Kibitzer Goes To World Con

[kibitzer]

Tomorrow I shall attend my first sci-fi convention. Thought I'd bore y'all with my thoughts and impressions.

It starts at 2pm tomorrow -- right now it's 1pm on Wednesday -- and I don't know whether to be excited or worried. I'm not really a convention person. I've been to tech conventions and a Toastmasters convention and it seems you have the best time if you interact with folks. Network a little. Actually talk to people.

This is not my forte :-) I don't particularly like meeting new people. Also, I'm a little worried about not being in an existing club or group or clique, like attending with a bunch of friends. I'm also a little nervous of... y'know... avid fans.

But y'know what? I'm going to try to be friendly! Given my age I ought to have learned a few conversational tricks by now ;-)

The program looks interesting though not amazing. (Check out the program here.) Having nothing with which to compare I've no idea whether this is always the case. The Kaffeeklatches look like fun so I'll try to get into some of them, particularly Mur's one. She's in with Cory Doctorow so it may be a challenge to get in. I'd actually rather see Mur than Cory Doctorow. I recently read his Down And Out in The Magic Kingdom and was underwhelmed.

So, anyone have thoughts or recommendations? What's a must do at a convention?

[Talia]

I find the crowds at conventions tend to be fairly friendly and not particularly clique-y. Its been my experience that if you want to make friends its easy to do so and if you want to do your own thing and not be bothered, you'll be fine too.

 As for what to do, that depends on YOU and what you like to do. I love going to author panels, so I always make a beeline for those. If a media guest of interest is giving a talk I go to those too. At the last con I went to, I added to my autographed books collection a few novels from some of my favorite authors - it was a very good con.

RE: worldcon specifically - I see Cory Doctorow is on the guest list, you should see him speak, in a panel or otherwise, he's a smart cookie. Other authors I like on the list: Peter V. Brett (the warded man is VERY good), Kate Elliott, oh hey look Mur's going to be there, (yes I'm just scrolling down the list, getting more jealous), George RR Martin (I'm shocked he's venturing into public, considering how deranged some of his fans are getting), China Mievelle and will McIntosh are on the list but their names are black, not sure what that means, ooh John Scalzi - he's also very smart, if you've ever read his blog, seems like he would be fun to hear speak. Niiice guest list.

If you can get in to the hugo awards ceremony I imagine that'd be spiffy.

Spend some time with the schedule and head to whatever program catches your fancy. Leave some time to browse the dealer's room.

[kibitzer]

Awesome, thanks for the advice Talia! Yeah, didn't mean to imply Mr Doctorow is a no-hoper as he certainly is not.

[kibitzer]

Day 1 -- Thursday 2 Sept

So hi. To noone's surprise, today was similar to other types on convention I've attended. The difference is this one is largely volunteer-driven. Well actually... I guess the Toastmasters ones are too. Anyway, one thing was clear: there's a bunch of people do the con circuit and know each other very well and have fun together, mostly in the bars and after parties, it seems ;-)

By the way, I intend to write something each day and I'll be making observations about my reactions to it all. It's likely some will interpret these as pleas for pity, or "poor old me." This is not the case. It's merely that I'm something of an observer-- I'm more likely to stand back and observe than jump right in. Those observations extend to my own behaviour so comments on my reactions are only that -- observations. Nothing more.

At 2pm was the opening ceremony. "Ceremony" is too grand a word as it was over in 25 mins! I guess I was expecting something more grandiose. I'm not disappointed but I think it's a fair gauge on what this con is like: largely volunteers, no frills, quite unassuming. All good.

I went to a session called "How to get the most out of this convention" which boiled down to "get involved and meet people". This respresented a challenge because as I said above, I tend to hang back and observe before jumping in. The times I have jumped in to stuff it hasn't always worked out for the best. Heh. Which is no reason not to do it again, but, well, maybe not right away. But it was a good session.

Was going to go to a couple more but I suddenly felt quite tired and buggered off home. Hah! So much for trying new stuff! Anyway things really kick off tomorrow with a full day's activities and a good night's sleep will help.

One interesting thing is, I didn't identify with a lot of the crowd. My thoughts were something like, "but these people are a bunch of geeks!" Duh! What did I expect? I live a lot of my life internally, I'm quite happy being by myself and doing my own thing and perhaps that extends to my love of sci-fi. Perhaps I'd rather leave it in my head than express it and have it "sullied" by a bunch of other people. I know how that sounds, believe me, so lemme give you an example.

I became a huge fan of Star Trek: The Next Generation during the early 90's. (Still am!) I heard about a Star Trek club starting up and thought I'd go along and join. It'd be fun to meet like-minded people and talk ST:TNG and other sci-fi stuff, right?

Err... well, no. I didn't enjoy it at all and left after a couple of months. I guess I enjoy sharing with close friends who are also like-minded, but not a large crowd. Watching, say, All Good Things with a few good friends is Very Good Indeed. Watching it with 200 others is... not so satisfying.

Hope that makes a kind of sense. And, there's actually a kind of compliment there.

Oh, and my idea about the Kaffeklatches was totally wrong. See, in the program I downloaded there's a line like this:

  Friday 1100 John Clute Jason Nahrung Ian Nichols Bill Patterson

so I thought the KK was with all these folks. Nope! One for each. Which makes a lot more sense! I wonder if I can get into the George R R Martin one?

Tomorrow's another day! Come back then to hear about Kibitzer's Big Con.

[DKT]

Kibitzer, I hate you right now. And Mur. And everyone else at World Con.

That said, I can totally sympathize with some of what you say. I'm relatively shy with people I don't know. Most of the cons I go to I know at least a couple other people attending. The one con where I didn't know anyone was still fun, though. I did bump into a couple of EA authors (this was before I was really doing anything at PC) and told them I'd really enjoyed their stories at EA. That opened up some cool little conversations. (I imagine you could say the same thing to a reader if they were there.) But yeah, try to enjoy yourself, hit some panels that look genuinely fun, say hi to Mur.

If you see Cory Doctorow, tell him I said "Hi!" He's genuinely awesome and a very nice guy.

Good luck, and I'm looking forward to reading more of these!

[kibitzer]

Day 2 -- Friday 3 Sept

Believe me, Dave, I'm quite eminently hateable ;-)

Well.

Well, well, well!

After all the guff I said about not connecting with people, I had a wonderful day today! It probably won't sound like it when I describe the panels, but I did. I think I was just getting used to the setup yesterday which is another thing I do. Once I can place myself in the environment -- what times do things start, where do we go, where do we eat -- I'm OK.

Started the day with "Unthinkable! Indescribable!" with Carrie Vaughn, Shane Jiraiya Cummings, Terry Dowling and China Mieville. Nice crew! I actually saw China downstairs and thought, "Wow, that guy looks a lot like China Mieville" and then this guy came up and started telling him how wonderful his books are. So yeah... it was the man himself.

It was great seeing Terry Dowling, too, as he's an Aussie writer with a fairly long history in the genres.

There was a lot of dicussion around, is calling something "indescribable" a cheat and so forth. Quite interesting. China Mieville is scarily convincing and smart, possibly because of his 'ard boy appearance. He's quite buff, bald and sorta angry-looking. But he clearly knows his stuff, as did the whole panel. Enjoyed this one.

Next was "Making a Living: Professional Writing for Spec Fic Authors" with George Ivanoff, John Scalzi and Cory Doctorow. The content  turned out pretty obvious, I thought; if I were younger it probably wouldn't have been. Basically: diversify; write cross-genre; do high-paying work if you can get it (e.g. corporate writing): BE NICE, DON'T BE A PRIMA DONNA; meet your deadlines; be aware of your tax and company obligations. Scalzi and Doctorow seemed to riff off each other quite well. Doctorow is clearly one smart and passionate cookie. That's as clear as the fact that he loves to talk! At one point, after he'd gone on non-stop for maybe 5-7 mins he stopped and said "Oh, am I talking too much?" to which everyone laughed as several people had had their hand in the air for some time. Entertaining.

Next, I went to "Ghosts Without Borders", the premise being that most cultures have ghost stories... come along and explore them with us. This turned out a little duller than I thought and seemed to me to devolve into "believers" vs. "science" pretty quickly. Didn't stay 'til the end.

At 2pm was a keynote speech by Shaun Tan, one of the three guests of honour. Dunno if you folks are familiar with his work but he's been illustrating professionally for about 20 years here in Aus, and has written some illustrated tales, most notably The Lost Thing and The Arrival. He took us though his development as an artist, with pictures he'd drawn since when he was 6!! (Apparently, his Mum keeps a lot of stuff) I tell you, the drawings from when he was 7 and 10 were just amazing! One was this giant lizard head with a very toothy mouth and he'd gone and drawn tiny scales all over the skin -- at 7! I really, really enjoyed this talk. Shaun comes across as a very self-effacing and ordinary kind of guy. Then you look at his illustrations and think, "wow. this is really some talent!"

Next was "Directions in Australian Horror". This was also good but I tired of it quite quickly as it became more of a "where do you get your inspiration" type thing -- pretty standard writer question stuff. I left early.

At 4pm I attended "To The Stars: The Never-Ending History of Star Trek", principally because Melinda M. Snodgrass was moderating. Thought I might get some insights into what it was like writing for my fave Trek (TNG, if you don't remember :-). Unfortunately, her first question to the panel was along the lines of, "What do you first remember about Trek? What made you watch it?" Since this is very well-explored territory which I've already read and seen many times, I left. Instead, I went to "Evil Robots" which was a great choice. Two guys were talking about the development of the "evil robot", illustrated with clips from movies. This was a lot of fun! I think the funniest was from a Japanese 70's series called "Red Baron". I'd never heard of it but think Power Rangers giant robots in the 70's. Hilarious! I swear, the clip they showed, one of the giant robots farted with every step -- at least that's what the footsteps sounds like to me! (Hehehehehe! says my inner 12-year old).

And then, I kind of pooped out again. Phew. I'm tired. Can't imagine how the panellists must feel.

Oh, also visited the dealer's room, talked with a few folks, looked at the stuff, received a free novel (hmmmm) and checked out what I might want to buy. Sum total: I might buy one book by Terry Dowling. Also, I want to catch up with the publishers of Aurealis to see if they're interested in starting a podcast. This is kind of a long shot but hey, nothing ventured, nothing gained.

So there ya go, folks, Day 2. Looking forward to Day 3!

(One final thing. Thought I'd wear my Goretex jacket today, rather than my heavier winter-ish coat, since it's allegedly Spring now in Melbourne. This was a good decision since it's light and easily stuffable-into-a-backpack... but I swear the damn thing has shrunk quite a bit since I wore it last year.)

[Talia]

Sounds awesome. So jealous. I'd love to see a Scalzi/Doctorow panel.

[DKT]

I've seen Scalzi and Doctorow on a panel before, and it was a total blast. Glad you're having fun, man!

(PS. I still hate you!)

[kibitzer]

Day 3 -- Saturday 4 Sept

Today was a short day. Had a few things to do in the morning so I went in later than expected.

Started off at 1pm with "Swords and Fists: Chinese Fantasy and the Wuxia Tradition." Enjoyed this very much. It was about the rise of Chinese Wuxia cinema and Chinese Fantasy. There were many clips from movies such as "Zu Warriors from the Magic Mountain", "Iron Monkey", "Chinese Ghost Story", "Big Trouble in Little China" and so on. I've seen quite a lot of Hong Kong cinema and none of these were new to me, but it was a lot of fun to see the clips.

Next was a keynote by Kim Stanley Robinson. He was to be "interviewed" by Sean Williams but unfortunately, Sean is sick in New Zealand and unable to attend the entire convention. So, "Stan" was interviewed by "Dr Robinson" instead. Quite amusing! He wore a jacket as "Dr Robinson" and removed it as "Stan" and used it to debunk a lot of myths about himself, such as the myth that he's into rock-climbing. Whilst this was entertaining I left early. I haven't read any of his books (probably a breach of geekdom right there) so it wasn't interesting to me.

Joined a line to sign up for a Kaffeeklatch and actually met someone!! Nice guy named Soon from New Zealand. We chatted briefly, signed up for the klatches and went to our next sessions.

Mine was "The Writer and the Audience: Online Interaction and Public Personae.", moderated by a slightly familiar lady, Mur Lafferty. The panel also featured Peter Brett, Cory Doctorow, John Berlyne and another guy whose name I'd heard but for the life of me can't remember right now. He does an online comic strip. Hugh? Nope, can't remember. This was a great panel. A lively discussion about how a writer should present themselves online through social media -- Facebook, Twitter and the like. Should one have a private and writer persona? Express political views?

4pm, I attended a Kaffeeklatch with Stephen Dedman, an Aussie author. Was interesting to be in a close situation with someone I've read before. (He's been published on Pseudopod, numbers 17 "Upon The Midnight Clear" and 20 "What You Wish For", amongst others). Enjoyable.

A few other things. Found the publisher of Aurealis and asked him about starting a podcast: he's not interested. Was thinking I could help out there, maybe host it or something but he said Aurealis was enough for him to think about. And fair enough, too. He pointed me to another Aussie who already has a podcast, but turns out he wants authors reading their own work, so no opportunity there either. Again, fair enough. Disappointing on both counts, but what can you expect from cold calling? They don't know me, I don't know them so, yeah.

Tonight was the big Masquerade a.k.a. costume competition. Was considering going but didn't in the end. Saving myself for tomorrow, maybe? That's the Hugo Awards and I do want to attend that.

Edit: The comic strip guy is Howard Tayler who writes "Schlock Mercenary" (http://www.schlockmercenary.com/)

[kibitzer]

Hugo Award Winners

"You heard it here last!"

I'm sure by now many of you know the outcome of the 2010 Hugos, given all the iPads and laptops I saw being wielded during the ceremony. I'll quickly post them here anyway. I'll also say, for an awards ceremony, it was remarkably free of boring bits. Sure, some dragged a little but overall quite fluff-free!

You can see all the nominees on the AussieCon 4 site.

THE JOHN W. CAMPBELL AWARD FOR BEST NEW WRITER: Seanan McGuire

BEST FAN ARTIST: Brad W. Foster
(7th year running apparently!)

BEST FANZINE: StarShipSofa edited by Tony C. Smith
(Awesome!! Quite a win for podcasting -- and the crew of the good ship Sofa, of course)

BEST FAN WRITER: Frederik Pohl
(say WHAT??)

BEST SEMIPROZINE: Clarkesworld edited by Neil Clarke, Sean Wallace, & Cheryl Morgan

BEST PROFESSIONAL ARTIST: Shaun Tan
(Hugely popular with the local crowd, of course.)

BEST EDITOR, SHORT FORM: Ellen Datlow

BEST EDITOR, LONG FORM: Patrick Nielsen Hayden

BEST DRAMATIC PRESENTATION - SHORT FORM: Doctor Who: "The Waters of Mars" Written by Russell T Davies & Phil Ford; Directed by Graeme Harper (BBC Wales)
(Since three of the five nominees were Dr. Who episodes this doesn't seem surprising)

BEST DRAMATIC PRESENTATION - LONG FORM: Moon, Screenplay by Nathan Parker; Story by Duncan Jones; Directed by Duncan Jones (Liberty Films)

BEST GRAPHIC STORY: Girl Genius, Volume 9: Agatha Heterodyne and the Heirs of the Storm Written by Kaja and Phil Foglio; Art by Phil Foglio; Colours by Cheyenne Wright (Airship Entertainment)

BEST RELATED WORK: This is Me, Jack Vance! (Or, More Properly, This is "I") by Jack Vance (Subterranean)

BEST SHORT STORY: (all of which ran on Escape Pod) "Bridesicle" by Will McIntosh (Asimov’s 1/09)

BEST NOVELETTE: "The Island" by Peter Watts (The New Space Opera 2; Eos)
(Peter was so sure he wouldn't win, he was dressed in t-shirt and jeans! Looked quite funny against all the tuxes and such.)

BEST NOVELLA: "Palimpsest" by Charles Stross (Wireless; Ace; Orbit)

BEST NOVEL: A tie!!! The City & The City by China Miéville (Del Rey; Macmillan UK) + The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi (Night Shade)
(Is this the first time there's a tie?)

Speaking personally, this has given me a greater appreciation of what the Hugos are about. I voted in most categories thanks to the excellent voting package put together by Kate Kligman -- almost everything was available in e-book form which I read on my Kindle. Just fantastic. (I didn't get to the novels since I didn't leave myself enough time.) But seeing the authors, the actual people behind the works, is priceless.

[kibitzer]

Day 4 -- Sunday 5 Sept

Today was the best day yet and contained a unexpected bonus, which I'll get to later.

First up at 11am was a Kaffeklatch with Mur Lafferty. This I was really looking forward to! Mur is certainly one engaging and generous lady. The group was full (9 people) and a good one, all prepared to participate and contribute. Many were there because of her "I Should Be Writing" 'cast but there was at least one other EA fan. We discussed how she finds time to do all the things she does; the equipment she uses; how long the 'casts take to put together; and a number of other things. It certainly was not difficult to fill the entire hour and in fact we could have gone on much longer. For me, a highlight of the convention.

I had four sessions marked for midday but finally opted for "Jack Vance and The Dying Earth", principally for the panel: Matthew Hughes, Mark L Olson, Jonathan Strahan, Terry Dowling and George R R Martin. I needed no convincing about either The Dying Earth or Jack Vance but it was great to hear some luminaries discuss The Man and his work. Have you seen or read Songs of The Dying Earth? It's edited by Gardner Dozois and George R R Martin and contains contributions from three of the panellists, which added extra interest to the session. There was discussion about what makes Vance and TDE so enduring; it easily filled the whole hour. Enjoyable.

By the way, if you do like TDE and haven't read Songs, go borrow it from the library or buy it.

Between 1pm and 3pm I had lunch and wandered around the Dealer's Room and the Art Exhibition. I know this isn't Twitter but I'm sure you wanted to know that.

At 3pm I went to "The Secret Life of Literary Agents": John Berlyne, Jonathan Bilmes, Ian Irvine and Eddie Schneider. I was interested since I'd no idea what an agent does for an author. This was a great choice as it was a lively and informative discussion. Clearly there were many authors in the room in specific situations with particular questions, but it was also good for anyone with no idea (like myself). All of the panellists were erudite, helpful and to-the-point; a great combination. One thing I noticed about this session. Mostly, when a session finishes, folks make a beeline for the door to get to the next session. In this one, folks made a beeline for the agents!!

For 4pm I had three sessions marked. I dropped in to one, got bored and left. Wandered about some more. (Unexpected bonus occurred during this time).

At 5pm was "Taking It On The Chin: Authors and Reviews." The panellists: John Berlyne, Jean Johnson, Karen Miller and John Scalzi. Scalzi was there first and engaged the audience before we started, regaling us with the tale of being "coerced" into a nightclub session the night before and feeling tired and grumpy and we better not cross him because he's the moderator and he'd... well, perhaps best not to say. ;-) Suffice it to say that Scalzi was entertaining, cogent and a whip-smart moderator, continually moving things along and making sure the audience got to ask questions. My respect for the guy increased enormously. This was another great choice as most of the panellists were able to contribute insightful anecdotes. For example:

• Karen Miller said her favourite fan comment was: "I only kept reading to see if the bitch died. You are sick and need help." Karen said she wanted that printed on a t-shirt!
• Scalzi's favourite comment from a reviewer: "I lost count of the times I threw this book against the wall."

So there ya go. Had dinner; read my copy of the latest John Connolly novel; attended the Hugos.

Now, to the unexpected bonus. I drop by the info desk a couple of times a day just to see which Kaffeklatch sessions are still open and whether I know any of the authors. (There's a lot I've not heard of!) There was one for George R R Martin today for which registration opened at 10am. I believe folks were queuing for that from at least 9am. Whilst I like Martin's stuff, I just don't do queuing like that. So, imagine my surprise when I dropped by at maybe 3:30pm and saw a Kaffeklatch for George R R Martin with ONLY TWO NAMES SIGNED UP! FOR MONDAY! I asked the info desk guy, "Is this for real?" and he looked at me like, "Are you stupid or something?" I hastily took out my pen and scribbled in my name! 1pm tomorrow, Monday, I get to Kaffeeklatch with Mr Martin! Cool!

[kibitzer]

Day 5 -- Monday 6 Sept

If you've made it this far, congratulations. I'm thinking I'm overdoing things here. This is the level of detail I give my wife, by the way. Can you see why she's such a wonderful lady? She gets all this stuff and more, and seems genuinely interested in hearing what I say. I can't figure her out sometimes.

Actually, I'll add some stuff later. I need to decompress.

[DKT]

Well, no pressure, but as someone considering going next year, I've enjoyed reading along.

[Heradel]

Well, no pressure, but as someone considering going next year, I've enjoyed reading along.

Ditto.

[FireTurtle]

Well, no pressure, but as someone considering going next year, I've enjoyed reading along.

Ditto.

Ditto in triplicate. This has been exceedingly entertaining!

[kibitzer]

Day 5 -- Monday 6 Sept (take two)

Thanks folks, I'll return to my previous ridiculous detail ;-)

Phew. It's more tiring than I expected going to all these sessions. You'd think sitting around and listening to stuff wouldn't drain you at all, but it does. And I think the venue itself requires a fair bit of walking, so there's that. That's the Melbourne Conference and Exhibition Centre, by the way. It's "fondly" known as "Jeff's Shed" after Jeff Kennett, one-time premier of Victoria. Anyway, it's big.

I started at 11am with "High Stakes: The Television Worlds of Joss Whedon." I thought it'd be interesting to hear folks discussing one of my favourite creative minds but I should have known better. This session was really full and it soon became clear it'd be an avid avid fan discussion. Whilst I have nothing against that, I didn't want to sit around and have people dissect the shows I love, so I left. It's a bit like that Star Trek club I mentioned above -- seemed like a good idea at the time but wasn't really for me.

At noon I went to "Dirty Feed". By way of background, the Australian federal government has been promising (threatening?) to implement an internet "clean feed" by mandating a site blacklist at the ISP level. Naturally the argument for this is to keep kids safe, stop child pornography, curtail terrorism and such. I think anyone who's a little tech-savvy knows this is next to impossible to implement -- leaving aside any issues freedom of information/choice and such. The implications for civil liberties are quite staggering. Anyway I principally went because Cory Doctorow was on the panel, knowing he'd have an opinion or two on this.

Now, Doctorow was indeed quite erudite and experienced in this area, as were the other panellists (and my apologies to them for referring to them simply as "the others"). But quite unexpectedly, I found myself wondering why the hell we were having this discussion. In general, anyone who goes to a sci-fi convention is (a) reasonably tech-aware (I know not everyone is, but many are) and (b) pro civil rights. Net result: I believe everyone in the room was convinced the "clean feed" is a bad idea. They didn't need convincing so what were we doing there? Setting forth arguments of which we're already convinced? Yeah, it's good to listen to folks who are informed on this matter but it's nothing I couldn't find out elsewhere. That's how it seemed to me, so I left. Odd. Maybe it was a personal challenge: if I am convinced the "clean feed" is a bad idea, what am I going to do about it? Listen to other folks trying to draw a line in the sand whilst just sitting on my arse?

At 1pm was the George R R Martin Kaffeeklatch. Well, this was interesting. I'm not that awed by famous authors so I was hoping for a chance to just chat like regular people. However I think Martin sees SO many fans and has been at this for so long that he kind of has these tracks or set stories and once he's on them he doesn't like being interrupted. Now, that's NOT to say this was a dull or unentertaining session; it wasn't. It was just a different experience. I asked him some questions about "Songs of the Dying Earth" which he edited with Gardner Dozois, like who didn't get in the book. Surprisingly, Gene Wolfe and Robin Hobb both turned down the chance to contribute! Of course, there were many questions about his Song of Ice and Fire books, and the HBO adaptation. He looks like a jolly old Santa Claus; he sure doesn't mind swearing; he's no fan of fanfic (had to explain to the girl sitting next to me what slash fic is); he's hopeful the HBO adaptation will turn out well; he explained what it was like getting into genre writing when he started, and contrasted that with what it's like now; we discussed writing in other people's universes. We filled the hour with no trouble at all.

At 2pm I went to "Hand-Waving, Rule Bending and Other Dirty Tricks of Hard SF". Stellar panel: Charles Stross, Jeff Harris (token Aussie?); Greg Benford and Alasdair Reynolds. Talk about heavyweights! They discussed the need, or choice, to stick closely to known or reasonably provable science, and when they choose to break those rules. Interestingly, Stross claimed he never studied physics past high school, though I believe he did study bio-chemistry at a tertiary level. This was hard to wrap my head around -- read the Hugo-winning "Palimpsest" and you might see why. There's some HUGE concepts in that one. Greg Benford turned out to be more jocular than I imagined -- thought he'd be a stuffy scientist type, but no. Alasdair Reynolds seemed quite accessible and friendly and normal, not the planet-sized brain I'd imagined. Enjoyed this session.

At 3pm I was knackered so I had some lunch, read a bit and waited for the Closing Ceremony at 4pm.

The Closing Ceremony was, as may be imagined, a series of thank-yous to the Guests Of Honour, the committee, the behind-the-scenes folks; basically, everyone. There was a "passing the flame" from AussieCon 4 to Reno 2011 and the Reno chair came up to give a big plug for why Reno is great and everybody should come along. She said that the hotel or convention centre she talked to wasn't at all fazed by having a sci-fi convention as that would be far from the oddest folks they'd had (!).

And with that, it was over! Almost lost my iPod (I left it in the bathroom) but someone had handed it in. Can't imagine anyone stealing it, it's virtually an antique. I trotted out the door and joined the throngs moving towards the trams, and home.

I have one more entry planned here, a series of impressions, sights and things I overheard.

[Talia]

Man that sounds great

RE the "Dirty Feed" panel - perhaps it was a way to arm onesself with arguments for making a case against dirty feeds when you come up against supporters? There are a lot of things I'm for or against but I might have a hard time stating precisely why. Seems to me its a good thing to provide a venue for arming people with solid arguments against the thing, if need be.

[kibitzer]

Seems to me its a good thing to provide a venue for arming people with solid arguments against the thing, if need be.

For sure, and I agree. I was pretty tired and I tend to be negative when tired, so it may just have been that. The folks on the panel provided some great arguments against, which are necessary. One problem with this issue is that the government's arguments are largely emotional or motherhood statements. Folks arguing against the feed try to look at it logically in terms of difficulty of implementation and such. Whilst those against repeatedly state they're also against child porn and such, they're always painted as being for it since they oppose the feed. This is where it starts to be a zero-sum game; it's unlikely either side will convince the other but there is great potential for damage.

[kibitzer]

In retrospect I'd say Talia's advice was spot-on. Thanks again, T!

[Talia]

hehe, happy to help, and glad you had a good time.  As a reader I adore author-heavy cons and this sounds like something I would have been positively gleeful to attend.


RE: next year: if a bunch of people go to the Reno worldcon, we should have an EA meetup.

[kibitzer]

RE: next year: if a bunch of people go to the Reno worldcon, we should have an EA meetup.

That would be very cool! I'd almost consider going just for that...

[quickly computes flight costs...]

in the order of AUD $1500-2000. Hmm.

[kibitzer]

Final Thoughts and Impressions

Well, as threatened, here's some things I saw and heard at AussieCon 4 you're unlikely to experience anywhere but a Con. Also, some random thoughts.

Conversations I Overheard:

• "Do you like the smell of burning eyeballs?"
• "My main priority in life is to indulge the senses."
• "I was heading for a session but was kidnapped by Charles Stross."
• (on the phone) "I think that's really unfair. I'm trying to be present right now."

Things I Saw: (that you don't usually see in everyday life)

• Seemed like every tenth person had an iPad and/or wifi-connected laptop.
• Someone sat down behind me and casually started playing a harp. (Beautiful! Very soothing)
• A young lady came into a session with a VERY flash laptop: big screen, backlit keys, etc. She used it to play Tetris for almost the entire session!! (Why was she there in the first place??)
• Saw a fella walking about wearing a deerstalker cap. I have never, ever seen that in real life.
• Every fourth person wore a geek comedic t-shirt. (Example: on the front -- Schrödinger's cat is dead. on the back -- Schrödinger's cat is alive. Some of you may know why I found this funny, given the EP Flash Contest.)
• A large-ish guy with very curly hair, dyed sky-blue. (Many people dyed their hair in many ways).

Star Wars Group

A Star Wars group had some awesomely convincing costumes; clearly, much time, money and effort went into them. Folks were asking them to pose for photos and such. These caught my attention:

• A guy dressed as a stormtrooper. He was very short. I manfully resisted going up to him and saying the obvious line .
• An arresting Asian female, dressed in a Bastila-style costume: skin-tight ochre bodysuit. I'm sorry ladies, I know it's sexist but... wow.

Final Thoughts

I didn't attend a single signing. This may make me... strange. There wasn't one person there whose signature I wanted. (Remember: there were plenty o' big names that I admire!! Silverberg; Martin; Dowling; Nix; Stross; the list goes on). There's only one author signing I've ever attended, that of John Connolly when he was in Melbourne several years back. Possibly the only other one I'd attend is if Dan Simmons turned up. But if you're into author signings, well, this is the place to be!!

Attending by myself didn't materially dim my pleasure. However, I like my own company, mostly. If you can go with a group of like-minded people, I believe that would multiply the experience. Do so, if you can. (Friends, Club, whatever).

I feel like attending the Con in my own city diminished the experience a little. If you're at the Con with nothing else to do, chances are you'll seek out like-minded folks and party on! Me, I went home about 5pm every day. I missed all the after-parties.

That's All Folks!

Actually, I wish I could go on and on about this. But, we always have to go back to real lives. When I went back to work on Wednesday, I felt I had a wonderful secret: I've had this intense experience that you folks can't understand and I won't explain!

I am very glad I went.

You should go if you can!

[eytanz]

• A young lady came into a session with a VERY flash laptop: big screen, backlit keys, etc. She used it to play Tetris for almost the entire session!! (Why was she there in the first place??)

Just thought I'd comment on this because I get this a lot too - I have adult ADHD, and I can't listen to lecture or presentation for any length of time if I'm not doing something with my fingers. I find that the best way for me to remain attentive is to be playing a game that requires motor skills but not intellectual stimulation; tetris is a great case of this. All my colleagues are used to the fact that I'm always playing something while listening to talks, but it can appear very odd to outsiders, and I have to balance being able to pay attention but looking like I'm not, with looking like I'm not distracted but not being able to focus. It may be that the woman in question is the same.