Belated MediaWest*Con 33 Trip Report
Jul. 7th, 2013 03:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
penfold_xDespite my misgivings about the hotel switch, I had a great time at MW*C 33.
I met up with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
myfieldnotes and mrwubbles in Detroit. We stopped at Tea Haus in Ann Arbor for afternoon tea, which I highly recommend to anyone passing through the area. Tea Haus is an authentic tea shop, serving literally hundreds of teas, including some rare picks of high quality. The servers really know their stuff, and if you order afternoon tea, you're free to change to a different tea at any point--I tried two on this trip, both of which were quite good. The afternoon tea menu is fantastic: delicious sandwiches, a fresh soup, hot scones with jam (whipped rather than devon cream, alas), and fabulous desserts, including house-made macarons. We've had tea at nearly every location available between Detroit and Lansing, and Tea Haus is by far the best--on par with the finest offerings in NYC, DC and LA.
Unfortunately, in addition to the known issue of not everyone in our group getting into the con hotel, we found out just a few days before that the hotel had (seemingly randomly) dropped days from many of the reservations. Those affected included the only people in our group who were trying to sell a new zine, and thus needed to be in the hotel all five days. We did some quick switching around so that they didn't miss out on Thursday--top sales night--and after one night were at least able to get everyone back into the host hotel.
Aswraithfodder has noted, the new hotel layout is less con-friendly than the former hotel. Most of my friends' rooms were stuck in the "Dagobah system" at the back of the hotel, a very long walk from the programming areas. The handicap rooms were also in this area, which seems, frankly, insane. The hotel design is a kind of courtyard, so hall-crawling naturally went in a square formation. There are a few cross-courtyard halls that were, by their nature, sort of out of the way; if I were trying to sell from those rooms, I'd be very frustrated.
The hotel offered complimentary breakfast to their guests. We took advantage on the first day, and it was decent. It would have been nicer had it not been offered out in the pool area, with the attendant, powerful chlorine odor.
I felt the hotel tried to get into the spirit of the convention, as much as they could considering they had mundane guests to accomodate as well (including a convention of state corrections officers which was winding up as we were moving in--strange bedfellows, indeed). The restrictions on advertizing were reasonable (only during the con, keep it on the glass/non-wood surfaces), and there were no nastygrams threatening those who moved furniture or breathed too hard on the decor. The hotel is in the middle of renovating its rooms, so a few folks got fridges, microwaves, and flat screens. The televisions would not hook up to any external devices without a coaxial cable, which was the only really significant problem (you can ask a bunch of media mavens to subsist on warm soda and cold pizza, but we need our TV!).
The only food offered by the hotel outside the breakfast buffet was in their attached restaurant, Finley's--sort of a midwestern Friendly's or TGI Friday's. Great if you wanted steak or something deep-fried, but not a place I'd recommend for anything else. Fortunately, there are several decent chain restaurants within walking distance of the hotel, including Cracker Barrel, Bob Evans and Denny's, as well as a farm market and a convenience store. The neighborhood is also much nicer than the one around the old Holiday Inn South, so you can feel safe walking to these locations, even late at night.
There was less programming space than at the old hotel, and this was especially noticeable in the dealers' room, which eventually spread out into the hallway so that dealers could get some elbow room. The table set-up resulted in small travel spaces, which was difficult, especially for folks with mobility issues. By and large, there did seem to be enough function space for almost everything else, so if we're at the Ramada next year, I think we'll be able to make it work.
As you may have suspected from my almost total lack of updates, I've mostly been focused on work this year, and didn't do much planning for MW. Pyramids Press took a break, so I wasn't obligated to do anything other than show up for the fannish technology panelmyfieldnotes and mrwubbles shanghaied me into moderating.
I attended a few panels, particularly for Doctor Who (very popular this year, including a lot of door decorations), and had a great discussion of Cabin Pressure (which had only one panel but it was very well attended). There was a lot of discussion of technology this year, including social media platform preferences and ereader formatting, tricks and tips. Avengers and its related heroes seemed to be the most popular fandom, with many panels, costumes and dedicated doors, though there was still big love for Sherlock Holmes' many incarnations, and seemed to be a lot of (low-key) Person of Interest fans as well.myfieldnotes created our Iron Man door, which, like a genius, I forgot to take a photo of. Fortunately cannellfan did. myfieldnotes mixed shots of magazines with Tony on the cover from Iron Man 1 with covers of real magazines Robert Downey posed for, which she photoshopped to read "Tony Stark". They work fantastically well because, as RDJ has noted, his story is essentially Tony's story.
I spent most of my time just jawing about fandoms old and new with my friends. I'm really thankful I got to spend time withlunate8, b7_kerravon and wraithfodder; they are fantastic people who I, unfortunately, see only at MWC. A number of us went out to see Star Trek: Into Darkness, then take it apart together over dinner, which was great fun.
There weren't a lot of gen zines this year in my fandoms; I wound up only buying one: Crossing the Gate, frombrate7. It's an SG-1/SGA crossover zine, with fic from some of the best authors, including mrwubbles (Yum@), liketheriver, Sheila Paulson and JJJunky. It sold out at the con, but she ordered another small shipment, so if you'd enjoy reading the Stargate universe crossed with Supernatural, Star Trek, Sherlock, NCIS, Mag7, or Ghostbusters, check it out!
Even without packing the con with panels and workshops, it still seemed to fly by. Although there were a few problems with hotel, I had a great time and am eagerly looking forward to next year.
I met up with
myfieldnotes and mrwubbles in Detroit. We stopped at Tea Haus in Ann Arbor for afternoon tea, which I highly recommend to anyone passing through the area. Tea Haus is an authentic tea shop, serving literally hundreds of teas, including some rare picks of high quality. The servers really know their stuff, and if you order afternoon tea, you're free to change to a different tea at any point--I tried two on this trip, both of which were quite good. The afternoon tea menu is fantastic: delicious sandwiches, a fresh soup, hot scones with jam (whipped rather than devon cream, alas), and fabulous desserts, including house-made macarons. We've had tea at nearly every location available between Detroit and Lansing, and Tea Haus is by far the best--on par with the finest offerings in NYC, DC and LA.Unfortunately, in addition to the known issue of not everyone in our group getting into the con hotel, we found out just a few days before that the hotel had (seemingly randomly) dropped days from many of the reservations. Those affected included the only people in our group who were trying to sell a new zine, and thus needed to be in the hotel all five days. We did some quick switching around so that they didn't miss out on Thursday--top sales night--and after one night were at least able to get everyone back into the host hotel.
As
wraithfodder has noted, the new hotel layout is less con-friendly than the former hotel. Most of my friends' rooms were stuck in the "Dagobah system" at the back of the hotel, a very long walk from the programming areas. The handicap rooms were also in this area, which seems, frankly, insane. The hotel design is a kind of courtyard, so hall-crawling naturally went in a square formation. There are a few cross-courtyard halls that were, by their nature, sort of out of the way; if I were trying to sell from those rooms, I'd be very frustrated.The hotel offered complimentary breakfast to their guests. We took advantage on the first day, and it was decent. It would have been nicer had it not been offered out in the pool area, with the attendant, powerful chlorine odor.
I felt the hotel tried to get into the spirit of the convention, as much as they could considering they had mundane guests to accomodate as well (including a convention of state corrections officers which was winding up as we were moving in--strange bedfellows, indeed). The restrictions on advertizing were reasonable (only during the con, keep it on the glass/non-wood surfaces), and there were no nastygrams threatening those who moved furniture or breathed too hard on the decor. The hotel is in the middle of renovating its rooms, so a few folks got fridges, microwaves, and flat screens. The televisions would not hook up to any external devices without a coaxial cable, which was the only really significant problem (you can ask a bunch of media mavens to subsist on warm soda and cold pizza, but we need our TV!).
The only food offered by the hotel outside the breakfast buffet was in their attached restaurant, Finley's--sort of a midwestern Friendly's or TGI Friday's. Great if you wanted steak or something deep-fried, but not a place I'd recommend for anything else. Fortunately, there are several decent chain restaurants within walking distance of the hotel, including Cracker Barrel, Bob Evans and Denny's, as well as a farm market and a convenience store. The neighborhood is also much nicer than the one around the old Holiday Inn South, so you can feel safe walking to these locations, even late at night.
There was less programming space than at the old hotel, and this was especially noticeable in the dealers' room, which eventually spread out into the hallway so that dealers could get some elbow room. The table set-up resulted in small travel spaces, which was difficult, especially for folks with mobility issues. By and large, there did seem to be enough function space for almost everything else, so if we're at the Ramada next year, I think we'll be able to make it work.
As you may have suspected from my almost total lack of updates, I've mostly been focused on work this year, and didn't do much planning for MW. Pyramids Press took a break, so I wasn't obligated to do anything other than show up for the fannish technology panel
myfieldnotes and mrwubbles shanghaied me into moderating. I attended a few panels, particularly for Doctor Who (very popular this year, including a lot of door decorations), and had a great discussion of Cabin Pressure (which had only one panel but it was very well attended). There was a lot of discussion of technology this year, including social media platform preferences and ereader formatting, tricks and tips. Avengers and its related heroes seemed to be the most popular fandom, with many panels, costumes and dedicated doors, though there was still big love for Sherlock Holmes' many incarnations, and seemed to be a lot of (low-key) Person of Interest fans as well.
myfieldnotes created our Iron Man door, which, like a genius, I forgot to take a photo of. Fortunately cannellfan did. myfieldnotes mixed shots of magazines with Tony on the cover from Iron Man 1 with covers of real magazines Robert Downey posed for, which she photoshopped to read "Tony Stark". They work fantastically well because, as RDJ has noted, his story is essentially Tony's story. I spent most of my time just jawing about fandoms old and new with my friends. I'm really thankful I got to spend time with
lunate8, b7_kerravon and wraithfodder; they are fantastic people who I, unfortunately, see only at MWC. A number of us went out to see Star Trek: Into Darkness, then take it apart together over dinner, which was great fun. There weren't a lot of gen zines this year in my fandoms; I wound up only buying one: Crossing the Gate, from
brate7. It's an SG-1/SGA crossover zine, with fic from some of the best authors, including mrwubbles (Yum@), liketheriver, Sheila Paulson and JJJunky. It sold out at the con, but she ordered another small shipment, so if you'd enjoy reading the Stargate universe crossed with Supernatural, Star Trek, Sherlock, NCIS, Mag7, or Ghostbusters, check it out!Even without packing the con with panels and workshops, it still seemed to fly by. Although there were a few problems with hotel, I had a great time and am eagerly looking forward to next year.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2013-07-07 08:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-09 01:43 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-08 10:17 pm (UTC)I guess the hotel doesn't remember us anymore. Isn't this the hotel where it *used* to be at, until it went feral? I have the dimmest of memories of having been there a couple of years before the switch.
no subject
Date: 2013-07-09 01:54 am (UTC)Like we would have gone ahead without you? Please!
FWIW, Science of Deduction brought home the FanQ. It was a bit odd because we wound up competing against a classic Holmes zine (I think that was an accident), but, there was also a ton of really great feedback from folks asking for a second issue. It was fantastic to know so many people enjoyed it.
Isn't this the hotel where it *used* to be at, until it went feral?
Yes, though the hotel is now under new management. I didn't start attending until 2000, so I didn't experience it, but my understanding is during the 1991 con the owners double booked the event space and MWC wound up having to have events in the pool area, which is still there and very noisy.
no subject
Date: 2013-07-09 11:11 pm (UTC)Congratulations! (Golly, all those years of fanfic, I think that's the first time I've been associated with something that won a FanQ!)
during the 1991 con the owners double booked the event space
It wasn't an accident. The management had gone against the convention and wanted it OUT, to the point that they deliberately double-booked. The bride in the wedding that got some of our space was a Denny's waitress, and she actually came to apologize. The Denny's across the street apparently did a third of their annual business from us; they even came and talked to the hotel, but it did no good. I remember the representative from the hotel where we ended up going around the convention trying to sway the Carletons into getting the business.
no subject
Date: 2013-07-11 02:16 am (UTC)