Waiting For Online Hugo Voting And The 2021 Voter Packet

Animated GIF by DemonDeLuxe (Dominique Toussaint), CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

By JJ: Enquiring Hugo voter minds want to know: When will we be able to vote online? When will the Hugo Voter Packet be available?

In the fine tradition of similar File 770 posts on the subject in years past, and using my highly-refined statistical skills gained while acquiring my Master’s degree from Cattimothy U*, here is a comparison of the deadlines and availability dates of recent Worldcons.

Because what the hell, we’ve got time to kill. And a year from now, someone is going to ask about this again, the way they do every year.

Notes:

  • In 2008 and 2009, the Hugo Voter Packet was put together by John Scalzi
  • In 2012, the Hugo Voter Packet was released in stages starting on May 18, becoming fully available on May 30
  • In 2008, 2010-2015, and 2018, the Finalist Announcements were made on Easter weekend

Timing Observations:

  • Aussiecon 4 in 2010 had online nominations available the earliest, on January 1.
  • Renovation in 2011 and Loncon 3 in 2014 had online nominations available the longest, at 82 days.
  • Chicon 7 in 2012 and Renovation were the Worldcons which had online voting up and running the fastest, at 2 and 5 days following the announcement of the Finalists.
  • Chicon 7 had online voting available the longest, at 113 days.
  • Denvention 3 in 2008 and Renovation were the Worldcons which had the Hugo Voter Packet available the most quickly, at 3 and 4 weeks following the Finalist announcement.


1 – days between online nominations becoming available and nomination deadline
2 – days between nomination deadline and finalist announcement
3 – days between finalist announcement and online voting becoming available
4 – days between finalist announcement and Hugo Voter Packet becoming available
5 – days between online voting becoming available and voting deadline
6 – days between voting deadline and the start of Worldcon


While you’re waiting for the Hugo Voter Packet, here’s a list of links to read the 2021 Hugo Finalists which are available for free online.

*The Camestros Felapton University for Beating Statistical Horses Until They Are Thoroughly Dead

Waiting For Online Hugo Voting And The 2020 Voter Packet

By JJ: Enquiring Hugo voter minds want to know: When will we be able to vote online? When will the Hugo Voter Packet be available?

In the fine tradition of similar File 770 posts on the subject in years past, and using my highly-refined statistical skills gained while acquiring my Master’s degree from Cattimothy U*, here is a comparison of the deadlines and availability dates of recent Worldcons.

Because what the hell, we’ve got time to kill. And a year from now, someone is going to ask about this again, the way they do every year.

Notes:

  • In 2008 and 2009, the Hugo Voter Packet was put together by John Scalzi
  • In 2012, the Hugo Voter Packet was released in stages starting on May 18, becoming fully available on May 30
  • With the exception of 2009, 2016, 2017, 2019, and 2020, all Finalist Announcements were made on Easter weekend

Timing Observations:

  • Aussiecon 4 in 2010 had online nominations available the earliest, on January 1.
  • Renovation in 2011 and Loncon 3 in 2014 had online nominations available the longest, at 82 days.
  • Chicon 7 in 2012 and Renovation were the Worldcons which had online voting up and running the fastest, at 2 and 5 days following the announcement of the Finalists.
  • Chicon 7 had online voting available the longest, at 113 days.
  • Denvention 3 in 2008 and Renovation were the Worldcons which had the Hugo Voter Packet available the most quickly, at 3 and 4 weeks following the Finalist announcement.


1 – days between online nominations becoming available and nomination deadline
2 – days between nomination deadline and finalist announcement
3 – days between finalist announcement and online voting becoming available
4 – days between finalist announcement and Hugo Voter Packet becoming available
5 – days between online voting becoming available and voting deadline
6 – days between voting deadline and the start of Worldcon


While you’re waiting for the Hugo Voter Packet, here’s a list of links to read the 2020 Hugo Finalists which are available for free online.

*The Camestros Felapton University for Beating Statistical Horses Until They Are Thoroughly Dead

Waiting For Online Hugo Voting And The 2019 Voter Packet

By JJ: Enquiring Hugo voter minds want to know: When will we be able to vote online? When will the Hugo Voter Packet be available?

In the fine tradition of similar File 770 posts on the subject in years past, and using my highly-refined statistical skills gained while acquiring my Master’s degree from Cattimothy U*, here is a comparison of the deadlines and availability dates of recent Worldcons.

Because what the hell, we’ve got time to kill. And a year from now, someone is going to ask about this again, the way they do every year.

UPDATE May 11, 2019:
The Hugo Voter Packet and Online Voting are now available.

Notes:

  • In 2008 and 2009, the Hugo Voter Packet was put together by John Scalzi
  • In 2012, the Hugo Voter Packet was released in stages starting on May 18, becoming fully available on May 30
  • With the exception of 2009, 2016, 2017, and 2019, all Finalist Announcements were made on Easter weekend

Timing Observations:

  • Aussiecon 4 in 2010 had online nominations available the earliest, on January 1.
  • Renovation in 2011 and Loncon 3 in 2014 had online nominations available the longest, at 82 days.
  • Chicon 7 in 2012 and Renovation were the Worldcons which had online voting up and running the fastest, at 2 and 5 days following the announcement of the Finalists.
  • Chicon 7 had online voting available the longest, at 113 days.
  • Denvention 3 in 2008 and Renovation were the Worldcons which had the Hugo Voter Packet available the most quickly, at 3 and 4 weeks following the Finalist announcement.


1 – days between online nominations becoming available and nomination deadline
2 – days between nomination deadline and finalist announcement
3 – days between finalist announcement and online voting becoming available
4 – days between finalist announcement and Hugo Voter Packet becoming available
5 – days between online voting becoming available and voting deadline
6 – days between voting deadline and the start of Worldcon


While you’re waiting for the Hugo Voter Packet, here’s a list of links to read the 2019 Hugo Finalists which are available for free online.

*The Camestros Felapton University for Beating Statistical Horses Until They Are Thoroughly Dead

Waiting For Online Hugo Voting And The Voter Packet

By JJ: Enquiring Hugo voter minds want to know: When will we be able to vote online? When will the Hugo Voter Packet be available?

In the tradition of similar File 770 posts on the subject in years past, here is a comparison of the deadlines and availability dates of recent Worldcons.

Because what the hell, we’ve got time to kill. And a year from now, someone is going to ask about this again, the way they do every year.

Notes:

  • In 2008 and 2009, the Hugo Voter Packet was put together by John Scalzi
  • In 2012, the Hugo Voter Packet was released in stages starting on May 18, becoming fully available on May 30
  • With the exception of 2009, 2016, and 2017, all Finalist Announcements were made on Easter weekend

Chicon 7 in 2012 and Renovation in 2011 were the Worldcons which had online voting up and running the fastest, at 2 and 5 days following the announcement of the Finalists. Denvention 3 in 2008 and Renovation were the Worldcons which had the Hugo Voter Packet available the most quickly, at 3 and 4 weeks following the Finalist announcement.

While you’re waiting for the Hugo Voter Packet, here’s a list of links to read the 2018 Hugo Finalists which are available for free online.

  1. – days between online nominations becoming available and nomination deadline
  2. – days between nomination deadline and finalist announcement
  3. – days between finalist announcement and online voting becoming available
  4. – days between finalist announcement and Hugo Voter Packet becoming available
  5. – days between online voting becoming available and voting deadline
  6. – days between voting deadline and the start of Worldcon

Update 04/29/2018: Added graph.

MAC II Delivers Pass-Along Funds to Worldcon 76

The pass-along policy is a commitment to distribute at least one-half of a Worldcon’s surplus to the next three Worldcons that make the same promise.

Last year’s Worldcon, MidAmeriCon II, benefitted from that policy and now is paying it forward. They gave $33,000 to Worldcon 75 earlier, and in a ceremony at Helsinki turned over a like amount to Worldcon 76 chair Kevin Roche.

They also gave $5,000 of their surplus to the 2017 NASFiC.

“We plan to but haven’t given pass-along funds to Dublin yet,” says MAC II chair Ruth Lichtwardt. “We’re also assessing several requests from fan groups along with looking at other possible contributions, and will be determining distribution soon.”

Pixel Scroll 3/27/17 On The Gripping Hand Of Darkness

(1) SPACE, THE INITIAL FRONTIER. In a profile published in the October 17 New Yorker, Julie Phillips reveals why Ursula Le Guin’s name has a space in it.

Her husband’s birth name was Charles LeGuin.  They were married in France, and “when they applied for a marriage license, a ‘triumphant bureaucrat’ told Charles his Breton name was ‘spelled wrong’ without a space, so when they married they both took the name Le Guin.”

(2) JUST MISSPELL MY NAME CORRECTLY. By a vote of the members, the Science Fiction Poetry Association has renamed itself the Science Fiction & Fantasy Poetry Association. Although its name has changed, the organization will keep using the initials SFPA.

And nearly every time the poets talk about SFPA in the hearing of old-time fanzine fans you can depend on someone dropping a heavy hint that they’re at risk being mixed up with a pre-existing fan group that uses the same abbreviation. Today it was Andrew Porter chirping in a comment on the announcement —

Not to be confused with the Southern Fandom Press Association, which has been around for more than 40 years…

Unfortunately it’s Porter who is confused, as he seems to have forgotten the apa’s name is the Southern Fandom Press Alliance.

(3) SAMOVAR LAUNCHES. A new sff magazine, Samovar, launched today, featuring “the best of speculative fiction in translation including original stories, reprints, poetry, reviews and more material, as well as printing translations alongside the stories in their original language.” Samovar will be produced as a quarterly, special imprint of Strange Horizons.

“Stories tell us who we are, and let us see who other people are. We already have access to an enormous wealth of speculative fiction in English, but we want to know more” – The Samovar editorial team.

What wondrous fantastical tales are being conjured in Finnish? Who writes the best Nigerian space odysseys? Is Mongolia hiding an epic fantasy author waiting to be discovered? We want to know, and we aim to find out.

For Samovar, writers and translators are of equal importance, and we do our best to shine a spotlight on the talented individuals who pen both the original and the translated version of a story. We hope that in this way we can boost the profile of speculative fiction in translation so that everyone involved receives the recognition they deserve and so we can all continue to enjoy the strange, mind-bending and fantastical fiction of all cultures.

In issue one: two sisters create an imagined world where things that are lost can be found. A despot is forced to see the truth he’s tried to hide from. An academic finds poetry, science fiction and reality beginning to merge. And the Curiosity Rover turns its own sardonic gaze on Mars.

The Samovar editorial team is Laura Friis, Greg West and Sarah Dodd. Their advisory board includes Helen MarshallRachel Cordasco and Marian Via Rivera-Womack.

(4) TENSION, APPREHENSION, AND DISSENSION. The Atlantic’s Megan Garber asks: What’s the opposite of a “cliffhanger”?

Extended cliffhangers (cliffstayers? cliffhaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaangers?) have animated some of the most narratively powerful works of television of recent years; they have helped to heighten the tension in shows like Breaking Bad (how low will Walt go?) and Serial (did he do it?) and Quantico (did she do it?) and True Detective (who did it?) and Lost (who are they? where are they?) and, in general, pretty much any sitcom that has ever featured, simmering just below its surface, some will-they-or-won’t-they sexual tension.

What’s especially notable about the recent shows that are employing the device, though, is that they’re locating the tension in one (unanswered) question. They’re operating in direct opposition to the way traditional cliffhangers were primarily used: between installments, between episodes, between seasons, in the interstitial spaces that might otherwise find a story’s momentum stalling. Big Little Lies and Riverdale and This Is Us and all the rest are taking the specific narrative logic of “Who shot J.R.?” and flipping it: The tension here exists not necessarily to capture audience interest over a show’s hiatus (although, certainly, there’s a little of that, too), but much more to infuse the content of the show at large with a lurking mystery. Things simmer rather than boil. The cliffhanger is less about one shocking event with one central question, and more about a central mystery that insinuates itself over an entire season (and, sometimes, an entire series).

(5) SLOWER THAN LIGHT COMMUNICATION. This is how social media works: I never heard of Harry Potter & the Methods of Rationality until somebody complained about it.

The appeal for a 2016 Hugo nomination was posted by the author in 2015.

First, the following request: I would like any readers who think that HPMOR deserves it sufficiently, and who are attending or supporting the 2015, 2016, or 2017 Worldcon, to next year, nominate Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality for Best Novel in the 2016 Hugos. Whether you then actually vote for HPMOR as Best Novel is something I won’t request outright, since I don’t know what other novels will be competing in 2016. After all the nominees are announced, look over what’s there and vote for what you think is best.

I don’t know how many votes he ended up getting but it wasn’t enough to rank among the top 15 works reported by MidAmeriCon II.

(6) FINALLY A GOOD WORD ABOUT THE MOVIES. Book View Café’s Diana Pharoah Francis was both nostalgic and thoughtful after hosting a Lord of the Rings marathon at home.

…Among the SF/F communities, it was this extraordinary vision come to life in a way we had never experienced before. It was not cheesy or all about the CGI. It was about strength, honor, choices, and hope. It was real characters in dreadful situations. The watching of heroes being made and broken beneath weights no one should have to bear. And Aragorn — a king in the making. A soul of strength and doubt and humility.

The movies were inspiring on a lot of fronts. I think it’s appropriate to watch it now in a world that is struggling so hard against itself. With so much fear, and worry and such dire enemies. Who are those enemies? Too many are ourselves. Our fears that turn us into monsters or traitors. Denethor, Gollum, Boromir, the Nazgul — absolute power corrupts. There are those who give up. Those who refuse to fight. Those who lose themselves.

The stories, the movies and the books, are a view into ourselves and what we can hope to be and what we may become — good and bad. It’s a reminder that it’s never a good time to quit in the battle against darkness — in whatever shape it takes….

(7) MAKE ROOM! MAKE ROOM! ON YOUR SHELVES. James Davis Nicoll names “Twenty Core Space Operas Every True SF Fan Should Have On Their Shelves”.

“Chosen entirely on the basis of merit,” says James, “with a side-order of not repeating titles that were on the first list.”

(8) TWEETS OF THE DAY ABOUT TWO WEEKS AGO. I felt a disturbance in the force. Just not right away.

(9) FIVE PLUS TWO. John Scalzi offers “7 Tips for Writing a Bestselling Science Fiction Novel” at Female First. This is my favorite:

Make your universe two questions deep. By which I mean, make it so when someone asks you a question about why/how you created or portrayed the universe, character etc the way you did, you have a smart, cogent answer for it, consistent with the construction of the book. And then when they have a follow-up question, be able to answer that effectively, too. That will make 95% of your readers happy with your worldbuilding (the other 5% are SUPER nerds. Which is fine! For them, say “Oh, I’m glad you asked that. I’m totally going to address that in the sequel.” Try it! It works!).

Strangely enough, none of his seven tips is “Start a fuss with somebody in social media.”

(10) SECOND FIFTH. But as we just witnessed last week, that is part of the Castalia House playbook – which is evidently followed by Rule #2, “Stalk real bestselling writers on their book tours.”

Here’s a video of a jackass asking John Scalzi to sign Vox Day’s SJWs Always Lie, and posing an insulting question about John’s Tor book deal. You’ll note the book in John’s hand has not been autographed by Vox Day. When is his book tour?

(11) HOT OFF THE PRESS. Liz Colter (writing as L. D. Colter) has a new book out this week – A Borrowed Hell.

Facing a sad, empty life, July always persevered by looking forward. An unhappy childhood, a litany of failed relationships, and even losing his job–none of it could stop him. But then the foreclosure notice arrives, and July is facing losing the one thing that keeps him grounded–his home.

With pain in his past and now in his future, July gives up and starts down the same road of self-destruction that the rest of his family had followed. It is only when he awakens in a hospital after a violent car accident that things change.

He starts to experience blackouts, which leave him in an alternate reality of empty desert and strange residents. It is a nightmarish world that somehow makes the real world seem that much better. Then he meets a woman that becomes a beacon of light, and his life starts to turn around.

But the blackouts continue, sending him to the alternate reality more often and for longer periods of time. Realizing that he may never escape, July asks the question he’d always been afraid to ask: How can he finally be free? The answer is one he’s not sure he can face.

I can’t resist a droll bio:

Due to a varied work background, Liz can boast a modest degree of knowledge about harnessing, hitching, and working draft horses, canoe expeditioning, and medicine. She’s also worked as a rollerskating waitress and knows more about concrete than you might suspect.

(12) HISTORY MINUS FDR. The LA Times says a bestselling author has a new trilogy on the way.

Charlaine Harris, whose Sookie Stackhouse books inspired the television series “True Blood,” will release the first book in a new trilogy next year.

Harris’ novel “Texoma” will be published in fall 2018 by Saga Press, a science fiction and fantasy imprint of Simon & Schuster, the publisher announced in a news release.

“Texoma” will be a work of speculative fiction that takes place in “an alternate history of a broken America weakened by the Great Depression and the assassination of Franklin Delano Roosevelt.”

(13) DAMP YANKEES. In New York Magazine’s author interview “Kim Stanley Robinson’s New York 2140: To Save the City, We Had to Drown It”, Robinson discusses why the book is surprisingly optimistic, how his thoughts on the global economy influenced 2140, and how he came up with the time frame for the book.

…[T]here were two goals going on that forced me to choose the date 2140, and those two goals cut against each other. I needed to put it far enough out in the future that I could claim a little bit of physical probability to the height of the sea-level rise of 50 feet, which is quite extreme. A lot of models have it at 15 feet, though some do say 50 feet. So I did have to go out like a 120 years from now.

Cutting against that future scenario, I wanted to talk about the financial situation we’re in, this moment of late capitalism where we can’t afford the changes we need to make in order to survive because it isn’t cost effective. These economic measures need to be revised so that we pay ourselves to do the work to survive as a civilization facing climate change.

I wanted a finance novel that was heavily based on what lessons we learned — or did not learn — from the crash of 2008 and 2009. All science-fiction novels are about the future and about the present at the same time.

(14) WEBCAST. Another Spider-Man trailer will be out tomorrow – here’s a seven-second teaser for it.

[Thanks to Rob Thornton, Cat Eldridge, Martin Morse Wooster, Carl Slaughter, Chip Hitchcock, Chris Gregory, and John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Daniel Dern.]

Pixel Scroll 1/10/17 Just Tie A Yellow Pixel Round The Ole Scroll Tree

(1) PRIVACY. David Brin’s Chasing Shadows, a collection of short stories and essays by other science fiction luminaries, was released today.

chasing-shadows-cover

As we debate Internet privacy, revenge porn, the NSA, and Edward Snowden, cameras get smaller, faster, and more numerous. Has Orwell’s Big Brother finally come to pass? Or have we become a global society of thousands of Little Brothers–watching, judging, and reporting on one another?

Partnering with the Arthur C. Clarke Center for Human Imagination, and inspired by Brin’s nonfiction book The Transparent Society, noted author and futurist David Brin and scholar Stephen Potts (UC San Diego) have compiled essays and short stories from writers such as Neal Stephenson, Bruce Sterling, Robert J. Sawyer, Aliette de Bodard, James Morrow, Ramez Naam, William Gibson, Vernor Vinge and many others to examine the benefits and pitfalls of technologic transparency in all its permutations.

Read the introduction by James Gunn and a story by Vylar Kaftan here [Tor.com].

(2) JEANETTE EPPS: She was one of MidAmeriCon II’s special NASA guests:

Next year she’ll be crewing the International Space Station:

NASA is assigning veteran astronaut Andrew Feustel and first-flight astronaut Jeanette Epps to missions aboard the International Space Station in 2018.

Feustel will launch in March 2018 for his first long-duration mission, serving as a flight engineer on Expedition 55, and later as commander of Expedition 56. Epps will become the first African American space station crew member when she launches on her first spaceflight in May 2018. She’ll join Feustel as a flight engineer on Expedition 56, and remain on board for Expedition 57.

 

(3) LIVE FREE. The UC San Diego Library is hosting a live event, Short Tales from the Mothership, on Thursday, January 19 from 7:30-8:30 p.m.in the Geisel Library’s Seuss Room. Want to participate? Send in your entry by January 17.

If you enjoy creative writing or hearing original short stories, you won’t want to miss this Flash-Fantasy-Sci-Fiction open mic event. Taken from the sci-fi aesthetics of UC San Diego’s iconic Geisel Library building, the UC San Diego Library is hosting a written/spoken word event for the campus and San Diego communities…

Writers should send fantasy or science fiction pieces of no more than 250 words to student leader Amber Gallant, at [email protected], prior to the live reading. Early entries are due by Tuesday, January 17. At the event you will have the opportunity to read your entry or have it read aloud for you. All are welcome to come listen to these short stories from beyond!

…Otherworldly libations from our refreshment laboratory will be served along with live theremin & synthesizer musical interludes.

This event, hosted by the UC San Diego Library in partnership with The Writing + Critical Expression Hub at the Teaching + Learning Commons, is free and open to the public.

(4) HOLDING THE FUTURE AT BAY. Although a popular image of science fiction writers is people who predict the future, Connie Willis is distraught to find one of her predictions has happened. She learned the news from this Cory Doctorow article on BoingBoing.

Two employees at the East Lake County Library created a fictional patron called Chuck Finley — entering fake driver’s license and address details into the library system — and then used the account to check out 2,361 books over nine months in 2016, in order to trick the system into believing that the books they loved were being circulated to the library’s patrons, thus rescuing the books from automated purges of low-popularity titles

Willis had a character with the same motivation in her short novel Bellwether:

[My] heroine Sandra made a practice of checking out her favorite books and the classics to keep them from being summarily discarded by the public library. I did that because I’d had a terrible experience with my own library, who I caught throwing out their entire set of Beany Malone books.

“What are you doing?” I said, horrified. “Those are by Lenora Mattingly Weber, one of Colorado’s best writers. A whole generation of girls grew up on the Beany Malone books. They’re classics.” “Nobody checked them out,” the librarian explained. “If a book hasn’t been checked out in a year, it gets discarded and put in the library book sale.”

Where if it doesn’t sell, it gets taken to the landfill, she should have added. And it doesn’t matter if the book’s a bestseller or a classic of literature. (If you don’t believe me, go to your local library and try looking for MOBY DICK. Or Thornton Wilder’s OUR TOWN. Or THREE MEN IN A BOAT.

Or a copy of Arthur Conan Doyle’s THE COMING OF THE FAIRIES, with the original photos taken of the Cottingley fairies (or some fairy paper dolls) by the little girls. My library got rid of that, too, even though it sells for upwards of eight hundred dollars on AbeBooks. “Nobody wanted to read it,” the librarian explained…..

(5) JEMISIN GOES INTO ORBIT. Good news for her readers: “Orbit Acquires Three Books by Hugo Award-Winning Author N.K. Jemisin”.

Orbit has acquired three new novels by Hugo Award-winning author N.K. Jemisin. All three will be published by Orbit in both the United States and the United Kingdom, and as audio editions by Hachette Audio.

Acquiring editor Brit Hvide said, “N. K. Jemisin is one of the most creative, incisive, and important writers working in fantasy today, and her recent Hugo win only underlines that fact. We at Orbit are proud to continue publishing Jemisin’s work and to amplify her remarkable voice.”

…The first newly-acquired book, currently untitled, will be Jemisin’s first set in our world, and is a contemporary fantasy dealing with themes of race and power in New York City. It has a projected publication date of April 2019.

(6) TODAY’S BIRTHDAY BOY

  • Born January 10, 1904 – Ray Bolger

(7) COMICS AUTHOR CHARGED. Comics/comics history writer Gerard Jones has been arrested, suspected of putting child porn on YouTube.

An accomplished San Francisco comic book and nonfiction author, who has been published in Marvel and a slew of other publications, was arrested on suspicion of possessing more than 600 child pornography files and uploading the graphic videos to YouTube, police said Friday.

Gerard Jones, 59, was arrested after a police investigation and ensuing search warrant at his residence in the 600 block of Long Bridge Street in San Francisco’s Mission Bay neighborhood turned up a host of electronic devices storing more than 600 images and videos depicting child pornography, police said.

The longtime author has written screenplays for Warner Bros. and 20th Century Fox, served as a writing teacher for the San Francisco Writer’s Grotto, and put together graphic novels for both DC Comics and Marvel Comics, according to his official website.

His works include Men of Tomorrow: Geeks, Gangster, and the Birth of the Comic Book.

(8)  CREEP FACTOR. Nerd & Tie has a well-researched post about a convention acting on its conduct policy, “Artist Scott Windorski Banned From Evercon For Harassment, Smears Event Organizer”.

Artist Scott Windorski, who vends under the name “Knotty Cobbler,” was ostensibly there to sell his wares, but began to make the rounds a few hours into the first day of the con, January 6th. As he did so, Windorski apparently began to interact with the other (mostly women) artists. For some, like Bal Flanagan, Windorski was at their booth to not only push his own wares aggressively, but made unwelcome comments that “made everyone uncomfortable.”

For others, the line was crossed even further.

Windorski approached artist Brittany Smith (who previously vended as part of PinStripes Studio and currently sells as AcuteCastle). Smith had sold art to Windorski at a previous event and he was, initially very complimentary of her work and asking for a picture with her. However, as Smith posted to the Artist Alley Network International Facebook group, Windorski followed up questions about the artist’s eczema by telling her “I would love to see you naked.”

Smith immediately put Windorski in his place, telling him that she was uncomfortable and asked him to leave…

Unfortunately, that was only the beginning.

(9) GASLIGHT LOSES SPARK. Conrunner Anastasia Hunter announces she has left the board of the group that runs San Diego’s Gaslight Gathering.

Due to irreconcilable and escalating differences between myself and members of the Board of Directors of CAASM, Inc. (Non-profit corporation that owns and oversees Gaslight Gathering), I have made the decision to resign as Chair and withdraw myself completely from their organization. A formal letter was mailed to CAASM late last week.

However, the Steampunk party we enjoy here in San Diego is far from over. I will be announcing a new project next week for those of you interested in future steampunk shenanigans!

To everyone on the Gaslight Gathering committee, thank you so very much for volunteering with me these past six years! You are the very best crew of Steampunks and con runners in town!

(10) PACKER OBIT. SF Site News reports Australian fanartist John Packer has died.

Australian fan artist John Packer died the weekend of January 7. Packer was a two-time Ditmar Award winner in 1983 and 1984. In 1983, he also won the Golden Caterpillar Award for services to “triffids” and for redefining the word “vermin.” His cartoon appeared in numerous Australian fanzines. In 1984, he stood for DUFF.

(11) DEEP TWEET. While enjoying his latest Twitter brawl, John Scalzi cut loose with a multi-level bit of snark.

At least I counted it as multi-level, coming from the author of Lock In.

(12) ART ON THE CORNER. For several years a project of the city of Glendale, CA’s arts commission has been having artists paint murals on streetside utility boxes. At the website you can see photos of them all. Many have fantasy, sf, or dinosaur imagery.

There’s a parallel effort in Los Angeles City Councilman Jose Huizar’s district. For example, this one’s at Fletcher Avenue and San Fernando Road, photographed the other day by Tony Gleeson.

utility-box-art

Councilman Huizar’s website also has a gallery of utility box murals. (Incidentally, Councilman Huizar’s district encompasses Ray Bradbury Square — he attended the dedication in 2012.)

(13) MIMEO MANIACS. Moshe Feder reports Fanac.org has put online the video from “a fannishly famous fanzine panel from 1976’s Big MAC (MidAmericon 1) featuring moderator Linda Bushyager and panelists Victoria Vayne, Taral Wayne, Jon Singer, Patrick Nielsen Hayden, Gary Farber, and yours truly… Thanks to the late Scott Imes for recording this and David Dyer-Bennet for his restoration work.”

This panel discusses what used to be the commonplace wisdom of mimeography, but today is an esoteric look at the fanzine production practices of 20th century fandom. Includes a wonderful segment early on where Jon imitates a mimeo, and a novel use for the New York Times. There is about a 20 minute period where the video is damaged, but the audio remains clear throughout.

 

[Thanks to Moshe Feder, Arnie Fenner, JJ, and John King Tarpinian for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Soon Lee.]

Rotsler Award Exhibit at Midamericon II

mac-rotsler-4-kenn-bates-min

Rotsler Award exhibit at MidAmeriCon II. Photos by Kenn Bates.

By John Hertz: Midamericon II was the 74th World Science Fiction Convention, held at Kansas City, Missouri, August 17-21, 2016. The 34th, now known as Midamericon I, was there in 1976.

The Rotsler Award, named for Bill Rotsler (1926-1997), is given annually for long-term wonder-working with graphic art in amateur publications of the S-F community. The winner is determined by a panel of judges, currently Mike Glyer, Sue Mason, and me.

Founded in 1998, the Rotsler is sponsored by the non-profit Southern California Institute for Fan Interests, Inc. At Loscon, the annual L.A. convention over the United States’ Thanksgiving weekend in November (Loscon XLIII was 25-27 Nov 16), the winner is announced and a sample of the winner’s work exhibited.

I try to exhibit all the winners to date at the Worldcon. Two exhibits I was particularly happy about were at Denvention III (66th Worldcon; Denver, Colorado, 2008), where Spike contributed those handsome black foam-core panels, and Lonestarcon III (71st; San Antonio, Texas, 2013), where volunteers helped me choose samples visually interesting to folks who might not know fanzines.

Elizabeth Klein-Lebbink contributed her electronic wizardry to the MAC II exhibit; also a fine design sense, and not being very active in the fanzine world she could temper my enthusiasm for reference jokes. For Chicon VII (70th Worldcon; Chicago, Illinois, 2012) she’d helped marvelously with an exhibit in honor of Diane Dillon and in memory of Leo (1933-2012).

With a few hours at Klein-Lebbink’s equipment — well, more than a few, actually — we were able to print a Rotsler Award exhibit on six-foot-long banners. I took them to MAC II and didn’t have to get dozens of images enlarged by photocopy, mounted on colored construction paper, and hung with binder clips from hooks set in pegboard panels.

The banners looked swell. Kenn Bates kindly photographed them.

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Loscon is hosted by LASFS, the L.A. Science Fantasy Society, oldest S-F club on Earth. I rhyme LASFS with joss fuss, but Morris Keesan said “That’s your dialect,” and Len Moffatt rhymed it with sass mass. I miss them.

SCIFI (of course that’s what the initials spell; despite the power of Forry Ackerman, pronounced skiffy) has among other things produced Worldcons, Westercons (West Coast Science Fantasy Conference), a NASFiC (North America Science Fiction Convention, held when the Worldcon is overseas), and the second (1992, hardbound) edition of Harry Warner’s history of 1950s fandom A Wealth of Fable.

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Artwork by ATom.

Artwork by Brad Foster.

Artwork by Brad Foster.

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Artwork by Kurt Erichsen.

 

MAC II Incident Response Statistics

MidAmeriCon II, the 2016 Worldcon, has shared statistics about Code of Conduct issues handled by the Incident Response Team. Although a few instances resulted in public announcements, they generally will not be commenting on any of the details.

MidAmeriCon II received 40 official reports through the Incident Response Team’s report process.

  • 4 of the reports we received were made pre-con.
  • There were 28 distinct incidents reported.
  • 18 of the 28 incidents required additional follow up by the IRT.
  • 8 of the reports included information about previous and/or ongoing patterns of harassing behavior by the person who’s behavior was being reported.
  • 11 incidents included verbal harassment.
  • 7 incidents included physical intimidation or unwanted physical contact.
  • 5 incidents resulted in a response more substantial than a warning.
  • 3 incidents resulted in membership revocation or suspension.
  • 1 incident resulted in removal from a volunteer position.
  • 6 incidents resulted in a warning.
  • 17 incidents resulted in neither warning nor any sort of more substantive action being taken.

MACII’s Code of Conduct Response Procedures Posted

The MidAmeriCon II Incident Response Team Handbook, scrubbed of personal identifying information, has been posted online by IRT head Kris Snyder for use or adaptation by other conrunning groups.

A lot of conventions that have followed the trend of the past few years by adopting a Code of Conduct or antiharassment policy will find this document a help in thinking step-by-step through their own procedures.

Here are a couple of excerpts. The first was selected because it probably came into play when MACII dealt with Dave Truesdale’s membership revocation.

Handling reports about Program Participants

  • Take the report as normal.
  • If the manager evaluating the situation is considering removing the panelist from being on program, they need to consult with programming (preferably [Programming DH], [DDH] or [Program Ops] as backup).
  • If the member’s program participant privileges are revoked, please make sure to take any gizmos or ribbons that indicated their program participant status.
  • In the case that we take action against the member which does not include removing their program participant status or privileges, we still need to inform the programming department.
  • Always involved the conchair if a situation involves a Guest of Honor.

The second excerpt shows a range of available responses to complaints.

  • Actions we can take in response to a complaint (and who needs to be consulted or informed)
  • Talk to person and tell them to cut it out
  • Talk to the parents if the person reported is a minor
  • Restrict access to certain areas of the convention (eg: art show, dealer’s room, thing)
    • o Consult with the Area Head and/or Division Head Involved
  • Disallow someone’s continued participation on programming (While we can’t stop people can be assholes, but we don’t have to give them a platform to be an asshole from)
    • o Include programming in that decision.
    • o Programming has requested that we inform them about all reports made about the behavior of a program participant.  IRT bears the primary responsibility for acting on reports about panelists.
  • Pull someone from their staff position/disallow them to volunteer
    • o Supervisor should be included in the decision making process, in consultation with the area head.  The division head should be informed
    • o Volunteers should be informed
    • o If a DH is the problem, involve the chair.
    • o If it’s an advisor, involve the chair
    • o If the chair ([Chair]), is the problem, go to [Vice Chair] and [Advisor]
  • Remove someone from the convention for a day.  They can return tomorrow
    • o Please inform the chair afterwards
  • Remove someone from the convention period.
    • o Involve the chair in this decision, unless there is an immediate safety concern.

[Thanks to JJ for the story.]