Video Success

After much messing around with video files I have managed to get a short clip of the 1979 Hugo Award ceremony onto YouTube (and posted it to the official Hugo Award web site). Here it is.

Unfortunately it seems unlikely that the BBC will issue DVDs of the Time out of Mind series, and it would be unwise to tweak their tails by uploading more than this very short clip. However, I hope to get the rest of the material into a state where it can easily be shown privately.

However, for a little more proof that the BBC cameras were at Worldcon that year, here are a couple of very fuzzy photos. I think they are from the art show auction.

Photo from Seacon 79

Photo from Seacon 79

Once again many thanks to Arnold Akien for providing me with this material.

Time Out Of Mind

Back in 1979 the BBC produced a series of five half-hour documentaries about science fiction called Time Out Of Mind. I don’t think that I saw the programmes at the time, and I’m not sure that they have been shown again since. Given how sloppy the BBC are with their archives, they may even have lost the originals. But video recording had been invented in 1979, and now, thanks to British fan Arnold Akien, I have copies.

There are five programs in all. Four of them focus on specific writers: Sir Arthur C Clarke (plain Arthur as he was back then), John Brunner, Michael Moorcock and Ann McCaffrey. The Moorcock programme also features M. John Harrison — including some live rock climbing — and Hawkwind. But it is the fifth programme that really caught my eye, because it was filmed at the 1979 Worldcon in Brighton.

Yes, seriously, a whole half hour documentary devoted to Worldcon. There are interviews with the likes of Brian Aldiss, Fred Pohl and Robert Silverberg. There are interviews with fans. There’s Filthy Pierre (with a fine crop of dark hair) playing the Star Wars theme on his signature keyboard instrument. Somewhat to my surprise, there are Christopher Reeve and Tom Baker. And some of the best interviews are given by a very calm and professional looking con chair, Peter Weston. There’s film of the masquerade, including a young lady wearing nothing much except a pair of 40-foot wings. And the programme closes with a very happy Vonda McIntyre clutching a silver, rocket-shaped object and thanking Avram Davidson for inspiring her to write Dreamsnake.

I have to say that the quality is not great. This was the very early days of video, and the tapes are now quite old. But I do have digital versions. The files are currently VBOs and quite large, but I’ll see what I can do about converting them into something more compatible with YouTube and the like. There’s also a question of copyright, of course, but I don’t suppose the BBC will object to my posting a few minutes of a Hugo Award ceremony.

If anyone knows who at the BBC I should talk to about this stuff, please let me know. And if people are interested in getting copies, or showing it at conventions, let me know.

The Year Ahead

If I’m going to do the seasonal posts thing I might as well go the whole hog and try to look forward to 2010. Right now I do not have any sekrit projekts, which is probably just as well after last year. A little consolidation is probably required.

My main priority for the year will be to get the translation awards safely off the ground, and hopefully into the hands of a large and enthusiastic group of people who will carry them through far into the future.

I’ll also be putting a fair amount of effort into chasing articles for Clarkesworld because it has become obvious over the past year that even paying 10c/word is not enough to encourage people to write non-fiction. I’m actually going to have to hold a few folks down and beat them over the head with the money. You have been warned.

I want to work with Kevin and others to help get the Hugo Awards Logo widely used. The first book with the logo on the cover should be in bookstores in the USA this week. Here’s hoping for many more.

ConReporter.com was always intended as a stop gap that would show Worldcons what they could be doing. At some point they will start doing it all themselves, but I suspect that there will be a pretty large demand for reporting from Australia and we’ll be there if no one else is.

SF Awards Watch has been pretty badly neglected by me over the past year. I need to do a lot of work on it to get it into a state in which I can hand it over to other people if I’m unable to carry on doing it. I’m also hoping to use it to test a few ideas about how online conventions could run panels.

The only conventions that I’m actively involved in running are BristolCon 2010 and SMOFcon 28. I’m hoping to be able to make an announcement about the BristolCon guests in a couple of weeks.

Of course I will be attending some conventions as well. Here is a preliminary schedule.

Update: convention list edited to include Bristol ComicCon.

It’s A Wrap

I don’t normally go for “end of year” posts, let alone “end of decade”, but thinking back over 2009 I have realized that it was fairly interesting in many ways and therefore probably deserves a retrospective.

The year began in a very worrying way with a real possibility that I might never be allowed back into the USA. Having been advised that I ought to get a visa, and having spent around $2000 on an immigration lawyer, I took myself off to the US embassy in London only to be laughed at and told that I had no chance. The only good thing about it was that my application was apparently so risible that they didn’t bother to turn it down (which would definitely have meant no further travel); they just said they’d forget they ever saw it. As it turns out, I didn’t actually need a visa at all. It is all very strange.

Had things gone according to plan, I might have been spending more time in New Zealand and Australia, but what originally appeared to be a very promising business opportunity turned to dust thanks to the credit crunch and I was left holding some rather expensive plane tickets. I went anyway, and enjoyed a couple of conventions (here and here).

Talking of which, if you are ever in need of a hard working guest for a convention, try Julie Czerneda. I had the pleasure of watching her at three different cons this year and I can’t remember seeing anyone, not even Neil, put more energy into being a guest.

On the subject of Mr. Gaiman, I went to see him do a reading in Dublin, and to see a gig by someone called Amanda Palmer whom Neil seemed to think was rather talented. They did seem very friendly at the time, but I had no idea quite how things would blossom over the coming year.

I started working with Clarkesworld from the first of January and had my first involvement in the February issue. I think we’ve published some interesting non-fiction through the year, but I have been very disappointed at the low level of submissions. I need to start nagging you folks.

Being nervous about my prospects for US travel, I made a point of going to more events in Europe. In particular I attended my first convention in France. Imaginales was a lot of fun and I intend to go back again next year. Finland was awesome as always. It was great to see Finncon have space to expand into.

Of course I’m still very much interested in Worldcon, which led me to write this. And as just talking doesn’t generally get you anywhere I produced ConReporter.com. As a piece of software it wasn’t really up to much. Had I had time, and more skill with PHP, I could have produced something much better. But it got a lot of interest, and a lot of help from famous people, as a result of which over the 5 days of Worldcon it was visited by 1,950 people from 59 different countries. I call that a win. That’s more than half the number of people who attended the convention. Next year hopefully we can do even better, and start to make Worldcon a truly international event.

At Worldcon I won a Hugo, which was very nice indeed. I also beat Dave Langford in a straight contest, which still hasn’t really sunk in. Thank you, again, everyone.

On a very much smaller scale I helped found BristolCon. Huge thanks are due to our GoHs, Al Reynolds and Charlie Butler, and to people like Paul Cornell and Juliet McKenna who came along to support us. We only got just over 50 people, but it was a solid start and we hope to do better in 2010. Congratulations are due to Jo Hall and her team for a job well done.

The last big event on my convention calendar was World Fantasy, in which I was closely involved as I’m a director of SFSFC, the fan group that staged the event. As far as I have heard from most of the attendees it was a huge success (and apologies once again for the art show, which we know was well below par). The World Fantasy Board appears to think the convention was a total disaster run by a bunch of greedy incompetents, but apparently they say that about almost every year. They were sufficiently rude that I, for one, won’t be attending World Fantasy again. And if you happen to be a member of a fan group that is thinking of bidding to stage the event I have one word for you: don’t.

It was at World Fantasy that I helped launch something that is going to be taking up most of my time during 2010. The Science Fiction and Fantasy Translation Awards are long overdue and will hopefully help bring many talented writers to the attention of English language fandom. I’ll be writing a lot more about them in the New Year.

2009 has, of course, been the year of Twitter. I happen to find it enormously useful. I appreciate that’s not the case for everyone. If it is not for you, don’t use it. It is just a communication platform, after all.

And finally, a decade into the 21st Century, technology has started to come good. Obviously there is broadband internet, without which my life would be very different indeed. But 2009 also saw my discovery of the iPhone and Wii – two bits of technology that have rapidly become indispensable to me. Yes, of course life is possible without them, but in their different ways I find them both very valuable. Being someone who is well versed in the concept of superfluous technology, I find that rather remarkable.

Fannish Inquistion Online

For those of you interested in forthcoming Worldcons, Kevin has posted video of the Fannish Inquisition sessions from this year’s SMOFcon over at ConReporter.com. They are all on YouTube. Here’s Stephen Boucher and Janice Gelb with the latest news from Melbourne. Artists in particular should watch this.

Alan Moore Conference

I think I have probably mentioned this before, but they’ve just put up a web site so it is a good opportunity to mention it again. On May 28th & 29th next year the University of Northampton is running a conference called Magus: Transdisciplinary Approaches to the Work of Alan Moore. It is an academic conference so it may not be of interest to all, but I’m sure the discussion will be fascinating.

Unfortunately it is on the same weekend as Imaginales, so I will probably be in France at the time.

Some Brief Linkage

Two interesting posts appeared overnight.

John Picacio asks whether Locus might get more readers if they devoted more space to artists and illustrators. Note that he’s not demanding that they should do so, he’s asking Locus readers, and potential readers, whether this is something they would welcome.

On the SFWA blog Mary Robinette Kowal talks about what writers can get out of conventions and how to ensure that they make the best of the experience. (Even writers, it turns out, have to be reminded to bathe.)

Two Small Victories

Here are a couple of bits of UK news to be happy about.

Firstly the proposed law that would have required anyone working with children, for no matter how little time, to be put through a vetting process, is to be eased. It will now apply only to people who work with kids about once a month. This means it will not apply to writers who come to a school to read from their work, unless they do so very regularly. Score one for Philip Pullman. It also presumably no longer applies to people who run child care at conventions, again unless they do so very regularly. Much relief all around.

Meanwhile the European Commission has decided that the UK Government’s proposed “Equality” Bill, which in several places is essentially a charter to discriminate, is in contravention of EU directives on workplace discrimination. The Guardian’s report notes that, “the UK is the only European country to have failed to implement two key EU directives on discrimination.” Those EU directives date all the way back to 2002. Hopefully someone in Westminster is suitably embarrassed.

Mission SMOFcon Accomplished

Well, SMOFcon 27 is over, but as SFSFC is hosting SMOFcon 28 in San José I have been very busy setting up the web site and the various social media pages for the event.

So basically everyone else is off home or enjoying Austin, while Kevin and I are in our hotel room tied to our computers. But not for much longer, I hope. There are still plenty of good restaurants to explore.

Tomorrow I’ll be flying back to San José.

Busy in Austin

There won’t be much activity here today as I’m at SMOFcon and will either be in panels or taking a look around Austin. If I do any blogging it will probably be over at ConReporter.com. In particular watch out for the live coverage of tonight’s Fannish Inquisition in which the assembled SMOFs will ask pertinent (and occasionally silly) questions of the Melbourne and Reno Worldcon committees, and any bids that have been brave enough to turn up (starting with Chicago who are here).

SMOFcon on ConReporter.com

Given that Kevin and I are going to SMOFcon, and given that I’m starting to play with new software toys, it seemed like a good idea to do some coverage through ConReporter.com. If you are going to be at SMOFcon next weekend and would like to get involved, let me know. More details, including the Google Wave coverage, here.

Out and About

The last 24 hours have been fairly busy for Kevin and myself. We’ve managed no less than four separate events in that time.

Last night we attended the Transgender Day of Remembrance service in San Francisco. It was extremely well attended — not just standing room only but packed solid. The event went very smoothly, and included messages of support from Mayor Newson and the State Senate (the latter delivered personally by Mark Leno). It is always depressing to attend such events and hear about how many people have been killed (often very brutally killed), but at the same time it is good to see more and more people expressing sorrow over the murders, and more politicians prepared to stick their necks out by doing so themselves.

Having finished there we headed off to FyDySyFy, a Friday night fannish meet-up that takes place in the bar of the Hyatt Regency down by Embarcadero. It is a fairly small event — there were only six of us there — but the hotel is truly spectacular inside and the hot buttered rum they were serving as a winter warmer went down very well indeed. Many thanks to Espana Sheriff for inviting us along.

This morning we had a board meeting of SFSFC, much of which was given over to a post-mortem on the World Fantasy Convention that we ran. Thankfully most people seem to be very happy with us, though the art show was well below par and the World Fantasy Board appears to never be happy with the performance of its operating committees. Most importantly, we did not lose money, though the people who are continuing to spread rumors of rapacious profiteering on our part will need to be very creative with our accounts in order to justify their claims.

Finally this afternoon a group of us headed up to Alameda for an open day at St.George’s Distillery, our local vendor of superb flavored falling-over-water. The theme of event was “prom night” and there were many fine outfits in evidence, but we decided to go as the school’s goth kids. Kevin Roche and Andy Trembley were superbly attired as ever, and my outfit went down sufficiently well for one young lady to ask me if she could have her picture taken with me.

As well as various spirits, fruit liqueurs and so on, the event features numerous quality food vendors, including another local favorite: Recchuiuti Chocolates. There was also a band called Farewell Typewriter who played mostly cover songs but were very good.

So I’m totally rocked out on absinthe and 80’s pop numbers. Thankfully Kevin makes a wonderful designated driver. I’m now off to drink lots of water and orange juice. I’ll leave you with a photo of us in the old aircraft hanger that the distillery calls home.

Cheryl & Kevin in Hanger One

Jay to do Grand Tour

I see from this morning’s blog reading that Jay Lake has booked up to do the Grand Tour of Down Under next year. That means he will be attending Au Contraire in Wellington the weekend before AussieCon 4. This is a great opportunity for writers to get to see New Zealand as well as Australia, and do something good for fans in New Zealand along the way. And, of course, in Wellington you can get to see Weta, Rivendell and the Colossal Squid as well. I’ve no booked my flights yet, but I am planning to be there. See my New Zealand video diary and photos from this year for more background.

WexWorlds Is Coming

I am reminded that WexWorlds, the public SF&F festival in Wexford, Ireland, gets underway in a week’s time. Wish I could have gone. But I do have a press release from James Bacon about comics-related activities at the festival. It sounds like good stuff. Full press release under the fold.
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WFC Press Coverage

You never know when you do a press office for a convention what is likely to turn up in the papers. However, you do get to know local journalists, and Kevin and I remembered Gary Singh from ConJose. He wasn’t going to write a “crazy geeks in costume beam down” story. Indeed, as you’ll see from this story, he’s a bit of a cyberpunk fan.

It has everything: cannibalism, the apocalypse, defecation, plague, Internet meltdown and, of course, The Great Flood. All of which, I suspect, will be blamed on us by the World Fantasy Board.

And remember, despite the flood, no books were harmed in the making of the convention.

Utopiales Con Report

Today’s posts on World SF News include a con report from Utopiales by Aliette de Bodard. The con appears to have an interesting membership structure. There’s a dirt cheap one-day membership that appears to be an equivalent of Exhibits Only, a more expensive one that is “professionals only” membership of the entire event, and a “VIP pass” that looks like a way of making money out of rich fans who want to go to exclusive parties to meet their favorite authors. I note also that the convention gets a big subsidy from the city of Nantes.

Utopiales is often held over the same weekend as World Fantasy so I have never gone. It is, however, easy to get to by train. As I probably won’t be going to World Fantasy next year I may look into it, though I’m still waiting on the dates of next year’s Gaylaxicon, which will also be in October.

Health Report

Bleagh. We are both still sick. Indeed, both of us appear to have had relapses. Very odd.

Elsewhere various people returning home from WFC are reporting being diagnosed with H1N1 (or hamthrax if you prefer). I suppose we could have it too. Certainly we are going to avoid BASFA tonight just in case. But it isn’t at all serious, just annoying.

I do hope it clears up by next weekend. In the meantime it would be good to have my head de-fugged enough to be able to do some serious work.