Unnamed individuals behind an entity calling itself “Fandom Galaxy” took over the Space City Comic Con Facebook page yesterday with the intention of capitalizing on SCCC’s social media profile while unilaterally giving their next Houston show a fresh start.
There is no re-brand. No rename. No “new look”. Fandom Galaxy saw potential and seized the opportunity. We saw fans and vendors who were now without a show they had supported and enjoyed over 6 events. We did not acquire this to repeat the past, but to begin something new – and after all, the social media was strong and already in place! They took their name off, we acquired the social media (NOT the name), and made it all our own, as a starting point to get to know the fandom….
Those familiar with Space City Comic Con’s checkered past – everything from being sued for trademark infringement about the name, to nationally-publicized controversies over payments owed celebrities (like the Sons of Anarchy cast), vendors, and others at the 2016 event – began posting skeptical comments. Why would a new event risk association with SCCC’s baggage instead of starting with a clean slate? And others aware that Facebook pages cannot be sold speculated about a continued connection to the old regime.
As Kat wrote in File 770’s comments yesterday:
They are engaging a bit with fans in the comments, but are thus far ignoring all comments asking for more information about THEM. More and more folks are asking who they are, like actual names of people and/or corporate entity name, where they’re from ‘out of state,’ etc., and are being met with silence.
One fan had the presence of mind to research the Texas Secretary of State records for the “Application for Registration of an Entity Name” filed by Fandom Galaxy where – lo and behold! – the person signing on behalf of this newly-formed Delaware corporation was George Comits, the financially-troubled head of last year’s Space City Comic Con.
Trae Dorn of Nerd & Tie succeeded in getting Fandom Galaxy to comment on its connection to Comits:
We did hear back from Fandom Galaxy’s management. When pushed about George Comits’s involvement, they responded:
He’s an employee. He had to be, because Facebook pages cannot be sold. Also, he has congestive heart failure and if there was an event, we wanted to know the vendors, network etc from his advice. He’s admitted his mistakes to us, but he’s also told us the real version of events – which include the theft of the entire cash office receipts by [REDACTED]
Meanwhile, Fandom Galaxy today deleted a large number of comments from its Facebook page, including the many displaying copies of Comits’ registration form.
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As I noted at Nerd and Tie,
The congestive heart failure is so irrelevant that I assume they’re trying to make us feel sorry for Comits. But the rest of that sentence admits that they didn’t keep him on just because the Facebook page couldn’t be sold: they want his input (“advice”) on what to do, and how to deal with vendors.
Why fannish douchebags think they can get away with this amazes me.
Okay, sure, they’re emboldened by political douchebags getting away with it, but fen are naturally suspicious of authority and have good Google-fu.
The word is spreading rapidly around Houston fandom. Hmmm… someone should tip David Gerrold a heads-up, because from him it will make the rounds of media stars in general. I’d hate to see anyone else get screwed over.
Someone needs to tip the “Sons of Anarchy” fans. I don’t know any of ’em, but they are many and vocal and pissed off about last year.
Get one or more of the cast who got screwed to Tweet/FB about it. They’re fairly high profile in media land, and they were so nice to the fans after last year’s debacle.
yet another reason for a Quality Rating for conventions.
I have more sympathy for the health issue. He chose to hide the impact his health was having on his business…I’ve chosen the opposite approach (with Amazing).
I think the latter is a better choice, but admitting our issues has actually made sustaining things more difficult, as people are understandably reluctant to invest time and effort into something that has a questionable future (tho our future is not really questionable…we’ll be back, firing on all jets, within a year, if not sooner).
The above, of course, does not in any way excuse the other things. In this case its part of a package of bad decisions, lack of transparency and, maybe, a bit of greed.