Con Report - Westercon70 by Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Con Report
Westercon70
by
Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Over the July 4th weekend in 2017, I went to Westercon in Tempe, Arizona.

I expected to have a good time. Instead, I had a GREAT time.

I hung out in the Star Trek party suit, the Sime~Gen Party, the Con Suite, and was on a number of panels, and an autographing.

It was a busy weekend, but I managed to grab some phone-photos for our historical archives.

You can see some of them below.

Freebie Table

Hall outside Dealer's Romm

Hosts of Star Trek Party with Bjo Trimble GoH

At ongoing Star Trek Party

 Bjo Trimble and me (in blue and black)

Bjo, her husband, and our Party Host

Con Suite

Before Sime~Gen Party

Sime~Gen Party Hostesses

Sime~Gen Party Begins

On a Panel

The panel audience

Another panel

I kept forgetting to take pictures because I was having such a good time!

Jacqueline (happy) Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

Westercon 66 Con Report by Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Westercon 66 Con Report by Jacqueline Lichtenberg


Westercon 66 (2013) was held (as with most all Westercons) over the 4th of July weekend, the weekend of the big plane crash in San Francisco, and several other disruptive bits of news.

But my trip from Phoenix to Sacramento was absolutely nominal.

Except for the addition of the TSA checkpoint hassle, and the chisseling away of passenger seat and overhead space, the trip could have been typical of the 1970's (during which I did a lot of flying, so, yes, disruptions were less of a problem then.)

The plane was full the whole way, and the Phoenix airport (both ways) was absolutely jammed to capacity -- yet staff was on hand and the passengers moved smoothly through the airport.  My rides to and from the airport on both ends were likewise on time and on light traffic moments.

By the time I was on the way back home, the problem at the San Francisco airport was being resolved, and only 3 of the 5 flights on the board from Sacramento to San Francisco were still showing cancelled.  You have to admire the emergency crews that worked through the disruption.  We have so many great folks in this world! 

I got the feeling that the world is waking up at last from the doldrums of the last few years.

The convention was filled with laughter, high spirits, good parties, and busy, lively crowds with the usual level of knowledge one finds at science fiction conventions.

In fact, it was so boisterous that there were people who took refuge on the party floor during a very loud concert held on the ground floor! 

Westercon is a "regional" con that moves from city to city throughout the West USA, each site bidding for the convention as with Worldcon.

http://westercon.org

2014 Westercon is in Utah, and 2015 will be in San Diego, CA. 

So wherever it is held, most of the attendees are local residents, old friends who come to the con to see each other, party, and exchange songs and books (lots of songs!).  And there is always a scattering of folks from around the country, bringing lots of party with them.

I connected with a twitter-friend @Robynmcintyre and had a blast getting to know her in person. 

I met a few people new at the con, one an SF writer with a post-global-warming book out postulating a 200 foot rise in the ocean levels (max at the point where she is writing her story.)  I met her in the Green Room and talked for a couple hours with her, and a fellow doing an academic book on the state-of-the-art in research about Mars.

Also still sitting in the Green Room, I met the moderator of a panel I was on about Star Trek (with John and Bjo Trimble and David Gerrold).  Turns out the moderator is into videogames, and was delighted to hear of the story-driven RPG approach of the crew working on Ambrov X (the Sime~Gen Videogame).

https://www.facebook.com/ambrovx

Consensus among those attending their first science fiction convention seemed to be that entering a group of people who already know each other seems difficult, as they all get chattering to each other about things they experienced in common, somehow forgetting to include the new folks in the conversation.

I've found that typical in other organizations, too, and for the most part organizational leaders remind members to turn around and welcome the new folks into the conversation.  But it takes much reminding!

This issue didn't really prevail at the original Star Trek Conventions where hardly anyone knew anyone else -- except maybe having read something about them or by them in a printed 'zine.  So everyone being strangers (at first), they all connected with each other on the common ground of Trek.

Later, though, the group dynamic shifted to "everyone knows everyone" and the new person, alone in the crowd, had difficulty joining in. 

It seems it's a human behavior thing, not a group-specific characteristic, so I'm not surprised to find it at Westercon or any other con.  But I am gleeful to report that those who found a hard time connecting with people at Westercon 66 are willing to try other conventions.  They will soon be feeling at home. 

Friday morning, I did my stint in Adrienne Foster's Writing Workshop.  The format is that 3 professionals and 3 beginners and a moderator all read all 3 manuscripts by the beginning writers.  Then we sit around a table and each person gives their commentary and analysis of the manuscript.  You get both the beginning writer's input, and the professional input which always contrast starkly. 

The author of the manuscript has to keep SILENT (very hard but accomplished by these 3) during the commentaries, then gets a few minutes to ask clarification questions but NOT DEFEND.

Unusual at this workshop was that we all joined in many uproarious bursts of laughter.  The general spirit of the convention was just that high!  And when the sense of humor is engaged, learning is much easier.

It usually turns out the three pros all pretty much agree on the problems, but sometimes take a different approach to possible solutions.

That's what happened this time, and it provided an interesting discussion.

This time (I've done Adrienne's workshop a number of times), we had three manuscripts that each demonstrated a DIFFERENT skills dearth.  That's unusual.  Ordinarily, we see three manuscripts that lack conflict.

This time we had one that I saw as lacking in conflict which could be cured by bringing forward the COMMON THEME between two disparate viewpoint characters, and adding a third (a villain) opposing the main character's attempt to solve the problem.

And we had one that needed to find a different opening scene, and finally one that proved the most interesting as its only flaw lay in scene structure issues (which is the foundation of information feed).

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/08/plot-vs-story.html

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/07/6-tricks-of-scene-structure-part-2.html

That final manuscript became the subject of an additional 2 hour conversation between the author, the moderator and me.  And I expect that story to sell one day not so long from now. 

After the workshop, I connected with another long-time Sime~Gen fan-writer friend from the area, Mary Lou Mendum who has several Sime~Gen novel-length works posted on simegen.com/sgfandom/, and then in the evening more fans brought together the elements of a Sime~Gen party.

So that evening I sat around in a hotel room holding various conversations against a total roar of sound that ebbed and flowed.  The party was on the party floor, so party-hoppers kept coming in asking "what's this?" and getting (from the hostess Kaires) the explanation of what is Sime~Gen, and all about the latest development, the Sime~Gen Videogame.

Of course, I'd be remiss not to ask for your support on the Ambrov X Kickstarter which is running Sept 3 to Oct 4, 2013.  And that might seem out of place to Romance Writers -- but actually, no, it's not.  You will learn a lot about the dynamics of the marketplace in this new and evolving environment and pick up many clues about how to gain more respect for the Romance field by supporting this Kickstarter and watching the way it unfolds.

Remember, you "donate" to a Kickstarter (using your Amazon or Paypal account, sometimes other means, always easy), but your account does NOT GET CHARGED at all unless the Kickstarter makes it's goal.  So supporting doesn't cost you anything unless you actually get something for it -- each level of support carries with it some tangible reward, and for most products, a copy of the product itself.

People are using this method of capitalizing projects ranging from BOOKS (yes, print and/or e-book) to Web-TV series, and feature films. 

Crowdsourcing capital is changing the face of fiction. 

Kickstarter and the other crowd-sourcing features of our new world indicate a type of change going on that is at least as signficant as the invention of the printing press (before movable type). 

We'll have to go into that in more detail, but today we're talking about Westercon which was a landmark for Sime~Gen, the debut of Ambrov X.  The Facebook Page and website (where you can sign up for a free newsletter if you're not on Facebook) --

http://ambrovx.com

So Friday afternoon, I stopped in to the Gaming room and found a group intent on a board game.  I waved the first Ambrov X flyer at them and immediate interest arose.  The person running the gaming room examined the back of the flyer and then asked if she could POST IT.  I gave her a front and a back (a few of the copies didn't get printed on both sides, so they got used for wall-postings), and a couple for the table.

So as I said, the Sime~Gen Party at Westercon 66 was such a ROAR (a lot of happy people is a good sign for fiction sales in general!) that I'm not sure how much of the facts of the game actually sank into people's minds. 

And the rest of the weekend was non-stop conversation, so as usual I came home hoarse and wonderfully tired.  The hotel wasn't as huge as a Worldcon hotel/convention center setting, so my feet weren't as sore, but my voice was.

I did learn a lot talking to first-timers: #1 that there are people attending their FIRST SF con, #2 that a bunch of them are WRITERS, #3 that there is an appetite for something new, #4 SFRomance has what they're looking for, but they have no clue that it does! 

We have our work cut out for us showing not telling the world that well read, well educated people will find the entertainment they're looking for in Science Fiction Romance.  That may be the conundrum of the century.

by Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://jacquelinelichtenberg.com

Westercon 2009

No, it wasn't the Two Thousand Ninth Westercon, but the 62nd.

62 is really a respectable number for an annual science fiction convention. But I can't keep track of conventions by their numbers, so I use the year. I even do autographs that way. And this year was a particularly nice Westercon.

Science Fiction conventions aren't like political conventions where large bodies of people send "delegates" to represent them. Cons are a 'y'all come' gathering of anyone and everyone interested in the array of topics and the professionals working in the various fields from books, e-books, and other text media all the way to feature films.

I posted my panel schedule here
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/06/snow-dogs-and-happily-ever-after.html

And as it happened, all my programmed events actually were on time and in the scheduled location. That is the sign of a well run convention.

My husband and I arrived at the Tempe Mission Palms hotel just before 9AM on Friday July 3, 2009, and for a wonder, our room was already cleaned and ready for us to move in. The convention had even arranged for us to use the valet parking without an additional charge, so that saved a good fifteen minutes. That was a good omen and the rest of the weekend went just as well.

Those 15 minutes were important minutes as I was scheduled for my first panel at 10AM. We deployed our stuff in our room, and went to find the Green Room where program participant badges were to be had.

Finding the Green Room was easy. We were on the same floor, but far enough away that the parties in the convention's reserved corridor weren't going to keep us up all night. The Mission Palms is laid out somewhat like a Roman Villa with a square hole in the middle, palm trees waving in the court yard, their fronds on the second story level.

The sound proofing was really good since the hotel is right under the flight path for Sky Harbor airport but planes were a distant rumble. And it was a comfortable room (not that I saw much of it!)

When I arrived at my first panel, there were already people in the room holding a rambling conversation as the other panelists zipped in and the room gradually filled. And from there on, it was energy and laughter and wide-ranging well informed questions and comments from the audience.

The first moment I opened the panel room door was a total shock. Instead of the usual hotel chairs that kill your back, the whole room (including behind the panel table) was filled with COMFORTABLE CHAIRS. They had 5-spoke rollers, tilted, spun, and RAISED HEIGHT for taller people, lowered for smaller, and had CHAIR ARMS!!!! The seat and back were made of lacey open fabric that might have been carbon filament, I don't know, but it stretched nicely and didn't make you hot.

I couldn't believe those chairs. I loved them and so did everyone else.

You'd think it would make you crazy to sit facing a room full of rows and rows of these swiveling chairs and watch people fidget, rock, sway, and jigger back and forth. Guess what? FANS didn't do that to people. Everyone sat still (except me; I succumbed a number of times, then realized I had to sit still too.) Everyone loved those chairs though, even people who had to watch other people sit in them.

A few quick polls of several of the panel audiences showed that they had much reading in common and had at least seen many of the same TV shows. They didn't all know each other, but they really all KNEW each other. There were instant friendships being formed everywhere and old acquaintances re-connecting.

That thread continued through nonstop panels, hallway conversations, con suite conversations and into the evening parties.

Friday night, one of the Sime~Gen fans known as Kaires engineered a Sime~Gen party, put posters up, got a room in the party section of the con's hotel block, and put out an array of interesting snacks. Laurraine Tutihasi and her husband helped set up, and within an hour we were having drawings for door prizes (mostly books of course).

The Art Guest of Honor was Todd Lockwood ( http://www.toddlockwood.com/ ) who did the splendid cover for Sime~Gen The Unity Trilogy



While I was madly running around Friday on programming, my husband tracked down Todd (who seemed to be on programming opposite me all the time) and got him to sign a hardcover copy of Sime~Gen The Unity Trilogy for me. (goshwow indeed)

One panel I was on was about the new Star Trek movie, and I was on with David A. Williams who moderated and Alan Dean Foster who did the novelization of the screenplay.

Alan had tales to tell about how much and how little access he had to the film before having to write the novelization. He has written a number of novelizations of films so he had a great deal of experience to draw on to make the most of the very little a novelization writer gets from producers. He said he got to see a screening of the Trek movie rough cut, but couldn't record it and had to take hand-written notes to work from.





Photo taken with my new cell phone! Your left to right - Alan Dean Foster, David A. Williams (ASU space science professional), and me, Jacqueline Lichtenberg.

Between panels on Friday I stopped at one of the used book dealers in the dealer's room to sign whatever copies of my books he had (quite a stack -- I keep thinking I must have signed every one printed, but alas not yet) and while I was sitting there a couple more people came up with stacks for me to sign.

I think they may have thought it was my official autographing session, which was scheduled for 5PM on Friday. One fellow brought along three or four titles plus FACES OF SCIENCE FICTION (photos of SF authors) which I'm in. I said, "Ah, you must be a dealer," and he said, "No, these are for my relatives."

A whole family that loves science fiction? Wow.

I think I signed books and touted and sold some for the merchant for about 40 minutes.

Then I ran to another panel, and came back for my official autographing and there were only a couple of people waiting. The other person who was to autograph didn't make it to the table. A writer I'd met on facebook, Dana Davis ( http://www.danadaviswriting.com/ )brought me a couple of review copies of her own books, one of which I started right at the autographing table because there was a lull in conversations, and am still reading (with absorption). Desert Magic: Superstition, is set in Scottsdale, right here in the Valley of the Sun, and in the Superstition Mountains which I see every day I go walk in the park. (I'd see them all the time but houses are in the way.)

Jennifer Roberson likewise didn't make it to Westercon though she was assigned a number of program items. I was looking forward to seeing her again!

Saturday I was pooped already, and I wasn't on any programming items, so I had the luxury of going TO things instead. I saw an entry for a film titled STARWATCH that was being previewed at the convention and after showing the film there was to be a panel with the actors and producer. I wish I had a website where you could buy the DVD already, but I will be notifying you as soon as I know how you can see this film.

Here's why.

As I sat down to watch it, I recalled it was supposed to be a low budget film, but when it started I sat watching the whole first act and it suddenly occurred to me to wonder if I were in the wrong place. "Where's the low budget film?"

But no, it was the right place. It was an astonishingly low low budget film with a credit roll that took only a few seconds but the film had the look and feel of a typical theater release.

It's set in the asteroid belt after a war between Earth and a corporation that settled the astroid belt and created a whole new culture. But it's still oil and water out there -- the factions are spoiling for more fighting.

The science premise that has me intrigued is that one faction is hot on the trail of a method for "weaponizing souls" -- harvesting souls from dark-energy from the Big Bang and using the souls to transmit destructive force that can pulverize anything.

The audience and the producer didn't seem to think this particular weapons research would turn up again in a TV Series made from this feature film (if there ever is one), but I can think of more stories to tell about it.

I didn't at first realize that the fellow introducing the film (whom I was sure I'd seen at cons before) was actually THE producer of the film, but later I went up and told him exactly what I thought of it, then realized it was his work. Well, honestly, I wasn't trying to butter him up or anything. I really do like this film.

After the panel with the actors and producer that followed, I met the fellow who did the special effects (all the space ships and advanced tech), Jeremy Totel http://www.pixeleight.org/ -- that's ORG not COM; the .com is selling cameras)

And I met a couple of the stars, among them a woman I think may go far, Silvia Suvadova (http://www.suvadova.net/ ) I met her later in the restaurant and she gave me her card. I gave her my NL flyer. Today she turned up linking to me on facebook. I would love to see her as a Vulcan on Star Trek, and a major ongoing character.

Then I went to see (finally) a presentation by Todd Lockwood
http://www.toddlockwood.com/ with a blog at http://www.tolo.biz/

Todd showed slides of some of his work (mostly dragons and warriors which is his specialty) and then gave a demonstration of how he can use Corel Draw to make a dragon's head. But he says he much prefers working in oils. Today publishers often accept electronic files for artwork which makes working in electronic originals more attractive. He uses a top of the line digitizer pad to draw freehand.

And Saturday night, the 4th of July, was FIREWORKS (the hotel was very close to where major city firewords displays originate, and mundanes flock to this hotel for the vantage). The Con Committee had the genius to nail a suite for the Con Suite that had the best view of the fireworks and they held a fabulous party with good food and lots of people.

At the same time there was a STAR TREK PARTY put on by the local Star Trek fan organization one of the oldest (perhaps by now the oldest) in the country. Many members have gone on to work in the space program projects based in the ASU (Arizona State University) campus nearby, and south of here in Tucson.

I talked so much that by Sunday morning I had laryngitis. There were no microphones for the panelists and the parties were full and loud. The crowd was exuberant and joyful, even the smokers who could only smoke out-doors usually on the balconies outside the elevator lobbies.

But Sunday, luckily, I had smaller panel rooms which still had a good turnout, considering how much partying everyone had done. Even the 3PM panel I was on about making fan friendly websites was well attended.

Sunday between panels I signed some more books. By the end of the con I was ready to take off for home which was only a half hour drive. This is one of the reasons I decided to move here -- local conventions! And Los Angeles and San Diego are in reach. Even the San Francisco Bay area is available. And these days there are good cons developing in Las Vegas ( Xanadu being a case in point.) Seattle often hosts Westercons, too.

Overall, Westercon was a very well run convention, the programming mix of topics and panelists was ingenius (done by Catherine Book), the food services in the con suite were nothing short of miraculous, and the dealer's room was full of books, costumes and jewelry.

The art show was small, but high quality. In addition to Todd Lockwood's leap-off-the-wall art (the man is a master of perspective), there was a tapestry of the Hogworts coat of arms that dominated one aisle and was readable across the huge ballroom that contained art show and dealers room. It looked REAL. I've seen it before, but it was hung splendidly under the right lighting here.

The costume Masquerade actually ran short but produced eye-popping winners. I suspect the economy and the threat of the flu pandemic that's developing as worse for younger people kept some people with children home. There were fewer very young children than usual, but those that were there had the advantage of a very professionally run children's programming track.

Usually fans come to conventions whether they're sick or not, hacking and coughing, sneezing and wheezing they ignore everything just to get to the panels and parties. This time though, I didn't notice anyone who was ill.

Regional SF book-focused conventions have shrunk in size, and this year Westercon (July in Phoenix, remember) had around 700 people attending in a hotel where you had to go outside to get from one group of function rooms to another.

Since I live here, I didn't mind too much, and there were even people sitting at outdoor tables in the court yard in the 107 degree heat talking a mile-a-minute. I actually had to wear a sweater most of the time because the hotel had cold-spots. I wasn't uncomfortable in the sweater when I went outside. The dew point had dropped below 50 again, and it was nice weather (for July 4th in Phoenix).

But when I got into the car to drive home -- I checked the dashboard thermometer and it read 112F. Well ... the valet parking had left the car in the sun, but 112 is noticeably warmish.

Watch http://www.westercon.org/ for the next Westercon. Pasadena CA in 2010, San Jose CA in 2011 -- July 1-4 each one.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://www.simegen.com/jl/

Bits and Pieces of Catchup

I think one of my greatest ambitions is to write SHORT blog posts.

Didn't make it today. I did try. Really, I did!

I'm way behind on getting packed for Westercon which will be held in Tempe, AZ, right up the road from me over the July 4th weekend. I've just filled out the speaker questionnaire but don't have my schedule yet. Anyone reading this blog who's planning on Westercon? I didn't see any Alien Romance panels, but signed up for everything that might lead into such a discussion. Come help me open (warp?) some minds.

http://www.westercon.org/

I hope you have had time to read my previous post and all the stuff linked to it. Could take you a week to wade through all that.

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/06/crumbling-business-model-of-writers.html

Waiting for everyone to catch up, here's some bits and pieces of followup on other open topics woven into a writing challenge.


I know there's a novelization of the Trek movie, and I haven't read it yet. (yet being the operative word -- I sooo want the DVD and book; I'll pass on the action figures.)

There's a wild and thriving ongoing set of posts on twitter about people seeing the new ST movie 4 and 5 times and more. Some posts saying "what's so great about ST?" and others in goshwow shock. Other long time fans of Trek are still seeing it FOR THE FIRST TIME.

Twitter is carrying some criticism of the actors, some snearing at the entire concept.

I saw one review that really lowered my opinion of both the reviewer and the publication, calling the ST movie melodramatic.

It isn't.

But I can see how someone assigned to review a movie set in a universe they think of as kiddie stuff or teen-action-stuff (SF has borne that perjorative all along) would find this script "melodramatic." That's a point of view that always happens when someone is not engaged in the fictional universe. If you're wholly engaged, the emotional tension does not seem overblown or out of proportion to the issue. But that works only if you really understand the issue.

If everyone is running for the exit in screaming panic, and you're just standing there, you should ask yourself, "What do they know that I don't know?"

Reviewers who slap the label "melodramatic" on a piece of fiction generally haven't asked themselves that question about the audience that does not see the story as melodramatic. In fact, the rest of the audience may be seeing the story as understated while "sophisticated" reviewers trash it as melodramatic. This is in general, not just about this particular Star Trek movie.

It's not the writer's fault usually. "Melodrama" is not a property of the text or script. It exists only in the reader/viewer's mind. (You won't likely find anyone else who holds such an opinion).

There is one flaw a writer might introduce that could give some viewers the impression of melodrama, and that's failing to display in show-don't-tell the character motivations, sensitivities, hot-button issues, loyalties, friendships, and relationships, all clearly derived from the theme.

The JJ Abram's Star Trek movie is written to give you as much of these character and situation traits as possible in the time alotted (and fit in all the commercially requisite action). Anyone have an opinion on what the envelope theme of this film is? Perhaps it's "The Challenges Temper The Character Strengths?" I.e. what character strengths are there already get made stronger by challenges.

When a reviewer sees a movie as "melodramatic" it may not be the reviewer's fault for being unobservant, disinterested, or prejudiced. It might be the "fault" of the review publication for assigning the wrong person to do the review. If someone has a strong emotional reaction to a piece of fiction, a reaction which embarrasses them deep inside, they might slap a distancing label on the fiction -- as if the fiction is at fault for their own refusal to confront their own emotions. You can't tell if that's the case just be reading a review of a film you have seen.

Or the negative reaction might possibly be the fault of the professional reviewer for choosing to review a product because it's popular so that the review will get read rather than reviewing something else that's less popular.

When I read that accusation of "melodrama" against Star Trek (in the context of "it's not a good enough movie for this much hype and people who are enchanted with it have something wrong with them") it brought up questions about how people interact with fiction, fictional universes, and with their own expectations and anticipations.

There's a lot of hype for the Trek movie, and as usual fans are divided into various camps regarding how well or poorly this or that favorite aspect was handled. In general, and overall, there's a consensus of approval and wait-and-see from the old fans, and some astonished interest from new or younger people. To them, it's just a good action movie without a lot of subtext. To veteran fans, it's ALL subtext.

So public discussion makes non-fans (or even non-viewers of Star Trek) curious, and they go see the movie, and express their reactions in public (on twitter maybe).

That's how you sell a lot of movie tickets, you see. Word of mouth (or tweets) motivates people better than any amount of paid commercial time on TV.

All these thoughts are related to some very abstract thinking I've been doing lately, about how fiction strikes a person at different stages of maturity. (I've been reading a number of children's books for my review column.)

And there are subjects flickering in the back of my mind about how the USA used to have so much of a common language and experience, and how that's all been destroyed.

The base cohesiveness of our society has been shattered. That lack of imagery and trivia in common is taking a huge toll, and most people don't realize why these horrific things are happening. New stuff will arise to take its place, because humans need stuff in common with each other, but meanwhile we've got a generation without a cultural connection to anyone other than those with interests in common. The wireless web is changing THAT, too, but it hasn't taken hold yet.

Not everyone paid attention to the Presidential Election! Those that did formed cliques, as usual in politics. But we can't even say "everyone" heard Obama's speeches other than snippets on news shows. You can read his words on the web, but it's not the same as watching his delivery.

Recently, I met someone who had worshipful, shining, beatific eyes every time she mentioned (often) how much she TRUSTS Obama to do the "right thing." She was absolutely pro-Israel, and seemed totally unaware of Hillary Clinton's declaration that none of the USA's verbal agreements with Israel will be kept, period.

I was thinking, as I watched her speaking to other pro-Israel and not-so-pro-Israel people, that if I put her conversation into a story as dialogue, the editor would X it all out because it's implausible the way she ignored everything everyone else said and insisted on how much she TRUSTS Obama, and that trust solves all problems. (talk about melodrama -- her conversation dripped melodrama -- I could hardly believe I was watching a real person not a character).

Other people listened to her politely, but didn't CHALLENGE her thinking (remember the idea the Star Trek movie is about character tempered by challenge). People just expressed their own opinions, without pointing out the fallacies in hers -- they could see she would explode emotionally if challenged, and that would be disruptive to the group. So she left without having her certainties questioned, as one would expect in DIALOGUE. Her "story" and "plot" did not progress because of this group conversation.

Which of course leads into a point I've made on this blog before, that:

A) DIALOGUE is not CONVERSATION.

B) CHARACTERS are not PEOPLE

Somone who prefers to read non-fiction, but has to watch the Star Trek movie ( because maybe their wife dragged them?) might take the film's dialogue as "melodramatic" because it tries, in a very short time, to lay out for you a set of comprehensible motives.

Also consider this is a feature film. The series was designed to be an ensemble show, and each of the characters got a 50 minute (back when there were fewer commercial minutes per hour - maybe 49 minutes) show in which to be introduced. But JJ Abrams was starting from scratch to introduce these (NEW) characters to a new audience, all in one movie.

The script actually does that introduction fairly well within the time alotted. The characters of course come off shallow if all you know is what you see in this new movie, shallow and perhaps overly impressed with themselves.

One of the requirements for good feature film script writing is that there is ONE star character, and maybe a co-star, and all the rest are SUPPORTING characters. Kirk is of course nominally assigned the "starring role" -- but the truth from the POV of many viewers is that Spock is the star. (yep, I'm one of those). Because this show was (will be again?) a TV show (already another movie is in the works), the ENSEMBLE CAST requires fudging the "star-co-star-supporting" paradigm.

If, in your mind, you're superimposing these characters on the old TV characters, you see disparities and are so busy thinking what the old characters would do that you don't totally engage in and thus BELIEVE the current characters.

The result is that you see melodrama instead of drama because you think the characters are OVER reacting.

Well, is this woman who "trusts" Obama "overreacting?" She doesn't think so, and most of you don't either. She thinks she has good reason to trust him, but can't say what those reasons are. She's just bewildered that anyone might squint sideways at Obama and wonder if WYSIWYG.

It all has to do with how we "judge" people and how we "judge" characters -- how we evaluate the values of another person.

And that brings us to the question of whether politicians (and say, actors?) whose "images" have been professionally built by spin-doctors are "characters" or "people."

And what has this all to do with creating that blockbuster TV show with Alien Romance that will change the world?

That woman was in love with Obama, even though she'd never met him. She couldn't separate the image from the man - the character from the person (as often happens with fans of a TV character who can't separate the actor from the character.)

The adoration I saw in her eyes was soooo totally "romance" -- it was Neptune at it's best, worshipful adoration. I'd seen fans of Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Chekov, Uhura, and Scotty with that same beatific expression when discussing the lives of the characters as if they were the lives of the actors, or vice-versa.

I saw in her eyes the experience of JOY in being UNDERSTOOD and being SAFE AT LAST. (I'm not kidding; I saw that, but it may not actually have been there. I am always researching this Alien Romance problem even when wandering around the social fabric of my mundane existence!)

She was not an SF fan. She was ever so mundane. She was an older woman, well and securely married. Her husband was there and totally agreed with her assessment of Obama and apparently had no inkling that there could be a jealousy issue going on there.

Here was a woman so infatuated with a public image that is a "character" more than a "person" that she totally believes she's assessed him correctly.

That's what falling in love does. It cuts the critical faculties out of the circuit and allows you to believe the image you are projecting onto someone is the actual, real person and not a reflection of your own aspirations.

And that's exactly the state of mind you must have in order to "fall in love with" a real Alien From Outer Space.

Here's the thing about Neptune, though. What you see in another person through Neptune's veil is sometimes more TRUE than what you see through your critical faculties.

Sometimes, your critical faculties have been honed by training in very logical, practical ways. And because of that, sometimes your critical faculties will reject information that is actually pertinent simply because the information seems implausible.

That's how a professional reviewer could conclude that the JJ Abram's ST movie is "melodramatic." A reviewer often is trained as a critic (they aren't supposed to be the same function), and an art critic has to view art through his/her critical faculties.

But art, by its very nature, speaks to the subconscious, subverting all critical analysis. Even the art of the spin-doctor creating a politician's image for the media speaks to the subconscious. Spin-doctors work with the fabric of symbolism to get you to believe what they tell you in ways that mere words could never achieve.

The subconscious does not view the world through the conscious mind's critical faculties.

When the subconscious becomes convinced, it over-rules the conscious mind and asserts its opinion as the TRUTH. And subconscious can't be swayed by facts.

So, if we're going to create a TV show, an Alien Romance, that will argue our case the way Star Trek argues the case for SF, we have to include one character like the woman I met with the starry-eyes for Obama. This character has to speak for the human capacity to see past the obvious surface and into the true heart -- as McCoy does in Star Trek, and as this woman believes she has with Obama (which she may have; we'll see).

------and one more bit-------or maybe a piece?------

I've been talking a lot about social networking, the cure for the shattering of our culture as mentioned above.

Found this link on twitter
http://social-media-optimization.com/2009/02/top-twenty-five-social-networking-sites-feb-2009/

and on that page it says:

Interesting information from Compete.com that shows Facebook surging past MySpace in Monthly Unique Visitors and that Twitter has moved from #22 to #3 in the rankings of the top 25 social networking sites by monthly visits.
-------------

And another link on that social-media-optimization page is to an article on the "graying of facebook"

-----------------

http://social-media-optimization.com/2009/02/the-graying-of-facebook/

WHICH STARTS:

Last week I was at a meeting at Facebook and as Facebook was talking about their demographics, one of the statistics that struck me was facebook’s demographics is starting to mirror those of the U.S. of A.

-----------------

Nevermind reading these whole articles (hey, I'm not the only long-winded person on the web!), just those two facts juxtaposed with the snatches on ST from Twitter and various reviews is telling us so much about where to find a lever long enough and where to stand to move the world toward respecting Alien Romance.

Here's another bit of the puzzle.

http://www.thegalaxyexpress.net/2009/06/8-ways-science-fiction-romance-could.html

quotes my blog entry at
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/05/marketing-fiction-in-changing-world.html

and reasons to the conclusion:

---------- THEGALAXYEXPRESS.NET ---------------
These days, authors aren’t just writers—they’re entrepreneurs.
----------END THEGALAXYEXPRESS.NET ----------

And that is what Jean Lorrah and I have been discussing with an ever increasing intensity.

Jean Lorrah is researching (she's a professor, you know? Research is her bag.) how to employ the techniques used by web based entrepreneurs to the needs of writers. Basically, it's not really a compatible set of techniques. A writer can't just take what these (big buck$ maker$) do and use it to sell books. Readers would run away in droves. But, as you can learn a lot by watching Mission: Impossible or McGiver or Burn Notice or Royal Pains, you can stoke your creative fires by subscribing to free things around the web.

Jean has found a Free Offer from one of the best teachers in the web-entrepreneur business which will open June 15, 2009 and run for a very short while.

See? That's one of their techniques -- short, quick opportunities that ignite your greed to get something others can't get! But to put our culture back together, everyone has to be able to get some specific thing that that everyone else has. We need things in common, not divisiveness.

Here's a link where you will be able to get the free offer (as of June 15th which is next Monday and I don't know how long it'll run). Jean says this is a good place to learn web marketing from Jim Daniels, who has been doing and teaching since 1996.

http://fc403pw6f3th2ke9upz2l1cngo.hop.clickbank.net/

Now to the writing lesson.

If you want to write a BURN NOTICE type TV program to pitch to TV producers, but using (say) a web entrepreneur ( tall, blond, built, and HOT!) as the male lead, and perhaps the actress who stars in (and probably writes and produces and creates the music for) his YouTube videos, getting this free subscription would be a good start in scoping out the character of these people and finding some of the web-entrepreneur tricks that are like the spy-tricks used on BURN NOTICE.

The web entrepreneur tricks can be used as plot devices as High School Chemistry often served McGiver (and now Royal Pains).

Remember how I discussed the use of SETTING in telling a story when a Producer, J. Neil Schulman, mentioned how a Psychic Cruise could be the setting for a Monk or Murder She Wrote episode?

http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/05/medium-is-message_19.html

Here's a chance to do an exercise like that "USA Characters Welcome" pitch.

"Wagon Train To The Stars" became Star Trek because Wagon Train was the most popular, longest running, iconic TV show at the time (maybe other than Gunsmoke, but Gunsmoke took place mostly in one town).

What is the most popular TV show today? Or web-show? What is iconic in the USA? What is topping the ratings? What is the longest running or has the widest demographic? How do you pitch an Alien Romance to the general audience? What do kids and parents watch together?

Iconic Current Show into A New Setting.

We have to transpose that woman I met into the setting we need, and build a springboard into a CHEAP TO MAKE TV series. (Star Trek was cheap for its day, considering the state-of-the-art FX; and it looks it!)

A Web Entrepreneur's life would be a great SETTING, (mostly shot on a standing set of an office with lots of electronics; plus some location shots of hotel ballrooms for speeches; stock shots of airports; standing set hotel rooms -- pretty cheap) and I'm sure a worshipful woman would "fall for" his spin-doctored character in each episode, pissing off his Soul Mate.

Are there any Web Entrepreneur TV series yet? Have I come up with something new here? THE APPRENTICE MEETS MY FAVORITE MARTIAN?

Now consider what an Alien stranded on Earth would do for a living? In BURN NOTICE, we have a guy with no visible means of support using his spy skills to help people and make a few bucks in fees. Why wouldn't an ALIEN gravitate to electronic salesmanship to make a living?

Yes, of course there would be obstacles -- which points to conflict.

Today's audiences are filled with people who have been ousted from salaried jobs and are applying their talents to becoming "consultants" or self-employed entrepreneurs.

Tell me the story as an Alien Romance. I do hope you've read Linnea Sinclair's DOWNHOME ZOMBIE BLUES!!!

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://www.simegen.com/jl/

Westercon 2008 Report

I flew to Las Vegas with my husband for Westercon the day before programming started. We had bought tickets in January, so our fare was reasonable.

We were on Southwest, and they are not charging extra for checked bags -- but have reduced the weight limit to 50 lb and enforce that. Because I was carrying books for "show and tell" on the panels -- plus flyers to give away -- my bag weighed in at 49.5 lbs. When we picked up the luggage in Las Vegas, I found the handle on my rolling suitcase had ripped off. I've got to travel much lighter if I do that again.

We got settled in the hotel, picked up badges and learned the way around this huge, spread out hotel. It's a sprawling, multi-building golfing resort/casino that usually charges $399 for the room we got for $150 (which is still way high by convention standards).

Thursday morning we went wandering through the convention area and started meeting people. I met The Wombat (Jan Howard Finder) and we had a good 2 hour talk, then wandered around talking to other people.

I found the Green Room just opening up and sat down for a while.

I got to talking with some people, and it turned out two of them were a reporter-photographer pair looking for a story. I gave them several. They took my name, but I forgot to find out who they were.

Back near Registration, I ran into Jan Howard Finder (The Wombat) again and he introduced me to the fellow who was running the hotel's "business office" where you can get stuff copied for an exhorbitant fee. Turns out he's an aspiring SF writer. I gave him a flyer or three and a pep talk.

Programming started at 2:30 and I had my first panel. I was surprised we had 6 people listening to this panel. I did an autographing and Kaires turned up while I was introducing someone to the Sime~Gen universe. Kaires was wearing her S~G T-shirt and silver starred cross -- so she became my "show and tell."

The Convention's party maven had not answered Kaires' emails asking for party-space at the con. (room parties were not allowed; you had to use the designated rooms) By the time Kaires got an answer from the party maven, it was "sorry, all booked" even though she'd requested space months in advance. Kaires had come all set to throw a whopper of a Sime~Gen party Friday night, but we just couldn't make it happen.

Friday I did another bunch of panels -- a few more people in the audience at each successive one as people arrived. I didn't have so much energy as I usually do, and wondered why. The topics were interesting and the audience awake -- the panelists clever and full of things to say. I wasn't. (got some laughs and a compliment or two anyway).

After a short discussion in the dealer's room with another panelist (Tony N. Todaro I think it was) someone came up to me in the hallway and gave me the most surprising compliment of my life -- that I exhibited great body language during that exchange in the dealer's room! I didn't know anyone was listening or watching. That made my day.

I woke up Saturday morning with a stuffy head and by 11AM I knew I had a cold, not just allergies. I'd have given everyone at the S~G party a cold -- so it's a good thing we didn't have the party!

My husband ran all over and finally found someone in the Con Suite who gave him some ephedrin for me. Saved my life. Later, the hotel gift shop produced NyQuil and DayQuil which I lived on until I got home to my more usual remedies. That's the first time in decades that I've gotten sick at a convention. Usually, it's after I get home!

Despite laryngitis and stuffiness, I did my remaining 3 panels on Sunday and garnered a number of compliments, gave out some newsletters, and had another unique experience.

I often carry around several books of mine and offer them for sale at the end of a panel especially if that title isn't in the Dealer's Room. And I often get some takers. This time I wasn't doing that at all, but did have a couple of books to wave around that I commented on during the panels.

At my second to last panel, someone came up to me and asked if I had any books of mine for sale because someone told her that I usually carry some around to sell. So I sold one of the books that threatened to make my suitcase over-weight.

I'd given out flyers too, so I went home a lot lighter than I'd come because I refused to buy anything in the Dealer's Room (that was hard). Good thing I went home light, though, without the suitcase handle.

I made a DIARY ENTRY: Don't Fly With A Headcold.

But I wouldn't have missed this convention for anything. Due largely to the oil crisis and that the venue was more expensive than usual, there were barely more than 300 people at this convention -- more like a pre-Star Trek con. Next year, when Westercon is in the Phoenix suburb Tempe, we might have as many as a thousand attend. I've already been invited to be on programming there, and since it's a 20 minute drive up the road from me, I definitely plan to be there.

But frankly, with the cost of air fare soaring, I'm not planning as many trips as usual next year.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg
http://www.simegen.com/jl/