This post is mainly for my friends in Finland. Jonathan Cowie has just put up a major update to the Concatenation web site. It includes a fairly lengthy rant about the current state of ESFS and the Eurocon. It includes a long quote from Tero’s blog, just to prove that Jonathan isn’t the only person underwhelmed by parts of the organization.
I must admit that my first experience of a Eurocon left me realizing just how good WSFS is at doing things like business meetings and award ceremonies. But I doubt that ESFS will get any better until there is a substantial contingent of European fans who are willing to attend the Eurocon every year and work on making it better. Perhaps people should go to ConRunner and talk about it. Or maybe set up a pan-European con-running convention if they think that the Brits won’t want to get involved in Eurocon (though I think actually they should, because it would help get them off the hook for running European Worldcons).
Thanks Cheryl!
Underwhelmed is the word. Though I personally experienced it like one of the most entertaining chaos I’ve ever walked into. Never again.
I see Jonathan has also written a con report as well. Seemed almost like the one I attended, but not quite. Copenhagen was fun, but not that good a con.
I think that a major issue with Eurocon, even more so than with Worldcon, is that local fan groups are not necessarily competent to put on a large event. The Danes looked like they were trying very hard, but recruiting a bunch of outside help in advance might have been smarter than trying to do it all themselves.
And of course you can’t blame the Danes for the Business Meeting or the Award Ceremony.
I really do agree.
My ability to attend the events of the Eurocon last summer was quite limited, and attending to the events of the main hall was impossible because of its mouldy air.
People at the con were really really friendly and I enjoyed the international atmosphere, programme – and the chaos as well. What impressed me was the national and local co-operation Danish had been able to create in such a small time. That is future in Nordic countires.
Still, they could have used a lot more international help. However, I know how difficult it is to delegate things DURING the con when you are a main organizer. It has to be done in advance. That saved our ****** in Finncon 2997 – and we were so lucky we had wonderful people helping us, like you, Cheryl.
Traveling around the world is expencive in Nordic Countries. I think most of the active Finnfans are able to attend max. one foreign sf con annually. Thus enhancing the funding for the young fans to support their travels is important.
Ipa
Re: Jukkahoo’s comment.
Glad my con report “Seemed almost like the one I attended.”
Regarding “Copenhagen was fun, but not that good a con.” I concur and I did say that the organization was a little ragged. (Perhaps I am too kind?) However having been to a dozen or more Eurocons in my time I can say that it was well above average for a _Eurocon_ and the programme was _very_ good especially by British standards (albeit in my limited experience of having been to a few score Brit cons in my time). (Few Brit cons these days cater for such a broad range of fan interests, though many Brit cons are excellent as more specialist events. We – the core Concat team – suspect that our 10,000 or so visitors a month have a disparate range of SF interests and so I try to write my con reps from that perspective.)
Re: IPA
Yes, the air quality in the main hall (as mentioned in my review) was very bad and put me off the main hall prog items too.
Cheers
JC