Date: Thu, 20 Oct 2005 00:10:51 -0400
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>
From: Elspeth Kovar <wsfalist at wsfa.org>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: Great Con Redux...(DMZ Version)
Cc: Capclave 2005 <Capclave at yahoogroups.com>
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>

If I've done this correctly I've sent it to both the WSFA list and the
Capclave 2005 list but with all replies going to the WSFA list so that the
conversations don't diverge.

At 02:53 PM 10/19/2005, Mike B. wrote:
>At 01:10 PM 10/19/2005 -0400, dicconf wrote:
> >On Wed, 19 Oct 2005, Mike B. wrote:
>
> >> Friday had 2 plus a video room (watching "Euro-Buffy" I think).  Saturday
> >> had 4 that were on the board and that I attended at least briefly.  I
> heard
> >> rumors of a couple of private parties as well.

It's worth noting that three of the parties were held by Worldcon bids and
Corflu, the fanzine convention, got in touch with me the Friday of the con
to ask if they could be moved so as to hold a party.  This is pretty
amazing for a fairly new convention, especially one as small as ours which
isn't dedicated to running conventions.  Hopefully it will encourage
Worldcon bids to attend in the future.  There's a synergy between bids,
voters, convention runners, authors, editors, and so on.  I think that this
will be very good for us.

(I couldn't do anything about Corflu, as they needed a suite where smoking
was allowed, but we did manage to put them at the very end of a
hallway.  But because we couldn't buffer them it was, officially, a
'private' party.)

Besides, the bid parties are almost always attended by interesting people
and when they ramp up are really quite good.  Joe Mayhew once described
Disclave as "a party for people who read."  The word "party" made some
folks think of a drunken bash but we all know that that's not always
true.  WSFA meetings, after the business is done, are a "party for people
who read".  We don't always and actually rarely talk about books but we're
all the sort who do read.  [NB: this isn't to exclude people who are mostly
interested in non-reading aspects of SF -- I'll write that post later.]

If we're looking to become a convention where people come for the
programming and also the chance to spend time with other people rather than
only attending programming we've made a good start.  Our Guests of Honor
and other notables were as often found hanging out in the consuite or
parties where people could talk with them as on panels.  Excellent
programming, a wide number of people, and parties and a consuite where
people could mingle was great.

>It's also worth noting that none of the parties I was at got calls from the
>hotel, or anyone banging on the walls, or shouting anything down the halls
>about shutting up and letting people sleep, so the planning and effort that
>went into isolating the parties from the mundanes and others who sleep when
>it gets dark out paid off well.  Another check in the "things done right"
>column IMO.

Thanks, but the majority of the thanks don't go to me or the very few
people who agreed to have their rooms next to or near the parties so as to
buffer them from people who want to sleep.   All of the credit goes to Miss
Joanne, the only hotel housing manager I've ever heard of, much less known,
who could put the puzzle pieces together on their own.  She and I spent a
lot of time together the Friday a week before the con doing the basic
work.  When there were suddenly changes the Thursday and Friday of the
convention she made that work as well.

** Next year we may not have Miss Joanne.  Even if we do could people
please make her life, and mine, easier by volunteering to be near parties
and/or asking others to do so?  The Hilton reservations system isn't set up
such that people can express a preference when reserving a room so we
depend on people letting us know, people not bucking being recruited, and
this year people not objecting when I unilaterally put them near parties
without consulting them. **

Concerning some Capclave budget issues.

Bob has my record of the tips we gave the hotel.  For front line staff --
front desk, bellhops, the folks who set up rooms and supply the food,
beverage, trash pickup, water, and all the rest of that -- we worked out $5
per person for all the folks who worked during our convention.  From all
reports they certainly earned it.  Managers, however, aren't tipped in
cash: it's tacky.  In fact I gather that fewer and fewer meeting planners
tip managers at all.

That's not something that I subscribe to, so Capclave has the expense of
gifts to the managers who did the most work for us.  Mr. Mucci received a
copy of Future Washington inscribed to him by the Chairman as well as one
of the better "Capclave 2005" book bags.  John, who was on duty most of the
time and was in charge of our food, water, and trash received an inscribed
copy of Future Washington.  Miss Joanne received an inscribed copy and a
pair of earrings that Judy had made.

Capclave owes Judy for the earrings, Fo'Paws for the bag, and WSFA for the
books.  I'd forgotten to include all of this in the budget but hopes that
people consider it money well spent.

Elspeth