14 thoughts on “2013 FAAn Awards”

1. So the guy who administers the award turns out to be the best fan writer in the whole wide world? Wow… that’s quite the co-inky-dink. No conflict of interest there… no siree Bob!

2. Andy’s a good writer and he’s an honest person. I’m quite certain he counted the votes that came in and reported them as they were. He also volunteered to take the time and effort to receive the nominations and votes and deal with them. Did you vote for the FAAn awards? I did.

3. How sad that Jonathan M knows so little of fanzine fandom that he could even entertain such a thought. The FAAn award administrators have always had the full confidence and trust of everyone involved.

4. Andy is, and has been for a long time, one of the best fan writers writing for fanzines. It’s no surprise he won this year and no subterfuge would have been needed at all. He’s won in the past and probably will again in the future.

5. I join Gary and Bill in vouching for the honesty and integrity of Andy Hooper. Checking the voting records for the FAAn awards, I don’t find Jonathan McCalmont’s name. How churlish it is to complain about the results of a poll in which one doesn’t participate!

6. “How churlish it is to complain about the results of a poll in which one doesn’t participate!”

   An age old tradition.

7. Exactly, Michael, but McCalmont does it with such incredible — let me dig around for an old fannish descriptive! — fuggheadedness (yes, that works!), and then hides out as “Jonathan M” instead of being courageous enough to use his full name.

8. I suspect this is a “Caesar’s wife” kind of thing to an outside viewer, who would expect not only no impropriety, but no appearance of impropriety as well, from his point of view. I don’t know Andy Hooper personally, but I know he’s been fannishly/faanishly active for many years, and those who do the same and know him well clearly trust the rules and trust him personally. Mr. McCalmont appears to come to fandom from an outsider’s vantage point and is applying standards which someone would who is not part of our, frankly, sometimes insular world. I don’t think he was being fuggheaded, I think he sometimes doesn’t understand fannish culture (of which the use of the old faanish term “fuggheaded” is an example).

   This is just how it appears to me from my limited and distant point of view. If I have misunderstood anyone, corrections are welcome.

9. Jonathan M – hmmm, wild accusations based upon nothing. Looks like a desperate plea for attention

10. Jonathan McCalmont seems to enjoy attention as much as any other blogger (see his Ruthless Culture blog), however, his comment here struck me as scoffing at appearances rather than a serious accusation.

    FAAn voters have always been comfortable with the arrangements. Not every group of fans is that thick-skinned.

    It was just two years ago that David Howe resigned as Chairman of the British Fantasy Society, which presents the British Fantasy Awards, after Stephen Jones accused him of a conflict of interest. Howe was a partner in the outfit that published two BFA-winning stories and won Best Small Press in 2011, and also the domestic partner of Sam Stone, winner of two fiction BFA’s. Despite British Fantasy Society President Ramsey Campbell exonerating Howe of any corruption or wrongdoing, the Society has since made major changes to its rules.

    Avoiding both actual and perceived conflicts of interest is the motive behind the Hugo Awards’ anti-conflict rule which dates to the original WSFS Constitution of 1962-1963.

11. David K.M. Klaus, you understand perfectly! Thanks for your comments.

12. “Avoiding both actual and perceived conflicts of interest is the motive behind the Hugo Awards’ anti-conflict rule,” which is why Harry Stubbs resigned (as treasurer?) from the Noreascon committee, after Star Light, by Hal Clement, got nominated for Best Novel, in 1971 (the year of Locus’s first Hugo). Probably not the only time someone has resigned from a con committee in order to retain their award eligibility.

    Thanks, Mike, for the link to the original constitution. It’s interesting reading, especially George’s comments, and it’s nice to know that even fifty years ago, people were complaining that the wrong things were getting nominated for Hugo awards.

13. Since Forry Ackerman declined the first Hugo ever presented in favor of Ken Slater one can truthfully say there’s never been a time when somebody didn’t think the award was going to the wrong people.

14. Amusing … in George’s commentary regarding 2.09:
    “The purpose of all this is to avoid proliferation of Hugo awards until the award becomes meaningless”.

    And let me say that George’s commentary makes for some fine reading.

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