Worldcon question

[stephbg]

I'm assuming that Worldcon has a panel programme of some sort. Since I've only ever been to Swancons, can anyone provide a compare-and-contrast with Swancon panels? Bigger audiences therefore less interactive? Fewer fan panellists? That kind of thing. TIA

Comments

[strangedave.livejournal.com]

The most important thing about Worldcon programs is that they have many streams, so you can't generalise much -- all sorts of things can lurk in the 5th or 6th stream of programming, including some awesomely cool and weird things. Some of them have MUCH bigger audiences, all star panels, and relatively little audience interaction, but some of them, particularly the ones that are more about fandom than SF are quite a lot like Swancon panels. The main difference is they have a LOT more authors to use, so a lot of panels will tend to get filled with authors with less fans. But there are whole streams that are mostly fans.

The fans that are on panels tend to be ones with experience on panels, and usually some qualifications, rather than newbies.

I've been a Worldcon panellist a bunch of times, at a few worldcons. There will be some individual Worldcon differences.

[kremmen.livejournal.com]

As an example, here's Nippon 2007's programme. That's a small (i.e. non-US) Worldcon. US ones can get up to 25 streams.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

Well, I've never been to a Swancon, so I can't give you a direct comparison, but I've been to a lot of Worldcons and to a lot of "local" conventions (BayCon and SiliCon in the SF Bay Area, Norwescon in the Seattle area, OryCon in the Portland area, etc.), and I personally don't think there's a significant difference between a panel at a local con and a panel at a Worldcon. Oh, you can sometimes get huge-turnout events where it wouldn't be practical to have the small-scale interactivity you would when the audience and panel have about the same number of people, but because a Worldcon can cover so much variety, you can certainly find all types of panel type event. The biggest thing a Worldcon has is a larger pool of "talent" from which to draw, and more program items to provide. The essential format of the convention doesn't change, though; there's just more of everything.

[mortonhall.livejournal.com]

Were you looking at the Australian Worldcon or a different one?

If it's the Australian one then you have an in with the Divisional Head of Programming who will do their best to find you *something* that you can be on :)

[emma-in-oz.livejournal.com]

Cough, I think that for instance there will be an arty stream in which you might want to participate.