266 thoughts on “Worldcon Intellectual Property Announces Censure of McCarty, Chen Shi and Yalow; McCarty Resigns; Eastlake Succeeds Standlee as Chair of B.O.D.”

1. Dang…

2. 😲

3. Good for them.

   I wasn’t happy with Yalow before, who refused to answer when I complained I couldn’t get a response from the Hugo “help” team, when I couldn’t get a token to nominate.

   But then, last year in Chicago, when I bitched at him after the business meeting that I went to, about if the WSFS membership was split form Worldcon membership, it needed to have hybrid meetings. Otherwise, people who could not attend lost some of their rights. His response was what, did I want a thousand people zooming into the meetings?

   Yeah, right. 88 of us showed up in person, at a Worlcon with thousands. Like anyone not serious is going to sit through the meeting…. And then there was my friend Bill Roper, who, like me, was really unhappy with the idea of splitting the membership that way… but he couldn’t vote, because he was in the dealers’ room, and couldn’t leave his table.

   Yalow said he should have just shuttered his table for hours… right.

4. 😮

5. Exciting news.
   I am waiting. Chen and his friends must be punished pay for their actions in China.

6. Good.

7. Shocked. Shocked and grateful. Something needed to be done and this is a strong statement.

8. (1) I’m not sure I understand the nuances of this, so here are a couple of questions.

   If I understand right:

   • WIP is the nonprofit corporation, which “owns the WSFS service marks in selected locations and manages them on behalf of WSFS.”

   • The MPC is a committee of WSFS.

   • “WIP’s Board of Directors consists of all members of the MPC.”

   So if Dave McCarty is no longer a WIP Director, then presumably he’s also no longer a member of the MPC; true?

   The update at the end of this post seems to corroborate that, and McCarty is no longer listed here: (https://www.wsfs.org/committees/mark-protection-committee/), so I think I’ve got that right, but I wanted to check to be sure.

   (2) Chen Shi, Kevin Standlee, and Ben Yalow are still on the MPC and thus still on the WIP Board, correct? (Kevin is no longer Chair, but appears to still be an MPC member, according to that page I just linked to and the update at the end of this post.)

   (3) What’s the difference between “censure” and “reprimand” in this context? I did some quick web searches, but didn’t find anything that was clearly definitive for this context, so figured I might as well ask.

9. Jed Hartman: Your first points cover as much as I know, and look right to me.

   I’ll ask Eastlake what they think the distinction is between censure and reprimand.

10. Eastlake answers, “reprimand is generally considered a lesser penalty than censure.”

    So I gather this is a distinction in ordinary English usage. Not a callback to something in a legal rule

11. I’m a little confused. How do these reprimands, censures, and firings for issues with the marks connect with people knowingly signing off on corrupted lists of nominees?
    Will there be a direct response to that issue?

12. Jed Hartman: Kevin Standlee has clarified on his personal blog that he has stepped down as chair of the MPC and WIP, but remains an individual member of the MPC and the WIP board of directors. So your point (2) is correct at least with respect to him.

13. Pingback: The 2023 Hugo nomination statistics have finally been released – and we have questions | Cora Buhlert

14. Jas: The “actions of the Hugo Administration Committee” part covers the nomination WTF-ery.

15. Duly noted

16. Good as far as it goes, but… @Jas gets at the most important issue, and secondarily, it’s not clear to me why the involved folks ought to be trusted with any responsibility or authority whatsoever with WIP and MPC. I like to think there screwed up that badly, any organization I’ve been involved with would show me the door and make sure I stayed thereafter on its outside.

17. Now it’s gone to just lashing out at people and trying to find someone to pin the blame on. There’s little satisfaction in saying “I told you so,” but I did. I repeatedly pointed out that a Worldcon in an authoritarian state can only work out badly. Although I’m obscure outside of filkdom, my blog articles got pretty good search rankings.

    Who’s to blame? Once fans from outside China agreed to work within the system, they were screwed. Their Chinese colleagues were hostages. They had to pretend everything was fine. Can we say the fans who voted for Chengdu were to blame? It was a huge influx of votes from China that made it happen.

    All that was left to do was to let the con happen as a Chinese con and not pretend it was a Worldcon in anything but name. But this isn’t what happened. Good people have let themselves be dragged down. We’re stuck with the long-term loss of good will and trust.

18. @Bruce Baugh
    Exactly. No matter how invidious their position was in Chengdu, the choices they made in response have really muddied the reputation of the Hugos. The sad puppies were one thing, but this time the call is coming from inside the house. I think everyone involved needs to step away for a while at least so the organisation can deal with the damage done.

19. Gary McGath: Now it’s gone to just lashing out at people and trying to find someone to pin the blame on.

    No, these actions were necessary and important, and are a first good step.

    It’s infuriating but not surprising that Ben Yalow didn’t have the grace or the self-awareness to resign. (I have to say that I’m very surprised McCarty did.) I don’t know if the MPC/WIP didn’t have the authority to kick him off, or if they were just still too interested in all trying to be “friends” to take that step. Hopefully the WSFS Business Meeting will give him a good hard boot off the MPC in August.

20. Click

21. I think the experience on his FB page gave McCarty that crumb of self awareness to resign.

    And yes, this is just a beginning. These Augean stables still need the rivers.

22. Okay first I look at the case of Kevin Standlee seperatly. Not involved in the big skandal, did screw up, but I think that this is intern and I personally don’t have any problem with him staying in the MPC.
    Ben Yalow, Dave McCarty and Chen Shi have responsibility and should be punished and out of any responsibility of worldcon. Good for Dave that he had at least that decensy to step down. Ben Yalow and Chen Shi should do this also. It may be difficult or imposible for the MPC to force them to resign, but they where responsible for the ballot and this is not searching for people to blame.
    I think that the buisnessmeating has some question for everyone involved.
    Btw for someone who is a biger expert can the buisnessmeating vote someone out of the MPC before the end of their turn?

23. As for the “alphabetic order”, it is noteworthy that the WIP/MPC (not to mention Filers) remains unaware that Chen is the surname / family name.

    (See for example the westernised, capitalised listing of the Subcommittee at the bottom of https://hugo.chengduworldcon.com/hugo-awards/ but note that the Chinese characters are NOT reversed from the usual form, with the second, simpler one being “Shi”.)

24. mostly c4c

    But I would like to know exactly what “actions” are being referenced:

    Chen Shi – censured for actions of the Hugo Administration Committee of the Chengdu Worldcon that he presided over.
    Ben Yalow – censured for actions of the Hugo Administration Committee of the Chengdu Worldcon that he presided over.

    Regards,
    Dann
    They say marriages are made in Heaven. But so is thunder and lightning. – Clint Eastwood

25. Silly question, perhaps, but will we ever find out the real reasons/circumstances/excuses/obscure rules for why some works were declared “ineligible?”?

26. @Jan Vanek jr.: And as I noted in the November 11th Scroll, he also uses the English name Raistlin Chen.

    And this brings me back to the Smofcon panels that I keep banging on about: in the interview covered in that Scroll, I said:

    Question: when Chen Shi and/or the Chengdu team were doing presentations at other events, was there any indication that “he had already decided to take a different path”, or what that path might be?

    That was posted roughly 3 weeks before Smofcon. Was there no-one at Smofcon there that thought to ask that question? Plenty of people had long observed about how commercial and non-fannish many aspects of the event were (all the “industry” panels), shouldn’t Chen, Yalow, etc have been asked about that? Some of those things may well have been unavoidable in order to hold an event in China, so I’m not saying that they’re completely unacceptable, but how were the trade-offs decided? And for things like the online platform, I think the majority of the panels that were chosen for streaming were corporate/industry in nature; how many of the fans who paid for online memberships are/were interested in that stuff?

27. @Brendan DuBois:
    No.
    If we would have, this blog and Camestros would have writen less words than they have.
    But we have arived at the conclusion that the disqualifications are not the only problem, nearly every category looks wrong.

28. @Brendan or why the reported nomination statistics are complete garbage? Enquiring nerds want to know.

29. I believe the degrees of official disapproval are, in rising order: raised eyebrows, harrumph, icy glare, rebuke, admonishment, warning, reprimand, censure, condemnation, strong condemnation, strong condemnation with a cherry on top, damnation, eternal damnation.

30. That was posted roughly 3 weeks before Smofcon. Was there no-one at Smofcon there that thought to ask that question?

    There is no doubt that Chinese SF fans shouted the possibility repeatedly. If we had noticed the newsletter appeared in Chinese media and File770, we would have discovered the fact that CBD committee members paid no attention to running a successful Worldcon.

    Question: when Chen Shi and/or the Chengdu team were doing presentations at other events, was there any indication that “he had already decided to take a different path”, or what that path might be?

    Yes, you might have found some interesting news. Science Fiction Industry Developed Rapidly in Chengdu: Worldcon Comes to Chengdu showed that Liang Xiaolan stressed the necessity of making full use of Worldcon to develop SF industry by drawing the talents, enhancing technology companies, and promoting science. She did not mention the importance of Worldcon and fans.
    However, it is the fandom that joins and develops a Worldcon. Chen Shi, Liang Xiaolan, Yao Chi and others (no matter what name they use) dismissed this apparent and obvious fact in Chinese science fiction, dismissed fandom and facts consisting of real people in Chinese science fiction. You can see that they escaped from the appealing from Chinese people. Just take myself as an example. I asked for a financial report. I wanted for a member list. I asked for an official Chinese video of the business meeting. I asked for an explanation of the Tianwen Award, International Youth Science Fiction Union, Xingcha Science Fiction Industry United and so on. Where is my answer?
    Riverflow grumbled about his inconvenience during his meeting. Then he was banned. Chengdu government invited a science worker to join the Worldcon as a guest, but the committee refused to allow him to come into the meeting room. Even the administration could not find the explanation. Siha Zhaoyang casts doubts on social media. The question was deleted, and he was complained about by Yao Chi because his doubts violated the fame of the Chengdu Science Fiction Association.
    McCarty shouted and barked. But you cannot find Yao Chi’s speech. He also joined the work of Hugo! Why does he escape now?

    If you want to know more about their contribution to the Worldcon, here is some of my works:
    Walk in to the 1st Goodness Science Fiction City and express the warmth of Pidu (1)
    Walk in to the 1st Goodness Science Fiction City and express the warmth of Pidu (2)
    Walk in to the 1st Goodness Science Fiction City and express the warmth of Pidu (3)

31. Teemu Leisti: I have copied your list of disapproval gestures. Can maybe use it in a book I’m writing….

32. Anyone else sick of politics at this point?

33. YIKES!

34. Teemu Leisti

    I believe the degrees of official disapproval are, in rising order

    No strongly worded letter to The Times?

35. @Zimozi Natsuco:
    This document is about the members of the MPC, so if someone responsible for anything isn’t a member of the MPC they won’t be scolded now.
    In a way the chinese members of the worldcon are lucky because they aren’t as well known in the western fandom as their american counterparts, plus Dave did make itself a prime target.
    Also people are angry because of the news we have. We know the con had a lot of isues that the chinese fans mentioned but anger in the west is mostly concerned because of the Hugos. There is also a bigger barier than on other worldcons because the chinese fandom and the fandom of the west are very seperated.

36. Rob: Go right ahead!

    Ed: Oops, forgot that.

37. StefanB: anger in the west is mostly concerned because of the Hugos

    I would strongly disagree with that.

    Anger is probably the greatest at the Hugo Awards fiasco, but a lot of Western fans are extremely upset about the way that Worldcon was completely co-opted by corporations and governments and used as a propaganda tool to promote their for-profit SF industry while shutting out the actual Chinese fans.

    I mean, a bunch of us said that this is exactly what would happen — but speaking for myself, that doesn’t make me any less angry about it.

38. @Brendan: I think that we might, many years from now, when it has no political salience either within WSFS or within the PRC. But until then, no, I don’t think anyone will say.

39. One of the things that really strikes me, over and over again, is how much this was a cruel slap to Chinese fans. I don’t know how to address that harm. Getting the Hugos house in order seems important, but it also seems like we should be trying to reach out and embrace our fannish community in China. I don’t think a fan fund, a la TAFF, would work given the difficulties of language and government (though surely there’s something to be done with the acronym CHAFF) but I would like to see our community think about this aspect, also.

40. It looks like Chengdu was not a fannish event but an event used by the Chinese government to make money from a future enterprise. I hope fans are aware and will be careful in voting. I am not concerned about Glasgow, Seattle or Los Angeles. The Ugandan bid should be examined as it seems to be using an elitist site for its convention. Will African fandom be able to afford to attend.
    We now have been put on notice that Worldcon is a fannish event not a capitalist event. (I am not criticizing those folks who bring goods for sale in the Dealers room, those are a welcome part of any Worldcon)

41. @Linda: there have been several reports that suggest that the Chengdu bid started out as a fannish bid, but was taken over by corporate interests after the bid was won. (Note that “corporate” and “government” are not entirely discrete in the PRC.) It looks like the actual fans got severely screwed by this.

42. JJ, Lydia Nickerson:
    you are both right, I did tread that aspect to lightly.
    This worldcon wasn’t run as it should have been and I feal sorry for the chinese fans.
    I am afraid that the harsh truth is we concentrate on the Hugos because it is fixable and could be a problem in the future.
    What was done to the fans in China, that were treated terrible by those responsible is something we can’t fix.
    We have ideas that adress that problem, but they will not help the fans in certain countrys (and here is China unfortunatly only one of the examples) to have a fancon, that they want. Punishment from the west is also not likly. Exclusion from fandom is what I expect will happen to dose responsible but most of the Organisers weren’t part of fandom to begine with.

43. To be honest all the official Chengdu tables I have seen at other WorldCons have always given me a strong “this is not geared toward the fans” vibe. But Chinese fans were ultimately the reason the commercial interests managed to get their grubby hands on a WorkdCon of their very own. And what other choice did the Chinese fans have? I was hoping that they would, at the very least, get a WorldCon that they could physically attend, which I remember being a huge thing for me when I went to my first WorldCon.
    I am sorry that the change of venue and date robbed most of them even of that much. And I am doubly sorry because at this point, the idea of another Chinese WorldCon, even an honest one ran honestly and by fan, will be opposed with much more virulence.

44. You might discover that McCarty resigned himself instead of being ordered to leave.
    W.I.P. might still not want to make it too big. So some facts cannot be presented now. However, I don’t think Chen Shi and others can continue hiding themselves from criticism from China and other fandom.

45. I believe the very old fannish expression, “All fandom plunged into war” is relevant here.

    Just read an article in the NY Times today about how the Chinese government is more and more going after companies and individuals there who are critical of the state of the economy.

    Did we, naively, have any doubts about how corporate and Chinese Communist bodies could and likely would interfere with the management/structure of a Chinese worldcon?

46. @StefanB

    I think it’s no less a scandal how the Worldcon and it’s marks were coopted for use by a corporation representing the interests of publishers and real estate developers. The Chengdu Worldcon was used as a way to attract investors for multi-billion investment and equity deals.

    Also, regretfully WIP and the MPC take the position that they and their officers are not held to any responsibility by WSFS, and the Business Meeting can not remove, sanction, censure, or reprimand any of their officers.

47. I still don’t think we have enough of the true story to accurately evaluate whose “actions” really contributed to this fiasco, and I am unconvinced that this action by the W.I.P. accurately address who was really at fault. It’s clear that Dave McCarty erred and his resignation is appropriate, so let’s move on from that. I am less clear about Kevin Standlee’s role, and I am very surprised at Ben Yalow’s censure. In all matters Worldconish, Ben has long been one of the few people in the room who really knew what they were doing. I suspect that Ben may have been thrown under the bus in this matter and unless and until those “actions” he’s accused of are fully explained, I will remain dubious.

    Fandom doesn’t need scapegoats. Fandom needs nothing less than the full truth. I don’t think we have that yet.

    I would also like to urge the W.I.P. to place an immediate ban on all future bids from China, and any other nation – Uganda, for instance – unless and until such bids and their host nations can fully meet the set of standard requirements for freedom, transparency, and commitment to human dignity that I now EXPECT the W.I.P. to establish at their earliest opportunity. The Chengdu Worldcon Fiasco should demonstrate to the W.I.P. what many of those specific standards should be, and why we must have them in place going forward.

    If the W.I.P. is unable to accomplish the very basic task of establishing those standards, then I suggest that the W I.P. itself should be reorganized into an organization that CAN address those issues.

48. While they’re rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic, I really, really hope they’re ALSO talking to a trademark attorney about protecting the Hugo mark, and, more importantly, LISTENING to that trademark attorney.

49. @Teemu Leisti

    Excellent list!

50. I’m a little concerned over the current status of Worldcon Intellectual Property. Just to make sure of something, I checked on their status.

    WIP has been notified it is in Delinquency, dated 25th August 2023, and back dated to 15th May 2020. This appears to be due to failure to file properly.

    WIP’s Registration number is CT0169323 https://rct.doj.ca.gov/Verification/Web/Search.aspx?facility=Y

    They might face problems with their next filing, because I think they’re going to have to declare misuse of charity property.

    I think they should now contact a tax attorney.

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