GeekNights Thursday - Dashcon and Horrible Convention Disasters

MrPeriod

Tonight on GeekNights, we discuss what went wrong at the ridiculously failed and popularly-enjoyed failure of Dashcon. In sum, people think doing things (like running cons) is easy. They see a convention happen and think "I could do that!" And the truth is: it IS easy... if you're intelligent, knowledgeable, drama-free, and able to respond in a timely fashion to email. Most people are incapable of being all four of these things. Dashcon 2014 was a joke (just LOOK at their ridiculous panels application form). Dashcon 2015 will be a disaster. In the news, Jeff Lemire has a new comic coming that touches all the right things, and SDCC is happening (and to be avoided).

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Neito

Y'know, after having been to some terrible panels, I can kinda understand wanting to see if people are reliable via an interview, but (and I feel like this could apply to a lot of what DashCon was) it was just not practical given the amount of people they had (and the fact that they were all raving lunatics, apparently.).

MATATAT

When I first heard of Dashcon I thought it was a brony con as well.

Victor Frost

In terms of failed conventions:
Mikomicon, an anime convention held at my university, failed after three years due to (as the CSUN anime club members told me) drama, incompetence, and shoddy bookkeeping.
Equestria LA, a brony convention, only managed to get two conventions (in the same year, mind) before the shut down due to drama and shoddy book keeping. This time the drama was in the leadership, as I know all the staff since they were all experienced staffers from Anime Los Angeles who were asked to come in and save the first two EQLAs. There was also a ton of confusion and mismanagement in the accounting department, I hear.

MATATAT

There's a pattern of drama in all of this.

Luke Burrage

This episode has never downloaded properly for me in about 7 or 8 attempts.

Apreche

Luke Burrage said:

This episode has never downloaded properly for me in about 7 or 8 attempts.

Working perfectly over here.

Brand

I'll be sharing this episode with some of my friends. We run an anime club and it always comes up that we should try running a con. Which in concept I have no problem with. But I've heard a lot of stories about how much work it is. So, I'm always the Debbie downer, who is like this going to be a lot of work.

I actually had a friend go to Dashcon. I didn't ask her about it after she got back though because I felt like it would as insult to injury.

I do think the average person going to a con would never check out the panel submission form. Even when I submit panels as a team, I always end up at the point person to fill them out. And for something like Dashcon I would guess many of the people who did go haven't been to a con before.

I'd say never go to a 1st year con but I totally have. I went to the Strasburg Railroad's Steampunk Unlimited last year. And while there was less stuff then I hoped (I am really used to big conventions) it was nice and you could totally ride the train all day if you wanted.

MATATAT

Suckers.

Coldguy

Dashcon returns.

New name, same bull shit they posted in the first place.

Neito

And the hilarity when 4chan finds this in 5... 4... 3...

ShadedSpriter

I am a bit behind on my podcasts so hearing again about dashcon I got something similar to bring up around the same time I also heard of another convension disaster.

Mine-o-rama a minecraft convension in new York got about $500,000 in ticket sales cancelled 5 Days before the convension and now has literally disappeared off the internet.

SWATrous

Ooh that's some shiiit right there. I wouldn't imagine it difficult to take that ball of dollars and scram if you were intending that con from the beginning.

If I were gonna be running a legit convention, or more realistically if I was gonna be involved in helping to conceive an set it up, it seems like the ideal thing would be to use some trusted third party, or escrow, or something similar, to organize handling everything money related, until the event goes on.

Rym

It's happening again.

Akiba Expo.

https://twitter.com/search?q=akibaexpo&src=typd

It's disintegrating in spectacular fashion. It might actually be a scam for all I can tell.

Victor Frost

Huh? Since this is in my convention area, I'm gonna reach out to some people and see what they know about this. But, in general, the anaheim Marriott is only good for a first year con if you have an experienced staff, otherwise most cons I've seen that have their first year there also had their last. The LAX Marriott is much better in terms of first year con survival rate.

Rym

Check out the convention rules they posted originally.

https://t.co/Tob6dZNozw

Copy/pasted from some random rave from the looks of it. They took it down once people noticed.

Victor Frost

Heh, that's funny.

Anyways, I poked a whole bunch of people who typically work or manage conventions around here and none of them know anyone who's working that con. Either that or they don't know anyone who'll admit it.

MATATAT

Wait, so Akiba Expo is Dashcon rebranded? I'm confused.

Linkigi(Link-ee-jee)

I spent a minute looking at their website and couldn't even figure out where the convention was happening.

Rym

Crunchyroll announced they they had nothing to do with the con and were not appearing at it.

They had listed Crunchyroll in the guest lineup on their site...

We have crunchyroll as one of video web service company to provide your anime, Korean drama, and Japanese movies. Please click the link to learn more about Crunchyroll

Ikatono

Let me guess, they mean that they have a crunchyroll account to stream shows in viewing rooms.

SuperPichu

I have but one question: Is there a ballpit?

malzraa

It's dead. They just posted a message saying the con is cancelled because of "internet drama" making their staff & guests bail. If only there was some sort of legal mechanism to let guests and cons agree on terms and not disintegrate at the first sign of trouble. Perhaps we could name it after cons, like maybe a con-tract.

Rym

malzraa said:

If only there was some sort of legal mechanism to let guests and cons agree on terms and not disintegrate at the first sign of trouble. Perhaps we could name it after cons, like maybe a con-tract.

Jack Draigo

I'd throw in a peppercorn for that Malzraa.

MATATAT

Didn't they do a very similar thing last time saying Benedict Cumberbatch would be a guest?

Victor Frost

Just listened to the show. I feel like I should go down to Anaheim just to see if people show up for the convention that didn't know it was gone.