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Readdressing the Balance
So, after my post on how Media and Lit Natcons were joined, and how media fandom as a whole got thoroughly screwed, general consensus was that the whole situation sucked.
So what are we going to do about it?
Well, as it happens, there is a Natcon in Adelaide this weekend. With a business meeting. That would be a great place to start. I can't afford to go, but I know a fair chunk of you will be there. Do you want to set things in motion, and back each other up?
The fact that the original business meeting notes vanished may be down to accident, incompetence, or deliberate mishandling is neither here nor there. What matters is that it's well past time the situation was fixed. The deal was that in exchange for merging their Natcon with the Lit one, media fandom would get fair representation, in the awards and by extension, the programming. That's not happening.
There's no doubt that there will be resistance. But you know what, fuck it, a deal was made. And it was broken. There's no doubt that it will take years to rebuild things, to get that side of fandom even caring that there's a Natcon, let alone coming to it. And some would argue there's no point. But there is a point.
It could have gone the other way.
The Ditmars could have been lost, the Lit Natcon no more. They easily had the numbers to do this at a time when the Lit Natcon was not doing well, and they still gave up their awards, and their Natcon, with expectation of a fair deal they never received.
I didn't set out to try and get this thing fixed, I just wanted to make the point that we used to have more awards. But fuck it, now I'm angry. Because you know, I read and love books, but if I had to choose which box I fit in, I've always thought of myself as a media fan. Most of us watch films and TV shows, and love them. In our everyday lives, the Lit/Media divide doesn't exist, but our Natcon is skewed ridiculously heavily towards Lit.
Media fandom believed in community, and for over a decade that community has let them down.
And I think that's long enough.
So what are we going to do about it?Well, as it happens, there is a Natcon in Adelaide this weekend. With a business meeting. That would be a great place to start. I can't afford to go, but I know a fair chunk of you will be there. Do you want to set things in motion, and back each other up?
The fact that the original business meeting notes vanished may be down to accident, incompetence, or deliberate mishandling is neither here nor there. What matters is that it's well past time the situation was fixed. The deal was that in exchange for merging their Natcon with the Lit one, media fandom would get fair representation, in the awards and by extension, the programming. That's not happening.
There's no doubt that there will be resistance. But you know what, fuck it, a deal was made. And it was broken. There's no doubt that it will take years to rebuild things, to get that side of fandom even caring that there's a Natcon, let alone coming to it. And some would argue there's no point. But there is a point.
It could have gone the other way.
The Ditmars could have been lost, the Lit Natcon no more. They easily had the numbers to do this at a time when the Lit Natcon was not doing well, and they still gave up their awards, and their Natcon, with expectation of a fair deal they never received.
I didn't set out to try and get this thing fixed, I just wanted to make the point that we used to have more awards. But fuck it, now I'm angry. Because you know, I read and love books, but if I had to choose which box I fit in, I've always thought of myself as a media fan. Most of us watch films and TV shows, and love them. In our everyday lives, the Lit/Media divide doesn't exist, but our Natcon is skewed ridiculously heavily towards Lit.
Media fandom believed in community, and for over a decade that community has let them down.
And I think that's long enough.
Re: The Ditmars are not the fan drawcard they should be
In my case, I told people not to nominate or vote for Midnight Echo Issue 1 unless they read it.
I also think the quality of the nominees is quite high this year.
I think it's also worth pointing out that there's has been a genuinbe transitions away from fannish things like fanzines and fan art and the like and toward more pro endeavours. This is because the fans who wrote the fanzines and drew the art have become pros in their own right. So the disappearance of more fannish categories, might be more to do with the growing professionalism of the Aussie spec fic scene, rather a dismall of fannish creativity. I mean, it's not like there's hundreds of fanzines or fan productions out there being ignored by the elite.
Just my penneth worth.
Re: The Ditmars are not the fan drawcard they should be
I'm not sure the fan turning to pro argument works too well as a reason for the change in the award categories. That shift from fan to pro has been happening regularly for decades without impacting so strongly.
That said, this year is the first time we've only had 3 named fan categories in a very long time, compared to most of the recent years where there was usually 5 or so. So Paul's argument about small press doing the damage doesn't quite hold water either. Why start so late, given small press has been going strong in Australia for most of the last decade?
Maybe small press are behind the shift this year, but it could just be statistical aberration, a screw-up on behalf or the Ditmar committee, or... something involving flying monkeys.
Re: The Ditmars are not the fan drawcard they should be
:(
Re: The Ditmars are not the fan drawcard they should be
Re: The Ditmars are not the fan drawcard they should be
Re: The Ditmars are not the fan drawcard they should be
Keep that up and I'll have to start scanning my old photos and putting them up...
Re: The Ditmars are not the fan drawcard they should be
Re: The Ditmars are not the fan drawcard they should be
Re: The Ditmars are not the fan drawcard they should be
Re: The Ditmars are not the fan drawcard they should be
I'm not really sure what categories would best represent current media fannish activity. Maybe fan film? The other issue is that until media fandom reconnects with the convention scene the there will be nobody to nominate for any category that we might come up with. A bit of a chicken and egg situation there.
Re: The Ditmars are not the fan drawcard they should be
Re: The Ditmars are not the fan drawcard they should be
(Anonymous) 2009-06-06 03:56 am (UTC)(link)Re: The Ditmars are not the fan drawcard they should be