that fandom is more than a institution to promote science fiction. If so, it’s likely that future fans will notice the change in attitude. Fanac may well evolve into superfluous non-fiction categories.

  6. Off topic to a degree, but I really wanna know: how many folks here read the article in the issue and how many are just responding to the response to it?
    Call it market research…
    Chris

  7. What the hell time zone are we in here, Glyer?

    The latest batch of Hugo nominees for the fan awards just left me with the feeling we should scrap the whole bunch of them. There are some good nominees but a lot seems to be simply name recognition gained through pro-affiliations or absurd productivity. The Fan Hugos have only occasionally picked a winner that has been consistently thought of as the best fandom delivered in that time period and the drift gets worse and worse over time. Several of the last Best Fanzine awards have gone to things that few of us would recognize as fanzines.

    To end on a facetious note – it’s time we returned the best fanwriter Hugo to real fans like Dave Kangford and not filthy pros like Fred Pohl!

    Rich

  8. Glad Luddite got under your skin Taral, as you seemed very willing to insult others (cf humpty dumpty and all that) in your little “get those kids off my lawn” screed. For me, anybody who gets annoyed about a spoken word fanzine winning best fanzine award because they object to the format, is a luddite. To insist on printed or even written fanzines as the one proper format is to insist on obsolence.

    That’s probably where Curt’s confusion about Scalzi comes from. John has been online a hell of a lot longer than he has been a professional paid writer and his blog has always been fannish, if perhaps not so connected to old skool fandom as some. But that’s the point, whole new generations of fans have now grown up with the internet and their first inclination is to blog, not to zine… Different definitions of fandom.

    Whether or not Pohl deserved a Hugo is not the question, it’s whether he was eligible for it and by any definition of fanwriting, what he does on his blog, chronicling the history of early fandom as he experienced it, is fanwriting. As Gary pointed out, he isn’t paid for it either.

  9. @Martin Wisse: “To insist on printed or even written fanzines as the one proper format is to insist on obsolence.” Obsolence. As soon as that word pops up in a dictionary (it seems to be lagging behind the word “fanzine” which has only been around for 70 years), I’ll check your point. In the meantime, as Sean O’Hara has been quoted as saying, “I’m stumped — you clearly exist in a universe that doesn’t intersect this one at any two consecutive points, and yet you still manage to connect to our Internet.”

  10. “And John Scalzi is a ‘fan’ in exactly what way?”

    By doing fanac.

    Curt: “Off the top of my head, Gary, Bob Tucker ran the 1940 Chicago Worldcon. Does that count?”

    Mark Reinsberg was the chair. Can you tell us more about how Bob Tucker ran the 1940 Chicon? Do you have any specific fanzine articles in mind about this that you could point us too, Curt? I don’t ask because this would make any difference, but because I’m quite curious. I don’t recall every hearing or seeing anyone before assert that it was Bob Tucker who was largely responsible for and “ran” the Chicon, so I’d certainly be interested in reading more, merely out of curiosity.

    “Alexei did a bit more fanac than the articles you cite. Read some old fanzines sometime and you’ll see this for yourself.”

    Thank you for that generous thought, Curt, but as it happens I’ve actually discussed this with Alexei several times; ask him yourself whether he believes he was “well established in SF Fandom many long years before [he] then moved on into the ranks of SF professionals. [He was among those] very active in writing and publishing fanzines, attending and running conventions, organizing clubs, and a multitude of other established fan activities,” and if he was a “well known fan” before writing the articles that became Heinlein In Dimension.

    If you wish to disagree with him about this, and do so publically, I hope you’ll be kind enough to drop me an email with a pointer to any fanzine or URL where your discussion might be posted.

    I’m still left wondering, Curt, what language do you suggest would work to otherwise objectively define “fanwriting” in the WSFS Constitution?

    If you don’t have any language, or even any words at all to offer, however, informally, to define “fanwriting,” it would seem difficult to move the discussion further with you.

    Taral: “A prime example is the argument that work meant for a publishable book is *not* professional because it *might not* be published.”

    Taral, I tried to point out to you previously that Fred Pohl’s quote was susceptible to a variety of interpretations, not just the one you solely choose. Others have since, unsuccessfully, attempted to make the same point to you. Fred Pohl’s single quote simply doesn’t mean that it’s “meant for a publishable book,” and in any case, you can’t usefully propose a rule based on mind-reading future intent of a nominee.

    So, Taral: what principle it is you are proposing?: there should be a rule excluding writers from being eligible for the Best Fan Writer Hugo because we think in future they might use some of the same writing as a draft for, or directly selling it as, professional writing? Or what?

    What is the administerable rule you wish to suggest?

    “But when Fred Pohl says he is writing his blog for possible publication, I see no reason to try to second guess him.”

    But that’s not what he wrote. Is this your only argument as to why Pohl should have been disqualified from eligibility (is that your position? If it isn’t, I’m not sure what your entire point is)?

    “The matter of the Photoshopped image was a mistake, as I’ve acknowledged. It had even been shown to Mike Glyer before being published in “Drink Tank…” without Mike’s objection at the time. I asked him about that. I sent him a preview of the piece, in part, seeking his guidance. As Mike explained, he didn’t notice that I had made a change to the image. Well… such things happen.”

    Yes, it’s definitely Mike Glyer’s fault.

    “So it all comes down to one very simple question. Were Fred Pohl’s drafts for a new edition of ‘The Way the Future Was’ really fanwriting,”

    I’ll go along with that as the key question to what seems to be your point.

    “or just drafts for a new book? It is unreasonable to suggest they were not drafts for a book.”

    See, have to disagree with you there.

    “Is a book necessarily ‘professional?'”

    I’m not sure what you mean by “book” (really, I’m not: it’s not a matter of size; is it a matter of thickness of binding? ISBN number? Or what? Was Warhoon 29 a “book” or not?), but I think that’s the wrong question.

    The question is whether a piece of writing is professional writing or amateur, and I suggest that the most useful test of that question is whether the author is paid for that piece of writing or not.

    If you have an alternative test, please do suggest it. An objective test.

    Presumably you do recognize that you need to suggest an actual objective test to determine whether something is eligible or not. It can’t be a matter of consulting you for your ruling each year. So what’s your suggested objective test for whether something is fanwriting or not, Taral?

    Chris, if I hadn’t read the article, I wouldn’t have seen that Taral did finally change his erroneous URL for the quote of Pohl’s that he likes to the correct URL I gave him, after he repeatedly insisted to me that the fact that it was wrong wasn’t relevant. Hey, you’re still welcome, Taral!

  11. I was just wonderin’ how many people read the issue. I usually have no idea how many folks read the thing.
    Chris

  12. “I usually have no idea how many folks read the thing.”

    It should take you only a couple of minutes to put SiteMeter or Google Analytics, or whatever your preferred hit counter is, on any efanzines.com page, if you have access to the HTML on your own page. If not, you could ask Bill how he feels about adding a counter or not.

  13. “Since the award is named “Best Fan Writer” and not “Best Fan Writing” why not just define eligible fanwriters to exclude a writer who had work published during the year which would qualify in the professional categories?”

    It’s a fair question, Eric, but I thought fandom settled the question of whether someone can simultaneously write professionally, and still be a fan, with the precedents of the 1960s, which Scalzi brought up (and if he hadn’t, any number of other folks would).

    Do we now want to say that we think Terry Carr’s Hugo, or Ted White’s Hugo, or Bob Shaw’s two Hugos were improperly awarded and undeserved?

    Ditto Jack Gaughn, Vaughn Bodé, and arguably a number of other Fan Artist Hugos? (I’m reasonably sure Rotsler had at least a few cartoons professionally published and paid for, among other Fan Artist winners and nominees.)

    Perhaps yes, but the idea that one can’t be a fan and sell writing professionally doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me, at least. Obviously this is something reasonable people can disagree about, but my own view is that it’s both unfair and unreflective of reality as I’ve observed it, in which innumerable pros — not all, but many — write as fans on innumerable occasions, and a number of fans have sold professional writing or art of a wide variety of kinds.

    Whether a specific piece of writing, on the other hand, is professional or amateur, is something it’s easy to draw a bright line through by virtue of the test of whether that specific piece of writing has been paid for or not.

  14. @Gary-From the Long List of Worldcons:

    “Chicon I was run by a triumvirate. Mark Reinsberg held the title of chairman, with Erle Korshak (secretary) and Bob Tucker (treasurer) as equal partners. Korshak presided over the opening day of the con, when Reinsberg fell ill.”

  15. Re my suggestion that the fan writer award be changed to exclude pros, Gary Farber said:

    “It’s a fair question, Eric, but I thought fandom settled the question of whether someone can simultaneously write professionally, and still be a fan, with the precedents of the 1960s, which Scalzi brought up (and if he hadn’t, any number of other folks would).

    “Do we now want to say that we think Terry Carr’s Hugo, or Ted White’s Hugo, or Bob Shaw’s two Hugos were improperly awarded and undeserved?”

    Of course we wouldn’t retroactively take people’s awards away and changing the focus of the award to make it meaningful today, under today’s circumstances, wouldn’t be to denigrate those who won it in the past.

    John Scalzi’s citation to all the pros who won the Hugo years ago, and particularly before the Internet, isn’t really pertinent to the current situation. You probably realize that writers today, as soon as they are published, are advised to maintain an Internet presence. I have never been comfortable with that but I did display the books Mary and I write on the website I established long before we sold the books and I do mention new pro work on my blog, even through the blog is primarily personal essays like my zine Groggy was, and I started it primarily to write such essays.

    Whether professional writers intend it or not their Internet work, whether they are directly paid for it or not, is tied to the work they are paid for closely in a way that was not possible before the Internet. Terry Carr publishing an article in a fanzine with a circulation limited to 150 readers selected by the editor did not have the advertising effect of John Scalzi’s blog, freely available to…well…you name the number. Countless readers.

    Now I think John Scalzi has treated the whole matter with a lot of class and I don’t question his motivations in blogging at all. But I wonder if he might even agree that maybe he shouldn’t have found himself in the position he did? That maybe the award ought to be changed so that it rewards those we usually think of as fan writers.

    If people think the award should strictly be for writing done without pay then the name should be changed from “best fan writer” to reflect that. But was the fan writer Hugo really intended to strictly reward the best body of writing that wasn’t paid for? Wasn’t it really intended to reward *fan* writers?

    Sure a pro can be a fan, but if, as seems likely, it will be won from now on almost exclusively by professionals who are also fans is that what is really wanted? Is it meaningful? Is there any purpose for it? Maybe. I guess that’s a matter of opinion. But it doesn’t seem like a good idea to me.

  16. I figure that I’ve had my say. Certain writers are just repeating the same points, or rushing off on tangents as though they this added fresh insight to the issue. It doesn’t.

    At this point I think we’ve seen a clash of two irreconcilable ideas of what a fan, and fandom, is. This is likely the inevitable outcome of fandom having become as large as it is, and with so many of its members having virtually nil connection with what it was. (Despite some surprising converts to the new paradigm.)

    Sadly, there are those who want fandom to be larger still, and even more commercial.

  17. Taral, rather than engaging in fruitless debates over what is a fan and what is fandom, maybe people involved with the Hugos should simply ask themselves whether there is a need or real desire for an award for the best blog by a professional and depending on the answer either rename the best fan writer award or come up with an entirely new definition of it.

  18. And all of the questions about what is fanwriting / fanzine are coming up again in the discussions about the semi-prozine, which the A4 Business Meeting again referred back to the committee that was appointed by the BM at Anticipation to try to produce recommended Constitutional changes for Semi-prozine.

    And it’s clear to the committee, at least, that it’s impossible to merely touch Semi-prozine without looking at Fanzine, Related Work, and Best Professional Editor.

    So we’re going to spend another year trying to either reach a committee consensus, or produce a set of minority reports (and possibly a majority report), to discuss at the Business Meeting at Renovation.

    So, if you want your input to count, feel free to show up at the Renovation Business Meeting, where I expect the topic will be discussed in more detail (I expect it’s likely to be a long debate, if the committee is able to produce recommendations).

    Because, in the end, only the people at the meeting in Reno (and at the meeting in Chicago, a year later, if something passes and therefore is up for ratification) get to make those decisions.

    And a side note:

    After Jack Gaughan won both Fan Artist and Pro Artist in the same year (for different work, since he was doing both fan art and pro art that year) the Constitution was amended to only allow a person to compete in one category in any year. But that was amended recently (passed 2007, ratified 2008) to allow people to be nominated in both categories in the same year.

  19. Eric — that would be my preferred solution. I’ve nothing against blogging, podcasts, or even fans who wish to expose their bottoms in front of a camera for kicks. (As long as I don’t have to watch.) But these things need their own categories, not to take over some existing one.

    With luck, somebody will take this radical notion to a Worldcon business meeting to get the ball rolling. It won’t be me. The last Worldcon I attended was because they footed the bill. They next one will have to do the same, and little chance of that. Worldcon politics is a democracy that requires money to participate in.

  20. @Ben: Rather than implicitly telling people to wait until the Business Meeting, far better to make the discussion public at this point if you want an outcome with broad support.

    I’ve been very frustrated that the Best Fanzine category was changed without provision of meaningful definitions of several important terms, giving the Hugo Awards Administrator no black letter guidance and happily turning it into the “Best Anything You’d Like to Give a Hugo” category. That doesn’t seem to have been understood as a serious defect in the rules, but the political fallout from the failed attempt to eliminate the Best Semiprozine Hugo compelled the BM to create a committee to define Best Semiprozine which, as you point out, will have a reciprocal effect on the Best Fanzine category. Unfortunately, Chris Barkley’s promise to make this an open process has not been kept, nor the promise to publicly report about the committee’s work in advance of this year’s Business Meeting.

    A more open discussion is essential. Think about a Business Meeting that looks like this comment chain condensed into an hour or so of in-person debate. Is that an atmosphere anyone thinks will produce a good, thoughtful result?

  21. “Best Anything You’d Like to Give a Hugo category”. Very apt. Thank you for the preliminary dry run toward “A more open discussion is essential”.

  22. As Taral noted in his essay “Ambiguity reigns.” Let’s hope some sort of resolution occurs before Renovation, otherwise the Business Meeting may go on forever and a day.

    And how many votes does it take to get on the Fan Writer ballot? Well … not that many ….

    44 Frederik Pohl (13.8%)
    41 Chris Garcia (12.9%)
    31 Lloyd Penney (9.7%)
    30 James Nicoll (9.4%)
    29 Claire Brialey (9.1%)
    ————————–
    28 Steven H Silver (8.8%)
    26 David Langford (8.2%)
    26 Guy Lillian (8.2%)
    24 Bruce Gillespie (7.5%)
    24 John Hertz (7.5%)
    24 Taral Wayne (7.5%)
    22 Cheryl Morgan (6.9%)
    22 Niall Harrison (6.9%)
    19 Abigail Nussbaum (6%)
    18 Jo Walton (5.6%)
    18 Mike Glyer (5.6%)
    13 Rob Hood (4.1%)
    12 James Bacon (Fan writer) (3.8%)
    12 Tempest Bradford (3.8%)
    12 Teresa Nielsen Hayden (3.8%)
    11 Karen Burnham (3.4%)
    11 Mark Plummer (3.4%)
    10 Charles Tan (3.1%)
    10 Matthew Cheney (3.1%)
    http://www.aussiecon4.org.au/hugoawards/files/2010HugoVotingReport.pdf

    It’s good to have friends.

  23. Eric: thanks for your thoughtful reply. To touch on just a couple of points:

    […] Whether professional writers intend it or not their Internet work, whether they are directly paid for it or not, is tied to the work they are paid for closely in a way that was not possible before the Internet. Terry Carr publishing an article in a fanzine with a circulation limited to 150 readers selected by the editor did not have the advertising effect of John Scalzi’s blog, freely available to…well…you name the number. Countless readers.

    I think the larger picture here is that the internet has irrevocably changed the world, and has changed society, and has changed fandom.

    And I think a lot of older fans who make only superficial use of the internet haven’t grokked this. This is 2010. Fandom isn’t what it was in 1970, or 1980, and even 1990 is twenty years ago.

    The internet means that fandom is different. One can ignore this, of course, and simply limit one’s self to as small a number of intimates and interlocuters as one wishes, but what no one can do is claim possession over “fandom.” I’m certainly not saying that’s what you, Eric, are advocating, but I want to further address this:

    Now I think John Scalzi has treated the whole matter with a lot of class and I don’t question his motivations in blogging at all. But I wonder if he might even agree that maybe he shouldn’t have found himself in the position he did? That maybe the award ought to be changed so that it rewards those we usually think of as fan writers.

    The use of “we” here is tricky, because I don’t think it includes most of those people who have entered fandom in the last twenty years.

    I’ve been reading the LJs and online writings of innumerable fans in the last twenty years, and damned if I can see any significant difference in their writings than if they mentioned Burbee and Laney.

    What I suspect many older fans whose knowledge of online fanac is limited don’t fully realize is just how much trufannish culture has exfiltrated, and how fannish, and even directly connect to fandom-as-they-know-it most of the online fans they’ve never heard of are.

    For instance, in this thread, we have Taral explaining that he’s never heard of Martin Wisse. Martin Wisse and I haven’t always seen eye-to-eye, and I doubt I’m beloved by him — though I’ve always respected him, myself — but his writing is certainly entirely known to me, for over fifteen years. I can’t imagine any reason to not think of Martin as a fan, and I’m sure that the list of mutual friends and acquaintances between Martin and Taral is not insignificant, starting with Avedon Carol, and on and on.

    In the end, when you write, Eric, about who “we usually think of as fan writers,” you’re engaging in tautology.

    And it’s apparently necessarily so, since what “fandom” tends to be defined as by some is “the people I personally know who wander into the particular areas of fandom I’ve been active in for forty years or more.”

    But if you want to have rules for an award, you have to have objective rules.

    And that’s why I keep asking for any kind of suggestions. If “fandom” boils down to “I have to recognize your name,” that’s not an objective means of administering the Hugos. So what is, if it isn’t “someone who engages in fanac even if I’ve never heard of them before?

    Incidentally, if anyone thinks they know what my own opinion is as to whether Starship Sofa is a fanzine or not, or whether or not Fred Pohl should have won the Hugo, they’re apt to be wrong. I’ve yet to actually state my opinion anywhere.

    And the fact is that I’ve yet to make up my mind about Starship Sofa. I’m not arguing from a perspective of what result I do or don’t like; I am arguing from a perspective of trying to find a workable paradigm for the Fan Hugos, and one that is mutually acceptable to the maximum number of relevant people and interests.

    […] If people think the award should strictly be for writing done without pay then the name should be changed from “best fan writer” to reflect that.

    In fact, we had the “Best Amateur Magazine” award for many years, rather than “Best Fanzine.” “Best Amateur Fan Writer” as a title change would only clarify that and return to a long tradition of Worldcon usage.

    The bottom question here is “what is a fan?” I don’t think it’s a question answerable by passing a test of specific knowledge, although there indeed must be some overlap of knowledge with fellow fans, by definition.

    I think science fiction fans are people who choose to be active in sf fandom for amateur reasons. That simple.

    I think that in today’s fandom, we can’t remotely expect to know everyone in fandom. But what I find is that in almost every case where I encounter someone I’ve never heard of before, it turns out they were writing off in some corner of LJ or a blog or running a convention or being highly active as a regional fan, for decades, and we have a long list of mutual friends.

    Even though they’ve never attended a Corflu, or read a fanzine that wasn’t a pdf. In my world, there are at least somewhere between ten and twenty thousand active fans, I would guess. I only know a couple of thousand of them by name/handle, but I’m hardly going to deny that someone I’ve been mutually fanacing with for fifteen years is apt to have various other fan friends I don’t know.

    In other people’s world, there are vastly smaller numbers of active fans, by their definition and experience. Maybe it’s 5000, or 2000, or 200.

    But the whole point is that my definition of who is a fan doesn’t matter; we all have our own definitions; and each is valid for ourselves. The question is “what definition do we use for Hugo rules?,” and I’m all ears as to everyone’s suggestions.

    Eric:

    […] But was the fan writer Hugo really intended to strictly reward the best body of writing that wasn’t paid for? Wasn’t it really intended to reward *fan* writers?

    Could you please define the difference?

    Taral:

    […] I figure that I’ve had my say.

    Taral, this is obviously important to you: you’ve written a heart-felt screed, and gone on in various other places about it. Which is entirely understandable. But having made your complaint, I ask one more time, what is your suggested solution?

    One last time: I remain unclear what principle it is Taral is proposing: there should be a rule excluding writers from being eligible for the Best Fan Writer Hugo because we think in future they might use some of the same writing as a draft for, or directly selling it as, professional writing? Or what?

    What is your suggested solution?

    Mike:

    […] Unfortunately, Chris Barkley’s promise to make this an open process has not been kept, nor the promise to publicly report about the committee’s work in advance of this year’s Business Meeting.

    There was a report. It said that the committee wasn’t submitting a majority report because there was not yet a consensus on one. The majority of the committee felt that progress was being made, and discussion should continue for another year.

    My understanding, which is second-hand and nondefinitive, is that Kent Bloom, as Chair of the Aussiecon Business Meeting, can appoint whomever he wishes to the committee, so presumably anyone interested should ask him.

    Right now the committee’s email list has been dead since the convention, while everyone sits and waits for Kent to Officially Speak. Or, at least, that’s what I’m waiting for, since it doesn’t make sense to continue talking to last year’s committee when we haven’t yet officially, so far as I know, activated a new iteration, and if a new chair has been appointed, it’s not been announced on the email list, just as there has been no official announcement of anything, and no further discussion on the list, while we All Wait.

    I’d suggest that you, Mike Glyer, try asking Kent Bloom for comment.

  24. One more comment, by way of example: I am at least slightly familiar with the fanac of all the names of those who received any nominations for Best Fan Writer, as posted above, with the exceptions of Rob Hood, who is indeed another pro fiction writer and whom I can’t otherwise comment on.

    But everyone else there is a familiar fan writer to me.

    The question of what kind of writing we prefer, and whose, is of course, what we vote on.

    Lastly, I don’t understand why anyone need view there being any conflict between enjoying physical fanzines, or .pdf fanzines, or writing in other formats.

    Enjoy one, enjoy the other, enjoy them all, care about the format, don’t care about the format, care about the delivery system, don’t care about it: whatever, it’s all something everyone is entitled to their own preference about.

    And then, hey, vote as you wish.

    But what’s interesting is that, loosely speaking, we have some older fans who tend to think that anyone they’ve never heard of, who hasn’t crossed their attention, can’t be a Real Fan, and some younger fans who tend to think older fans who are semi-clueless about online fandom are a bunch of fuddy-duddies, and in both cases we have people complaining that they don’t know anyone from that awful Other Crowd, and in both cases I tend to think it might be helpful if folks simply made an active effort to more familiarize themselves with each other’s fanac.

    In many cases, of course, this will be useless, because in some people’s minds, this has elements of tribal conflict, and minds have hardened, and to some degree camps have been formed. And, of course, people are simply entitled to not enjoy one form of fanac or another, and in this case, there are online fans convinced that there are things about old-fashioned fanzines they don’t like, and fanzine fans convinced there are things about online writing they don’t like. Fine.

    But telling other people that they’re Not Real Fans, while lacking any objective test of what is a Real Fan, seems curious to me. As well as rude.

    Me, if I think someone’s writing doesn’t please me, I won’t vote for them. I may even voice my opinion to to others.

    But whether or not they’re a fan or not only becomes an issue for me if they seem to have little connection to, or activity in, sf fandom. Not whether or not they seem to be active within my own range of view.

    Others’, as we say online, Mileage May Vary.

  25. Gary, you’re absolutely right about the dangers of defining fandom as what “we” think it ought to be with “we” defined as “my friends and I”. This approach grates on me and I try to avoid it, but it is easy to fall into that kind of phraseology. My mistake! Although I must point out that defining both “fan writing” and “fan” in terms of one another pretty much sends you around in circles too. All of which points out why these sorts of discussions never seem to get anyplace. It is almost impossible even to arrive at definitions of the terms.

    I suppose my major point is whether the Worldcon really wants to give yet another professional award — called best fan writer” for best nonpaid work by a professional author, which I suspect is what the award is going to mostly be, if it hasn’t been that already for a long time if the truth were told.

    Also, as I pointed out, a professional author cannot separate his or her Internet presence from his or her paying work. Which means that such work is not the same as the truly amateur work done for fanzines by professionals in the past.

    Although fan history is filled with fans who went on to professional success or continued their fanac while writing professionally, many many more fans — and many terrific writers — never or rarely wrote professionally and it seems to me that these people should have an award for their efforts. Pros already have plenty of awards.

  26. @Gary: You write –

    There was a report. It said that the committee wasn’t submitting a majority report because there was not yet a consensus on one. The majority of the committee felt that progress was being made, and discussion should continue for another year.

    Is it impossible to discuss this without someone coming back with that defensive, lawyerly answer?

    Where is the report of the “Committee for Reconstruction of the Semiprozine” on http://aussiecon4.org/index.php?page=47 Aussiecon 4’s WSFS page (you know, on that internet thing you so often call our attention to)? Answer: unlike the other working committees, they didn’t submit one for posting. Members of WSFS aren’t getting to hear any substance of the committee’s discussions, not even a description of the issues they’re trying to reach consensus about.

    After all, you know what would happen if that got out. Other fans might discuss those issues.

    Okay…and the problem with that is?

  27. Eric:

    […] I suppose my major point is whether the Worldcon really wants to give yet another professional award — called best fan writer” for best nonpaid work by a professional author, which I suspect is what the award is going to mostly be, if it hasn’t been that already for a long time if the truth were told.

    As it happens, I do think the issue of voters voting for the most famous names whose writing they’re familiar with is a perfectly valid concern, and it’s a concern I share.

    […] Also, as I pointed out, a professional author cannot separate his or her Internet presence from his or her paying work. Which means that such work is not the same as the truly amateur work done for fanzines by professionals in the past.

    And I agree. But my point was that this is now simply the reality of our world. We can’t change this.

    What we can do is try to come up with rules that are seen as fair by the maximum number of people, and that make the fewest number of people unhappy. And different people will legitimately reasonably have different views.

    But we can’t make fandom go back to the way it was thirty or forty years ago, so simply observing that things are different now only takes us so far.

    Although fan history is filled with fans who went on to professional success or continued their fanac while writing professionally, many many more fans — and many terrific writers — never or rarely wrote professionally and it seems to me that these people should have an award for their efforts. Pros already have plenty of awards.

    Although you would not be aware of this, in my opining to the Committee on the Semiprozine (which I was only thrown onto at the NASFiC, or a couple of weeks later, depending on how you look at it), I have consistently advocated maintaining a distinction between what’s amateur work, what’s semiprofessional work, and what’s professional work.

    But what I don’t think we can do is divide up people this way.

    We can divide up work as amateur or professional, but people can and often do work in two or three of these categories. That’s just reality, so far as I can see.

    Mike, I wasn’t at Aussiecon II. All I know is that Mark Olson wrote on Thu Sep 2 18:31:08 EDT 2010 that “The report that I drafted and various member of the committee modified and which the committee approved without dissent has been submitted as a
    report of the committee.”

    I am not Mark, I speak only for myself, but if I’m not confused in checking the archives, this is what Mark submitted, which was posted Tue Aug 24 23:31:01 EDT 2010 and subsequently voted upon, and which I’m given to understand was printed and distributed in written form, on paper, to the Business Meeting (I apologize that I won’t fix the picket-fencing):
    ——————————————————

    The Semiprozine Committee has been unable to come to a consensus on a
    proposal, but believes that substantial progress has been made in
    understanding a problem which turned out to be more complex than
    expected.

    Accordingly,
    Moved, to continue the Semiprozine Committee for another year and to
    direct it to report in Reno with such members and officers as determined
    by the chairman of the WSFS BM.

    Discussion:

    The committee was set up in response to a defeated proposal to abolish
    the Best Semiprozine Hugo category “to study the Semiprozine Hugo Award
    category and related categories and prepare recommendations for
    modification for the improvement of the categories”. The objections to
    the Best Semiprozine (BSP) Hugo are that the category has too few
    plausible candidates, that the category boundaries are vague and
    confusing, and that in general it is not a “good” category. The
    objections to eliminating it are primarily that there is a lot of good
    work being done which are covered only by that category and which should
    not be deprived of recognition with a Hugo.

    The options before the committee were to do nothing, to again propose to
    abolish the category, or to expand it (given that no one thinks the
    category is too big, retaining it while shrinking it is not an option
    being considered.) Most of our discussion has been around how to expand
    the category and on ways to clarify the boundaries.

    It quickly became apparent that changes to the Best Semiprozine category
    would necessarily affect the three “adjacent” categories: Best Fanzine,
    Best Related Work, and Best Editor Short. Best Fanzine because the
    original purpose of the Best Semiprozine category was to move large
    non-fiction periodicals out of the fanzine category, Best Related Work
    because there is no real content distinction between the two categories
    (material published as a book belongs in BRW and the same material
    delivered as a periodical goes into BSP), and Best Pro Editor because
    the editor categories are focused on fiction editing leaving no home for
    professional non-fiction editors.

    As a further complication, the increasing importance of electronic
    publishing and distribution invalidates some of the traditional
    distinctions between categories: Category boundaries which separate
    periodicals from non-periodicals are difficult to justify or even define
    in a world where content is commonly released continuously, and
    boundaries which depend on circulation are iffy when applied to email
    lists or web sites. (Nevertheless, size *does* matter!)

    We discussed a series of principles we would attempt to follow in
    developing proposed changes to the categories: Try to rely on public
    information only for determining categories, try to minimize changes,
    stay true to our fannish traditions, keep it simple, etc. It has become
    very clear that any result is going to be a compromise not only between
    competing positions within the committee, but even between our
    principles. (For example, it is proving hard to be both clear *and*
    unambiguous, and it’s proving hard to develop useable category
    boundaries which actually reflect our fannish sense of what ought to
    fall in what category.)

    Where we stand today is we have a series of concepts ranging from
    full-fledged proposals down to interesting observations. Nothing yet
    commands a majority of the committee and it does not appear that we’re
    very close to crafting something that does. Here is an incomplete
    summary of some of the concepts which have been tossed out. Quite
    possibly none of them will find their way into a final proposal, or if
    they do, they will not do so unchanged.

    >>> None of these represent the view of the committee! The committee as
    yet has no views! <<<

    * If any staff is paid beyond the purely nominal, the work is
    professional and is not eligible for a Hugo, though the editor(s) would
    be in the Best Editor category.

    * The electronic equivalent of an "issue" is a substantially complete
    turnover of material.

    * Define the fanzine/semiprozine category boundary by the number of
    editors.

    * Size matters a lot and we need to figure out how to measure it.

    * We'll never figure out how to measure size, so we should ignore it in
    setting the category boundaries.

    * Should all fiction magazines be ineligible with the award going to the
    editors in Best Editor?

    * Is a fannishly-run book review website eligible for Best Fanzine, a
    Best Semi-prozine or Best Related Work?

    * Nothing but money payment to the producers of content, or for access
    to the work, should be used to determine whether a work is a fanzine, a
    semiprozine, or a professional publication.

    * Is Spectrum a periodical?

    * If something is available for free under some conditions, but most
    subscribers pay for it, is it a paid or free publication?

    * Where the criteria are not easily determined, should we trust the
    nominees to certify that they meet the criteria for the category in
    which they are accepting a nomination?

    * Can we define a fanzine as something most people get for free, while a
    semi-prozine is one most people pay for?

    * Do we need to keep the Best Fanzine category tight enough so that
    traditional paper fanzines can win?

  28. For what it’s worth, I suggested several other sentences on other ideas discussed, but not enough people voted for them to go into Mark’s summary above; everyone on the committee was concerned that simply mentioning every wild idea discussed and argued over would give the wrong impression that any given idea was necessarily remotely popular.

  29. And, Mike, just write Kent Bloom and ask him to put you on the furshugginer committee. When it was created in Montreal, according to the minutes, all you had to do to be on it was ask. Anyone who wanted to sign up could and did.

    Did I know that, since I wasn’t there? No, not until I went and read the posted minutes.

    Which, incidentally, I didn’t do until Chris Barkley said “hey, would you like to be on my committee?” I never asked to be on the damn thing. I simply agreed when Chris asked me at NASFiC. (Which he was authorized to do by the motion that created the committee, which authorized the chair to add anyone the chair wished to, subsequent to the original BM sign-up.)

    After all, you know what would happen if that got out. Other fans might discuss those issues.

    Okay…and the problem with that is?

    I’m pretty sure we’re discussing the issues right here. And that fans will continue to do so all over.

    If you have an issue with the way Chris ran his committee, presumably you should take it up with Chris. I am, as you know, not him.

  30. @Gary: I appreciate your providing the text of the report — do I take that to mean you’re part of the Committee?

    You’re quite right that I might have asked to be on the committee and assuming I was appointed then I would have had access to these discussions all along. However, there are reasons I didn’t do that, and won’t now.

    I served a year on the Hugo marketing subcommittee. I joined it with the intention of writing a more accurate history of the Hugo Awards for use on the official website. Along the way some controversies involving the posted Hugo Awards came to my attention that were caused by the work of a different committee and I felt bound to try and work privately within the WSFS committee structure to address them. Unfortunately, this went nowhere until Richard Lynch made the problems public. After he did I wrote about them. The necessary corrections were made later very quietly — it was only an accident I found that had been done.

    It was impractical for me to write an official history when significant facts weren’t agreed upon by all of the relevant committee members, so I dropped off at the end of my year’s term. (Let me emphasize none of these problems were with the members of the Hugo marketing subcommittee itself, like Kevin, Cheryl and Craig.)

    Now I believe I’m more likely to move things in a positive direction by writing about them here or in my fanzine than within a WSFS committee.

  31. Mike:

    @Gary: I appreciate your providing the text of the report — do I take that to mean you’re part of the Committee?

    I wrote:

    […] Although you would not be aware of this, in my opining to the Committee on the Semiprozine (which I was only thrown onto at the NASFiC, or a couple of weeks later, depending on how you look at it), I have consistently advocated maintaining a distinction between what’s amateur work, what’s semiprofessional work, and what’s professional work.

    […]

    Which, incidentally, I didn’t do until Chris Barkley said “hey, would you like to be on my committee?” I never asked to be on the damn thing. I simply agreed when Chris asked me at NASFiC.

    I hadn’t realized, when Chris asked me at NASFiC, on August 7th, that the idea was to come up with a report for Aussiecon; I had at that time an entire vague idea that the committee was supposed to report next year in Reno. My conversation with Chris was only about ten minutes long, if that, and consisted largely of his asking me about the creation of the Semiprozine Hugo in ’82, which you’ll recall I was one of the writers of, and which was why Chris brought up the subject with me.

    So I didn’t bug Chris immediately after the NASFiC in Raleigh, about the committee and access to the mailing list, for couple of weeks, and then finally asked, and he told me to sign up for the mailing list, and my first email was immediately upon my finishing reading the archives, which took less than half an hour, on Sat Aug 21 15:04:36 EDT 2010.

    I was then startled to learn, reading the archives, that the idea was to report at Aussiecon. Further discussion ensued.

    Thanks for explaining why you prefer not to be on a committee.

    I’d note that several people signed up for the mailing list when it was created after Montreal, and then never contributed. (And, as well, quite a few people who signed up at that Business Meeting never signed up for the mailing list.)

    There’s no requirement to contribute, so it’s entirely within your choice to join the committee solely for the purpose of following the discussion, if you decide that would be interesting.

  32. For what it’s worth, here were my suggestions as summaries of some of the other notions discussed.

    I stress again, discussed, not recommended.

    * Should editors of primarily nonfiction professional magazines about sf/f be considered eligible for Best Editor? Does the current language already allow for that, or would it need clarification?

    * Should the titles of the categories be changed to better reflect what they now include? Would “Best Semiprofessional Publication” and returning to “Best Amateur Publication” be preferred? Or more hybrid phrasing, such as “Best Semiprofessional Publication/Website” and “Best Fanzine/Website,” or “Best Amateur Publication/Website” be preferable?

    * Do podcasts fit into these categories, or are they dramatic presentations?

    * Should eligibility as a Best Editor be determined by defining what makes an editor professional, or by whether the eligible work they’ve edited is professional?

    * If a publication has multiple aspects, such as a physical edition, a blog, a website with additional content, and a podcast, should these aspects be nominatable separately, or only as a unit? Can a conglomerate or professional publishing company own a fanzine or semiprozine? Do we view the parent company as part of the whole publication?

    * Should self-selection be allowed in any aspect of eligibility for any category? Should it be forbidden?

    * Should amateurs be allowed to accept limited amounts of financial compensation, if distinctly less than semiprofessionals, or utterly forbidden? If allowed, up to what point or amount?

    * How comfortable are fanzine editors and bloggers with competing against each other in the same category?

    * Should we retain a four-issue minimum for publications, or reduce it to three issues, or two?

    * Is “average” readership of an online publication’s URLs in a given period something to be considered in category placement, or is it irrelevant? Are webcounters of any possible use, or should they be not considered at all because they’re insufficiently reliable?

  33. Thanks, Bill Burns, for that link to the new issue of Chris’s DRINK TANK — which I just followed and have come back *happy* to have encountered Claire Brialey’s long and thoughtful letter of comment. I won’t pretend to have read all of it just yet, but it’s such a distinct breath of fresh air compared to the unreadable loghorreaic rantings of Gary Farber here.

    I also found Chris’s comments (on the last page, in response to Kevin Standlee) comparing the clarity of the criteria for Animated Feature, Short Film and Documentary to the muddiness of the same for Best Fanzine and Best Fanwriter to be well-put, and would hope that the people who attend worldcon business meetings would take them to heart.

  34. Mike:

    Let me emphasize none of these problems were with the members of the Hugo marketing subcommittee itself, like Kevin, Cheryl and Craig.

    Thank you! I was never certain about that when you declined re-appointment.

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