For the first time in three years, Kumoricon experienced a growth in attendance, and a record one at that. What is your opinion of growth of the convention, and what more likely would you give an aye vote to if the convention outgrows Vancouver: Staying in Vancouver and instituting an attendance cap, or moving to a venue that would work well with growth?
I am very excited about our recent growth, and would like to see us grow more in the years to come. Growth is the ultimate feedback that says we’re doing well as a convention. And freely choosing to put a cap on attendance when there are other venues available doesn't make sense to me. Our attendees want more variety in programming and higher profile guests, and as a larger convention with a bigger budget we would be in a much better position to bring that to them. While moving to a new location would provide other logistical challenges I think the work is well worth it for the overall quality and well being of Kumoricon.
Give us your schedule of major milestones for Publicity in 2013 (Publications Deadline, Manager hires, Other convention appearances, anything else I may have missed)
Publicity is a little different from the other departments in that events happen shortly after elections that we need to prepare for and staff, for example Orycon and Mochitsuki, and we continue to have events practically every month leading up to Kumoricon. This means that I don’t have the luxury of waiting around for the
perfect graphic designer or promo force staff to come along. Does that mean I’ll take just anyone or that they’ll necessarily be the manager? No. I have more than the required skill set to manage those teams until until managers are hired. I’m looking specifically for people that have the skills needed to do the job, or the skills needed the learn the job, are responsible and good at communicating their needs and concerns in constructive and appropriate ways. I’m hoping that we have a good number returning staff members from last year, specifically in these two positions, so that we can get the ball rolling as fast as possible. Ideally, I would like to have my assistants hired by November and my managers by January.
Other positions, such as photographers and publications staff, can be filled a little later. However, because Publicity has so much up-front work, the sooner I can get a good staff together the better positioned we’ll be to get everyone excited about Kumoricon.
I would also like to address our publication schedule, specifically the Program Book and Pocket guide. Simply put, I think we should push our deadlines up by at least a month for several reasons. First of all, it’s not fair to those staff. Having worked on the Program book in 2011, and in professional graphic design settings, I feel that the amount of work that goes into the con book is a month’s worth of work, which we currently squeeze into a week and half. This sacrifices the quality of the book itself and forces us to pay extra-rush printing charges. That being said, the publication deadlines are not only set by publicity. We get a lot of our content from other departments, so the actual moving of those deadlines would be a collaborative effort on the part of the board of directors. Ideally, I would like to have 80% book content by July 1st, absolutely finalized content by the 3rd week of July and the book sent to print by the beginning of August. The pocket guide is a much simpler matter, but I feel that similar content and acquisition deadlines would make the whole process go a lot more smoothly. The shifting of deadlines will also allow the publicity department to put more time and energy into the things that DO need to happen right be con, such as getting signs printed and reaching out the media outlets as part of our last push before, and during, con to get the word out there.
Teph, you're currently running unopposed. Tell me who would be an ideal assistant in your department.
I want to back up for a minute and explain the breakdown of roles within Publicity, at least the way I see them, for anyone who isn’t familiar. Publicity is easily divided into two subgroups. The first group are the people on the streets, making sure we’re getting our name out there and staffing our events and appearances throughout the year. This includes the Promo Force, Publicity Staff, etc.. The other subgroup creates the promotional materials, such as our graphic designers, videographers, etc.
Because our staff has a diverse set of skills, I feel the most appropriate way to organize the department is to have 2 assistant directors, with each working with each of these subgroups. My goal is to get people for the roles that are already familiar with that area of publicity, and hopefully with a basic working knowledge of the other as well. This will allow for a more natural workflow within the department, as well as more specialized support when the staff need it.
What is your opinion of the proxy balloting system for elections?
I think it’s important to offer some way for staffers that can’t attend the elections to still have a vote. That being said, I think our current proxy system could use some improving.
