Dublin 2019 WSFS Business Meeting Day 4

Corina Stark completed the marathon today with notes of Monday’s session, “WSFS Business Meeting 3”, which can be read on Alex Acks’ blog.

Once video of the meeting has been uploaded, it will be available at Worldcon Events on YouTube.

The agenda is available here. The references (e.g. “D9”) identify items in it.

Chair Requested to Rule on Handouts: Business meeting chair Jesi Lipp answered Nicholas Whyte’s request for a ruling about charging debate time against opponents to a motion due to a handout they distributed at yesterday’s meeting, and/or their allowability in general.

Lipp said there is nothing in the rules that explicitly disallows handouts of any kind, nor any provision about printed materials classified as debate. While they qualify philosophically as debate, procedurally they do not. They are not disallowed. However, a proposed rule about them, submitted yesterday and referred to committee, will be addressed next year.

Someone appealed the ruling of the chair. The meeting voted to sustain the chair’s decision.

New Business: Item D9, Non-Transferrability of Voting Rights. This would essentially divorce the membership of WSFS from attending the con.

The motion was referred to committee with Dave McCarty and the makers of the motion, Ben Yalow and Kate Secor (along with anyone else who asks to be added). Yalow will chair the committee. 

D10, Preserving Supporting Membership Sales for Site Selection. The proposal would add this rule:

1.5.10: No convention shall terminate the sale of supporting memberships prior to the close of site selection.

The makers of the motion, Cliff Dunn, Kate Secor and Ben Yalow, proposed the rule because Dublin 2019 terminated the sale of attending memberships and day passes [but not supporting memberships] two weeks prior to the start of the convention.

An attempt to refer the motion to committee was defeated. The main motion passed and will be up for ratification at next year’s business meeting.

Close of Meeting: The Chair was presented with an engraved gavel which says “Jesi Lipp, Chair, World Science Fiction Society, 2019, Dublin, Ireland.” The Chair said they had fun, “even though it is sick and twisted to call this fun.” The meeting adjourned.

Dublin 2019 WSFS Business Meeting Day 3

Corina Stark provided full notes of the Sunday session in “WSFS Business Meeting 2”, which can be read on Alex Acks’ blog.

Once video of the meeting has been uploaded, it will be available at Worldcon Events on YouTube.

The agenda is available here. The references (e.g. “D7”) refer to items in it.

Site Selection: Washington D.C.’s unopposed bid to hold the 2021 Worldcon is officially voted in. (See File 770 post “Site Selection Confirms Washington DC” for vote count and GoH info.)

Seated Worldcon: CoNZealand made a short presentation. Membership price goes up October 1. Program signups are available now. CoNZealand.nz is the website.

Pass-On Funds: Kevin Roche passes along some funds from Worldcon 76 to Dublin 2019, CoNZealand, and DisCon III.

Continued New Business: Resumed with D8, No Deadline for Nominations Eligibility.

Martin Pyne offered an amendment to add a 2024 sunset clause. Nicholas Whyte, one of the makers of the motion, opposed it because either it [D8] is a good idea or it is not, and a sunset clause would be counterproductive. A vote was called and the amendment failed.

Kevin Standlee said there was an “entryism” problem which is why there originally was a January deadline., and he moved to amend to reinstate January 31 as the deadline. The amendment passed.

A vote was called and D8 passed as amended. It will be forwarded to next year’s agenda for ratification.

D13, Best Game or Interactive Experience. Ira Alexandre, a maker of the motion, spoke in favor. (See Spark’s full notes for argument.)  There was a motion to refer the motion to a committee to report back next year. Ultimately, the business meeting voted to refer D13 to a dedicated subcommittee in the Hugo Awards Study Committee.  The proponents of the proposal were invited to join the committee as part of this consideration.

D7, Five and Five. Rafe Richards moved to amend the motion so it does not subtract six or add five to rule 3.8.1 – which the chair explained would keep the number of finalists at 6 but still get rid of the existing sunset clause (reversing the intent of the original motion.)  

When the meeting voted on the amendment (to keep 6, and to get rid of the sunset clause) it passed. The amended main motion also passed, keeping 6 and removing the sunset clause. It will be forwarded to next year’s agenda for ratification.

Then the meting considered B4, Suspend 5 and 6 for 2020, and the voters rejected the motion, keeping 5 and 6 for 2020.

D11 is Clear Up the Definition of Public in the Artist Category Forever. An attempt to refer the proposal to committee failed. The main motion passed. It will be forwarded to next year’s agenda for ratification.

Proposed Resolution: The meeting next took up B.5, Credit to Translators of Written Fiction. B5 would award a Hugo to the credited translator of a novel, novella, novelette, and short story, when the original text is not in English. Kent Bloom argued against, confused about what this is trying to do – it is within the authority of the administering Worldcon or dealt with as a constitutional amendment depending on what they are trying to do, so is not appropriate as a resolution. The meeting voted against the resolution.

Standing Rules Change. As a result of a handout being distributed at the business meeting this weekend, there was a proposed B.6 Standing Rule Change, which would require someone making a written response to new business to submit it 14 days before the business meeting so the originators of the new business can have a chance to respond in the same (written) fashion.

Don Eastlake III moved to refer the rule change to the Nitpicking and Flyspecking for next year. The proposal was referred to committee.

Business carried over: Items D9 and D10 will be considered at Monday’s business meeting.

Dublin 2019 WSFS Business Meeting Day 2

Corina Stark provided full notes of the Saturday session in “WSFS Business Meeting 1 Liveblog”, which can be read on Alex Acks’ blog.  (And Acks will be writing summary articles later.)

Once video of the meeting has been uploaded, it will be available at Worldcon Events on YouTube.

The agenda is available here. The references (e.g. “D7”) refer to items in it.

Mark Protection Committee: The current year’s open seats on the Mark Protection Committee were filled by Kevin Standlee, Ben Yalow, and Jo Van Ekeren by vote of the meeting.

New Resolution. A new resolution was added to the agenda, B4: Credit to Translators of Written Fiction. In it, Mark Richards, Chris Barkley and Juli Marr request that when a work in translation for Novel/Novella/Novelette, or Short Story wins a Hugo, that a Hugo rocket also be awarded to the credited translator. (See makers’ explanation in File 770 post “Resolution Asks That Hugo Trophy Also Be Given To Translator, When Applicable”.)

Business Passed On: Items that received first passage in 2018 were brought up for ratification.

C1, Adding Series to the Series, adds the bolded words and deletes the struck-over word.

3.2.6: The categories of Best Novel, Novella, Novelette, and Short Story, and Series shall be open to works in which the text is the primary form of communication, regardless of the publication medium, including but not limited to physical print, audiobook, and ebook.

The motion passed unanimously.

C2: Comic Books and Graphic Stories. The motion adds “or Comic” to the category title. The change was a product of the Hugo Awards Study Committee.

3.3.7: Best Graphic Story or Comic. Any science fiction or fantasy story told in graphic form appearing for the first time in the previous calendar year.

The argument was that it avoids any implication that comics are less eligible than graphic novels. The meeting voted to ratify the change.

C3, Notability Still Matters. The motion adds the language in bold. (See Dave Wallace’s File 770 guest post “How ‘Notability Still Matters’ Would Have Affected the 2017 and 2018 Hugo Long Lists”.)

3.12.4: The complete numerical vote totals, including all preliminary tallies for first, second, . . . places, shall be made public by the Worldcon Committee within ninety (90) days after the Worldcon. During the same period, the results of the last ten rounds of the finalist selection process for each category (or all the rounds if there are fewer than ten) shall also be published. Rounds that would otherwise be required to be reported for nomination may be withheld from this report if the candidate to be eliminated appeared on fewer than 4% of the ballots cast in the category and there are no candidates appearing on at least 4% of the ballots cast in the category in rounds to be reported below them.

Dave McCarty advocated the change, saying it would lower the burden on administrative staff as many administrators publish a long “long list” anyway.

Dave Wallace shared an analysis of past results if the change had been in effect, saying that the Short Story category is disproportionally affected and that it would have left off many excellent stories by well-known names in the field. As this helps Hugo voters to discover new works, the harm of leaving this information off outweighs the benefits of the proposed amendment.

Ratification failed, by a vote of 41 for, 44 against.

New Constitutional Amendments: Any of the proposals that pass get forwarded to next year’s Business Meeting for a ratification vote.

D1, Clarification of Worldcon Powers. The proposal removes struck over words and adds words in bold.

3.2.12: The Worldcon Committee is responsible for all matters concerning the their Awards.

Kevin Standlee said the change would make it mechanically impossible for a future Worldcon to “take away” Hugos from a previous year. The motion passed unanimously.

D2, Disposition of the NASFiC Ballot. The proposed addition to the rules would resolve Site Selection if it crashes at a NASFiC, which has never happened, but this would allow for a safety net and call a Business Meeting at a NASFiC solely to deal with Site Selection.

4.8.5: In the case the administering convention is a NASFiC, it shall hold a Business Meeting to receive the results of the site selection voting and to handle any other business pertaining directly, and only, to the selection of the future NASFiC convention. This meeting shall have no other powers or duties.

The motion passed.

D3, A Problem of Numbers. The proposed change clarifies that a member can vote in the Final Hugo Awards and the Site Selection even if they do not know their membership number or it has not yet been assigned, as the staff may supply it for them. The motion passed unanimously.

D4, The Needs of the One. Clarifies that an item can be moved around on an individual ballot, while the other clauses in the line item applies to categories as a whole. Adds the words in bold.

3.8.7: The Committee shall move a nomination on an individual ballot from another category to the work’s default category only if the member has made fewer than five (5) nominations in the default category.

Motion passed unanimously.

Item D5, The Forward Pass. Clarifies that the pass-along of member information to future Worldcons must be done in compliance with all appropriate laws such as GDPR. Discussion surfaced several issues that could not be immediately resolved and the pending amendment and a related motion on the floor were referred to the Nitpicking and Flyspecking Committee for a report next year.

D6, That Ticket Has Been Punched. The proposal would amend the WSFS Constitution by adding a subsection to Section 3.4.2:

3.4.2.1: For finalists in the Series category which have previously appeared on the ballot for Best Series, any installments published [in English] in a year prior to that previous appearance, regardless of country of publication, shall be considered to be part of the Series’ previous eligibility, and will not count toward the re-eligibility requirements for the current year.

During debate a motion to amend the proposed rule by adding “in English” was passed 39-29. Stark’s notes don’t say where the words were added, so I have placed the phrase in brackets about where it seems to belong, pending confirmation. The motion as amended then passed and will be subject to ratification next year.

Stark’s notes say “D7, Five and Five will take significant time to discuss and debate…” without stating what happened to it, but that the meeting voted to proceed to item D8.

D8, No Deadline for Nominations Eligibility was debated. The proposal would get rid of the requirement for people to buy Worldcon memberships by the December 31 deadline in order to be allowed to nominate for the Hugos. (See File 770 discussion “The Right Date?”) Martin Pyne moved to add a sunset clause for 2024.

At that point the meeting adjourned, with plans to take up D8 on Sunday tomorrow with proper wording of the sunset clause. D13, the Best Game or Interactive Experience amendment, will also be discussed on Sunday, after the Site Selection results are presented.

Dublin 2019 WSFS Business Meeting Day 1

Corina Stark did a fantastic job of notetaking in “WSFS Preliminary Business Meeting Liveblog”, which can be read on Alex Acks’ blog.  

Once video of the meeting has been uploaded, it will be available at Worldcon Events on YouTube.

The agenda is available here. The references (e.g. “D7”) refer to items in it.

Short summary: The business meeting rejected the proposed Best Translated Novel Hugo by a motion to postpone indefinitely. Basically, everything else was assigned a debate time and will be taken up tomorrow.

Here are the highlights – see the full post for what the participants had to say, and details of the parliamentary maneuvering.

Last year’s Worldcon chair (Worldcon 76) Kevin Roche responded to a question about their financial report. “Kevin Roche reports they are still in litigation which reduces the pass-along funds, but he has brought three checks for Dublin, CoNZealand, and the 79th Worldcon. First four complaints dismissed with prejudice, defamation claim still pending…. Kent Bloom questions Roche about surplus to give a donation for preserving the Worldcon memorabilia. Roche will check his budget, but they anticipate prevailing in the lawsuit however it is a hope not a guarantee.”

The motion to add a Standing Rule giving the Committee of the Whole the ability to extend itself rather than repeat the labyrinthine maneuver from last year’s business meeting was passed, and (by a second vote) given immediate effect. The text of the rule is —  

Rule 5.12: Committee of the Whole. The Committee of the Whole shall have the right to amend its duration without seeking permission from the Business Meeting by way of a motion to extend debate.

Motions to extend the Hugo eligibility Prospect and Worlds of Ursula K LeGuin both passed.

Debate times were set for ratification of business passed on from last year, to be considered on Saturday.

Debate times were set for new constitutional amendments D1-D6.

D7 – the “Five and Five” motion to cut back the number of Hugo finalists in a category to five – was challenged by a motion postpone indefinitely. . [See discussion of motion at File 770 in “Reform or Rollback?”] The motion to postpone indefinitely failed, for lack of a two-thirds majority, 46 in favor, 30 against. Debate time was set.

D8-D11 debate times set.

D12 – The proposal to add a Best Translated Novel Hugo was eliminated when the meeting voted in favor of a motion to postpone indefinitely.

D13 – The proposal to add a Best Game or Interactive Experience Hugo survived a motion to postpone indefinitely and debate time was set.

All the items for which debate time was set will come up for consideration at a subsequent business meeting session this weekend.

Pixel Scroll 8/5/17 Nine Pinterests In Amber

(1) I KNOW, YOU’RE FROM THE SIXTIES! Somebody may be slipping drugs into the coffee at the Arizona Opera Company. Coming in October is their production of Hercules vs Vampires.

Hold on tight for an out of this world event! Hercules vs Vampires combines operatic singing and 1960s pop culture, synchronizing live music with the 1961 cult classic film, Hercules in the Haunted World. Watch as the original film, starring bodybuilder Reg Park and horror legend Christopher Lee, is projected above a live orchestra and singers performing the music to a new, original score. You’ll thrill as the mighty hero Hercules journeys through the underworld, battling fiendish monsters to rescue his beloved! Action packed, outlandish, and fun for the whole family, Hercules vs Vampires offers a fresh take on this gorgeously campy Technicolor world.

(2) BATMAN REMEMBERED. Adam West Day will be celebrated in the actor’s hometown — Walla Walla, Washington — on September 19.

He said proceeds will go to Camp Rainbow, a free camp in Idaho for children who have survived or are undergoing treatment for cancer and blood-related disease or disorders. West, who had a home in Idaho, was a vocal supporter of the camp.

Grant plans to wear his own Batman costume to the screening and is urging others to join him.

“This is bigger than just one fan,” Grant said. “This is a community getting together and doing something that should have been done long ago to honor someone that they love, and that they’re very proud of.”

They will also host a bat-signal lighting ceremony, similar to the one done in Los Angeles.

(3) 2017 HUGO VOTE TOTAL. I don’t remember reporting this when it came out, so just in case:

(4) FINNISH WEIRD. This Is Finland continues its Worldcon coverage: “Proud to be weird at Worldcon”.

[Maria] Turtschaninoff, who won the Finlandia Junior prize, is one of the most popular authors in Finnish literature today. She has had her book rights sold to over twenty countries and a movie has even been optioned. The first two books in her Red Abbey Chronicles series, Maresi and Naondel, have been called “feminist fantasy” by impressed reviewers.

“I’m not very interested in labels. I’m not that interested in messages either,” she says. “But I am a feminist, and an environmentalist, and a humanist, and all my values are reflected in what I write. And the mere fact that I am a woman who gets to write and who writes about women is inarguably a feminist action.”

Worldcon attendee Turtschaninoff says she is proud of the diversity in Finnish Weird, and says for such a small country Finnish writers have done quite well.

“From what I have seen, we in Finland are somewhat freed of the commercial expectations authors in, for instance, the Anglo-Saxon world face,” she continues. “This gives us some room to experiment, to go beyond what is expected. I believe Finland is fertile ground for bold, different and new voices and stories.”

(5) MEME OF THE DAY. A couple of SJW credentials have their own ideas about packing for the Worldcon.

(6) AN EXCUSE IN EVERY PORT. Writing Excuses cruise “WXR 2017 in the Baltic Sea” docked today. Follow the #WXR17 hashtag to see tweets sent during the voyage:

(7) 9W. Lots happening at Nine Worlds this weekend. One small example:

(8) ALPHABET MALES. The Nameless Digest’s “A to Z: Influential Science Fiction Authors” has photos of 26 authors in alphabetical order – including a rare one of a clean-shaven Larry Niven.

Unfortunately, no women included at all.

(9) OWNING LITERATURE. One never thinks of these numinous scenes as being associated with a real place that a person could buy: “E.B. White’s former Maine farm, where Charlotte spun her web, goes up for sale”.

White, who wrote the children’s classics “Charlotte’s Web” and “Stuart Little,” bought the 44-acre property overlooking Blue Hill Bay with his wife, Katharine, in 1933. He lived there until his death in 1985.

The Gallants, who also own a home in South Carolina, purchased it shortly after White’s death, and have lived half of each year there ever since. They are now in their 80s and plan to live full time in their single-level home in South Carolina.

The couple has tried to be respectful of White’s memory – and the history of the house – by updating the kitchen and refinishing the floors but otherwise leaving its character alone.

“They have not gentrified it,” said Martha Dischinger of Downeast Properties in Blue Hill. “They’ve not gone in and done weird things. They have made all the right improvements.”

The barn that was the setting for “Charlotte’s Web,” the beloved children’s book about a pig named Wilbur and his friendship with Charlotte the spider, is still there, including the famous rope swing whose motion was mimicked in White’s writing.

(10) TODAY IN HISTORY

  • August 5, 1960 – William Castle’s 13 Ghosts brings “Illusion-O” to moviegoers.
  • August 5, 1988 The Blob remake oozes into theaters.
  • August 5, 2011 Rise of the Planet of the Apes premiered on this day.

(11) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY MOONWALKER

  • Born August 5, 1930  — Neil Armstrong

(12) WHAT, HE WORRY? Kyle Smith at National Review Online has a piece called “Confederate and the Dunces Who Assume It’s Pro-Slavery” where he argues that people who assume that ‘Confederate’ is going to promote slavery will have nothing to worry about.

Race these days is a kind of mental high-voltage power surge that is short-circuiting people’s minds. Do these writers really lack the imagination to see what creative direction Confederate is going to take? Every character, scene, and line of dialogue is going to be scrutinized, double-checked, and triple-checked to make sure it sends the message that white supremacy is evil. The primary creative risk for Confederate is not, as many commenters fear, that it will amount to alt-right white-supremacy porn but that it’ll be so focused on being the opposite of that it will keep pounding the same chords over and over. It’ll be so single-mindedly determined to prove it is on the morally correct side that it might be didactic and repetitive. A creative project that is principally concerned with selling the audience a political message (even one as unexceptionable as opposition to racism) risks being more of a sermon than a story.

(13) PERSON OF INTEREST. Chip Hitchcock theorizes: “It looks likely that the authorities have again gotten the wrong angle on a computer crime: Bail of $30,000 set for UK cyber expert Marcus Hutchins. To those of us who remember the mess the Secret Service tried to make of Steve Jackson Games, this sounds way too familiar.”

Ms Lobo said Mr Hutchins denied he was the author of the malware and said he would plead not guilty to all of the charges, which date between July 2014 and July 2015.

“He has dedicated his life to researching malware, not trying to harm people,” she said. “Use the internet for good is what he has done.

“He was completely shocked, this isn’t’ something he anticipated. He came here for a work-related conference and he was fully anticipating to go back home and had no reason to be fearful of coming or going from the United States.”

Mr Hutchins came to prominence in May this year after finding a “kill switch” to stop the WannaCry ransomeware attack that hit the NHS, as well as other organisations in 150 countries.

Also known as “MalwareTech” online, Mr Hutchins was hailed as an “accidental hero” after registering a domain name to track the spread of the virus, which actually ended up halting it.

Mr Hutchins, who works for Los Angeles-based computer security firm Kryptos Logi, had been in Las Vegas to attend the Black Hat and Def Con cyber-security conferences.

He was arrested at Las Vegas airport minutes before he was due to fly home.

(14) THE SHIRT OFF THEIR BACK. Pulp Coming Attractions runs a weekly roundup about publications and products of interest to pulp collectors and fans. That’s where I spotted these magazine logo t-shirts —

Famous Fantastic Mysteries T-Shirt This is the authentic logo used for this classic pulp magazine from the 1940s. Note: red fabric only. $22.95

(15) STAR WARS WEATHER. You may also appreciate Snorgtees’ “Alderaan 5-Day Forecast”

(16) AND MATCHING SHOES. Yahoo! Movies’ Marcus Errico recommends these “‘Star Wars’ Shoes: Put the Force on Your Feet For 40th Anniversary”

As the 40th anniversary celebration for A New Hope, rolls on, a new line of canvas footwear inspired by George Lucas‘s original 1977 space opera is ready to launch from shoemaker Sperry, which released a popular Jaws-themed collection last year. Arriving Aug. 10, the Star Wars x Sperry collection features five styles that run the gamut from the light side to the dark side with seminal designs, images, and iconography from the film

For example —

Cloud Slip-On Droids: Now you can walk a mile in C-3PO and R2-D2‘s shoes.

(17) MEMO FROM THE EMPEROR. Charlie Lee Jackson II’s Empire of Entertainment has released two new digital books this week, both space operas.

Planet Patrol is about a small ship on which a Space Princess (like a circuit-riding judge of the Old west) travels the Solar System.

Dreadnought of Space is set centuries later, on one of those gigantic ships travelling to another star system to dispense justice. They represent the first books of a new series, “Star Service”.

(18) PARK EFFECT. When you wish upon a star…. “MouseMingle helps Disney fans find their happily-ever-after”.

Tavres, who scored six dates on MouseMingle, quit his full-time job as a technical program manager to work on the site. He’s close to finishing a mobile app and site redesign…..

MouseMingle is not just about finding love. Subscribers can also find friends and park pals.

“It’s not just about Disneyland, and it’s not specific,” Tavres said. “Everybody is welcome. I want people just to connect.”

“I couldn’t believe it when I learned couples were getting married from this site that I started,” said Tavres, who noted that Disney contacted and applauded him but added that he stress the website was an unofficial fan site unaffiliated with the Walt Disney Co. “I’m so happy for all of them.”

Tavres learned of the Guy wedding when Atwood-Knudson sent him an email thanking him for his creation.

Their wedding bands were set in three diamonds in the shape of Mickey Mouse’s head and the character’s silhouette was featured in tabletop topiaries and as a cake topper.

The bride walked down the aisle to “Married Life” from “Up.” The new husband and wife left the ceremony to an orchestral version of “You’re Welcome” from “Moana,” shared their first dance to “Ma Belle Evangeline” from “The Princess and the Frog” and selected “Baby Mine” from “Dumbo” for the father-daughter number.

(19) FRANKENSTEIN LOVED GUACAMOLE. Do you find news like this anywhere else? Of course you don’t.

(20) BEETLEJUICE ANNIVERSARY COMING. Documentary for the Recently Deceased is an independent documentary about Tim Burton’s movie Beetlejuice. It will be available in 2018 to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the release of the film. Here’s a trailer —

[Thanks to Bruce D. Arthurs, JJ, Andrew Porter, Cat Eldridge, Martin Morse Wooster, Chip Hitchcock, Charles Lee Jackson II, and John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Daniel Dern.]