SMOF News, volume 1, issue 36

Con or Bust saved, PAX East staff member dies, StarFest is ending, and news in brief.

Con or Bust Will Continue

As reported back in October, Con or Bust, a fund for helping nonwhite fans attend conventions, has been looking for a new team to run it. The Dream Foundry, a nonprofit dedicated to helping new professionals in speculative fiction and art, has stepped forward to take it over.

File 770 spotted the announcement at the opening ceremonies of Flights of Foundry, Dream Foundry’s online convention, which ran April 8-10. The announcement can be viewed on YouTube.

Alex Jennings and Brandon O’Brien, both previous recipients of Con or Bust assistance, will be heading its revival and expansion. No timeline has been announced yet, and its website and Twitter account are not yet active.

PAX East Staff Member Dies of COVID-19

Dawn “Deestar” Wood, a long-time Enforcer (operations staff member) for PAX East, died of COVID-19 on April 29 or 30 after coming home sick from the convention, which ran April 21-24 in Boston. A GoFundMe for funeral expenses states she was exposed at the event itself.

Kotaku reports that this has revived a discussion about whether in-person conventions are necessary at all:

Some members of the games industry have spoken out against the necessity of in-person conventions. They were difficult to justify once companies and independent creators realized that they could run conferences online, and they’ve only become more contentious as E3 was canceled, covid spread rampantly at the Game Developers Conference, and MAGFest became a spreader event.

While COVID-19 symptoms can begin as little as two days after exposure in rare cases, the incubation period is more typically 4-5 days. CDC data for Suffolk County around the time of the event shows a 7-day moving average of over 300 cases per hundred thousand.

StarFest Ends This Year

StarFest (May 13-15, Denver, Colorado, USA) has announced that this will be its final year. It is one of the last survivors of the first wave of Star Trek conventions that formed in the 1970s. Westword has a look back at its history:

As seminal as that experience might have been, Walker says the inspiration for StarFest itself came from a 1976 science fiction convention in New York City. At the time, she was part of a national organization called the Star Trek Welcommittee, which had been founded in 1972 to answer questions and support the fandom surrounding Star Trek, and she made the road trip to NYC to see the fan events just starting to pop up.

“I remember driving back,” Walker says, “and thinking, 'Why can’t we have something like this in Denver?'”

Walker and her sister Karoline Jobin, who’d gone with her on the trip, started talking about how it might be done. Walker laughs when she remembers thinking, “How hard can it be?”

In Brief

• Pop-Up Gen Con, Gen Con’s companion event taking place in game stores around the USA, is taking 2022 off while Gen Con focuses on getting its main event in Indianapolis going again. Gen Con Online is still expected to happen as previously announced.

• Kumoricon (Portland, Oregon, USA, November 11-13), has added Cherami Leigh, Bryce Papenbrook, Ray Chase, Max Mittelman, and Robbie Daymond as guests of honor.

Event Calendar

Weekend of May 6-8

• Demicon 2022: The After, Urbandale, Iowa, USA

• Furry Weekend Atlanta: The Enchanted Forest, Atlanta, Georgia, USA

• ChupacabraCon VIII (gaming), Round Rock, Texas, USA

• AniMinneapolis (anime), Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA

• Hanami (anime), Ludwigshafen am Rhein, Germany

• South Pacificon Game Fest, San Diego, California, USA

• Heroicon (gaming), Decatur, Illinois, USA

• WagonCon 2022 (gaming), The Dalles, Oregon, USA

• S’mores & Meeples (gaming), Coatesville, Pennsylvania, USA

• Festival Alchemie du Jeu (gaming), Toulouse, France

• GlyphCon 2022 (Pathfinder/Starfinder), Leduc, Alberta, Canada

• 21st Windy City Pulp and Paper Convention (pulp), Lombard, Illinois, USA

• Portsmouth Comic Con, Portsmouth, UK

Weekend of May 13-15

• ColoniaCon 24, Köln, Germany

• SFeraKon 2022, Zagreb, Croatia

• AtomaCon 2022, North Charleston, South Carolina, USA

• StokerCon 2022 (horror), Denver, Colorado, USA

• Geekway to the West 2022: Life Finds a Game (gaming), St. Charles, Missouri, USA

• Huzzah! Con 2022 (miniatures gaming), Portland, Maine, USA

• Romance of the Cyclops Con (D&D), online

• PuchiCon (anime), Tannersville, Pennsylvania, USA

• Metrotham Con Episode 3: Revenge of the ‘80s (media), Chattanooga, Tennessee, USA

• Tidewater Comicon, Virginia Beach, Virginia, USA

• StarFest Denver (media), Denver, Colorado, USA

• Fan Expo St. Louis (media), St. Louis, Missouri, USA

• Saratoga Comic Con, Saratoga Springs, New York, USA

• Northern FanCon (media), Prince George, British Columbia, Canada

• FrankenCon (horror films), Knoxville, Tennessee, USA

• QFX East (LGBTQ+ media), Tampa, Florida, USA

• Seaquestria Fest (My Little Pony), Ocean City, Maryland, USA

Weekend of May 20-22

• Keycon 39: From Myth to Modern, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada

• 2022 Nebula Conference, online

• FurcoNZ: Post-Apocalyptic Punk (anthropomorphic), Ōtaki, New Zealand

• Zomerspel (gaming), Merelbeke, Belgium

• Play (gaming), Modena, Italy

• RPGCON (gaming), Huntsville, Alabama, USA

• BN Video Game Con, Bloomington, Illinois, USA

• Anime Central, Rosemont, Illinois, USA

• IberAnime, Lisboa, Portugal

• Otafest 2022 (anime), Calgary, Alberta, Canada

• Bak-Anime, Bakersfield, California, USA

• Harucon (anime), Klagenfurt am Wörthersee, Austria

• Animefest 2022, Brno, Czech Republic

• ExpOtaku A Coruña (anime), A Coruña, Spain

• Megacon Orlando (media), Orlando, Florida, USA

• Comic Con Baltics, Vilnius, Lithuania

• Argentina Comic Con, Buenos Aires, Argentina

• Dublin Wizard Con (fantasy media), Dublin, Ireland

• Horrorcon UK (media), Sheffield, UK

• Crypticon Seattle 2022 (horror media), Seatac, Washington, USA

Weekend of May 27-29

• Balticon 56, Baltimore, Maryland, USA

• ConQuesT 53, Kansas City, Missouri, USA

• MisCon 36: Carnival of Wonders, Missoula, Montana, USA

• Satellite 7, Glasgow, UK

• Fargo CoreCon: The Great Age of Dragons, Fargo, North Dakota, USA

• Åcon 11 (relaxacon), Mariehamn, Finland

• WisCon (feminist sf), Madison, Wisconsin, USA

• Mephit Mini Con 23 (anthropomorphic), Kirchen/Sieg, Germany

• ConFuzzled (anthropomorphic), Birmingham, UK

• AnthrOhio 2022: Tech Noir (anthropomorphic), Columbus, Ohio, USA

• KublaCon (gaming), Burlingame, California, USA

• GOBFest (gaming), Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

• ReCon (gaming), Kernersville, North Carolina, USA

• PrairieCon (gaming), Brandon, Manitoba

• Rocky Top Game Con, Knoxville, Tennessee, USA

• Nordsken 2022 (gaming), Skellefteå, Sweden

• Gamex 2022 (gaming), Los Angeles, California, USA

• Lincon 2022 (gaming), Linköping, Sweden

• Richmond Open 2022 (gaming), Richmond, Virginia, USA

• BGG.Spring (boardgames), Dallas, Texas, USA

• Enfilade! 2022 (miniatures gaming), Olympia, Washington, USA

• FanimeCon (anime), San Jose, California, USA

• Naka-Kon (anime), Overland Park, Kansas, USA

• Anime Onsen, Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA

• Anime Boston, Boston, Massachusetts, USA

• Thy Geekdom Con (anime), Oaks, Pennsylvania, USA

• Animazement (anime), Raleigh, North Carolina, USA

• Momocon (anime), Atlanta, Georgia, USA

• Mizucon (anime), Miami, Florida, USA

• Sabaku Con (anime), Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA

• Naka-Kon 2022 (anime), Overland Park, Kansas, USA

• MomoCon 2022 (anime), Atlanta, Georgia, USA

• Phoenix Fan Fusion (media), Phoenix, Arizona, USA

• MCM London Comic Con, London, UK

• Fantasy Basel (media), Basel, Switzerland

• Fanboy Expo Knoxville (media), Knoxville, Tennessee, USA

• Star Wars Celebration 2022, Anaheim, California, USA

Weekend of June 3-5

• ConCarolinas 2021, Charlotte, North Carolina, USA

• Oz-Stravaganza 2022 (Wizard of Oz), Chittenango, New York, USA

• Biggest Little Fur Con 2022 (anthropomorphic), Reno, Nevada, USA

• DieCon 20-22 (gaming), Collinsville, Illinois, USA

• UK Games Expo (gaming), Birmingham, UK

• Y-Con 2022 (gaming), Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada

• North Texas RPG Con (vintage tabletop RPGs), Irving, Texas, USA

• A-Kon 31 (anime), Irving, Texas, USA

• Black Hills Con (anime), Rapid City, South Dakota, USA

• KimoKawaii (anime), Conroe, Texas, USA

• DoKomi (anime), Düsseldorf, Germany

• Anime Riverside 2022, Riverside, California, USA

• ExpOtaku Torremolinos 2022 (anime), Torremolinos, Spain

• FedCon (media), Bonn, Germany

• Awesome Con (media), Washington, DC, USA

• 3 Rivers Comicon, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA

• ColossalCon 2021 (media), Sandusky, Ohio, USA

• Alabama Comic Con / KimestuCon 2022, Birmingham, Alabama, USA

• Whinny City Pony Con 2022: Super Hero Showdown: The Return! (My Little Pony), Schaumburg, Illinois, USA

Coda

• The rheology of Oreos (MIT)

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