I would like to thank you for making this post, and it gave me a lot to think about. I admit I have been guilty of seeing the history of Melbourne con-running largely in lit con terms (which is where I come from in fandom, I'll freely admit my bias), and ignoring the role of media natcons, which I knew about but not much about. Thank you for filling in the other side of the story.
I knew the great natcon convergence had been badly handled, for a variety of reasons, but I didn't really appreciate how badly. I know that I was probably unwittingly part of the problem. I ran the 2001 natcon pretty much ignoring the media natcon purely out of ignorance - I of course tried to put media in the program, but that was because it was a Swancon (traditionally mixed media/lit) rather than because of the media natcon aspect. Not that I am particularly blaming myself -- I was ignorant because no one told me, because no one knew, because records were lost (notably, the minutes of the Natcon BM that covered all this have never been seen) and things badly handled, etc. Note also that another problem due to the poorly handled combining of the two was the horrible great Ditmar controversy of 2001, which had its origins in the 2000 committee being told to combine the two sets of awards with no guidance whatsoever as to how to do so.
I don't think it will surprise anyone when I say that I am rather glad the lit natcon wasn't killed, given the amount of time and effort I have put into the maintenance of that institution over the years via chairing and minuting meetings and committees, attending and sometimes running natcons, changing its rules, etc. But I certainly think the killing of the media natcon was a bad thing, and a loss for Australian fandom. Perhaps the combining of the two might have been a positive, had it been handled well. But it certainly wasn't, and I think did a lot of damage to media fandom nationally.
no subject
I knew the great natcon convergence had been badly handled, for a variety of reasons, but I didn't really appreciate how badly. I know that I was probably unwittingly part of the problem. I ran the 2001 natcon pretty much ignoring the media natcon purely out of ignorance - I of course tried to put media in the program, but that was because it was a Swancon (traditionally mixed media/lit) rather than because of the media natcon aspect. Not that I am particularly blaming myself -- I was ignorant because no one told me, because no one knew, because records were lost (notably, the minutes of the Natcon BM that covered all this have never been seen) and things badly handled, etc. Note also that another problem due to the poorly handled combining of the two was the horrible great Ditmar controversy of 2001, which had its origins in the 2000 committee being told to combine the two sets of awards with no guidance whatsoever as to how to do so.
I don't think it will surprise anyone when I say that I am rather glad the lit natcon wasn't killed, given the amount of time and effort I have put into the maintenance of that institution over the years via chairing and minuting meetings and committees, attending and sometimes running natcons, changing its rules, etc. But I certainly think the killing of the media natcon was a bad thing, and a loss for Australian fandom. Perhaps the combining of the two might have been a positive, had it been handled well. But it certainly wasn't, and I think did a lot of damage to media fandom nationally.