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lance_sibleyI got another cold call from a headhunter this afternoon; this was from an agency I'd dealt with before, but a different agent. In the "it's a small world, but I wouldn't want to have to paint it" department, he noticed this line in the "other interests" section of my resume:
(That's not nearly as impressive as it sounds, as![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
dagibbs will attest.)
It turns out his aunt is also a member of Buckman's, and I've played against her many, many times. This headhunter also plays, but he hasn't been to Buckman's since the 1970s. I wonder if I've played against him at tournaments.
Alas, the position is a 24/7 oncall support position with American Express, located at Warden and Highway 7. There's no conceivable way I could get to the office if the pager went off in the middle of the night (in fact, getting to work would take about two and a half hours normally), so we agreed that it was not a good fit and he didn't submit me. It was a fun conversation, however. (And coincidentally, I was wearing my Buckman's sweatshirt today...)
Had a lousy night at bowling: 124, 149, 152. That first game was my second-worst game of the year, and the series was my worst. Troy and I have both noticed that since the alley put in new pins a few weeks ago, we're both bowling poorly. The one good thing about tonight was that we were bowling against Troy's team, so at least I had friendly people to hang out with. Alas, one of Troy's teammates won the strike pot tonight - it hadn't been won in several weeks, so it was about $1000.
I had a bad headache when I got there, which probably didn't help. I don't know why, exactly, but I slept an extra hour today and woke up with it. Then I probably exacerbated it by trying to use the computer this afternoon to check my email. I really have to figure out a way of getting my curtains up to block out the afternoon sun.
When I got home around quarter to 11, I sat down to actually deal with the emails that had come in. There were 27 Toronto Trek panelist signups, which I've assigned to various team members, which gives us a total of 32 so far. (Last year, we had a total of 186 panelists.) I hope everyone who tried to sign up before we discovered that the automatic emails toozreison and myself were being lost in cyberspace has seen the various requests to forward their personal confirmations (which were not being lost) and have done so, or resubmitted the web form. (Damn ISP.) The problem has been fixed now, fortunately.
The track list is being expanded to add Battlestar Galactica as a separate track. We really should have set that up at the beginning of the process, but it was something that slipped past us. Argh. (Well, slipped past me, at any rate. I shouldn't speak forozreison. :) ) I've tweaked four of the Programming-related web pages to reflect this change; now to pester dx4 into getting them up. (I had a weird dream last night that he was actually back reading/posting on LJ, and I had to go back and change a bunch of posts so that he wouldn't see what I'd written about him. I don't know why, as I've never written anything about him that would make me want to do that. Unlike certain other people whom I cannot name lest I incriminate myself.)
I also had 12 panel suggestions to sort out (why do people submit panels on Survivor for the More Shows track when we have a perfectly good Non-SF track?), and about 20 other generic emails to deal with this evening. There was an interesting one from the SMOFS list: a member passed along this interesting little tidbit regarding Creation Entertainment:
The first paragraph struck me as someone within Creation just blowing smoke. First of all, fan-run cons don't sell "tickets", nor are there different "brackets" of ticket, as a general rule. Secondly, fan-run cons have dozens of things happening simultaneously. If you can't get into the main room at TT on Saturday to see Rene Auberjonois (for example, since he's our only announced guest so far), there are a dozen or so panels going on, plus the video room, the anime room, the gaming room, photos or autographs with other guests or readings that you could go to, and see Rene speak on Sunday. (Okay, that doesn't work when a con has a guest only appearing one day, but that's the exception to the rule.) Creation only has each actor appear once, so if you miss him/her, you're screwed.
However, that second paragraph is particularly disturbing. Fan-run cons work on a model which includes mutual benefit, and usually, dates are chosen so as not to coincide with other fan-run events within the same geographical location. What constitutes "competing" to Creation may not be the same thing as in fandom. Are they referring to events taking place on the same weekend as Creation events? (Personally, I think that any group running a con against a Creation or Hobbystar event would be essentially committing suicide, as fan-run events don't have the same advertising or guest budget.) Or are they just talking about other science fiction events, regardless of the weekend on which or the geographical area in which they're being held? If I want to promote Toronto Trek at a Creation event in Buffalo in April, for example, and there's a Creation event being held the same weekend as TT in, say, Minneapolis, are they going to raise a stink?
Companies which put on for-profit events have always wanted to be the only game in town. However, the more Draconian their policies, the more they will put off the regular-Joe fan who wants to enjoy a convention experience.
Personally, I'd like to see Creation and Hobbystar drive each other out of business. It aggravates me when I see people posting threads at TrekBBS saying "Are you going to this convention on such-and-such weekend?" I open the thread, and they're talking about Creation. Argh. I want to shake those people by the scruff of the neck and scream, "THOSE AREN'T CONVENTIONS! THEY'RE JUST CATTLE CALLS DESIGNED TO GIVE YOU AS LITTLE AS POSSIBLE FOR AS MUCH OF YOUR MONEY AS THEY CAN TAKE!"
Ahem.
But I would never do such a thing, because I'm a good poster who only rants about my fellow TBBS members on my LJ or in private conversations withrosemary_ca or kosst_amojan. ;)
*deep breath*
Hey,montrealais is coming to town tomorrow, so I may not be nearly as verbose online over the next couple of days.
- Member of American Contract Bridge League and Kate Buckman Bridge Studio; current rank is Life Master
(That's not nearly as impressive as it sounds, as
dagibbs will attest.)It turns out his aunt is also a member of Buckman's, and I've played against her many, many times. This headhunter also plays, but he hasn't been to Buckman's since the 1970s. I wonder if I've played against him at tournaments.
Alas, the position is a 24/7 oncall support position with American Express, located at Warden and Highway 7. There's no conceivable way I could get to the office if the pager went off in the middle of the night (in fact, getting to work would take about two and a half hours normally), so we agreed that it was not a good fit and he didn't submit me. It was a fun conversation, however. (And coincidentally, I was wearing my Buckman's sweatshirt today...)
Had a lousy night at bowling: 124, 149, 152. That first game was my second-worst game of the year, and the series was my worst. Troy and I have both noticed that since the alley put in new pins a few weeks ago, we're both bowling poorly. The one good thing about tonight was that we were bowling against Troy's team, so at least I had friendly people to hang out with. Alas, one of Troy's teammates won the strike pot tonight - it hadn't been won in several weeks, so it was about $1000.
I had a bad headache when I got there, which probably didn't help. I don't know why, exactly, but I slept an extra hour today and woke up with it. Then I probably exacerbated it by trying to use the computer this afternoon to check my email. I really have to figure out a way of getting my curtains up to block out the afternoon sun.
When I got home around quarter to 11, I sat down to actually deal with the emails that had come in. There were 27 Toronto Trek panelist signups, which I've assigned to various team members, which gives us a total of 32 so far. (Last year, we had a total of 186 panelists.) I hope everyone who tried to sign up before we discovered that the automatic emails to
ozreison and myself were being lost in cyberspace has seen the various requests to forward their personal confirmations (which were not being lost) and have done so, or resubmitted the web form. (Damn ISP.) The problem has been fixed now, fortunately.The track list is being expanded to add Battlestar Galactica as a separate track. We really should have set that up at the beginning of the process, but it was something that slipped past us. Argh. (Well, slipped past me, at any rate. I shouldn't speak for
ozreison. :) ) I've tweaked four of the Programming-related web pages to reflect this change; now to pester dx4 into getting them up. (I had a weird dream last night that he was actually back reading/posting on LJ, and I had to go back and change a bunch of posts so that he wouldn't see what I'd written about him. I don't know why, as I've never written anything about him that would make me want to do that. Unlike certain other people whom I cannot name lest I incriminate myself.)I also had 12 panel suggestions to sort out (why do people submit panels on Survivor for the More Shows track when we have a perfectly good Non-SF track?), and about 20 other generic emails to deal with this evening. There was an interesting one from the SMOFS list: a member passed along this interesting little tidbit regarding Creation Entertainment:
CONVENTION SEATING & THE CREATION ENTERTAINMENT DIFFERENCE:
Unlike so many other genre conventions, Creation Entertainment has a
strict company policy not to "oversell" our conventions. In other words,
every patron, no matter what bracket of ticket they purchase, will have a
seat in the main auditorium where the major guests appear and events take place. Nothing upsets us more than hearing about other conventions that sell tickets to patrons and then those very same patrons have to wait on additional lines inside the facility to get into (or sometimes not!) the main theatre. An important Creation Entertainment difference we want you to know about!
Promotion of genre events is strictly prohibited without pre-written
confirmation by Creation Entertainment. Although we often allow this to
occur at our sole discretion, if the event you wish to promote is directly
competitive to existing or planned Creation events, unfortunately we can not allow promotion of said conventions. Distribution of promotional flyers for sci-fi or other genre conventions without permission will result in your booth being closed without refund.
The first paragraph struck me as someone within Creation just blowing smoke. First of all, fan-run cons don't sell "tickets", nor are there different "brackets" of ticket, as a general rule. Secondly, fan-run cons have dozens of things happening simultaneously. If you can't get into the main room at TT on Saturday to see Rene Auberjonois (for example, since he's our only announced guest so far), there are a dozen or so panels going on, plus the video room, the anime room, the gaming room, photos or autographs with other guests or readings that you could go to, and see Rene speak on Sunday. (Okay, that doesn't work when a con has a guest only appearing one day, but that's the exception to the rule.) Creation only has each actor appear once, so if you miss him/her, you're screwed.
However, that second paragraph is particularly disturbing. Fan-run cons work on a model which includes mutual benefit, and usually, dates are chosen so as not to coincide with other fan-run events within the same geographical location. What constitutes "competing" to Creation may not be the same thing as in fandom. Are they referring to events taking place on the same weekend as Creation events? (Personally, I think that any group running a con against a Creation or Hobbystar event would be essentially committing suicide, as fan-run events don't have the same advertising or guest budget.) Or are they just talking about other science fiction events, regardless of the weekend on which or the geographical area in which they're being held? If I want to promote Toronto Trek at a Creation event in Buffalo in April, for example, and there's a Creation event being held the same weekend as TT in, say, Minneapolis, are they going to raise a stink?
Companies which put on for-profit events have always wanted to be the only game in town. However, the more Draconian their policies, the more they will put off the regular-Joe fan who wants to enjoy a convention experience.
Personally, I'd like to see Creation and Hobbystar drive each other out of business. It aggravates me when I see people posting threads at TrekBBS saying "Are you going to this convention on such-and-such weekend?" I open the thread, and they're talking about Creation. Argh. I want to shake those people by the scruff of the neck and scream, "THOSE AREN'T CONVENTIONS! THEY'RE JUST CATTLE CALLS DESIGNED TO GIVE YOU AS LITTLE AS POSSIBLE FOR AS MUCH OF YOUR MONEY AS THEY CAN TAKE!"
Ahem.
But I would never do such a thing, because I'm a good poster who only rants about my fellow TBBS members on my LJ or in private conversations with
rosemary_ca or kosst_amojan. ;)*deep breath*
Hey,
montrealais is coming to town tomorrow, so I may not be nearly as verbose online over the next couple of days.
