Chengdu, Memphis Officially File 2023 Worldcon Bids

The DisCon III committee announced today that two bidders for the 2023 Worldcon filed by the deadline to appear on the mail ballot: Chengdu, China (@chengduworldcon) and Memphis, Tennessee (@MemphisIn2023).

The committee tweeted that the bid filings will be available on the DisCon III website soon. They will be talking with both bids to set the Site Selection Voting Fee and other details of the site selection process.

CHENGDU IN 2023

Proposed Site: Chengdu, China
Proposed Dates: August 16-20, 2023
Bid Leadership: He Xi, chair
Website:
English: CD-WSFC CHENGDU WorldCon in 2023
Chinese: http://www.worldconinchina.com/
Twitter: Chengduworldcon
SMOFCon 37-1/4 Questionnaire: Chengdu for 2023
Bid Filing: Chengdu in 2023

MEMPHIS IN 2023

Memphis in 2023
Memphis in 2023

Proposed Site: Memphis, TN
Proposed Dates: August 23-27, 2023
Bid Leadership: Cliff Dunn and Kate Secor
Website: Memphis in 2023
Twitter: Memphis in 2023
Facebook: Memphis in 2023
SMOFCon 37-1/4 Questionnaire: Memphis for 2023
Bid Filing: Memphis in 2023

DisCon III provides more information about 2023 Worldcon Site Selection at the link.

To vote in this election, you must be an attending or supporting member of DisCon III. When you vote, you will pay an additional amount called the Advance Supporting Membership rate, which gives you a supporting membership in the 2023 Worldcon, regardless of which site wins the election. This money goes to the winning Worldcon bid regardless of who wins or how you voted….

Pixel Scroll 2/24/20 You Make Me Vote Like A Natural Person…

(1) WORLDCON AMBITIONS. Tammy Coxen wants to remedy the problem of groups bidding for Worldcons without having any knowledge of the norms and customs of the convention they want to run. With input from many others, she has created an introduction — “So You Want to Bid for a Worldcon”.

Have you ever thought about running a Worldcon? Because Worldcon has been going on for so long (over 80 years!) there are a lot of expectations, traditions, norms and customes about how to do that, and if you don’t know about them, it’s really hard to win your bid! We haven’t necessarily done a great job of communicating that to people, so (with a lot of help from friends) I put together this intro guide. This is not a how-to document with details – this is more big picture. I think it’s useful to all bidders, but it should be especially useful to people who are new(er) to Worldcons. Please feel free to share.

(2) AURORA AWARDS NEWS. The Canadian Science Fiction & Fantasy Association reminded people today that the Aurora Awards Eligibility lists close February 29, 2020. And the announcement comes with a warning —

This means that if there are any works you wish to nominate for an award which are not found on the public eligibility lists you will need to submit them before 11:59PM EST February 29, 2020.

Nominations will open March 1, 2020.  

Unlike in previous years, works that are not on the Eligibility lists prior to the opening of Nominations will NOT be able to be added.  

(3) BENFORD Q&A. At Buzzy Mag, Jean Marie Ward conducts the “Gregory Benford Interview – The future is all we have left”.

Jean: We’re so glad to have you. Your most recent published books are both alternate history. “The Berlin Project” looks at the world that might have been if the U.S. had the A bomb before D-day. “Rewrite” offers a sequel to your classic timescape with a Groundhog Day twist. What occasioned this desire to remake recent history?

Gregory: Because it’s so tempting. There are so many pivot points, particularly in World War II and I as a physicist was very close to the issue of, how do you get the Uranium-235 to make bombs? You have to separate it out from the heavier 238 isotope. And the decision of how to do that, I had two choices and General Groves was forced to make the choice because the scientists were divided and he chose the wrong one and it cost us a year in the Second World War. It’s generally agreed by historians that had we suggested or made happen centrifically a separation, spinning cylinders, we would have chopped a year off the gaseous diffusion that Oak Ridge used and spent $1 billion doing. So, how would that change the war? You would have the bomb at D-day, well, how would you use it? And I use this title, “The Berlin Project” because that’s what the scientists in the project called it the first few years because the target was Berlin. Groves said that was too obvious.

So he called it the Manhattan Project and opened an office in Manhattan to give the excuse of, well, of course it was near Columbia University where all his work was done, but still they were always focused on Berlin. So, that was just too tempting because I was a postdoc for Edward Teller at Livermore for two years and then a staff member. He offered me a staff position which I took before I went to UC Irvine. And Teller told me all these delicious stories about the Manhattan Project. And I knew so many of them. The woman who helped me to do physics at UC San Diego, Maria Kepert Mayor, when I was working on problems with her and did a bunch of nuclear physics, again for my thesis, she won the Nobel Prize. And she told me all kinds of delicious stories about the Manhattan Project….

(4) GIBSON BAFFLED. [Item by Martin Morse Wooster.] Behind a paywall in the February 15 Financial Times, John Thornhill interviews William Gibson.

Gibson knew the late (John Perry) Barlow well, but he says he is ‘absolutely baffled by the naive utopianism of the early Internet pioneers, who enthused about disruption.  Barlow professed to love Neuromancer — according to Gibson — but appeared to have missed the central idea that cyberspace also had its downsides.  Even today Gibson says he is puzzled by older readers who approach him at book signings to thank him for inspiring them to pursue a career in tech.

“They’d read a book in which there didn’t appear to be any middle class left and in which no characters had employment.  They were all criminal freelancers of one sort or another. So, it was always quite mysterious to me.”

(5) BRINGING DIVERSITY TO SPACE. “Black in Space: Breaking the Color Barrier” is airing this week on the Smithsonian Channel. It also can be viewed on YouTube.

America’s experiences during the Civil Rights Movement and the Space Race are well documented. However, few know about the moment these two worlds collided, when the White House and NASA scrambled to put the first black astronaut into orbit. This is the untold story of the decades-long battle between the U.S. and the Soviet Union to be the first superpower to bring diversity to the skies, told by the black astronauts and their families, who were part of this little known chapter of the Cold War.

…On Aug. 30, 1983, the astronaut Guion Bluford embarked as a crew member of the Space Shuttle Challenger, making him the first African-American in space. This documentary features him alongside Edward Dwight, an Air Force pilot edged out of a position with NASA, and Frederick Gregory, the first African-American to command a NASA mission, to examine the complications of sending a black man into space during the Cold War. 

Also included are Arnaldo Tamayo Méndez, the first Cuban astronaut sent into space by the Soviet Union, and Ronald McNair, an African-American pilot who died in the Challenger disaster in 1986.

(6) JOHNSON OBIT. Fame came late in Katherine Johnson’s life for her contributions to the early space program. “Smithsonian Curators Remember Katherine Johnson, NASA Mathematician Highlighted in ‘Hidden Figures,’ Who Died at 101”.

…Striking out during “a time when computers wore skirts,” she once said, Johnson quickly proved her incomparable worth. So trusted were her calculations that astronaut John Glenn, the first American to orbit the Earth, considered them an integral part of his preflight checklist—even after the equations had been transferred over to modern electronic machines. “When he got ready to go,” Johnson said of Glenn, “he said, ‘Call her. And if she says the computer is right, I’ll take it.”

Her work fueled innumerable feats of aeronautics, several of which were outlined in the 26 research papers Johnson published over her decades-long career. The earliest of these publications made Johnson one of the first women at NASA to become a named author or co-author on an agency report, according to Margalit Fox at the New York Times.

…Though Johnson’s landmark contributions went mostly unheralded by mainstream media throughout her tenure at Langley, the 2010s finally brought her name into the public eye. In 2015, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by Barack Obama, who described Johnson as “a pioneer who broke the barriers of race and gender, showing generations of young people that everyone can excel in math and science, and reach for the stars,” reports Russell Lewis for NPR. The next year, Margot Lee Shetterly’s book Hidden Figures, as well as a movie adaptation by the same name, highlighted the accomplishments of Johnson and her colleagues.

The film was nominated for three Oscars. When Johnson took the stage at the 2017 Academy Awards ceremony, the mathematician—then 98 years old and the only one of the movie’s central characters still alive at the time of its release—received a thunderous standing ovation. That fall, NASA dedicated a new Langley building in her honor, the Katherine G. Johnson Computational Research Facility….

The Washington Post obituary also includes many details of her personal life and early career at NACA and its successor, NASA.

…Mrs. Johnson had a bachelor’s degree in mathematics and spent her early career studying data from plane crashes, helping devise air safety standards at a time when the agency’s central concern was aviation….

Chris Garcia wrote her bio when the Bay Area’s Computer History Museum made her a Fellow last year:

… NACA was renamed National Aeronautics and Space Agency (NASA) in 1958, and Johnson became an aerospace technologist within NASA’s Spacecraft Controls branch. In 1960 she coauthored Determination of Azimuth Angle at Burnout for Placing a Satellite Over a Selected Earth Position, an important report that laid out the equations for determining landing position for orbital spaceflight. In 1961 she calculated the trajectory for Alan Shepard’s Freedom 7 Earth orbital mission….

(7) MORE ABOUT BARBARA REMINGTON, In “Blast from ye past”, DB follows this intro with some intriguing comments and insights about the late artist:

Barbara Remington has died, at 90. Really old-time Tolkienists will remember her name as that of the artist who created the covers for the first issue of the Ballantine paperbacks of The Lord of the Rings, which may be seen pictured in her obituary here. (Note they’re all actually one painting split into three parts, which was also issued as a single poster without overprinting.)

Ballantine’s goal was to get the books in the shops quickly, to compete with the unauthorized Ace paperbacks, so they gave Remington very little time to work….

(8) TODAY IN HISTORY.

  • February 24, 1952Aladdin And His Lamp premiered. It was directed by Lew Landers, and starred Johnny Sands and Patricia Medina. Filming was finished in less than a week. It was originally produced for a television audience, then Allied Artists picked up the film and added additional footage for a theatrical release. You can see this short film here.
  • February 24, 1960 The Amazing Transparent Man premiered. It was directed by Edgar G. Ulmer, and starred Marguerite Chapman and Douglas Kennedy. It and Beyond the Time Barrier were film in Dallas in two weeks. Critics in general liked it, but the audience rating at Rotten Tomatoes is a lousy 16%. You can see the film here.

(9) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS.

[Compiled by Cat Eldridge.]

  • Born February 24, 1909 August Derleth. He’s best known as the first book publisher of H. P. Lovecraft, and for his own fictional contributions to the Cthulhu Mythos (a term that S. T. Joshi does not like). Let not to overlook him being the founder of Arkham House which alas is now defunct. I’m rather fond of his detective fiction with Solar Pons of Praed Street being a rather inspired riff off the Great Detective. (Died 1971.)
  • Born February 24, 1933 Verlyn Flieger, 87. Well-known Tolkien specialist. Her best-known books are Splintered Light: Logos and Language in Tolkien’s WorldA Question of Time: J. R. R. Tolkien’s Road to Faerie, which won a Mythopoeic Award, Tolkien’s Legendarium: Essays on The History of Middle-earth (her second Mythopoeic Award) and Green Suns and Faërie: Essays on J.R.R. Tolkien (her third Mythopoeic Award). She has written a YA fantasy, Pig Tale, and some short stories.
  • Born February 24, 1945 Barry Bostwick, 75. Best remembered for being Brad Majors in The Rocky Horror Picture Show. His first genre undertaking was the English language narration of Fantastic Planet. He voices the Mayor in The Incredibles 2
  • Born February 24, 1947 Edward James Olmos, 73. Reasonably sure the first thing I saw him in was as Detective Gaff in Blade Runner, but I see he was Eddie Holt in Wolfen a year earlier which was his genre debut. Though I didn’t realize it as I skipped watching the entire film, he was in The Green Hornet as Michael Axford. (I did try watching it, I gave up after maybe fifteen minutes. Shudder.) He has a cameo as Gaff in the new Blade Runner film. And he’s William Adama on the rebooted  Battlestar Galactica. He made appearances on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Eureka
  • Born February 24, 1951 Helen Shaver, 69. Her SFF debut was as Betsy Duncan in Starship Invasions aka Project Genocide in the U.K. though you’ve likely not heard of her there, you might have seen her as Carolyn in The Amityville Horror.  She’s Littlefoot’s mother in The Land Before Time, and Kate ‘White’ Reilly in the second Tremors film. She’s got one-offs in The Outer Limits, Amazing Stories, Ray Bradbury Theater and Outer Limits to name but a few. And she was Dr. Rachel Corrigan in Poltergeist: The Legacy, a super series indeed.
  • Born February 24, 1966 Billy Zane, 54. His genre roles include Match in Back to the Future and Back to the Future Part II, Hughie Warriner in Dead Calm, John Justice Wheeler in Twin Peaks, The Collector in Tales from the Crypt presents Demon Knight and the title role in The Phantom.
  • Born February 24, 1966 Ben Miller, 54. He first shows up in our corner of things on The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones in the “Daredevils of the Desert” episode as an unnamed French Officer. His main genre role was on Primeval, a series I highly recommend as a lot of fun, as James Lester.  He later shows up as the Sheriff of Nottingham in a Twelfth Doctor episode entitled “Robot of Sherwood”. 
  • Born February 24, 1968 Martin Day, 52. I don’t usually deal with writers of licensed works but he’s a good reminder that shows such as Doctor Who spawn vast secondary fiction universes. He’s been writing such novels first for Virgin Books and now for BBC Books for over twenty years. The Hollow Men, a Seven Doctor novel he co-wrote wrote with Keith Topping, is quite excellent. In addition, he’s doing Doctor Who audiobooks for Big Finish Productions and other companies as well. He’s also written several unofficial books to television series such as the X Files, the Next Generation and the Avengers

(10) COMICS SECTION.

  • Today’s Bizarro is a look-twice.
  • The Argyle Sweater has a silly twist on a common parents-with-a-teenager line.
  • And the brilliant Tom Gauld again –

(11) MARTIAN HOPS. “Hunting for ‘marsquakes,’ NASA lander finds a surprisingly active red planet” reports the LA Times.

…The lander, which touched down on the red planet 15 months ago, has detected plenty of seismic activity, an unexpectedly strong local magnetic field and around 10,000 whirlwinds passing over the Martian surface.

The findings, published Monday in a suite of six papers in the journals Nature Geoscience and Nature Communications, will help scientists unlock the secrets of Mars’ interior and understand why it looks so different from Earth.

“What these results really are showing us is that Mars is an active planet today,” said Bruce Banerdt, the mission’s principal investigator, based at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada-Flintridge, and a co-author of the new studies.

InSight is situated in a roughly 27-yard-wide impact crater in western Elysium Planitia, a volcanic plain whose surface material ranges in age from 3.7 billion to just 2.5 million years old. About 1,000 miles away lies Cerberus Fossae, a volcanic region full of faults, evidence of old lava flows and signs that liquid water once ran on the surface.

(12) HITCH YOUR WAGON TO A STAR. In the Washington Post, Homer Hickam argues that it’s time for a “moon rush” and “once electricians, plumbers, miners, and construction workers start going to the moon, and the middle class starts using products made with materials from Luna, the United States will turn into a true spacefaring nation.” “Let the moon rush begin”.

As these efforts get going, however, it’s important to avoid the thinking of a half-century ago and look at the moon in a different way. This is, after all, not your grandfather’s moon. After the Apollo moon-landing program of the 1960s and ’70s, a series of robotic missions discovered that Luna was a lot more interesting than many had previously thought. It has abundant water and oxygen, as well as helium, platinum, thorium, rare earth metals and other minerals that may well be worth digging up and transporting back for use in thousands of products. Last year, a gigantic blob of metal, as yet unidentified but significantly larger than the Big Island of Hawaii, was discovered beneath the lunar south pole. Whatever it is, it has value. The quiet far side of the moon could also provide a location for interstellar observatories, and tourists who would pay a lot to have a lunar vacation are inevitable. In other words, a real business case can be made for the moon, a case that could not only put dollars back into the pockets of taxpayers but also open up jobs for skilled workers on the lunar surface.

(13) FEEL THE HEAT. Own the “Darth Vader Helmet BBQ Grill” for a mere $724.97! Yahoo! Lifestyle adds:

In addition to the Darth Vader version, Burned by Design LTD makes a R2D2 fire pit, a Storm Trooper fire pit, a Death Star fire pit, and a Boba Fett fire pit. So find your favorite character and enjoy one of those long, outdoor summer nights.

(14) FEEL THE BEAT. “Earth Harp: The man behind the unique instruments ‘epic’ sound” – BBC video.

William Close is the inventor behind the Earth Harp – the world’s longest string instrument which uses architecture and landscapes to create a unique sound.

Mr Close, who has performed the giant harp all over the world, says the audiences are often left feeling like they are “inside the instrument” during his performances.

(15) SET AN EXAMPLE. “Marvel’s Black Panther film costumes to star in new Ipswich exhibition”.

Costumes from Marvel’s Black Panther film will feature in an exhibition designed to help “young black people shape their sense of identity”.

Three costumes from the big-screen hit will be on show at Unmasked: The Power of Stories in Ipswich.

Organisers were inspired by the film’s message about the capacity of storytelling to unite or divide people.

Contributor Phanuel Mutumburi said the exhibition would provide opportunities for people to join in.

Ipswich’s communities were “at the heart” of the exhibition, which would highlight important issues for different communities within the Suffolk town, said organisers.

(16) MAKING DEW. BBC traces “The ethereal art of fog-catching”.

In chronically dry regions around the world, communities are finding ways to live from the water suspended in the air – creating valuable drinking water from mist.

When Abel Cruz was just a boy, near the Peruvian region of Cusco, he had to walk for more than an hour every day to collect water from the nearest source and take it back home. Then he realised that, during the rainy season, drops accumulated in the banana leaves.

“When we saw that, my father and I built natural canals with the leaves to collect the water,” he says. “The first drops were a bit dirty and dusty, yet it was useful to wash dishes.”

The leaves, however, only lasted for around two weeks. “So we cut bamboo in half and we replaced the canal pipes with them, which lasted a lot longer,” explains Cruz. “That is how I got involved with collecting water.”

Today Cruz is collecting water in a very different way – he catches fog.

With large sheets of mesh strung up on hillsides, it is possible to harvest the thick mists that drift across the arid Peruvian landscape. Tiny droplets condense on the netting and dribble down into pipes that carry the water into containers where it can be used to irrigate crops or even as drinking water.

Each net can capture between 200-400 litres of fresh water every day, providing a new source of water for communities that have had no easy access to regular supplies. Cruz has helped to install more than 2,000 of these fog catching nets in eight rural communities across Peru as well as in Bolivia, Colombia and Mexico. The impact has been dramatic.

(17) VIDEO OF THE DAY. Mitigation of Shock from Superflux on Vimeo is about an installation by Superflux displaying the gloomy world of 2050 after climate change and economic collapse.

[Thanks to JJ, John King Tarpinian, Martin Morse Wooster, Tammy Coxen, Chip Hitchcock, Cat Eldridge, Mike Kennedy, and Andrew Porter for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Camestros Felapton.]

Glasgow 2024 Weekend Meeting

[The Glasgow 2024 team had their initial team meetings and social gatherings in Glasgow this past weekend, and James Bacon has sent us a thorough write-up.]

By James Bacon: It was lovely to be back in Glasgow, amongst fans, looking at the Scottish Exhibition Campus (formerly the SECC) and being welcomed and to the city which held two Worldcons previously. 

It is such a wonderful city and I was impressed to find that there are now tours of Glasgow Central Station going underground, overground and so forth in proper hard hats (glasgowcentraltours.co.uk). I paused to look around the Central Hotel which has changed so much since the Moscow 2017 bid with their incredible amount of vodkas tempting fans to support their efforts in 1995. The view from the bar in the hotel which has hosted Eastercons, Albacon of course, and those parties in 1995 looking out over the busy station is lovely. 

I made my way to the new Forbidden Planet, in its new premises on Sauchiehall St, it is very large, and I was stunned by how many new comics they stocked. It was a vast amount. The shop is spread over two floors, and I was pleasantly engaged by some staff, which was helpful. Also on my list to get to were Thistle Books, Caledonia Books, the Voltaire & Rousseau Bookshop  and City Comics. All four not far north from the area of the SEC. 

The walk from the city to the SEC has changed, The Anderston ‘bridge to nowhere’  Footbridge which I spent a lot of time contemplating in 1995, in its unexpected glory leading to the sky, and of course the Iain Banks Espedair Street reference. The area around the SEC has developed mightily also, The Radison Red hotel, now one of six hotels in the immediate area (and two more are being built.) has a fabulous interior. All of the 174 rooms and public spaces have wallpaper designed by legendary Glasgow comic artist Frank Quitely, depicting scenes in a beautiful style. 

Esther MacCallum-Stewart had announced at Novacon in 2015 that a team were investigating Worldcon venues in the UK, concurrently with the practical visits and analysis, presentations at Eastercon Smofcons and Novacons, fans were asked — Where would they like to go? — and Glasgow was overwhelmingly the most popular choice of city. The selection process came to fruition in 2019 when it was announced at Eastercon that the SEC was the venue that the team would look to bid for the 2024 Worldcon. At Dublin 2019 Lewis Hou and the Science Ceilidh (https://www.scienceceilidh.com/)  had stolen the show, and it was a bold move to bring over the band from Scotland, which along with their parties and continual table work, saw over 600 people pre-supporting the Glasgow 2024 bid. 

It was nice to walk into the SEC, to contemplate the venue. Mike, it’s a fecking lifetime ago since I was an Area Head here in Glasgow, at a Worldcon, but it is a great venue and it feels so nice to be here. The SEC welcomed the bid and hosted these meetings. Signage throughout the venue was adorned with the 2024 Logo and Space Field, both by Sara Felix. 

We were joined by Jennifer Roddie of the SEC and Aileen Crawford of the Glasgow Convention Bureau. Aileen has worked with us on the previous Worldcons at Glasgow and as there have been several changes to the venue since it was last used it was a good opportunity for everyone to see it for the first time  or with fresh eyes.

The tour was lovely but there have been many changes, technology is now much more prevalent, the area on the mezzanine has been developed into a meeting academy, with what was a restaurant now a very nice 400-seater room and soft furnishings in the common area. Space is of course a fair question. Worldcons are popular. London, Helsinki, and Dublin have demonstrated that there is more interest from fans.

It is too early to make assumptions of what exactly space will be used for, but what is interesting is that Mark Meenan had already spent considerable time on the matter, thinking about new programme space, and shared the concept of having a 1,500-seater Second Stage in Hall 2, a 400-seater programme space in Hall 1 and the addition of M1 with its 400 seats and taking ideas that worked well, such as the giant Gaming Marquee that held the successful gaming at Loncon 3. With eight hotels now in the immediate vicinity, there are also so many more options on smaller workshop type spaces, and of course the Armadillo, which has had a refresh since I was last in it, will be used the full five days. I admit I found all this very exciting… and we even found a throne for Esther.

The vision for the convention was then worked through, teams using word association and short tasks to come up with ideas and thoughts, which were presented back. Marguerite Smith did a very good job of getting everyone thinking and contemplating what they want and hope for and with a quick and energised approach we were soon vectoring in on tangible elements and tasks. Timeline, budget, and recruitment were all important items on the agenda for the weekend, and Marguerite took the lead and managed the 20+ people present. 

Meg MacDonald and Matt Calvert were announced as the leads for the Bid Promotions team, beautifully choreographed just in time to question the task-based ideas that came from the Promotions Brainstorming sessions, again managed by Marguerite, but here the new leads got to engage directly and explore new ideas and established strategies. 

Welcoming new fans was something that was recognised as being very important, and it was not lost on me that in 2013, some seven years ago, Esther walked in to a Loncon 3 staff meeting a new volunteer herself, and was in charge of multiple areas by the time the convention occurred, went on to be a successful Division Head for Dublin and is now Bid Chair. Although Esther did go to Conspiracy in 1987, possibly by accident. Marguerite was part of the Valley Forge NASFiC bid, and in early 2016 joined the Dublin team as a volunteer, was soon promoted to Deputy Division head and then onto DH for promotions. Other fans in the room, who had only volunteered for Dublin were now looking at more senior roles. It was amazing to think that one of the participants in the room, had been a youngster at YAFA* in 2005 and was now making a very important contribution. The doors are open, and fans are coming in. There were also Albacon, Eastercon, Satellite, Worldcon staff and chairs all adding experience as well as those bringing skills from outside fandom to the conversations. 

It was good fun there was a dynamism and energy to the weekend that was really nice. Esther has sought out and found fans who are so excited with the prospect of a Glasgow Worldcon and keen to help and it was good to be brought together to chat and catch up. 

Both evenings, drinking and chatting took place. The bar was rammed on Saturday, and Bowmore 12 year old proved very popular.  A cracking good weekend. I’ll be back up for a comic book swap meet event in March and then Satellite 7 in May. (https://seven.satellitex.org.uk/)

*Young Adult Fun Activities at Interaction the 2005 Glasgow Worldcon.

Glasgow in 2024 Bid Sets Dates

The Glasgow in 2024 Worldcon Bid will officially launch at Dublin 2019. They previously announced the Glasgow Scottish Event Campus (SEC) as their proposed venue, and today they confirmed plans to host the event from August 8-12, 2024 (Thursday to Monday). The committee explains:

These dates have been chosen to accommodate school holiday dates across the UK, and we look forward to welcoming fans of all ages to this celebration of science fiction and fantasy. 

We are excited by the thought that up to 5,000 science fiction fans and professionals will be assembling in Glasgow exactly five years from today. This will be the third time the Worldcon has come to the city, following previous events in 1995 and 2005, and the first time it has been held in the UK since 2014. 

The theme of our Bid – and of our Convention, should we be successful, is “A Worldcon for Our Futures”.  According to Bid Chair Esther MacCallum-Stewart, “science fiction has always provided insight into current events, by telling stories about where those events may take us. This is more important than ever at a time when the world is facing so much change and uncertainty – not only in science and technology but in economics, politics, culture and all aspects of society. Our aim is to bring people together – from writers and artists to scientists and activists – to debate these issues with energy and optimism.”

Dublin 2019 attendees are invited to join the Glasgow bidders for a Scottish ceilidh on the evening of Friday, August 16, and for their official launch party on the evening of Saturday, August 17.

Music for the ceilidh will be provided by the Science Ceilidh Band.  Science Ceilidh have played their high energy take on traditional Scottish music around Europe, incorporating elements from continental balfolk, quebecois and nordic traditions with a cheeky dash of techno and geek culture for good measure. 

The official bid website at https://www.glasgow2024.org is live and they will be updating it regularly with news from their campaign and ideas for the convention.

Art for the bid, including our logo, promotional materials, and website, has been provided by Hugo Finalist Sara Felix and UK fan artist Iain Clark. Iain’s art blends science fiction and fantasy themes with mythology, local architecture and history.

[Based on a press release.]

Hugo Voting: Let’s Look at the Record Yet Again

By Jo Van Ekeren:

I’ve spent the last couple of years exhuming statistics and ephemera about the Hugo Awards from various sources, including old Usenet posts on Google Groups, old fanzines, archived con websites, and various historical documents which have been scanned and made available online (and I give my thanks to those of you who have been making those archiving efforts, especially Joe Siclari, Edie Stern, Mark Olson, and Bill Burns).

I’ve managed to resurrect full or partial statistics for around 23 additional years beyond what was posted at TheHugoAwards.org. A few years have already been posted there, and I will be gradually rolling out the rest of them over the next few months as I get them formatted into readable documents.

This post is an expanded and updated version of earlier statistical analyses by George Flynn:
Hugo Voting: Let’s Look at the Record by George Flynn [1988]
Hugo Voting: Let’s Look at the Record (Again) by George Flynn [1999]

and of an update by Jed Hartman which pulled in some additional years and electronic vs. paper voting numbers:
Hugo stats: numbers of nominating ballots by Jed Hartman [2018]

I’ve updated it with Site Selection ballot numbers, Advance Membership numbers, and Hugo participation percentages for 2000-2019, plus Retro Hugo data, as well as showing the difference between the number of categories which were on the nominating ballot versus the number of categories which had sufficient participation to be on the final voting ballot.

I’ve got source citations for all of the numbers included here. A lot of the information came from documents on The Hugo Awards, Fancyclopedia 3, FANAC, eFanzines, the SMOFS Long List, old Usenet posts on Google Groups, and the Wayback Machine. If you have questions about where one of the numbers came from, you can message me here.

You are welcome to link to the full Google document — and certainly can make a backup of it if you wish — but please be aware that I expect it to continue to change as more bits of information become available.

Please do report to me any errors or omissions you might notice, either in the comments on this post, or by submitting a message here.

What does the most recent data about Hugo nominators and voters tell us?

  1. Tracking of the electronic vs. paper nominations and votes, at the turn of the century, was helpful in evaluating the amount of electronic uptake by Hugo voters. That hit 99% in 2011, and has remained there ever since. Now this comparison tracking is chiefly of interest in noting how many remaining members are either unable or unwilling to nominate and vote electronically.
  2. From 1989 through 2007, participation in the final ballot was consistently under 20% of the Advance membership (those eligible to participate in voting). In 2008, both overall membership numbers and Hugo participation began to rise steadily. It is likely that common acceptance and the ease of the ability to nominate and vote electronically contributed significantly to this. In addition, 2008 was the first year of the annual Hugo Voter Packet – containing finalist works which were not otherwise available for free – and this has also likely contributed to the rise of member numbers and of Hugo participation among members.
  3. The ratio of Supporting to Attending members has also steadily risen in the last 10 years, and while some of this can be attributed to the Puppy campaigns of 2015-2016 as well as to fans from the U.S. being unable to attend overseas Worldcons in London and Helsinki, it seems clear that access to a large number of free works in the Hugo Voter Packet is also a contributing factor. Percentage of eligible advance member participation in the Hugo Awards is now at an all-time high, at 40% to 50% of the eligible membership.
  4. Site Selection, which has remained a mail-in or on-site endeavour, has seen somewhat of a decline in participation in the last 10 years. This is likely due to having only one bid site in many of those years, but possibly also somewhat due to people who previously voted for both Hugos and Site Selection by mail in the past now only voting for the Hugos online. This is not likely to change unless and until it becomes common for bidcoms to be willing to have electronic voting for Site Selection.

Hugo Voting: Let's Look At The Record Again (1971-1999), by George Flynn



Over
seas



Year



Worldcon             



Location
[1]
# of
Cate
gories

Valid
Nominating
Ballots

Valid
Final
Ballots
[1]
# of
Cate
gories

Site-
Selection
Ballots

Advance
Member
Count
Final
Hugo
Vote
Ratio
197129 - Noreascon IBoston934373291,60045.8%
197230 - L.A.Con ILos Angeles927055092561,50036.7%
197331 - Torcon IIToronto, Canada11350708113752,20032.2%
197432 - Discon IIWashington DC12?930126452,60035.8%
O197533 - Aussiecon OneMelbourne, Australia12267600125281,88031.9%
197634 - MidAmeriConKansas City124861,595129933,60044.3%
197735 - SunConMiami Beach12500800128842,80028.6%
197836 - IguanaCon IIPhoenix135401,246131,1544,20029.7%
O197937 - Seacon '79Brighton, UK134671,160139204,12628.1%
198038 - Noreascon TwoBoston135631,788131,5495,44732.8%
198139 - Denvention TwoDenver124541,247121,6804,52927.5%
198240 - Chicon IVChicago126481,071121,1195,00021.4%
198341 - ConStellationBaltimore126601,322127295,50024.0%
198442 - L.A.con IILos Angeles135131,467131,3686,74021.8%
O198543 - Aussiecon TwoMelbourne, Australia13222443135272,19920.1%
198644 - ConFederationAtlanta135681,267131,863 (’88)
1,276 (’89)
5,400
[6]
23.5%
O198745 - Conspiracy '87Brighton, UK13567990131,3734,95320.0%
198846 - Nolacon IINew Orleans144181,178141,4554,72125.0%
198947 - Noreascon 3Boston13539980131,6366,10016.1%
O199048 - ConFictionThe Hague, Netherlands14291486141,0883,41814.2%
199149 - Chicon VChicago133521,048132,0865,12620.4%
199250 - MagiConOrlando14498902142,5095,29717.0%
199351 - ConFranciscoSan Francisco15397841141,2825,83414.4%
199452 - ConAdianWinnipeg, Canada14649491141,4394,38811.2%
O199553 - IntersectionGlasgow, Scotland14477744141,5544,90015.2%
199654 - L.A.con IIILos Angeles14442939141,0646,00015.7%
199755 - LoneStarCon 2San Antonio13429687131,4674,40015.6%
199856 - BucConeerBaltimore13471769132,1685,13115.0%
O199957 - Aussiecon ThreeMelbourne, Australia13425438138202,42518.1%

Hugo Voting: Let's Look At The Record Yet Again (2000-2020),
by Jed Hartman and Jo Van Ekeren
Over
seas
YearWorldcon             Location[1]
# of
Cate
gories
Valid Nominating Ballots
Valid Final Ballots
[1]
# of
Cate
gories
Site-
Selection
Ballots
Advance
Member
Count
Final
Hugo
Vote
Ratio
TotalElec%ElecTotalElec%Elec
2000
[2]
58 - Chicon 2000Chicago1340713031.9%1,07147544.4%131,6985,26220.4%
200159 - Millennium PhilconPhiladelphia1349517836.0%1,05028226.9%132,0945,01320.9%
2002
[3]
60 - ConJoséSan José1462637159.3%92469775.4%141,0344,42220.9%
2003
[4]
61 - Torcon 3Toronto, Canada1473877647861.6%141,4814,20418.5%
200462 - Noreascon 4Boston1456736664.6%1,093141,6865,61319.5%
O200563 - InteractionGlasgow, Scotland1554643679.9%68455280.7%15[7]4,16916.4%
200664 - L.A.con IVLos Angeles1553343481.4%71160084.4%141,5614,12817.2%
O2007
[5]
65 - Nippon2007Yokohama, Japan1540934083.1%589159024,69112.6%
200866 - Denvention 3Denver15483895158264,06222.0%
200967 - AnticipationMontréal, Canada167991,0741,04096.8%167633,81228.2%
O201068 - Aussiecon 4Melbourne, Australia168641,094165262,89837.8%
201169 - RenovationReno161,00699298.6%2,1002,08699.3%167604,68844.8%
201270 - Chicon 7Chicago171,1011,922179325,21836.8%
201371 - LoneStarCon 3San Antonio171,343132999.0%1,848171,3484,46841.4%
O201472 - Loncon 3London, UK171,923188998.2%3,5873,57199.6%177788,58041.8%
201573 - SasquanSpokane172,122211999.9%5,9505,91499.4%172,62510,32157.6%
201674 - MidAmeriCon IIKansas City174,032401599.6%3,130171,3216,17450.7%
O201775 - Worldcon 75Helsinki, Finland182,464245899.8%3,3193,31599.9%181,2277,67243.3%
201876 - Worldcon 76San José191,813179599.0%2,8282,81099.4%197266,39344.2%
O201977 - Dublin 2019Dublin, Ireland201,800179799.8%3,0973,08999.7%208806,000?51.6%
O202078 - CoNZealandWellington, New Zealand191,584158299.9%2,221221699.85195874,48649.5%

Hugo Voting: Let's Look At The Record for the Retro Hugos

Year
Held
Retro
Year
Worldcon             Location[1]
# of
Cate
gories
Valid Nominating Ballots
Valid Final Ballots
[1]
# of
Cate
gories
TotalElec%ElecTotalElec%Elec
1996194654 - L.A.con IIILos Angeles13111---605---10
2001195159 - Millennium PhilconPhiladelphia121304836.9%86215718.2%10
2004195462 - Noreascon 4Boston131319673.3%84110
2014193972 - Loncon 3London, UK1623322697.0%1,3071,29599.1%10
2016194174 - MidAmeriCon IIKansas City1648147598.8%86911
2018194376 - Worldcon 76San José1720419294.1%70368897.9%9
2019194477 - Dublin 2019Dublin, Ireland1821721498.6%83482699.0%11
2020194578 - CoNZealandWellington, New Zealand1812011797.5%52151699.0%12

No.Footnote Explanation
[1]Number of categories includes the Hugo Awards, the Astounding Award, the Lodestar/YA Award, and any other special categories or awards announced that year. Discrepancies between total nominating categories and total voting categories are the result of categories with insufficient nominations being dropped from the final ballot.
[2]Chicon 2000 received 1,101 Hugo ballots, of which 475 were electronic ballots and 626 were paper ballots. 30 ballots were invalid, which left 1,071 valid ballots. It is unclear how many of the 30 invalid ballots were paper vs. electronic.
[3]ConJosé received 940 Hugo ballots. There were 697 were electronic ballots, 226 paper ballots, and 17 fax ballots. 16 ballots were invalid, which left 924 valid ballots. It is unclear how many of the 16 invalid ballots were paper vs. electronic vs. fax.
[4]Torcon 3 received 805 Hugo ballots, of which 478 were electronic ballots and 327 were paper ballots. 29 ballots were invalid, which left 776 valid ballots. It is unclear how many of the 29 invalid ballots were paper vs. electronic.
[5]The number of final Hugo ballots for Nippon 2007 is unknown. The quoted figure is the number of Novel ballots / 80%, which is the average percentage of final ballots cast for Novel during that stretch of years.
[6]Site Selection went from 2 years to 3 years in advance
[7]Site Selection went from 3 years to 2 years in advance

2024 UK Worldcon Bid Picks Glasgow as Venue

It’s now called “Glasgow 2024 – a bid for the 2024 World Science Fiction Convention.” Today the committee announced that the venue they’ve chosen for the 2024 UK Worldcon bid will be the Scottish Event Campus (SEC), Glasgow.

Previously known as the SECC, the Glasgow SEC has already hosted two Worldcons – Intersection in 1995, and Interaction in 2005. We are delighted that our new bid is once again based around this internationally-renowned venue, which has seen considerable growth in the last few years, including new onsite hotels and reworking and expansion of the spaces inside the convention centre. The SEC has recently announced a further £200 million development plan to support the growth of conventions around the campus.

Our bid team is a dedicated band of fans both international and local, experienced and new. Our working party and support team already contain previous Worldcon Chairs and Bid Chairs, who volunteer alongside newcomers. We draw our experiences from the many events that take place around the UK and beyond, and celebrate the huge enthusiasm to continue hosting Worldcon after the success of Loncon 3 (2014 – the event’s most recent visit to the UK), and ongoing passion for Dublin 2019, an Irish Worldcon (2019).

The bid Chair is Esther MacCallum-Stewart, who invites everyone attending Ytterbium, the British Eastercon, to join them on Sunday evening, April 21, at 7 p.m. to celebrate this announcement and meet the team.

They will start taking pre-supports when the bid launches officially at Dublin 2019 in August.

The bid art is by Sara Felix.

For more information or to get involved in bidding for a UK Worldcon in 2024, contact them at [email protected] or watch for updates on their new website at www.glasgow2024.org.  

Pixel Scroll 2/1/19 You Scroll And Scroll The Daily Pixel, First None ‘ll Come, Then All The Ticks ‘ll

(1) AN EAR FOR OLD SFF. James Davis Nicoll’s young people weigh in on another classic: “Young People Listen to Old SFF: Foundation by Isaac Asimov”.

Isaac Asimov’s Foundation Trilogy1 was in fact three fix-ups of shorter pieces assembled into three volumes. Strongly influenced by Edward Gibbon‘s History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, the series set out to depict the collapse of the Galactic Empire and the attempt by scientists to shorten the ensuing dark age. The series is highly regarded: two sections have won retrospective Hugos and the trilogy as a whole won the Hugo for Best All Time Series in 1966.

The BBC’s radio adaptations are also highly regarded. Surely, combining a respected classic with the BBC’s resources must result in something that will delight and entertain my young readers. Right?

What are my other choices besides “Right”?

(2) SFWA GRANTS. Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America has announced its Giver’s Fund Grants for 2019.

SFWA Giver’s Fund grants totaling $46,837 have been awarded to:

  • Alpha, the SF/F/H Workshop for Young Writers
  • Art & Words Collaborative Show in Fort Worth, Texas
  • Can*Con Science Programming
  • Clarion San Diego Workshop
  • Clarion West Workshop
  • Confluence Writing Workshop
  • Deep Dish Reading Series
  • Denver Science Fiction and Fantasy Reading Series
  • I Need Diverse Games
  • Launch Pad Astronomy Workshop for Writers
  • Little Blue Marble
  • Northern Illinois University, for their archives pertaining to science fiction and fantasy
  • OutWrite Literary Festival
  • Odyssey Writing Workshop
  • Parsec Ink Young Editors Workshop
  • Philanthropic Endeavors Futurist Conference in York PA
  • Reel Stories screenwriting workshops
  • SFF Workshop at the Center for Literary Arts, Frostburg State University
  • Sirens Conference
  • Turkey City Writing Workshops
  • Willamette Writers workshops Flash Fiction Masterclass
  • Wiscon Writing Workshops
  • Young Writers Project workshop

Giver’s Fund grants are awarded to support programs that further SFWA’s mission, which is to promote, advance, and support science fiction and fantasy writing in the United States and elsewhere, by educating and informing the general public and supporting and empowering science fiction and fantasy writers.

(3) GUESS WHO’S NOT RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT OF SFWA. Lou Antonelli says he was going to run for President of SFWA (“Maybe some other day”) but there was one little problem – he isn’t eligible.  He says SFWA Executive Director Kate Baker notified him —

Thank you for being willing to run for office. Unfortunately, your membership lapsed in the last two years which makes you ineligible to run for the board. Additionally, you would need to have previously served on the board in some capacity to engage a run for President.

(4) 2021 WORLDCON BIDDERS NEED TO FILE. Johan Anglemark reminded bids to host the 2021 Worldcon must be submitted by February 15, 2019, either to [email protected] or to Worldcon 2021 Site Selection, c/o Anglemark, Lingonv. 10, SE-74340 Storvreta, Sweden.

The required information includes:

• bid location
• bid facilities
• bid date
• committee chair(s)
• committee members.

Please also provide the bid website URL and a contact email address.

Refer to the WSFS Constitution – http://www.wsfs.org/…/WSFS-Constitution-as-of-August-21-201… – sections 4.6 – 4.7 for more details. The Dublin 2019 Site Selection team will send a confirmation email to the contact email address in your bid declaration when we receive your bid information.

NOTE: An online announcement, listing on the Worldcon.org bids page or web site is not sufficient to formally file your bid.

(5) AND STRAIGHT ON ‘TIL MORNING. For Tor.com readers, James Davis Nicoll analyzes the difficulty of “Mapping the Stars for Fun and Profit”.

When you read a novel, short story, etc., you may be given hints as to star locations and the distances from star to star. Most of us just take those vague gestures at maps as given and focus on the exciting space battles, palace intrigues, and so on. Only a few nerdy readers (ahem!) try to work out star positions and distances from the text. And only a few authors (like Benford and McCarthy) provide maps in their novels. There are reasons why maps are generally left out, and who notices an absence?

Roleplaying games (RPGs), on the other hand, have to give the players maps (unless all the action takes place in one stellar system). If you are plotting a course to Procyon A, you need to know just where it is and how long it will take to get there. Game companies have experimented with several approaches to the mapping problem; most are unsatisfactory.

(6) TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS.

[Compiled by Cat Eldridge.]

  • Born February 1, 1908 George Pal. Let’s see… Producer of Destination Moon, When Worlds CollideThe War of the WorldsConquest of Space (anyone heard of this one?), The Time MachineAtlantis, the Lost ContinentTom ThumbThe Time MachineAtlantis, the Lost ContinentThe Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm7 Faces of Dr. Lao and his last film being Doc Savage: The Man of Bronze. Can we hold a George Pal film fest, pretty please? (Died 1980.)
  • Born February 1, 1942 Terry Jones, 77. Co-directed Monty Python and the Holy Grail with Gilliam, and was sole director on two further Python movies, Life of Brian and Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life. His later films include Erik the Viking and The Wind in the Willows. It’s worth noting that he wrote the screenplay for the original Labyrinth screenplay but it’s thought that nothing of that made it to the shooting script.
  • Born February 1, 1946 Elizabeth Sladen. Certainly best known for her role as Sarah Jane Smith on Doctor Who. She was a regular cast member from 1973 to 1976, alongside the Third Doctor (Jon Pertwee) and Fourth Doctor (Tom Baker), and reprised her role down the years, both on the series and on its spin-offs, K-9 and Company (awfully done) and The Sarah Jane Adventures (not bad at all). It’s not her actual first SF appearance, that honor goes to her being a character called   Sarah Collins in an episode of the Doomwatch series called “Say Knife, Fat Man”. The creators behind this series had created the cybermen concept for Doctor Who. (Died 2011.)
  • Born February 1, 1954 Bill Mumy, 65. Well I’ll be damned. He’s had a much longer career in the genre than even I knew. His first genre were at age seven on Twilight Zone, two episodes in the same season (Billy Bayles In “Long Distance Call” and Anthony Fremont in “Its A Good Life”). He makes make it a trifecta appearing a few years later again as Young Pip Phillips in “In Praise of Pip”. Witches are next for him. First he plays an orphaned boy in an episode of Bewitched called “A Vision of Sugar Plums” and then it’s Custer In “Whatever Became of Baby Custer?” on I Dream of Jeannie, a show he shows he revisits a few years as Darrin the Boy  in “Junior Executive”. Ahhh his most famous role is up next as Will Robinson in Lost in Space. It’s got to be thirty years since I’ve seen it but I still remember and like it quite a bit. He manages to show up next on The Munsters as Googie Miller in “Come Back Little Googie” and in Twilight Zone: The Movie In one of the bits as Tim. I saw the film but don’t remember him. He’s got a bunch of DC Comics roles as well — Young General Fleming in Captain America, Roger Braintree on The Flash series and Tommy Puck on Superboy. Ahhh Lennier. One of the most fascinating and annoying characters in all of the Babylon 5 Universe. Enough said. I hadn’t realized it but he showed up on Deep Space Nine as Kellin in the “The Siege of AR-558” episode. Lastly, and before our gracious Host starts grinding his teeth at the length of this Birthday entry, I see he’s got a cameo as Dr. Z. Smith in the new Lost in Space series. 
  • Born February 1, 1965  — Brandon Lee. Lee started his career with a supporting role in  Kung Fu: The Movie, but is obviously known for his breakthrough and fatal acting role as Eric Draven in The Crow, based on James O’Barr’s series. (Died 1993.)
  • Born February 1, 1965Sherilyn Fenn, 54. Best know for playing as Audrey Horne on Twin Peaks. Her first genre work was in The Wraith as Keri Johnson followed by being Suzi in Zombie High (also known charmingly not as The School That Ate My Brain).  Her latest work is Wish Upon, a supernatural horror film. 
  • Born February 1, 1984 Lee Thompson Young. Victor Stone/ Cyborg on Smallville, Agent Stewart in the “Heavy Metal” episode of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, Al Gough on FlashForward and Corporal Bell on The Event. (Died 2013.)

(7) THE MARTIAN PARTICLES. NPR is “Exploring The Mysterious Origins Of Mars’ 3-Mile-High Sand Pile”.

Scientists have evidence that a mountain 3 miles tall, in the middle of a crater on Mars, may be made largely from dust and sand.

To get the data for that surprising conclusion, the researchers MacGyvered a navigation instrument on the NASA rover Curiosity, and turned it into a scientific instrument.

The idea for repurposing the Rover Inertial Measurement Unit came from Kevin Lewis.

“It kind of frustrated me that we didn’t have a surface gravimeter on Mars,” says Lewis, a member of the Curiosity science team, and an assistant professor in earth and planetary sciences at Johns Hopkins University.

(8) WONDERFUL THINGS. “Tutankhamun’s tomb restored to prevent damage by visitors” – BBC has the story.

A nine-year project has been completed to restore the tomb of ancient Egypt’s boy king, Tutankhamun, and address issues that threatened its survival.

Experts from the Getty Conservation Institute repaired scratches and abrasions on the wall paintings caused by visitors to the burial chamber.

The paintings were also affected by humidity, dust and carbon dioxide introduced by every person who entered.

A new ventilation system should reduce the need for future cleaning.

New barriers will restrict physical access to the paintings, while a new viewing platform, lighting and interpretive signage will also allow visitors to better see the tomb and understand its historical and cultural significance.

(9) STARS LIKE… Is that a hidden galaxy in your pocket, or a grain of sand, or are you just happy to see me? Gizmodo tells how “Astronomers Accidentally Discover a Hidden Galaxy Right Next Door”.

One moment you’re investigating a globular cluster, and the next you’re unexpectedly writing a research paper about something else entirely, namely the discovery of previously unknown dwarf spheroidal galaxy. But that’s how it goes sometimes, and the authors of the new study, published this week in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, couldn’t be happier.

(10) SIPS OF FIRE. Charles Payseur reviews the short fiction in the latest Fireside — “Quick Sips – Fireside Magazine #63”.

There’s some big goings-on at Fireside Magazine in 2018, and January kicks off with five original stories plus an original poem. The pieces can be rather short (the poem might be longer than a number of the stories), but that doesn’t mean they pack less of a punch. The pieces range from deeply dark to lighter and so so cute, from epic and unexpected to unsettling and tense. The relationships that the pieces introduce, though, are complex and interesting and enlightening. From a father desperate to give his son a better life to a spouse unsure how to talk about what’s happening to them without draining those they care about. The piece looks at impossible situations, or situations that seem impossible, and shows how people move forward regardless. To the reviews!

(11) YA PERSPECTIVES. Vulture writer Kat Rosenfeld has organized the social media links, identified the players, and provided some analysis about the controversy around Amélie Wen Zhao: “The Latest YA Twitter Pile On Forces a Rising Star to Self-Cancel”.

Whether Zhao was guilty of any of the above is still up for debate, particularly in the absence of a finished book. (Blood Heir was not slated to publish until June; some reviewers had advance copies.) But unless we want to eliminate the Death Song trope from fiction or ding Tolkien’s own use of paraphrased Bible passages, the plagiarism allegations are shaky at best — and the charge of racism, led by a series of caustic tweets from YA fantasy author L.L. McKinney, relies on both a subjective interpretation of the word “bronze” and an exclusively American reading of scenes involving slavery. Nevertheless, the latter allegations caught the attention of social-justice-minded readers, and the controversy began to balloon. A smattering of one-star reviews cropped up on Zhao’s Goodreads page. Book bloggers began announcing that they no longer intended to read Blood Heir. In a tweet thread that did not name or tag Zhao but was clearly about her, well-known author Ellen Oh wrote, “Dear POC writers, You are not immune to charges of racism just because you are POC.”

It’s worth noting here that the role of Asian women within YA’s writers of color contingent has been a flashpoint for conflict before — one that led Zhao to butt heads with YA queen bee Justina Ireland in May 2018. After Ireland wrote a (since deleted) tweet that some readers interpreted as exclusionary gatekeeping of the “POC” label, Zhao launched a long thread asserting that Asian women are, indeed, women of color, including some pointed language about those who would suggest otherwise.

“You can delete your tweets, and we’re not going to come into your mentions, but ask yourselves why you wrote those/agreed with those in the first place, and why there is such an outcry. While we’re on the valid issue of anti-POC within POC groups, examine your own beliefs, too.” (She did not tag Ireland, but needless to say, everyone knew whom she was talking about.)

(12) SOUND FX. An old behind-the-scenes clip has surfaced of the foley work behind the sound of the malfunctioning for the Millennium Falcon (“Vintage Star Wars Video Explains the Sounds Behind the Millennium Falcon”).

The Star Wars franchise is full of some of the most recognizable sound effects to ever grace the big screen. Now, thanks to an unearthed video from 1980, the sounds that make up the Millennium Falcon failing to make it to hyperspace have been revealed. As is the case with nearly all other sound effects, the iconic ship’s sounds are made up of from more than one source and then mixed together to create something brand-new and unique. Hardcore Star Wars fans can probably already hear the iconic sound in their heads and don’t even need to pop in The Empire Strikes Back for reference.

A New Hope sound engineer Ben Burtt demystifies the Millennium Falcon failed hyperspace sound in a quick two-minute video. To make the noise, Burtt relied on five different sounds to achieve what he was hearing in his head. The inertia starter of an old 1928 biplane, an air jet recorded in a dentist’s office, the sound of an Arclight motor starting and stopping, the sound of a motor located in the turret of an armored tank, and the pipes underneath a broken sink in the bathroom at the recording studio were all used to make the sound in The Empire Strikes Back.

[Thanks to John King Tarpinian, Daniel Dern, Cat Eldridge, Mike Kennedy, JJ, Chip Hitchock, Martin Morse Wooster, Carl Slaughter, and Andrew Porter for some of these stories. Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editor of the day Kip WIllams.]

Taking Inventory of Future Worldcon Bids

Next year fans will choose the site of the 2021 con, for which Washington, DC is currently running unopposed. Beyond that?

This list matches the list of bids on the Worldcon.org page.

2021

DC in 2021

Proposed Site: Washington, DC
Proposed Dates: August 25-29, 2021
Bid Chairs: Bill Lawhorn and Colette H. Fozard
Website: DC in 2021
Facebook: DC in 2021
Twitter: DC in 2021
Code of Conduct: DC in 2021 Code of Conduct
Worldcon 76 questionnaire: DC in 2021 questionnaire for Worldcon 76

2022

Chicago in 2022

Proposed Site: Chicago, IL
Proposed Dates: Mid-August – Labor Day Weekend, depending on venue availability.
Bid Chairs: Helen Montgomery and Dave McCarty.
Website: Chicago in 2022 Worldcon Bid
Facebook: Chicago Worldcon
Worldcon 76 questionnaire: Chicago in 2022 questionnaire for Worldcon 76

2023

Chengdu in 2023
Proposed Site: Chengdu, China
Twitter: Chengduworldcon

The bid was announced at Worldcon 76. See the File 770 post “China Bids for 2023 Worldcon”

France in 2023

Proposed Site: Nice, in the south of France
Proposed Dates: August 2-6, 2023
Bid Leadership: (From a Smofcon questionnaire)

At the moment, our team is led by a group of seven individuals who have been active in the French fandom for several decades. Some are editors, writers, translators, many with past or current experience running local conventions and festivals.  These seven persons are: Alex S. Garcia, Alain Jardy, Sybille Marchetto, Arnaud Koëbel, Albert Aribaud, Thomas Menanteau and Patrick Moreau.

Website: Nice in 2023
Twitter: Worldcon in France
Facebook: Worldcon in France (English)
Worldcon 76 questionnaire: Nice in 2023 questionnaire for Worldcon 76

New Orleans in 2023

Proposed Site: New Orleans, LA
Proposed Dates: August 23-27, 2023
Facebook: New Orleans Worldcon Bid Year 2023
Worldcon 76 questionnaire: New Orleans in 2023 questionnaire for Worldcon 76

2024

UK in 2024

Proposed Sites: Two cities are being considered — Glasgow, Scotland; London, England.
Proposed Dates: August 2024
Bid Leadership: Esther MacCallum-Stewart and Vanessa May
Website: UK in 2024
Facebook: UK in 2024
Worldcon 76 questionnaire: UK in 2024 questionnaire for Worldcon 76

2025

Seattle in 2025

Proposed Site: Seattle, WA
Proposed Date: Mid-August 2025
Bid chair: Kathy Bond
Worldcon 76 questionnaire: Seattle in 2025 questionnaire for Worldcon 76

Perth in 2025

Twitter: Perth in 2025
Dates: August 2025
Committee: Jack Bridges, Dave Cake, P R Khangure, Sarah Parker (per questionnaire for Worldcon 75)
Worldcon 76 questionnaire: Perth in 2025 questionnaire for Worldcon 76

DISCUSSION POINTS. There is a drumbeat of opinion in favor of denying the U.S. all future Worldcons, energized by each new instance of an sff fan or writer being put through the wringer by TSA, or denied entry upon arrival in US due to visa rules enforcement. Here are several examples of what has appeared in social media. Apart from Adam Roberts, the rest live in the U.S.

Then, in a comment on File 770, Olav Rokne opened a discussion about whether the choice of Worldcon sites should be influenced by a nation’s human rights record —

One might base it on a simple “Does the World Freedom Index list the country as Free?” or “Does it rank highly on Amnesty International’s list“?

Update 09/30/18: Picked up some data from questionnaires submitted to Worldcon 76.

New Zealand Will Host 78th Worldcon in 2020

At the WSFS Business Meeting on Sunday morning (August 19), the results of the 2020 Worldcon Site Selection voting were revealed.

The New Zealand in 2020 bid received 643 votes of the 726 votes cast. There were no other official candidates; however, votes were received for the following:

  • New Zealand in 2020: 643
  • Xmas in Boston 2020: 22
  • Peggy Rae’s House: 3
  • Xerps: 3
  • Minneapolis in ’73: 2
  • Olive Country: 2
  • Aotearoa in 2020: 1
  • Bimin Zana, Wakanda: 1
  • El Fabulosa Bungalow: 1
  • Glug’s Chalet: 1
  • Grantville, WV: 1
  • John Sapienza’s Yard: 1
  • Marsopolis: 1
  • Minneapolis in ’74: 1
  • Slab City: 1
  • Tonopah NV: 1
  • None of the Above: 8

Total With Preference: 693
Needed to Elect (Majority): 347

No Preference: 33
Total Votes Cast: 726

CoNZealand, the 78th World Science Fiction Convention, will take place from Wednesday, July 29 through Sunday, August 2, 2020 in Wellington on the North Island of New Zealand. Details for the convention are contained in their Worldcon bid document.

The con chairs will be Norman Cates and Kelly Buehler.

Author Guests of Honour will be Mercedes Lackey and Larry Dixon. Lackey’s first genre publication was in 1985; she is best known for her numerous fantasy series including the Valdemar novels and the Elemental Masters stories. Dixon has collaborated with Lackey on numerous novels, and is also known for his genre artwork, especially his contributions to Wizards of the Coast’s Dungeons & Dragons source books.

NZ Artist Guest of Honour will be Greg Broadmore, a concept designer, artist, writer and sculptor with Peter Jackson’s Weta Workshop whose work includes genre films District 9, King Kong, and The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe.

Fan Guest of Honour will be Rose Mitchell, longtime fan, conrunner, and current President of the Australian Science Fiction Foundation.

Toastmaster will be George R. R. Martin, known for his Song of Ice and Fire saga which has been made into the HBO series Game of Thrones, and for his epic Hugo Loser Parties.

Supporting memberships for the convention will be $75 NZD (approx. $50 USD), and Attending memberships are currently $370 NZD (approx. $247 USD). Site Selection voters are automatically Supporting Members, and may upgrade to Attending for $300 NZD (approx. $200 USD). Kiwi and Silver Fern level Pre-supporters will receive discounts on memberships as well. There will also be special discounted membership levels for Young Adult (born in or after 2000), Child (born in or after 2005), Kid-in-tow (born in or after 2015), and Unwaged (NZ residents only).

CoNZealand links:

[Thanks to Jo Van Ekeren for the story.]

China Bids for 2023 Worldcon

A bid to host the 2023 Worldcon in Chendgu, China was announced at today’s Fannish Inquisition session at Worldcon 76. Chengdu joins a field which already includes bids for Nice, France, and New Orleans, LA.

A new chengduworldcon account is sharing information on Twitter:

Chengdu is well-known as the site of an annual International SF Conference.

It has also been one of the stops for the touring sf writers and well-known fans who in recent years have been brought to China by various organizations and sponsors.

SFWA President Cat Rambo wrote up her 2016 trip to China: “Beijing/Chengdu Trip, September 2016: Some Notes, Observations, and Images”.

I was originally invited by the heads of the China World Science Fiction society, Renwei Dong, Haijun Yao, and Wu Yan, to attend the Chinese Nebula Awards ceremony in Beijing, through the kind offices of Ruhan Zhao. Later the invitation was extended by the company Xinhuanet for Wayne and I to then spend a week in Chengdu.

Derek Kunsken, one of the guests of honor, told Black Gate readers about “The 4th International Science Fiction Conference, Chengdu, China, November 2017”:

For the first time ever, I was invited to a literary conference to be an Author Guest of Honor. It was the 4th International Science Fiction Conference in Chengdu, Sichuan, China. It was sponsored by SFWorld, a Chinese magazine and book publisher, with media and tech giant Tencent as one of the sponsors. I was one of about a dozen foreign authors and editors in attendance….

Among the international guests were authors Michael Swanwick and Ted Komsatska from the USA, Taiyo Fujii from Japan, Robert J Sawyer and I from Canada, and editors Neil Clarke from the USA, Francesco Verso from Italy, con organizer Crystal Huff from the USA, and a few others.

Huff is a former Worldcon 75 co-chair. Japanese sf writer Taiyo Fuji has been chair of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of Japan since 2015.

In 2018, two winners of The Shimmer Program’s first Two-way Exchange Fund were Pablo M.A Vazquez, chair of the 2017 NASFiC, and Mihaela Marija Perkovi?, Croatian writer and past GUFF winner.

Science fiction has to a degree become a national imperative. The Shimmer Program posted Sanfeng’s “Science Fiction in China: 2016 in Review” when it came out, which says in part:

SF as National Agenda

Historically, the trajectory of Chinese SF was heavily influenced by top-down political forces at times. Recently it begins to receive continuous and influential support from the governments at all levels. On the one hand, following the tradition of focusing on ‘science’ in science fiction, the government re-emphasizes SF as a useful instrument for popularizing science and improving citizen’s scientific literacy. On the other hand, due to the high popularity and penetration rate of SF media, it is conceivable that the so-called ‘SF industry’ is often adopted in governmental agenda for creative and cultural industry development.

In a central government’s paper regarding promoting citizens’ science literacy issued by State Council in February 2016, it is explicitly stipulated that the government shall support science fiction writing as part of popular science writing. More details were revealed in a later talk given by Han Qide, president of China Association for Science and Technology (CAST), announcing that CAST will set up a national award for SF and host international SF festivals. The story reached the climax when Vice Chairman Li Yuanchao attended 2016 National SF Convention held in September 2016 and gave a speech at the opening ceremony warmly encouraging SF writing.

And according to Lavie Tidhar’s 2017 article in New Scientist, “In China, this is science fiction’s golden age”.

In the 1980s, science fiction once again fell foul of the ruling party, as a new “Anti-Spiritual Pollution Campaign” emerged as a backlash to Deng Xiaoping’s modernisation and liberalisation policies. Deng’s opponents in the party railed against Western “bourgeois imports” of all kinds, and with sci-fi seeming to fall firmly in that category, it was all but wiped out for a time.

The genre’s recovery was partly led by the emergence of Science Fiction World magazine in Chengdu, and its energetic editor, Yang Xiao, herself the daughter of a prominent party member. Having such influential backing allowed Science Fiction World to bring together many young writers for an “appropriate” reason.

By the end of the century, Chinese sci-fi entered its own golden age. Although the authorities still raised the issue of literary “appropriateness”, the old restrictions had gone. One prominent contemporary sci-fi author is Han Song, a journalist at the state news agency Xinhua. Many of his works are only published outside the mainland due to their political themes, but Han is still widely recognised at home. His fiction can be dark and melancholy, envisioning, for instance, a spacefarer building tombstones to fellow astronauts, or the Beijing subway system being turned into a graveyard in which future explorers, arriving back on Earth, find themselves trapped on a fast-moving train. Along with Liu Cixin and Wang Jinkang, he is considered one of the “Three Generals” of Chinese sci-fi.

Chengdu also figured in the creation of the new Asia Science Fiction Association, which held its first meeting on July 17, and announced a plan to hold its first Asiacon there in 2019. ASFA’s president is Liu Cixin, whose Three-Body Problem (translated by Ken Liu) won the Best Novel Hugo in 2015.