Oddly enough, just yesterday I was trying to sort out my thoughts on this sort of topic. Coming to the UK has been an interesting experience, as we got to start from square one again not knowing anyone, and have had the chance to see a number of very different approaches to conventions.
Conclusion from a lot of rambling seems to be that I like conventions as a venue for life-long learning. Activities and presentations that teach somthing new or give me the opportunity to get more involved. Science is good, so are other things.
There's a growing trend here to include fun activities, not necessarily related to SF. Everything from costuming to stage fighting, juggling to jewelery making. Along with things like the cabaret acts people are being encourage to bring in and share things from their non-fandom life. This has the advantage that while new people may not feel they know enough to be comfortable on a panel, they are often quite at home talking about their favourite hobby.
At Orbital this weekend Neil Gaiman observed that if all the books, films etc of SF suddenly vanished, SF fandom would go on without ill-effect. They'd find something else to do, knitting perhaps. SF is just the hook to find your way to like-minded people. This rang true, particularly since it was only a few months ago at a convention that I was in a group remembering how to knit. ;)
Of course getting involved in volunteer work is always a good way in. One con managed to combine both with a "Teach yourself Tech" item - a thinly disguised recruitment drive for volunteers to run the lights, cameras and sound mixer. Most people just had a go to satisfy curiosity then wandered off with new friends to the bar. A few of us stayed and played with the kit for the rest of the con. I think it can probably be expanded to other areas, come and see behind the scenes, now stay for a while, sort of thing.
Have to say that I hate overt mixer games and have always tended to sit out if it was an option even though I'm precisely the sort of person who needs it, which I don't think is unusual among fen. I need more than permission and an excuse to talk to people, I need a reason. I don't mind the games that require working on something, but those tend to require more organisation.
Although most of this is completely off topic if we assume Science Fiction Conventions are meant to be about Science Fiction ;-)
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Date: 2008-03-26 11:56 am (UTC)Conclusion from a lot of rambling seems to be that I like conventions as a venue for life-long learning. Activities and presentations that teach somthing new or give me the opportunity to get more involved. Science is good, so are other things.
There's a growing trend here to include fun activities, not necessarily related to SF. Everything from costuming to stage fighting,
juggling to jewelery making. Along with things like the cabaret acts people are being encourage to bring in and share things from their non-fandom life. This has the advantage that while new people may not feel they know enough to be comfortable on a panel, they are often quite at home talking about their favourite hobby.
At Orbital this weekend Neil Gaiman observed that if all the books, films etc of SF suddenly vanished, SF fandom would go on without ill-effect. They'd find something
else to do, knitting perhaps. SF is just the hook to find your way to like-minded people. This rang true, particularly since it was only a few months ago at a convention that I was in a group remembering how to knit. ;)
Of course getting involved in volunteer work is always a good way in. One con managed to combine both with a "Teach yourself Tech" item - a thinly disguised recruitment drive for volunteers to run the lights, cameras and sound mixer. Most people just had a go to satisfy curiosity then wandered off with new friends to the bar. A few of us stayed and played with the kit for the rest of the con. I think it can probably be expanded to other areas, come and see behind the scenes, now stay for a while, sort of thing.
Have to say that I hate overt mixer games and have always tended to sit out if it was an option even though I'm precisely the sort of person who needs it, which I don't think is unusual among fen. I need more than permission and an excuse to talk to people, I need a reason. I don't mind the games that require working on something, but those tend to require more organisation.
Although most of this is completely off topic if we assume Science Fiction Conventions are meant to be about Science Fiction ;-)