Sasquan Numbers Blow Up

Sasquan, the 2015 Worldcon, has released another membership update hard on the heels of the one reported here the other day.

The con now has 7,016 members, including 3,418 attending and 3,300 supporting.

The surge is mainly in supporting memberships, the minimum requirement to become eligible as a voter in 2017 site selection and to vote on the winners of the Hugo Awards.

This compares to the figures reported as of March 31 as shown:

Sasquan Total Members
3/31/2015 5,466
4/12/2015 7,016
Increase 1,550

 

Adult Attending Members
3/31/2015 3,240
4/12/2015 3,418
Increase 178

 

Supporting Members
3/31/2015 1,948
4/12/2015 3,300
Increase 1,352

55 thoughts on “Sasquan Numbers Blow Up

  1. $54,080? Yeah, I’d call that a $urge! I’m pretty sure that translates to a marginal increase in revenues, even subtracting whatever postage and packet compilation costs per member.

    Why is this membership boom during rough times for cons still viewed – by some – as something of a mixed blessing?

  2. BECAUSE EVIL THINKEVILS!

    I haven’t even bought my membership yet. I imagine there is still more growth coming. It is $40 of near unlimited popcorny goodness after all and “free” books. As a bonus I found out I can attend the business meeting without getting the full membership.

  3. Oh and on counts…I’m still shocked by how _small_ WorldCon is. I always pictured it mentally in what is now PAX territory but it doesn’t even come close. 5k people is a rather small crowd.

  4. Traditional fandom doesn’t like the sort of massive crowds that the pop culture types seem so fond of. We prefer to have events where we can actually get into panels without waiting in line and where it’s possible to meet people without travelling as a pack.

  5. Worldcon has taken steps to keep its size down, preferring a smaller con that’s SF/F and fiction focused to a giant media con in which SF/F becomes a minor element.

  6. LOL. Not on your life. You think LonCon 3 doesn’t wish it had double the attendance?

  7. Loncon’s gigantic space certainly could have handled that double attendance. That place was positively cavernous.

  8. Mike: I believe that the dates for the Adult Attending Members and the Supporting Members should probably say 3/31/15 and 4/12/15, instead of 1/31/15 and 3/31/15.

  9. Joshua: I hereby award you the title “File 770’s Savior Proofreader of the Day” with all the rights and privileges appurtaining thereto. Thanks!

  10. “G. K. Chesterton”:

    One of the (many) reasons I liked Fandom and WorldCons when I was a neo (the 1960’s, say) was that after I’d been in fandom for two or three years and was attending my first WorldCon I was acquainted with (by previous personal contact, reading their material in fanzines, &/or personal correspondence) about 80% of the people there. And, after the two or three days of the Con, I had become acquainted with about 10% more. A few years later the attendance got above 1,500 people and things went alltohell as far as my sense of fandom being my family/communtity was concerned. And yes, certainly, “5k is a rather small crowd”. I go to s-f cons mostly to exchange ideas, primarily with friends whos biases & interests I’m already aware of. (Friends — & maybe a few enemies– if you will.) Like most human beings, about 500 is as many individuals as I can keep track of. When a convention is larger than that, it’s no longer possible to even think of considering it My Tribe.

  11. xdpaul: And if a sufficiently large number of people are determined to attend the WSFS Business Meeting (which is their right), the marginal additional facilities cost (quoted to me as ~$1,100/day for four days of meetings because under those circumstances we’d almost certainly end up holding the Day 4 “overflow” session) could eat up at least 10% of any “profit” in those memberships right there.

    GK: Among many other reasons, Worldcon is a brand new start-up event every single year in a brand new city. There’s no ongoing event in a single city, there’s no reserve against next year or seed money from last year. If PAX had been held once, then dissolved its corporation and some other people set up a one-shot PAX in (say) Chicago next year, then dissolved in and some others started up another PAX in (say) Glasgow the year after that, and so on, I suspect that PAX wouldn’t be so large. Conversely, if Worldcon were run by the same group every year and was held in the same place every year (say, Anaheim), it would probably start growing in size, but would lose a lot of its claim to be a “World” science fiction convention.

    “Worldcon” isn’t going to be the largest SF/F pop culture event in the world anymore because other groups have set out to make an ongoing, one-location event and to keep growing.

  12. What is the historical average for attending vs. supporting members? Does it have a wide variance?

  13. Mike: I answer your LOL with something GRRM wrote today: “The SMOFs who run worldcon made a conscious decision to slow down and even stop the growth, so as to preserve the unique character and flavor of worldcon, the sense of community, the ‘amateur status’ if I might use a sports metaphor.”

    His take is close to mine. Obviously each year’s Worldcon would like to draw more people, but the long-term trend has been to avoid letting it become San Diego Comicon.

  14. If Worldcon really wants to shrink, they need to get rid of the Hugos. You can’t simultaneously claim to Award SF’s best and exclude readers. I have no problem with Worldcon’s freedom of association. By all means, shrink away, but don’t fire shiny rockets from a membership organization and just hope no one will want to join.

    You could ensure its amateur status by abandoning the Lombardi Trophy to the professionals.

  15. GK:

    > As a bonus I found out I can attend the business meeting
    > without getting the full membership.

    That’s interesting. Can you explain you you expect to do this?

  16. xdpaul: WSFS can do whatever it wants to do with the awards it owns. Nobody is stopping you from setting up the Real Good Awards for Real Good Works given by Real Good Fans. Seriously. If someone set up awards that were as obviously Right as you’re convinced they should be, it’s likely that nobody would pay any attention to the Hugo Awards.

    There are lots of awards in SF/F. For several years, I helped try to keep up with them all but we eventually gave up because it was too much work for little reward to speak of and much abuse when we made mistakes.

  17. Reade:

    You neglected to mention another reason early fandom tried to keep the WorldCon Attendance low — to have the con in smaller hotels with room-rates low enough thad many dedicated, but impecunious, fans could attend. And in which 3/4 of the fans in one room could roll up their sleeping bags and conceal them before the maids came in.

  18. rcade: I am a past chair of the World Science Fiction Convention, L.A.con III (1996). Here’s what it looked like from the inside in my own experience.

    The 1984 Worldcon in Anaheim, L.A.con II, set the record for attendance (8,382, which has never been broken). In 1996, the Worldcon would be returning to Anaheim for the first time in a dozen years. We thought maybe there would be some pent-up demand. And with the ever-growing Comic-Con just down the road, maybe a bunch of those fans could be drawn to our event. Bruce Pelz (then on the committee) asked my opinion how many attendees our organization could handle, and if we should think about capping memberships. My guess was we could handle an event twice the size of the 1984 Worldcon. Well, in the three years between the time we won our bid and the 1996 con it became apparent we would not even have as many members as the last Worldcon in LA. Bruce and I never needed to discuss that question again.

    As a result, in 1996, we held back nothing in our promotional toolkit to generate membership. We ended up with 6,703 attendees. (A number the Long List of Worldcons reports was not exceeded again until LonCon 3. Not even by the 2006 con in Anaheim.) While I have seen a great many remarks over the years showing Worldcon leaders feeling pressured to find enough memberships to pay for the things they wanted to do, I haven’t seen anyone strategize ways to avoid growth. That’s my testimony on that score.

    Here is my recap of reasons why the Worldcons have stayed in the 5,000-8,000 range. (Kevin Standlee has mentioned a couple already.)

    1. Worldcons put written sf at center stage. Writers are featured participants at the con. (Of course, so were Mark Hammill, Dr. Demento, Patrick Stewart and other celebrities when they showed up, but many writers are there every year.) Book-oriented events do not draw the same masses that movie/TV/pop culture events do. For more on this, see my 2009 post “Sowing Dragon’s Teeth”
    2. The Worldcon moves around every year. Fairly often, it is held outside the US. As a result, it has a much smaller annual repeat membership than events that stay put.
    3. And while I hate to offend my friends, Worldcon committees do mediocre work marketing themselves. (One of the few exceptions was John Mansfield in 1994, who practically owned Winnipeg the weekend his Worldcon was in town.) It’s not a lack of effort — there are always people working sacrificially to run parties and do social media. I think the problem is a lot of work has to be invested in meeting expectations of existing members and keeping the buzz from going sour. That’s effort that isn’t spent on outreach. And there isn’t a bottomless pool of volunteer hours to invest, far from it.
    4. Other interests besides text sf (media, gaming, art, cosplay, filk, etc. etc.) are served at Worldcons, but much depends on how well each new committee recruits people with expertise and good ties to the communities of fans whose decision to attend will revolve around what’s planned for that interest.

    The size of Worldcons is limited by inefficiencies in the model. Some, like going international, are part of the Worldcon philosophy. Anyway, it’s only during these online shaming sessions (“Your stinky little con dares to own sci-fi’s greatest award?”) that a 7,500-person event is treated as insignificant.

  19. It sounds to me like the Sad Puppies have added a LOT of money to WorldCon. Perhaps I am mistaken.

    I don’t think Sad/Rabid Puppies will flood the actual Con with wrongthinkers and wrongfans.

    We will just buy our supporting memberships and vote on what we like.

    So you will mostly be safe from reality interrupting your Con.

  20. And if Sad Puppies did show up, how would we tell you apart from everyone else, hm?

  21. Kevin Standlee: ” Nobody is stopping you from setting up the Real Good Awards for Real Good Works given by Real Good Fans.”

    Jerry Oltion used to give out the Jerry Oltion Pretty Good SF Award. Since it only had a voting membership of one (Jerry Oltion), it never had any problems with gamemanship or personality clashes. He may have been on to something there….

  22. Mike Glyer on April 13, 2015 at 7:05 pm said:
    And if Sad Puppies did show up, how would we tell you apart from everyone else, hm?
    ————————–
    We’d be wearing “I support the NRA.” T-shirts.

  23. @Don and Kevin,

    I wasn’t attempting to slight WorldCon, but given the _name_ and how I viewed it growing up I expected it to be _much_ larger. Yes, there are obvious logistical issues. But, as xdpaul points out, it is supposedly the place where all fans vote for the Hugos. It creates a bit of a psychic disjoint seeing how small it is. And by habit I’m an extrovert if by personality an introvert so I understand the pleasure of “smaller” groups of 5k. In fact I can say for a very LONG time I was oblivious to the fact that it moved around. I always, growing up in a smallish place, assumed it was in some big city like LA.

    @Kevin,
    “That’s interesting. Can you explain you you expect to do this?”

    It was my mistake. I started reading the bylaws late the other night and misread 1.5.3. Some of us SP’s are taking notes. We’d really rather not be beaten by better prepared insiders who are already making noises about changing rules to favor the old cliques even if GRRM reliably informs me such things don’t exist except when they do.

  24. @Hunting Guy,

    I was considering doing something really apropos like wearing a sashimono myself.

  25. I wish somebody had told me about these old cliques years ago. Are their badges? A secret handshake? Do I need to learn a knock? Kevin? Why didn’t you tell me?

  26. “I wish somebody had told me about these old cliques years ago. Are their badges? A secret handshake? Do I need to learn a knock? Kevin? Why didn’t you tell me?”

    Are you _really_ saying that cliques don’t exist? Something at least GRRM had the sense to _not_ say?

  27. Hi all!

    I’m one of the new supporting members. I had never understood that you could buy this kind of membership before the puppy debacle, so it was a nice surprise. Attending WorldCon is a bit to expensive for me, I live in sweden, but support it I can.

    Also, I’m feeling quite giddy to be able to vote for a Hugo. And to get a nice reading list. I’ve even bought one or two of the puppy books, those that didn’t seem to be chosen for politics/friendship reasons. So there you have part of an explanation of the increase in membership.

  28. @Mike > Yeah, I was tempted to tell you re your last post on the topic to watch the numbers, but some people didn’t want to say anything until the whole page was updated (which is not trivial).

    @Brandon > No, actually, it’s not a lot of money. Supporting memberships don’t bring in a lot of money. After factoring in additional expenses the net benefit is what my accounting prof called “not material”. Treasurer is still concerned about break-even. (Loncon which had huge membership barely broke even.) I am much more confident than the treasurer because I have a projection model which I consider to be statistically sound regarding money that has not yet come in. 😉 We have a long wishlist of budget items that would make the convention better, and an extra thousand supporting memberships only loosens up a few smaller items on that list. Revenue side of the budget has large variables and we don’t have a future income stream to cover a mistake.

    As Mike suggests (phrasing differently), Worldcon is what it is for various cultural and historical reasons, but any decision-maker in these things wants to bring in enough revenue to guarantee a positive bottom line. Worldcons have not gone the route of pop-culture events that have paid celebrities to draw a crowd. We’re still a community of participating members (i.e. a literal “convention”), not a business selling tickets to an audience.

    Spokane Arena seats 14,000. We will not need it. But just saying that in our optimistic scenarios we take note of contingencies for expansion. Doubling membership levels would make some departments a bit crazy for a while but it’s a problem many of us would love to have.

    Attending memberships are what matter. We had a nice bump last week or two. My warm body count projection went up a little (by less than 100).

  29. Just to add: There are some pop-culture events that are very successful, but it’s no sure thing. There are plenty of stories about other events where organizers thought money would roll in that have ended up being catastrophic failures. Rolling the dice on a growth strategy can be very risky.

  30. @Kevin,
    Hush, you fool! Don’t tell him about the Secret Handgrip of Fandom! 😉

    @Daveon,
    Nope. Nothing to see here. Move along…

  31. GK: As you perhaps have now realized, the governing rule is Section 1.5.4 of the current WSFS Constitution:

    “1.5.4: The rights of attending members of a Worldcon include the rights of supporting members plus the right of general attendance at said Worldcon and at the WSFS Business Meeting held thereat.”

    Supporting members may, by standing practice, submit proposals and act as co-sponsors of proposals submitted to the Business Meeting, but they cannot attend in person or vote upon them, nor can they debate them beyond any statement submitted with the proposal. The Business Meeting does not have remote participation or proxy voting. Only those members present in person may vote.

    Attending (and with Sasquan, Young Adult and Military, which you should assume I include when I say “Attending” hereafter) Members may attend and actively participate in the Business Meeting, including making motions and voting.

    Single-day admissions do not include WSFS voting rights at this year’s Worldcon. Persons with single-day memberships may not be able to attend the meeting, particularly if we are obliged to limit attendance to only Attending members for room capacity reasons. We’ve not imposed such limits in my memory; however, we’ve also not had concerns about room capacity, given the increased interest in the Business Meeting, a function that typically only draws around 2% of the Attending Members. Should we have to have Sergeants-at-Arms check members’ credentials, particularly if we’re squeezed for space, we’ll have to keep it only to those people who are part of the eligible electorate. No person who is eligible to participate in the Business Meeting and who wants to attend will be excluded as long as that person participates according to our rules including our rules of order.

    I really wish I knew how many people will actually attend, not just talk about it or make dark threats. My interpretation of the WSFS Constitution is that the Business Meeting is the only function at the entire convention where every Attending member is guaranteed admission. If we get an “overflow” condition — and we’ve already upgraded the room to a larger-than-in-my-memory facility once — we might have to immediately suspend the meeting and disrupt a whole lot of the rest of the convention while we figure out how to accommodate everyone. Conversely, if we spend an estimated $12,000 (possiby more) in additional function costs in order to hold the meeting in the 2700-seat theatre and only 200 people show up, we’re wasting Worldcon resources that could be better spent on the members.

    WSFS Rules are Not Secret. They are published on the WSFS web site and in Worldcon publications. I have an article on the Sasquan website that attempts to give an overview of the Business Meeting process. I will explain procedures to anyone who wants to listen. I will help people draft proposals in the proper technical form, regardless of my personal opinions of them. I will do everything in my ability to provide every Attending member willing to play by the rules an equal opportunity to do so in a fair and democratic manner.

  32. @ standlee A nice outdoor location? Spokane is in the 70s and mostly clear in August. And if everyone has to remain standing, that will help reduce the length of the meeting 🙂

  33. Can’t say I have much noticed the clqiues in the decade or so I’ve been going to some worldcons (50% of the last 10 – mostly outside of the US mind you)…

    You do understand we’re all adults here and this isn’t school?

    How many Worldcons have you attended anyway?

  34. bookworm: Don’t think I haven’t considered it.

    But an all-standing meeting makes recognizing people in debate and doing “serpentine” counted votes really difficult. The latter we would probably have to do by a true physical “division” of the room, which I would rather avoid due to the amount of time it would take.

  35. Yeah we don’t tell people about the sacred underwear either.

    First rule of SMOF club: Never talk about SMOF club.

    @bookworm: Yes I think a number of us have independently considered the possibility of taking the business meeting into the park if a thousand people show up for it. Though my mental image of this has us sitting on blankets, wearing hemp shirts, interesting aromas in the air*, maybe some guitars or harmonicas.

    (*–certainly I am not suggesting anyone would be smoking the evil Marijuana ’cause that would be illegal. Or possibly not, depending on who you ask.)

  36. I’ve often said the internet doesn’t have a sense of humor, but I would not have accused it of failing to recognize irony.

  37. @ Ken Standee –

    Don’t tell me you guys haven’t considered *adding* physical divisions to the room. I have no idea what the logistics issues would be, but it might be worth a consideration.

    I *really* think you should look into monetizing the Business Meeting videos this year. 🙂

  38. @ Alex
    My memory of LACon II is that we had a breakeven point of 6000 members, and we didn’t reach that until about this time in 1984. (Hi, I was a Minor Rat!)

  39. Cat: Ro Nagey promised to write a new secret handgrip of fandom article for me. Hope she does…

  40. “Conversely, if we spend an estimated $12,000 (possiby more) in additional function costs in order to hold the meeting in the 2700-seat theatre and only 200 people show up, we’re wasting Worldcon resources that could be better spent on the members.”

    Look we aren’t the ones talking about changing the rules. We’re fine with them as they are. The other side _is_ and I’ll be damned if I let them write us out of the history books. And yes, I am impressed by the rules being posted and in a “revised” form. Very handy.

  41. Well GK, like the rest of us, you can come to a Worldcon and propose what you like and persuade people that its the correct thing to do. That’s the advice I gave the book bloggers, it’s the advice I’m giving you.

    Personally, I’d be more worried about the fact that you don’t seem confident that if you don’t game the system you won’t win or something…

    Gaming a system that hasn’t been gamed before because people didn’t try is a BIG accomplishment. Well done… (slow clap)

  42. Spokane is in Washington, so smoking marijuana at the hypothetical picnic business meeting would be legal unless there are local ordinances about smoking (anything at all) in the park. Oh, for any out-of-state visitors, you’ll need to show proof that you’re at least 21 years old to buy it legally.

    Personally, I think the business meeting and cannabis are two great tastes that do not taste great together.

  43. Glenn: Shh! I was less than subtly reminding Ro how interested I am in her offer to write an updated version for File 770.

  44. GK:

    And yes, I am impressed by the rules being posted and in a “revised” form.

    What exactly did you mean when you say “in a ‘revised’ form”? It’s late, I’m trying to do my day jobbe as well as follow all of the rest of this stuff, and I’m not getting the reference.

  45. > Well GK, like the rest of us, you can come to a Worldcon and propose what you like and persuade people that its the correct thing to do. That’s the advice I gave the book bloggers, it’s the advice I’m giving you.

    This reminds me of the advice given to Sad Puppies authors when they expressed concern for not being nominated, nevermind winning awards. ‘If you want to be nominated, maybe you should build more support’ *cue outrage & screaming when that is done*

    > Personally, I’d be more worried about the fact that you don’t seem confident that if you don’t game the system you won’t win or something…

    Annual “Pimpage” threads? Totally cool. Putting up a list of suggested works based on merits? Gaming the system.

    > Gaming a system that hasn’t been gamed before because people didn’t try is a BIG accomplishment. Well done… (slow clap)

    The system has always been gamed. Multiple authors have stated it. Harlan Ellison is on video stating outright that it was gamed back in 1995. You didn’t mind it being gamed when the right people were nominated. Now you do.

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