Date: Sun, 7 Oct 2007 14:38:12 -0400 (EDT)
From: "Keith F. Lynch" <kfl at KeithLynch.net>
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: Gaylaxicon gets a hotel
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net>

Mike Bartman wrote:
> I went to an Evecon out near Dulles once...there were lots of
> folks there.

I wasn't speaking of Dulles, but of Frederick.  They moved there
specifically to get rid of the riff-raff.  Unfortunately, it turned
out that the "riff-raff" included most of their volunteers, and the
whole thing just sort of fell apart.

> My first Disclave was as a young person, new to fandom without
> massive amounts of disposable income for any purpose.

Likewise.  It cost $4 at the door.  I was willing to risk that much
for something I had no idea whether I would enjoy or not.

> "Convenient to transportation" is very subjective.  I, as a driver,
> find urban cons highly inconvenient.  There is either no parking
> or expensive parking, there's a lot of traffic to get through, and
> things like one-way streets don't help a bit.

Motorists can take Metro.  Nobody is forced to drive everywhere.  It's
rather ironic when people who boast about how much more convenient
driving is complain about how inconvenient it is whenever the
destination is anywhere that a lot of people go.

If you want to get to homes, offices, hotels, businesses, restaurants,
museums, churches, convention centers, railroad stations, airports,
hospitals, schools, or shopping centers, driving is terribly
inconvenient.  If you want to get to a random point in the US, driving
is even more inconvenient (since most are nowhere near a road, as
searches for Stephen Fossett's missing plane have discovered).

But if you want to go to someplace that's on a road but not near
anything (e.g. to a highway rest stop), then cars are convenient --
if you have good eyesight, good health, take the trouble to learn to
drive, buy a car, maintain it, fuel it, repeatedly wait in line at the
DMV, have the papers to get the papers, don't mind carrying ID papers
wherever you go, pay for liability insurance, pay extra taxes, are
willing and able to give your full attention to driving whenever
you're traveling, and are willing to accept risks of being killed
that are orders of magnitude higher than flying or taking a train.

> These factors alone have made me decide not to attend lots of
> cons...like Philcon since they moved back into a downtown area
> from the Adams Mark.

They're very cheap and convenient to get to.  I just take a Chinatown
bus from DC.

> So long as I can find food of some sort, even a grocery store, ...

Magicon in Florida was in the middle of nowhere.  I had thought I'd be
able to get fresh citrus, what with it being in Florida.  But no, the
only onsite food was nasty, and the only offsite food was miles away.

> It used to be that clubs had a high percentage of college age, or
> recently college age, members...now most are middle-aged or getting
> close to that.

Come to PRSFS sometime.  You'll be surprised.

> The Age of Reading may be ending...

I see plenty of large bookstores, with plenty of books and plenty of
customers, despite the high price of new books these days.

Last weekend I went to the National Book Festival on Saturday (at
which I saw several WSFAns), and the used book sale at Arlington
Library on Sunday.  Both events were very large and very crowded.

The rec.arts.sf.written newsgroup, which is for discussion of written
SF, had over 8,000 posts in September.  And it was only that low
because of the Worldcon -- it had over 10,000 posts most months
this year.

The age of SF cons may be ending -- if they can't be kept inexpensive,
visible, and convenient -- but the age of reading is not.