DisCon III’s WSFS Division head Nicholas Whyte today announced on Twitter and Facebook that the Hugo Administration team of the 2021 Worldcon has resigned en masse:
Departing WSFS Division Head Nicholas Whyte was also in charge of the 2023 Site Selection voting.
The committee has not yet addressed the staff resignations.
This is the second team of Hugo administrators to quit DisCon III this year. The con’s original WSFS Division Head Jared Dashoff explained here in January why he and the Hugo Administrator resigned. It had to do with efforts to manage policies created by the committee “to deal with a) space constraints at receptions and award ceremonies, b) budget constraints of the receptions and trophies, c) constraints relating to font size on both ballots and in-ceremony visuals, and d) in response to multiple requests to list long lists of contributors to Hugo Finalists over the last few years….”
Dashoff made his comment in response to Colette Fozard’s guest post about why she resigned as DisCon III co-chair in the same timeframe.
The protested restrictions, which DisCon III announced January 11, were repudiated the next day by DisCon III chair Bill Lawhorn (see “DisCon III Abandons Previously Announced Hugo Policy”). Lawhorn said:
…All publications and visuals linked to the Hugo Awards will include all Hugo Finalist creators named to DisCon III with no restrictions to the number of names. This includes, and is not limited to, the Hugo Awards ballot, the visuals used during the Hugo Awards Ceremony, the plaques on the Hugo Awards trophies, the Hugo Awards Ceremony program guide, the DisCon III souvenir guide, and the DisCon III and Hugo Awards websites.
We will address concerns about the size of events such as the Hugo Pre-Reception, the number of Hugo Awards trophies, and any other cost considerations individually with the finalists….
However, it seems that when the time recently arrived to address these concerns, some controversial limitations were still on the table – see the message documented in Pixel Scroll 6/19/21 item #6.
When Nicholas Whyte announced on Facebook last January 17 that he had signed on as DisCon III’s new WSFS Division Head, he commented: .
…The Hugos have had some reputational issues to deal with. Having fought off direct assault by ill-wishers in 2015 and 2016, some pretty significant mistakes were made more recently. Many of those were outside the immediate responsibility of the Hugo Administrators, including most notably the awful botching of last year’s Hugo ceremony and the Hugo Losers Party in 2019, and the hostile response from some in the community to the winners of the award for Best Related Work in both of those years (cases where I very much stand by the eligibility decisions that were made by teams that I was a part of).
I have made mistakes as well, and I hope that I have learned from them. In particular, it’s clear, not least from the problems that arose in the last few days, that the Hugos as a whole need to be less siloed and need to improve communication in both directions with the rest of the Worldcon and with the wider stakeholder community (as my work colleagues would put it). DisCon III had already started putting structures in place that would improve this side of things, and I look forward to working with those and building on them.
What led to today’s round of resignations Whyte doesn’t explicitly say. He simply quotes Lawhorn’s aspirational statement about last January’s policy reversal, and says “It is clear that we have taken the process as far as we can, and that our input is no longer needed by the convention leadership.”
[Thanks to James Davis Nicoll for the story.]
Discover more from File 770
Subscribe to get the latest posts to your email.
Oh no. The first time in over a decade I decide to buy a supporting membership just so I can vote in the Hugos and it’s drama, drama, drama because of failure to be minimally considerate of the very people you are nominally honoring. This is not a good look.
It feels like such an “own goal”,. and twice now for the same (in a relatively broad sense) issue.
So what happens now? What’s the process for selecting their replacements? Surely they were doing work that still needs doing.
…sigh…click
Likewise, sigh and click.
I thank the resigning Hugo team for their work, and wish their replacements all the best in their efforts.
As a member of the Worldcon community I’d like to know what’s going on here. The dispute presumably involves something important in the administration of the Hugos, given this drastic step. We should be given a chance to weigh in on what has occurred without having to guess based on vague statements.
Right now, no one really knows what happened.
Sigh…
Is this related to the FIYAHCon fundraiser launched a couple of days ago?
I think that this is the greatest crisis a pending Worldcon committee has faced in the history of WSFS, and I’m including the Rabid/Sad Puppy mess several years ago.
Thankfully (I hope) there is still time for Discon III to pull out of this death spiral that will surely result in people openly disavowing attending and canceled hotel reservations.
There is time. But not very much if it, I’m afraid…
Chris B.
Clickity
Bill Lawhorn and all of the people who resigned know. There’s speculation it’s about how the awards are dealing with the number of individuals included in a nomination when it’s a large group of people. If that’s the subject of the dispute, it seems like something that could be discussed openly so that Worldcon members can give our input.
Just some additional info/clarity: the first round of resignations was not just Jared (WSFS DH) and Will (Hugo Admin). Several Hugo Admin staff, including myself, resigned as well.
I’m genuinely puzzled by this supposition. What is your reasoning?
My experience in fandom is that the number of people willing to “discuss” the issue is always much much larger than the number of people who will do the work.
Of course, if you are one of the few actually doing the work, you damn well better be listening to every single bit of advice. And implement it.
Or else.
@Chris: Perhaps dial back the hyperbole. Serious stuff this, but who can say it’s the greatest crisis ever faced by a Worldcon concom? As an example, the 1950 Worldcon came uncomfortably close to not happening at all. And the 1978 Worldcon is famous for the numerous problems it had.
clpolk: I agree. We just don’t know what internal conflicts led to the resignations. But we can expect they were internal.
bookworm1398: Is this related to the FIYAHCon fundraiser launched a couple of days ago?
I doubt that very much. FIYAHCon’s response was a positive, constructive way to enable the people involved with its implementation to celebrate their nomination in as inclusive a way as possible, given the financial and logistical constraints under which the Hugo Admins have to operate.
I think it’s most likely the result of the constant abuse to which the Hugo team are being subjected on Twitter and in e-mail, for having to work within the financial and logistical constraints which have been specified to them by the convention leadership, and by what seems to be the convention leadership’s apparent unwillingness to back them up and support them publicly.
At this point, I think DisCon III should cancel the Hugo ceremony, make a video announcement of the winners, and send the trophies to the winners by mail.
Chris M. Barkley: I think that this is the greatest crisis a pending Worldcon committee has faced in the history of WSFS, and I’m including the Rabid/Sad Puppy mess several years ago. Thankfully (I hope) there is still time for Discon III to pull out of this death spiral that will surely result in people openly disavowing attending and canceled hotel reservations.
🙄
@Rich Lynch:
Oh believe me, I wish it were hyperbole, but it isn’t. If the Discon III doesn’t get a handle on this situation in the next 48 hours the whole con may implode. That would be a catastrophe for sf fandom.
@JJ: Seriously? ?
I’m counting on the committee not to make a petulant and self-destructive decision of this kind.
The thing that makes the Hugos a significant award is not that they are given by the Worldcon, or even that they are voted on by fans, but that writers WANT them. And it’s entirely possible to make writers indifferent to them by bad management.
I’ll also add that it’s probably even more the case that they are significant because readers trust them to identify good works. While that would not be eroded as badly by mismanagement, some of the shine might come off.
Rich Lynch: I didn’t know the 1950 Worldcon nearly didn’t happen. Could you please give a short explanation?
Chris Rose: No, that’s not it. Whoever said, “I want to win a Hugo because they identify good works”?
I hope there is a ceremony at least. This is my first (and very probably only) time on the Hugo ballot.
On a purely personal level, I’d be very sad if there was no ceremony, and no pre-Hugos reception.
OlavRokne: Why would you think JJ’s saying that has anything to do with what’s really going to happen?
Mike Glyer: The thing that makes the Hugos a significant award is not that they are given by the Worldcon, or even that they are voted on by fans, but that writers WANT them.
I think that’s backwards. Writers want them because the Hugo is a significant award which many SFF readers regard as a mark of excellence. And the Hugo is a significant award because it’s developed a reputation for excellence and SFF readers look to it for new works and authors to read.
I assumed they want them because rocket ship statuettes have an inherent coolness.
Then again, I’m known to be fairly oblivious.
JJ: There are many dozen sff awards — I probably report on almost a hundred — and writers want to win them all. So in the end, the degree to which writers aspire to win a Hugo, if it exceeds their desire to win most other awards, is based on a story they tell themselves about this award. Not about who gives it, picks it, or won it 50 years ago.
@Martin: Harry Warner described the situation on p243 of A Wealth of Fable. “In early 1950, the chairman of the Norwescon, Jack de Courcy, and four of the five other committee members resigned their posts for various reasons. … An alarmed fandom had received no official publicity about the coming worldcon as late as April, and no hall had been officially rented for it at that time.”
As you might expect, it took some outside intervention by fans (Don Day and some others) to rescue the convention, otherwise it probably would not have happened at all.
Mike Glyer: the degree to which writers aspire to win a Hugo, if it exceeds their desire to win most other awards, is based on a story they tell themselves about this award. Not about who gives it, picks it, or won it 50 years ago.
I agree, that may be why the Hugo is more significant to authors than other awards. But it’s not the reason the Hugo is significant to everyone else – and that demographic is many thousand times larger than the number of authors who think the Hugo is significant. Even if a bunch of authors decided the Hugo is not significant (and a fair number of them seem to have already done so, at least based on what they say), the SFF readers and fans aren’t going to stop seeing the Hugo as a significant award.
Just a click.
Only to the extent that Site Selection area head Tim Szczesuil reported to him; Tim is still, to be the best of my knowledge, in charge of Site Selection. He was the person with whom the three bids met to iron out some of the joint arrangements about the ballot and voting procedures.
WSFS Business Meeting Chair Linda Deneroff also reported to Nicholas.
Cat Eldridge on June 22, 2021 at 6:19 pm said:
The convention Chair will need to find a new WSFS Division Head. That person will have to find a new Hugo Administrator to take over the remaining tasks.
The other two areas under the WSFS Division (Site Selection and Business Meeting) are still there and will report to the new WSFS Division Head.
I rather expect that there are a lot of telephone calls and e-mails flying around at the moment over these things.
Thanks for correcting something that wasn’t a mistake, Kevin.
I was pointing out that the WSFS Division Head isn’t ONLY responsible for the Hugos.
Well, I’m sure we’re going to hear everything about the why’s in the next few days. In the meantime, click
The Twitter link in the first line doesn’t work, by the way.
The statement in the resignation notice, “our input is no longer needed by the convention leadership,” is puzzling. What it reads like it’s saying is that everything is going OK, so they’re no longer needed to fix anything. If it means a conflict between them and the committee, it should be phrased differently.
As it is, I’m reminded of Geoffrey Howe’s resignation from the Thatcher government, which some apologists tried to brush off as a mere difference in style; there were no substantive disagreements. To which Howe replied that, if that were true, he was the first minister in history to resign because he was in total agreement with government policy.
Obviously not, and obviously not here either, only this time the brush-off is coming in the resignation statement, so: say what?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive-aggressive_behavior
I assumed the twitter statement was essentially: “We didn’t make the decision re: limiting numbers and don’t agree with it and/or don’t want to be left taking the blame for it.”
But, like, we’re all guessing! We have no idea! The clues are minimal!
Bartimaeus: Sorry to hear that it doesn’t work for you. It did for me when I tried it just now.
It works now for me as well.
Mike, I figured you were busy doing other things, so I fixed it for you.
Iphinome: no, I don’t think that explanation really works. It’s oddly phrased even for passive-aggressive talk, and such deep snarkiness doesn’t fit in a formal serious resignation statement.
JJ: Much appreciated!
A frustratingly opaque resignation statement. If you’re going to take a principled stand against something, maybe explain clearly what that something is.
Not that we actually need to know I suppose. Good luck to whoever ends up doing the job
It’s clear that those resigning feel that they are being ignored by the convention leadership and that in itself – if taken far enough – is sufficient reason to resign. While I’m sure many of us would like to know more, it was never likely to come in an official resignation statement,
It seems likely to me that this is not about a single issue – these things tend to be a cumulative weight of grievances.
As a publisher, I can tell you why my company aspires to producing books that win the Hugo: it increases sales. It really is that simple.
The Hugos are one of the most recognized awards in the SFF literary community, so when your book suddenly goes from “This or That Title” to “The Hugo-Award-Winning This or That Title,” not only does it increase the sales of that title, but also the prospects for the Hugo-Award-Winning Author of their next “This or That Next Title”
I got the same impression as Meredith.
I also understand that there are further resignations in the pipeline.
It seems that SF fandom just isn’t robust enough for contemporary conditions and is falling into hell (along with the rest of the world).