A Convention in Planning
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| Title: | A Convention in Planning |
| Creator: | Bjo Trimble |
| Date(s): | late 1971 |
| Medium: | |
| Fandom: | Star Trek: TOS |
| Topic: | |
| External Links: | |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
A Convention in Planning is a 1971 essay by Bjo Trimble.
It was printed in The Nimoyan #3.
It is likely that this essay was a bit of a warning to the Star Trek Lives committee about how difficult these cons could be for "newbies," as well as an opportunistic attempt to steer interested fans to her own con, Equicon. Seeing how Star Trek Lives already had a date and venue in place, Trimble's comments are a bit slyly aggressive. It was certainly a bit of an off-hand brag to bring up Los Angeles as "where the show started." All of these things together may have been seen as passive aggressive, and perhaps even sabotage.
In any case, discussion and planning of these two cons made it apparent that the interest and energy for these proposed gatherings was high.
Some Topics Discussed
- brief mention of the still-in-planning stage of Star Trek Lives! con in New York City
- Trimble's "version" of this con, which meant more Star Trek programming added to Equicon, something that didn't occur until 1973
From the Essay
New conventions pop up all the time; comics cons, witchcraft & sorcery cons, mystery cons, and now a Star Trek con! It should work; there are certainly enough fans, but most of all, it should work here in Los Angeles where the show started. Would two such cons in one year be too much? Would you go to both? Could you attend a California con where you might not make it to New York? Give us your ideas, affirmative or negative, on this, please?
Having a full-fledged convention is not as easy as a one-day gathering in some hall. All you have to do then is rent the hall, or convince the owners to volunteer it "for a good cause" in some cases. Then let the event occur; people will arrive and rap and enjoy themselves, trading film clips and experiences. But the minute a conventioneer pays a nominal sum for membership to a convention, he has bought a license to gripe! It is a wonder that anyone ever throw a con again, but people do!
A convention involves setting up exhibits, spaces for hucksters (sales) and guaranteeing the hotel that enough people will rent rooms and buy banquet tickets to help pay for the meeting rooms and banquet hall! Any standard hotel will charge around $350 to $600 a day for a ballroom, unless the convention meets its guarantees. Along with arranging several days worth of programming, a convention committee can end up with a huge bill, if the convention is not a whopping success! It's hard work, but it can be rewarding for the committee, if a really good convention has been run.
However, before a convention even starts, there are publicity and mailing expenses, speaker’s fees, hotel and travel expenses for some of the guests, display cases to be rented, fashion shows to pay for, and the extras charged by the hotel; costume balls involve lighting and music, and so on. Out-of-pocket expenses can be staggering, plus the extra work of convincing people that the convention is important enough to attend, and celebrities that it will be of any use whatsoever to their career, so they will come and speak or at least show up!
But several local ST fans have been kicking the idea around for some time, and would like to try it. We have the experience of putting on some very successful (and fun!) science fiction conventions, and the others have the fannish enthusiasm necessary for the hard work involved.
What do you think? What kind of program would you like to have?. Actors? Writers? Technical people? What movies would you like to see as part of the late-night program? How about an art show? Would slides — made from film clips — shows be of interest? Would you like to know more about the movie-making and TV industry in general, or stay just with Star Trek, or at least only science fiction shows? Outside the convention hotel, what would you like to see in the Southern California area? What else would you like to know about? What would YOU suggest for such a convention?
If we had the support of ST fans, we could arrange a really fun (as well as informative) convention. If you agree, write the Trimbles with your suggestions and answers to the questions posed. If you disagree, by all means write the Trimbles and tell them why!