Response to Open Letter from Carl Stark
CONduit was conceived as an old style fan oriented, fan run,
general interest Science Fiction and Fantasy convention. The
goal of the trustees is to return CONduit to a more inclusive,
open, vibrant, fan oriented convention.
We Trustees have become very unhappy with the direction the
convention has taken over more than just the past couple of
years. We have, if you will, fully "rebelled" against the more
recent past pattern of doing things and have embarked on a
fully new direction of effort.
It is keenly interesting that the dissatisfaction of the
Trustees married with the newest effort of the fen to again
try to involve CONduit in a dialog of concern. We share those
very concerns.
Every year our convention has garnered between 150 and 200
new members. Yet our net growth each year has been only about
50-75. As for the perspective that what we are doing is pleasing
to our membership, the numbers clearly demonstrate the opposite.
While some loss is inevitable—people move, have new pressures
in their lives, build new interests, etc.—a number equal to
the loss of 50-75% of our annual membership increase states
there is Trouble right here in River City. And the majority who
are leaving are the more long-term members. For 2011, while we
pulled in 283 new members, 306 people who attended in 2010 did
not return.
To reverse this trend, we need to be open to and listening
to all the various areas that a general interest SFF convention
should involve. This means a significantly greater interest in
providing both programming and guests for Media, Filk, Costuming,
Gaming, Horror, Anime, etc. while providing a reasonable level
of support for the areas that have, for the past few years,
strongly dominated the convention.
Why have we not moved sooner? Fear. If we changed direction,
we believed a certain, undefined, group of people would leave
the Planning Committee. Would there be others willing to step
in and fill those roles? We genuinely feared there would not.
This year we decided that did not matter. We needed to return
CONduit to its roots, its original raison d'etre. If there were
not the people out there who wanted that too and were not
willing to help us do that, then perhaps CONduit had run its
course and it was time to let it out to pasture, as it were.
Interestingly, each of the Trustees came to this decision
independently. We met the Saturday after CONduit to discuss where
we wanted to go. We each learned there we were of a single mind
to where we needed to take the convention. Brad took on the
responsibility to define how we might achieve that.
The next Saturday was the June meeting at which we close out
the old convention and begin on the next. Breaking with
tradition, a new chair for the Planning Committee was not
elected. Rather the Trustees asked for a brainstorming session
assuming no limitations on any kind of resource—a DreamTime
as one correspondent has called it.
On the third Saturday following CONduit 21, we held a
Business Meeting to which anyone was welcome to come and
provide input on our new direction. We were thrilled with the
response and are pledged to continue in our new direction.
We now look to you, current members, past members and
future members to work with us to make this new direction
successful. We certainly cannot do it alone.
The CONduit Trustees
Pam Oberg
Debbie Lords
Brad Hawks
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