Chair Donald Eastlake III has posted a report of the Chengdu Worldcon Site Selection Business Meeting on Facebook. (The Business Meeting Agenda is online — download the English-language version here and the Chinese-language version here.)
SITE SELECTION. The Seattle bid for 2025 was announced as the winner. See voting figures, GoHs and links to their website and PR0 here.
The Glasgow 2024 committee spoke, as did a representative of the Los Angeles in 2026 bid.
Finally, Yasser Bahjatt spoke briefly on the “Cairo” (formerly Jeddah) bid which is now suspended because they cannot get permission from the Egyptian government.
CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS. The remaining proposals to amend the WSFS Constitution, including several which had been sent to committee at a previous session, were brought to the floor.
The initials/numbers (“F.10”) identify agenda items (see the full original English text here.)
F.10 “Best Game Category”.
It failed to pass.
F.5 “Best Fancast Not Paying Compensation”. Eastlake explains that it —
had been referred to the two Presiding Officers to adjust the English wording to more closely parallel the Chinese version originally submitted. They reported back that the last line of new text being added (point 2) should be “was a paid professional creation”. However it was pointed out that non-professional is already a requirement from the first line of Constitution Section 3.3.15 and it was voted to revert the wording to the original English wording in the agenda.
The motion was then passed for the first time.
F.7 “Clarifying Language Requirements” and F.8 “Remove Regional Limitation”. Both proposals had been referred together to a committee that reported back a single motion (see the committee report here).
The revised motion amends 3.4.1 by striking out “English” and replacing it with “the main languages of the countries of the administering and previous year Worldcons”.
The revised motion amends 3.4.2 by striking out “United States” in two places and replacing the first instance with “countries of the administering and prior year Worldcons” and the second with a similar phrase.
The motion was then passed for the first time.
F.9 “Establishment of ASFiC”. The motion to create an Asian counterpart of the NASFiC had been referred to a committee. They returned a majority report, “Establishing RSFiC”, proposing a mechanism for creating multiple Regional Science Fiction Conventions, and also a minority report to create only the originally proposed ASFiC. (See the 3-page committee report at the links: Page 1, Page 2, Page 3.)
The minority report was accepted over the majority Committee Report.
The motion to create an ASFiC was then passed for the first time.
CONCLUSION. The Business Meeting adjourned. On Sunday the WSFS Mark Protection Committee held their annual organizational meeting.
Minutes and videos of the meetings will appear later.
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Call me a conservative, but I think WSFS needs to get out of the Regional Convention business. I would be more in favor of getting get rid of NASFic, and not adding ASFic.
How would it be called “conservative” to kill NASFiC when has existed for 48 years and put on 14 popular and well-regarded conventions?
Leave NASFiC alone. There’s no reason Asia wanting their own should be taken as a call to end the original. It is instead an acknowledgment that NASFiC is a successful concept worthy of emulation.
Too bad about Best Game, I was looking forward to that one.
Looking forward to it in a different way than the Best Game or Interactive Work category, which was ratified this year and is now an official category?
Oops, I was too slow posting this. 🙂 But here are a few more details.
The F.10 “Best Game Category” that didn’t pass was a new proposed amendment, unrelated to the “Best Game or Interactive Work” category that was approved last year and was up for ratification this year. That ratification was agenda item E.2.
(I’m guessing that the people who proposed F.10 were unaware of the “Best Game or Interactive Work” proposal, and the years’ worth of work that went into that proposal.)
For more details about both proposals, see items E.2 and F.10 of the Business Meeting Agenda linked from the post.
I declared my disapproval of the ASFiC with a 6-minute-long speech in the business meeting, here are some of my opinions:
1) We have had a lot of cons in Asia, like APSFiC ( You will remember this if you have see my notes). So why a new one?
2) They don’t talk and discuss enough in Asia.
3) I have to point out many cities in Asia have not enough ability to host an ASFiC based on the chaos in this worldcon.
I will write down more details about this, maybe they can be posted on File770.
In addition, I do know that the videos of business meeting will be sent in YouTube.
But we Chinese fans do have difficulties on surfing on YouTube for some reasons we all know. So will WSFS send a copy to Chinese video website like Bilibili.com?
Best Game (or rather, Best Game or Interactive Work) was passed in 2022 and ratified in 2023. It’s a permanent Hugo category now except that it will sunset in 2028 unless re-ratified then.
Re ASFiC (0r NASFic) the problem with -just- NASFic is that it enshrines the US/North America as a special category WRT Worldcon (Whcih in fairness historically it is; 60 of the 83 Worldcons have been held in the US and 65 in North America; only 18 have been held outside the NASFic area).
The problem with ASFiC is that it enshrines Asia as a special category WRT Worldcon, and Asia is decidedly not a special category WRT Worldcons histrically.
Eurocon, of course, is mosty not interested in being under the WSFS umbrella, and more importantly the whole RSFiC problem is that it dilutes the purpose of WSFS — WSFS isn’t some big organization running /organizing different conventions all over the world, and nor does it have the facility to do so reasonably; it’s purpose is to run Worldcon.
So, NASFic has some justification but one can justly feel it’s unfair.
ASFiC has a lot of problems and is very unlikely to pass ratification.
Also, the idea that “NASFic is doing fine” is pretty weak. Worldcon is a 3k-10k person convention (usually). a NASFiC that passes 1k people is really large for a NASFiC (ignorning Dragoncon). Why NASFics have remained quite small can be argued, but I think it coems down to: 1. NASFics are relatively small and people expect that and decide whether/whetehr not to go with that in mind. 2. NASFic doesn’t run every year so people don’t get into the habit of doing them; they are mostly gone to by US Worldcon regulars who can’t get enough or by locals in the area. 3. NASFic might not run on the same weekend as Worldcon, but ti absolutely competes with Worldcon and Worldcon attendees who decide to go to that year’s con are much less likely to plan for NASFic.
I see three good paths going forwards:
Just ignore the issue. ???? Everything is fine. ????
Abandon NASFic and turn it into a separate organization and convention. Bonus: It can run every year, just like Eurocon runs even in years where Europe hosts the Worldcon! This would likely increase NASFic attendence as there would eventually develop NASFic fans, and it could also develop its own identity and maybe events/customs.
Winter Worldcon. We can handle (somewhat radically) all these issues by creatig a second Worldcon which should run in the other half of the year (usually Winter in the northern Hemisphere) from the normal (Summer) Worldcon! A Winter worldcon could bring new fans into Worldcon fandom, could be specifically designed to always run in a different part of the year than the one that won Summer Worldcon that year (just havng a “cannot be on the same continent” would likely t do the job just fine) and could create a new pool of voters and nominatrs who could be considered to have a stake in Worldcons and have a right to vote in Worldcon site selection votes, nominate and vote on the Hugos, and be more likely to bid and vote for Worldcons. And since it would be held in another part of the year, it wouldn’t significatnly compete with Worldcon. (obviously, this is the path I favor).
I have it on good authority that when you do something twice, it’s tradition.
NASFiC doesn’t need to compare to Worldcon in attendance to be considered doing fine. It needs to have hosts who want to do one and by that metric it continues to thrive.
No, but by that measure, why is it necessary that we not have a NASFic only when there isn’t a Worldcon? How is NASFic served by not being able to develop its own identity or traditions (by only being held a few times a decade), and being governed by Worldcon rather than havin its own (NASFS?) largely non-existent SF society for it to be an adjunct to?
Nobody’s arguing that NASFic stop running and sink into the SFnal swamp (at least, not here); we need more unifying conventions as regional conventions become less stable and the fannish generations change, not less. But while I’m absurdly attracted to the idea of having two Worldcons a year, even if one is smaller than the other (although possibly not all the time), what is helped by having the North American convention only occur when Worldcon isn’t in the US?
I like the story about Pelz and Crayne bidding against each other for the first NASFiC and doing site selection voting without sponsorship or authorization from WSFS or TorCon 2. NASFiC doesn’t need to be administered by WSFS to be successful. That was demonstrated in the beginning.
If NASFiC were not part of WSFS, most fans wouldn’t notice. NASFiC bids would still have fan tables and parties at Worldcons, site selection would keep working the same way. If you paid close attention, you’d see a NASFiC business meeting on the schedule. The Nit Picking and Fly Specking Committee would have a field day. This is really for them. Think of all the sections that could just go away from the WSFS Constitution.
If we want to avoid utter chaos, like two competing NASFiC bids from the same city, there could be an overseeing body. A NASFS. But Crayne and Pelz did fine without one. Considering that Bruce Pelz did pretty much everything in fandom that could possibly be useful, or interesting, or fun, I would take that as a sign.
“Nobody’s arguing that NASFic stop running and sink into the SFnal swamp (at least, not here);”
Literally the second comment on this post makes that argument.
@Nicholas Whyte: It’s not clear. From the point of view of WSFS, NASFiC goes away. They don’t have to deal with it. Maybe for some people, this is the end of NASFiC.
But there’s nothing stopping people from running a NASFiC. It isn’t like WSFS will have text in the constitution saying that running a NASFiC is not allowed. That would require WSFS to actively monitor and enforce an anti-NASFiC provision. The whole point is to get WSFS out of the annoyance. It is a disentanglement.
“The whole point is to get WSFS out of the annoyance.”
Has anyone from WSFS said “NASFiC is an annoyance. We need to get out of it.”
Are folks inventing a problem to be solved that isn’t actually a problem?
Mmm..as a former Chair of ESFS (European SF Society) which runs the annual Eurocons (*), I’m a bit surprised at this idea of an ASFiC. There is already an embryonic ASFS (modelled on the ESFS): Asian SF Society (it has a website) and the idea is like the successful Eurocons in Europe, to eventually have an AsiaCon. It would ,alongside ESFS for all of Europe, handle all of Asia (tho that is a big effort). Its Statutes are even almost word-for-word as those of ESFS. [ * BTW, future confirmed Eurocons are now : 2024: Fri 16-Mon 19 Aug- ErasmusCon / Rotterdam-1 week after Glasgow Worldcon; 2025: Thu 26-Sun 29 July – Archipelicon (Aland: Baltic). ]
To me, this is like asking the question “if one World Cup every four years is popular why not have it every year?” Sometimes a limit on a thing is a reason it is successful. The collective brain of fandom knows that when a Worldcon is not in North America there’s going to be a NASFiC, otherwise it slumbers.
P.s. A World Cup every year would be the greatest thing that ever happened.
Whew! Maybe it’s worth it to post a note with that Best Game item that this was a new, separate proposal. Brief moment of extreme dismay there for me.
If one thinks of ASFS like a Eurocon, not related to the Worldcon but a nice regional convention, then there is no problem at all. A bid or bidders on the Asian continent could bid and interested fans, vote and then have an ASFS.
Josh, we don’t have enough bidders and conrunners for the one Worldcon a year we already have, and you want two? This is totally not a reasonable suggestion.
I would not characterize the last few NASFiCs as successful. Pemmi-con lost money and had sub-1000 attendance in a year when almost no regular Worldcon attendees were able to go to the Worldcon. A competently run and ambitious NASFiC in 2023 should have pulled at least 2000-3000 people. Pemmi-con was neither.
I used to be a big booster of NASFiC, and believed that strong NASFiCs would help grow talent and locations for Worldcon bids. But it just hasn’t panned out that way, and I’m now thoroughly in the kill the NASFiC camp. If the energy is there for the NASFiC to survive as a national yearly convention on its own, I think that’d be awesome. As others have said, maybe it would even help it be successful and live up to some of that potential. But it shouldn’t be a special WSFS carve out – Worldcon no longer needs protection from a competing NASFiC, which was one of the big reasons to keep it in the WSFS fold and having it only happen in non-NA years.
I’m similarly opposed to having ASFiC as part of the constitution. I think if Asian fans think they would benefit from a travelling continental convention they should adopt a model like Eurocon, not give control over it to the barely function WSFS.
I’m 100% neutral on the existence of NASFiC, ASFiC, ESFiC, or whatever (aside from a mild concern about the potential for confusion between Asia’s ASFiC and Africa’s ASFiC). It’s no skin off my nose if one exists or doesn’t. We don’t have a shortage of conventions in the world, but neither do we have so many that there’s no room for more!
That said, I don’t think Eurocon is relevant. North America has a large number of conventions that aren’t NASFiC! And Eurocon is a convention that isn’t ESFiC. It doesn’t prevent ESFiC from existing, any more than, say, Dragoncon prevents NASFiC from existing! Maybe ESFiC will never exist, but Eurocon is still an unrelated topic.
In fact, to the best of my knowledge, involvement with Eurocon gives you exactly zero say over anything related to WSFS, including any possible ESFiC!
As for the argument about the burden to a Worldcon committee, well, any Worldcon already has to run at least one site selection vote, and I can’t imagine that running a second (or third, or fourth) is particularly difficult once you’re committed to the first. I’ve never heard anyone from a concom complain about the extra difficulty of running a NASFiC vote; if I’m wrong about this, then my opinion might change, but for the moment, I remain resolutely neutral!
Re burden on Worldcon: The mark protection committee has to police and protect the marks for each con for regional conventions associated with WSFS as well as Worldcon’s and the Hugo Award’s marks.
Re the lack of conflict/connection between a possible ESFiC and Eurocon. So ESFiC (short for the European Science Fiction Convention) wouldn’t conflict or be confusing with Eurocon (short for the European Science Fiction Convention)? Sure.
Re 2 Worldcons a year: So, here’s the thing. I don’t care, in concept, whether they happen (I care whether at least one Worldcon a year happens). We have years in where multiple compelling bids materialize and we have to give one of them the mantle and dissapoint the others.
I presume (not close enough to inside baseball here) that there are also years in which there are no bids for a while and someone throws together a bid even if they wouldn’t be otherwise inclined in order to fill the gap. Ok, if those who know say it’s so I believe it.
But we’ve been accused of treating the Worldcon, which has become more of a viably international thing in the last two decades, with it being outside of the US for half the time for the last 20 years (before that, it was out of the US for 2 or 3 out of 10 years from 1970 on except for the decade of 1970 where it was out of the US 4 times), as a US thing by having NAsFIC. Two worldcons would be an interesting, and low risk experiment, and one that could let “second worldcons” in the US act like NASfic other than being further away from Worldcon temporally (unelss there was also a compelling non-US DuoCon bid as well as Worldcon1 bid, in which case bonus, while in years where Worldcon was in the US, we could see whether countries that said they should have a NASFiC-convention could actually pull one off!
On top of that, widening the pool of Hugo and site selection voters without significantly dropping the conditions for same (a measurable stake in Worldcon) is in my view an unadulterated good. More congoers regularly voting in these contests means more stability in resisting attacks from outside our communities to influence them without having a pre-existing stake in them.
Where in the constitution does it say that WSFS has to protect the marks of any hypothetical conventions which don’t yet exist? Or that any regional WSFS conventions have to follow the naming pattern established by NASFiC? If ESFiC is a problematic name, we could call it, e.g., “European Regional Worldcon Substitute” (or “Affiliate” or something), which, as a bonus, wouldn’t need any extra mark protection because it already incorporates WSFS’s protected mark, “Worldcon”.
Names are a trivial and easily solved issue if we actually want these conventions. Whether we actually want these conventions is the real issue.
Europe already has a continental convention. That’s the point of Eurocon, and it’s administered by ESFS, an organization with no connection to WSFS and quite different rules. I don’t think anyone in European fandom has any interest in seeing another European continental convention that’s somehow WSFS sanctioned.
The biggest objection to embedding ASFIC (or any other name you choose to give such thing) into the WSFS constitution is that you’re giving control of it an organization that probably most of the time most of the people in your region can’t attend. So all it would take was two business meetings in a row on the other side of the planet to remove it from the constitution, or change the rules in some way that you may not agree with.
Plus the voting just makes no sense. If there was an ASFIC right now (and assuming it operates just like the NASFiC), next year there would have to be a vote in Glasgow about which Asian country would host the 2025 ASFIC. And people from your region who wanted a say in that would have to pay to become members of Glasgow to vote. Now, it might stay administered from ASFIC to ASFIC for a while after that, but every time you do have Worldcon in Asia, then the next ASFIC gets chosen by somebody else. It just doesn’t make any sense. (All of these are equally good arguments for why the NASFiC should exit the constitution as well, I will note.)
I think every continent should get one and I’m looking forward to AntSFIC at McMurdo Station.
I think ASFiC is a great idea and I think fans from all over Asia, from China, Japan, Thailand and Vietnam should all get together and make it happen. Why should WSFS get involved? WSFS has plenty to do already. It is fans that make conventions happen and if Asian fans step up to the plate and make it happen, it will be a great thing.
Worldcon started not because of some big organization but because some fans wanted to get together and have a con and so they did. NASFiC started not because of some big organization but because some fans wanted to get together and have a con and so they did.
The big benefit of having the Worldcon in China is to show Asian fans what is possible and that they can do it too. If they decide not to, perhaps due to political differences among Asian countries, that would be a shame but either way it should not be the job of WSFS to do other than just provide moral support.
I don’t think WSFS should sanction other conventions besides Worldcon. It should get out of the business off NASFIC, and I don’t think it needs to be involved with continental conventions. Worldcons/WSFS should ideally have “friendly relations” with those continental conventions, and individuals would be involved with both.
I think the science fiction fan community should look at ways of strengthening the community all over the world, including in the United States. The pandemic has weakened a lot of the regional conventions, and both the NASFIC and Westercon feel like they are also on life support.
What I think makes sense is to wind down NASFIC and Westercon as they currently are, and then have some sort of new convention title that rotates amongst existing (or perhaps seeding new) regional conventions.
If NASFiC and Westercon shut down, what makes you think a new rotating site convention with no history and no fan awareness would have a better chance of success than they do in carrying on the same purposes?
Ending either one is not going to cause something new to flourish in their place. It’s just going to end something.
@Tammy Coxen: Tell me about it. I’m still working on Pemmi-Con. But I think the issues with Pemmi-Con, many of which were avoidable, were not caused by its being a NASFiC. Even if it had been a Worldcon, it still would have had to deal with being understaffed, the local con going on hiatus, John Mansfield passing away, and so on.
Anyway, whether NASFiC can be a successful convention is besides the point. DragonCon is a successful convention without being administered by WSFS.
@Michael Lee: In order to wind down NASFiC, WSFS would need to remain in charge of it. I guess that would be one way to discourage fans with stars in their eyes who want their own official WSFS sanctioned continental conventions. We could say yay, great idea, let them do the work to start it up, and then wind it down on them. But it would be a lot easier, and a lot less perverse, to have WSFS focus only on Worldcon.
@Xtifr “Where in the constitution does it say that WSFS has to protect the marks of any hypothetical conventions which don’t yet exist? ”
In general, if you own a trademark and don’t actively protect it, you can lose it.
Larks’ Tongues in ASFIC
@bill: True, but irrelevant. A convention doesn’t need a trademark, and if you don’t have a mark, you can’t lose it!
As I said, the name (not mark–name) could incorporate one of WSFS’s existing marks as part of its name, which would prevent anyone else from using that name, but would not require registering or administering any additional marks.
The WSFS doesn’t own the trademarks of the individual Worldcon conventions. It owns World Science Fiction Society, WSFS, World Science Fiction Convention, Worldcon, Lodestar Award, Hugo Award, the Hugo Award logo and the design of the Hugo Award rocket.
If one of the Worldcons has a distinctive name like Sasquan or MidAmeriCon instead of a descriptive one like Worldcon 75, the trademark rights in that name belong to the convention. Same goes for the logos of the convention.
Contrary to what was said earlier, the WSFS does not have to police and protect the marks owned by the yearly Worldcon or NASFiC conventions.
Just for completeness, it also owns NASFIC.
“World Science Fiction Society”, “WSFS”, “World Science Fiction Convention”, “Worldcon”, “NASFiC”, “Lodestar Award”, “Hugo Award”, the Hugo Award Logo, and the distinctive design of the Hugo Award Rocket are service marks of Worldcon Intellectual Property, a California non-profit corporation managed by the Mark Protection Committee of the World Science Fiction Society, an unincorporated literary society.
Mm… IMO, let WSFS concentrate solely on (i) each Worldcon as it happens and (ii) where applicable (ie if a Worldcon is one year outside N/America) the relevant NASFiC… And again IMO, the idea of some ESFiC (or whatever) would, here in Europe, only cause confusion at the minimum and indeed probably raise some outright hostility/opposition (in that it would be opposite the already 50 year old and quite successful Eurocons).. [ Eurocons, running since 1972, are in a sense Worldcon’s “little brother”..and I certainly would like to see more “regional” (as in continents other than N/America or Europe) Cons emerge, to parallel the Eurocons. The most obvious areas here are (a) Asia (hence ASFS/Asian SF Society and its idea of an Asiacon) and (b) Africa (which could emerge from the existing NIMMO Awards). Tho we shouldnt ignore S/America (tho that would be mainly Spanish and or Portuguese derived SF) or Pacifica (ie Australia, NZ and the other Pacific islands eg Fiji etc) …]
I saw on twitter (and confirmed here: https://www.worldcon.org/worldcon-bids/) that the only current bid for 2027 is Tel Aviv, and I can’t really say I’m looking forward to all the hot takes that come with.
Playing devil’s advocate for a moment (or continuing to play), the advantage of regional WSFS Cons is that they may encourage people to buy WSFS memberships! So, if we can eliminate or minimize the negatives, the regional cons could become pure win! Or close to it!
So, can we eliminate the negatives? Maybe…
Administrative overhead can be all-but-eliminated by not administering the regional cons! WSFS can run the site selection bids (this is how we get people to buy memberships), and nothing more!
People may not want one in their region? Easy! Make them optional! If nobody submits a bid for a region or if “None of the above” wins the site selection vote, then there won’t be one in that region that year! This will also allow all the regional cons, including NASFiC, to naturally fade away if that is truly what the people want.
(In order to prevent vindictive vote-bombing, it might be wise to allow members only one regional vote–if you vote against ESFiC because you hate the concept, you can’t also vote against NASFiC to punish ugly Americans.)
Heck, if Europeans are truly as opposed to having a ESFiC-style event as some are suggesting, some of them might buy WSFS memberships just to vote against any European bids!
Anything else?
@Xtifr: Sigh. Only Worldcon memberships are WSFS memberships.
Worldcons have tables and throw parties at regional cons all the time. They don’t have to administer site selection for regional cons to do that.
It may be hard to believe just how little benefit NASFiC is to WSFS, but really, all WSFS gets from it is the administrative overhead. There is nothing else. Nada. Zilch.
Well, in years where the Worldcon is selecting the NASFiC it can potentially get a little extra income because people have to join the Worldcon to vote. But that really only matters in a contested NASFiC race, and I don’t think we’ve had one of those since Detroit beat Phoenix for 2014. (When we had a report from a group of 3 local Detroit fans who pooled their money to buy one supporting membership and one voting fee so that they could do their part to support our bid.)
There’s also the benefit of the people who attend a NASFiC, enjoy the convention and the community of fans and decide to go to future Worldcons.
Having 14,000 people attend the 1995 NASFiC helped both DragonCon (that year’s host) and Worldcon.
14,000 people attended Dragoncon. At the time, Locus estimated that only about 1,000 attended because of the NASFiC. DragonCon was already bigger than Worldcon, and I don’t think there’s any evidence that NASFiC being there did anything to help the Worldcon – how would most people even have known that this NASFiC thing had anything to do with Worldcon, assuming they event noticed it in its little corner of the con?
I was making EXACTLY the same kinds of claims as you 9 years ago. That NASFiCs could be good for Worldcons. But it’s just not the case, as the NASFiC is currently constituted.
Here’s what our fine host had to say about the Dragon*Con NASFiC:
I’m having trouble understanding the big picture here of why NASFiC is so disliked by some WSFS longtimers.
It’s a long-running con that only requires a modest amount of work from WSFS (holding a site selection vote) and a large amount of work from the groups putting on the con (everything else). And sometimes a NASFiC even does the site selection for the next NASFiC, like when Pemmi-Con 2023 ran the vote electing Buffalo 2024.
The reason NASFiC is still around is because we’ve always had at least one group wanting to do that work each time Worldcon left North America. It is obviously popular with those people, thank Ghu’s purple fingers, because they keep showing up each time there’s an open year.
If NASFiC was no longer wanted or needed, wouldn’t the best way to decide that be when groups stop asking to run one?
Here’s one really important reason – to many conrunners outside of the US, the NASFiC is actively offensive. Non-North American conrunners have hosted half the last 10 Worldcons. This is an international convention. A “World” con. Why does the US get special status? Why do US congoers need a consolation prize?
The presence of the NASFiC in the constitution is what inspired the proposal for an ASFiC, and all the reasons why it’s a bad idea apply equally to the NASFiC, and make obvious the hypocrisy of its inclusion in the constitution.
I haven’t seen anyone in this thread make a compelling argument for why the NASFiC should remain in the constitution. If it wasn’t already there, no one would be trying to put it in there – it would make absolutely no sense to do so.
As you noted, the rest of the world is getting half of the Worldcons. That’s already proof that the “world” in Worldcon is legit.
One of the things that helped places outside North America win Worldcon site selection was voters deciding a North American city could be given a NASFiC instead. It has been enough of a trend that we’ve seen several North American bids announce before the vote that they won’t seek a NASFiC if they lost a Worldcon vote.
Take away NASFiC and there might be less “world” in Worldcon.
“Stop treating us like we’re special and we’ll take our toy and go home and you can’t play with it.”
That’s certainly not going to endear you to international conrunners.
The largest Worldcons to date have all been in Europe. They can muster plenty of voters of their own. US Conventions don’t announce they’re not going to run to protect those poor weak international bids, they do it so people will vote for their bid. There were 500 people at Pemmi-con, in a year when almost no Americans could attend the Worldcon. 800 at Spikecon, which was 4 conventions combined into one. 250 in San Juan. It’s really not the huge voting block that you think it is. Many US Worldcon voters really LIKE going to overseas Worldcons.
“We need to do it to protect the Worldcon” is a piss poor argument and insulting to boot.
That is in no way a fair characterization of what I said.
You’re finding insult where none exists. I suspect you’re doing the same when you speak of international conrunners being offended by North Americans having a con in years without a Worldcon. Nobody has fun on the condition that somebody on another continent must also be having less fun.
rcade: Just for fairness’ sake, I can assure you I’ve encountered UK and European fans who resent the idea of the NASFiC. There have been previous efforts to repeal it — Don Eastlake III recently commented here that they have failed at the business meeting roughly 60-40%, which speaks to the continuing resistance to the idea.
Some international fans taking offense at NASFiC’s existence, sure. Fans are a contentious lot.
Conrunners, though? They like Worldcon enough to want one for their country because of its long-standing practices, traditions and community, but find it “actively offensive” that one of those practices is a North American off-year con begun 48 years ago by members of LASFS?
Let’s hear from some of those people.