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meteordustI normally never make public posts about travel, because I prefer to keep real life and online fandom separate. But (1) I did not actually go to New Zealand for Worldcon as planned, and (2) I thought people might be interested in what a virtual Worldcon was like.
I'm going to break it into four posts: the anticipation, the reality, the Hugo Awards, and the aftermath.
Previously
I've been lucky enough to go to two Worldcons before: Nippon 2007 in Yokohama, and Aussiecon 4 in 2010 in Melbourne. It was at the latter that the New Zealand bid team first proposed hosting in 2020. I really liked the idea of another Worldcon in the local area, just a short hop across the water to visit our neighbours. And it would be the first ever Worldcon in New Zealand.
As the years rolled by, and the New Zealand bid team kept campaigning, it looked like other people liked the idea too. No competing bids rose to challenge them. When the vote finally came up, in 2018, they won. Yay!
I enthused about it to all my Australian friends who were into SFF. Quite a few people I knew planned to go. As the dates drew closer, we got progress reports and email updates, about guests of honour, Hugo voting, hotel bookings, and the sights of New Zealand.
Pandemic
So, yeah, that happened.
It was heartbreaking to have to go virtual.
But it would have been gutting to cancel.
I'm glad they made the decision they did.
Platforms
I'm just going to quote the newsletter:
* Socialising - "The social hub of the CoNZealand platform will be Discord. From here, you will be able to enter, talk with bidders at their bid tables, hang out in our social spaces and attend parties."
* Programming - "Programme items will be in Zoom, with the type of item determining what type of Zoom meeting we will use. Most events will be streamed to members and will also be available on The Fantasy Network's app."
* Scheduling - "Our schedule will be in Grenadine, where you can read about our Programme Participants, plan your convention schedule, and get to the programme items."
* Information - "Finally, we will greatly expand the CoNZealand website to provide information on exhibits, dealers, and the art show, and a wealth of information, including the Convention Newsletter and other convention publications."
Planning
One of my favourite things about conventions? Browsing through the programme book and circling everything that looks interesting.
The thing is, Worldcon is big. Five days, twelve hours per day, and half a dozen streams of programming. It can be overwhelming and exhausting. It's easy to get panelled out. So it's good to go in with a plan.
I decided:
- I should probably pace myself to around five hours of events per day.
- I wanted to check out the major events: the opening and closing ceremonies, the guest of honour talks, the masquerade, and the Hugo Awards ceremony.
- I wanted to focus on panels and workshops that made me really excited or intrigued my curiosity.
- I should keep my expectations modest about chatting to new people or catching up with friends. Normally socialising is a big part of a convention, but I was unsure how well this would work online.
- I wouldn't stress too much about also trying to go to readings, kaffeeklatsches, the dealers room, the art show, the film festival, gaming, or filking. There's always more going on than you have time or energy for.
I took a week off work to go. (And a day after, to recover...)
I'm going to break it into four posts: the anticipation, the reality, the Hugo Awards, and the aftermath.
Previously
I've been lucky enough to go to two Worldcons before: Nippon 2007 in Yokohama, and Aussiecon 4 in 2010 in Melbourne. It was at the latter that the New Zealand bid team first proposed hosting in 2020. I really liked the idea of another Worldcon in the local area, just a short hop across the water to visit our neighbours. And it would be the first ever Worldcon in New Zealand.
As the years rolled by, and the New Zealand bid team kept campaigning, it looked like other people liked the idea too. No competing bids rose to challenge them. When the vote finally came up, in 2018, they won. Yay!
I enthused about it to all my Australian friends who were into SFF. Quite a few people I knew planned to go. As the dates drew closer, we got progress reports and email updates, about guests of honour, Hugo voting, hotel bookings, and the sights of New Zealand.
Pandemic
So, yeah, that happened.
It was heartbreaking to have to go virtual.
But it would have been gutting to cancel.
I'm glad they made the decision they did.
Platforms
I'm just going to quote the newsletter:
* Socialising - "The social hub of the CoNZealand platform will be Discord. From here, you will be able to enter, talk with bidders at their bid tables, hang out in our social spaces and attend parties."
* Programming - "Programme items will be in Zoom, with the type of item determining what type of Zoom meeting we will use. Most events will be streamed to members and will also be available on The Fantasy Network's app."
* Scheduling - "Our schedule will be in Grenadine, where you can read about our Programme Participants, plan your convention schedule, and get to the programme items."
* Information - "Finally, we will greatly expand the CoNZealand website to provide information on exhibits, dealers, and the art show, and a wealth of information, including the Convention Newsletter and other convention publications."
Planning
One of my favourite things about conventions? Browsing through the programme book and circling everything that looks interesting.
The thing is, Worldcon is big. Five days, twelve hours per day, and half a dozen streams of programming. It can be overwhelming and exhausting. It's easy to get panelled out. So it's good to go in with a plan.
I decided:
- I should probably pace myself to around five hours of events per day.
- I wanted to check out the major events: the opening and closing ceremonies, the guest of honour talks, the masquerade, and the Hugo Awards ceremony.
- I wanted to focus on panels and workshops that made me really excited or intrigued my curiosity.
- I should keep my expectations modest about chatting to new people or catching up with friends. Normally socialising is a big part of a convention, but I was unsure how well this would work online.
- I wouldn't stress too much about also trying to go to readings, kaffeeklatsches, the dealers room, the art show, the film festival, gaming, or filking. There's always more going on than you have time or energy for.
I took a week off work to go. (And a day after, to recover...)
