Wondercon

So I had a really good time at Wondercon, and I have a few thoughts about it.

First, and most importantly, as I was predicting, it's taking over for Comic-Con. It started at just the right time to pull the core away from the larger convention. Here's how.

Wondercon originally was taking place in San Francisco. Two years ago they had to renovate the convention center, so they moved it temporarily to Anaheim. The move was intended to be temporary, and served as a testing ground to move Comic-Con there. The contract between Comic-Con and the city of San Diego was coming up for renewal, and if the trial convention worked, Comic-Con might move there. San Diego countered by promising to expand their convention center.

The trial convention was a disaster. Parking was a mess, first of all. Not only was there a shortage of it, the convention had not made a deal with Disney to allow overflow parking to move there, and they had no backup plan, so attendees had to guess at places in the general area; and since Disney takes up most of the surrounding locations, there are few places to go. I personally had to walk for more than a mile with my heavy gear and books. The shopping mall where I parked had no idea why everyone was going there, and were not happy that their parking spots were being taken up by non-shoppers. The organization at the convention was also very poor. The computer system apparently had problems as people who had bought tickets online were not able to get in because of some glitch that had lost their information. Those who did get in had to buy their tickets at one end then pick them up clear at the other end of the convention center, then walk clear back again to the opposite end of the convention. To top it all off, it rained that day. There were several leaks and garbage cans were placed around the convention floor to catch the water coming through. Here's the kicker to that: there were three floors above us, so the water was getting through all those levels.

So Comic-Con stayed in San Diego, and Wondercon returned to San Francisco. But the organizers in Anaheim decided to try it again. 2013 went a bit better, though their parking was still a problem.

What has worked in Wondercon's favor is Comic-Con's complete ineptitude. Despite a promise from the city, the convention center really hasn't expanded much. And despite clear interest from fans and a desire from companies to show more material, the convention itself has not expanded. They continue to keep the convention down to four days rather than going for a week, like Sundance Film Festival, or two weeks, like Coachella. Such an expansion would ease congestion and provide opportunities for more people to come. Instead, they sell the same number of tickets to an ever-expanding customer base, thus making it impossible to please people who want to come.

This expanded customer base, by the way, is primarily people from the mainstream who have little interest in comic books, science fiction, or fantasy. It's celebrity seekers who are following the large corporations that are sending their celebrities and marketing experts to the convention to advertise and make lots of money. It's become a fad, and people who want to see the latest thing are going. These are temporary fans, and when it is no longer the in place to go, they will move on.

The base fans, meanwhile, have been squeezed out. In order to get a ticket now, you have to state your interest, then watch their website for updates because when they announce the tickets will go on sale, (6 a.m. on a certain date,) you have to be on your computer and start clicking buy at the moment they go on sale. Then, if you're lucky enough, you'll get listed in a lottery and they will draw randomly as to whether or not you are allowed in. So, a dedicated fan who has been going every year, (some for decades,) has to literally win the lottery in order to get in.

Some people who have been going to Comic-Con have noticed a change in the fan base lately. Fewer people in costume and more people who seem less interested in the products. This is why.

Wondercon does not have the fame Comic-Con does. It hasn't attracted the mainstream audiences who are only wanting to follow what's popular. As a result, it's a large concentration of true fans. It's great for sellers like me who get more from a small number of sci fi fans than a large number of people who don't care. And it's better for fans who want to see what they're interested in rather than having every television show and movie shoved down their throat whether it matches their genre or not.

There is a bit of a fear, however, that the stigma of Comic-Con will follow. First, and perhaps most disturbing, as you walked into the convention center you passed under the gaze of James Spader on a poster of The Blacklist. A fine show, I admit, but it has nothing to do with Comic books, sci fi, or fantasy. It's just a corporation wanting to sell their product to a large audience, just like at Coimc-Con.

And then there's the parking. Still insufficient, but worst of all, incompetent. When I tried to park, I was told by a guard to go to the lot on Western Street. So I did. They told me to go to the lot on Katella Street, so I did, and they told me to go to the lot I first went to. So they were literally sending the attendees in circles. When I informed them of this, they didn't believe me, and they refused to get on their walki-talkis to confirm what I was saying. I had to go to the shopping center I parked at two years ago and lug my stuff a full mile to the convention.

But they did seem to fix the problem with the tickets, and with the rain, so that's good.

Relic Worlds: Lancaster James and the Search for the Promised World Released

Yesterday at Wondercon I released Relic Worlds: Lancaster James and the Search for the Promised World.  It is the first primary book in the Relic Worlds series.  What I mean by "primary book" is that there are other Relic Worlds books out there, but this is intended to be the first in the series.  The Deep Beyond, which was released several years ago, is the prequel, and is intended to be read after someone knows the characters and understands it.  That novella gives insight into the characters before the main incidents in the primary story.

The Relic Worlds series follows the adventures of Lancaster James, an anthropologist scouring the ruins of long lost civilizations on distant planets in search of powerful artifacts they left behind.  He is trying to find out what happened to these alien races, why they disappeared, and to see if the same thing can happen to humanity.

In The Search for the Promised World, Lancaster is following the trail of the subter-Siguerans, a race who left a trail of clues behind as they made their way to a planet they believed was promised to them by their god.  He will have to compete with space pirates, street thugs, and corporate barons to get to his destination and learn the truth.

The book is currently available on the website, www.relicworlds.com, and on Amazon at: http://www.amazon.com/Relic-Worlds-Lancaster-Search-Promised/dp/1499197020/ref=sr_1_11?ie=UTF8&qid=1398023946&sr=8-11&keywords=Relic+Worlds

Book Conventions – What are they really for?

This Saturday I’ll be going to Wondercon to promote my new book Relic Worlds: Lancaster James and the Search for the Promised World.  That makes this the perfect time to explain how I use conventions to promote.

When I first started going to book conventions to promote my work, I went in with the mentality that they are book sales where I would sell my work and try to make a profit.  I was VERY disappointed.  When I compared not only how much I paid to get space at the table, but also to get gas to get to the convention, food while there, parking, and sometimes even having to buy a ticket to the convention, I found that I had to sell a huge number of books just to break even.  Frankly, I didn’t even make enough to justify the time spent.  I didn’t even make enough to pay for the gas it took to drive to get my seller’s permit.

Did that make it a complete waste?  At first I thought it was.  However, when I started giving material away, people flocked to me.  They started following my work, and some have become long-term fans.  This has paid off in terms of people purchasing my material later.

The moral of the story?  Bring material to give away.  Also, try to get a table with others.  Getting one by yourself is not only costly, but doesn’t look as good unless you have a huge amount to fill the table.  Sometimes there are lone authors sitting at a table that no one wants to go near.  It actually looks a bit sad and can be a deterrent.  I go with the Greater Los Angeles Writers Society.  Sure, it’s their name on the banner, but I get a space at the table with my own materials, and often I get people who came over to look at other authors.

I prepare for the convention by making a small diorama of the subject of the book.  This weekend it will be Relic Worlds, so I have a diorama of some ruins in the desert with an adventurer exploring them, and a little battle happening around him.  I will also have bookmarks, and the first chapter of the book to be given away for free.  It’s an investment of around $150, but the series will be seen by a lot of people and will be taken more seriously because they saw it at a booth at a major convention.

It’s also a good idea to get into a convention where the trend of your audience is going.  I’m actually more excited about being at a booth at Wondercon than I would be at Comic Con this year because a lot of the die-had sci fi and fantasy fans are moving to Wondercon from Comic Con.  They have gotten tired of how overly commercialized Comic Con has gotten, and how it’s more about the big mainstream movies than they are about sci fi, fantasy, and comic books.  So, while there will be a lot more people at Comic Con, most of them are curious onlookers wanting to see what the new trend is rather than people who will become long-term fans.

It’s always about the niche in independent publishing.  You’re not going to get the mainstream audience; not at first.  Go for your niche.

http://www.comic-con.org/wca

The Real Independent Video and Film Revolution

Yesterday I had the wonderful privilege of working with Geek & Sundry on their Tabletop Day Special.  It was a huge honor for me as a gamer, but more importantly, as an independent artist.  Even though this blog is intended to be about independent publishing, I’m going to talk today about independent videos on the web because it’s an important element to freelance writers, and more importantly, an important ingredient to independent publications and publicity.

When I first got into film, I wanted to be an independent artist.  I was excited about the whole idea of film festivals and private investors to make heartfelt movies by real artists.  What I found in my 20 years in the film industry was that none of this was true.  The festivals were, at best, “independent” with the word in quotation marks because, first, you couldn’t even get your movie accepted unless you had a celebrity in it, (and you could only get those celebrities in your film if you were part of the Hollywood system,) and aspiring filmmakers who tried to get into the activities of these festivals usually found themselves blocked out by red velvet ropes that separated them from the VIPs.  I found the whole process hypocritical.  There was very little difference between the “independent” scene and the studios.

There was a first internet revolution in the late ‘90s and early ‘00s.  Several production companies popped up and there was a central location for videos called iFilm.  At first, these were made up of independent artists excited about pressing the reset button to create a true independent video scene.  Unfortunately, the mentality of many of these places were the same as the studios and “independent” film places.  Some of these companies were even run by the same people.  iFilm itself put up their own red velvet rope by deciding to stop accepting videos they deemed “unworthy” and even kicked a lot of videos off.  One of my own, a short version of The Forgotten Grave, was one of them that was kicked off, even though it had won a competition within iFilm’s own company.

What really killed the first internet revolution was when major movie companies tried to create internet content.  They saw real independent work being done, and they wanted to control it, the way they had bought all the “independent” production studios in 1999 when they swept the Academy Awards.  The result of this attempted take-over was that content became stale, and the larger companies found that there wasn’t enough money in it for them.  What should have been a place for young artists to grow was hijacked by people who wanted lots of money, who then threw it away because there wasn’t enough money in it for them.  The content itself was so much like regular television that people went, why should I watch this when I have TV at a higher quality level.  (In those days, watching on the internet meant you were watching a 2 inch screen that was often jumpy and couldn’t play more than five minutes at a time.)

The second internet revolution has, of course, taken hold.  High internet speeds are given the credit, and to be fair, that is a big part of it.  No one has to watch tiny screens and there’s no time limit.  But the main credit should go to Youtube, who doesn’t believe in the red velvet rope.  Companies like iFilm screwed it up for themselves by trying to follow the studio and film festival models and being exclusionary.  Everything had to be of a certain “quality level” or have celebrities involved.  This destroys innovation and experimentation, but more importantly, it takes the power away from the audience, who should really be deciding what plays and what does not.

This has given rise to some of the greatest entertainment ever to be put on screens.  Individuals from all over the world can now innovate, and others can decide for themselves what they want to watch rather than having some stuffy executive or pertinacious film student deciding what’s “worthy.”  The concept of capitalism itself was based on the idea of competition, and that has made entertainment on the web better.

It has also made other mediums better.  The rise in quality of television shows for programs like Breaking Bad, The Walking Dead, and Game of Thrones is due in many ways to this rise in quality in internet entertainment.  Why?  Because the competition is rising, and television executives are realizing they now have to compete with the rest of the world, not just their fellow executives.

What this means to writers is that many more opportunities are arising for work on projects that are more artistic, experimental, and innovative.  Whether searching for work with other companies, or to create product independently, the world of visual entertainment has grown, and in favor of trying new things.  It also aids book authors as video content is always a good way to get people to look at their books.  And with programs like Hit Record, people are sharing content that can then be used to support other artists in every medium, including books, blogs, etc.

So meeting Wil Wheaton yesterday was the equivalent to me of meeting a favorite author.  His show Tabletop, though it’s about gaming and not about writing, is helping every artistic community through being innovative, independent, experimental, and supportive.  Wheaton himself would be considered a “has been” by Hollywood, but rather than letting that get him down and believing what the system says, he took his interest, something most people would consider to be unimportant, and brought it to the forefront.  He shows through his passion and sheer joy how gaming brings people together.  He shows off games by both mainstream and small companies.  Most importantly, rather than being aloof from his community, he becomes a part of it through social media.  He helps others be seen through his Tumblr page, he vlogs to people that catch his attention online, and he treats people he meets on the same level as anyone rather than acting like he’s somehow above them.  Yes, he has celebrity status, but he’s using it to shine spotlights on subjects and people around him rather than demanding million dollar paychecks and entitlements the way most people do.

The new celebrities of the internet are mostly that way.  Some of them were celebrities in film and television, such as George Takei and Joseph Gorden Levitt, but I have to give them credit as well, as they could have just stayed in the more established film and television world, but they have been willing to make less money on the internet in order to be part of this true independent revolution.  As for non-celebrities, you have people like the Green brothers and Jay and Mike at Red Letter Media who are all from the Midwest and would be overlooked in traditional medias, and you have the fantastic comedians at Screen Junkies, How it Should Have Ended, and College Humor.  And if you want gaming, there are channels that have opened up that are very much like sports, such as Tabletop, The Prince of Macedon, World of Tanks, and my own Command Combat Battle Reports.

This democratization has opened up more venues than ever for writers and artists of every genre.  I’m at last satisfied with the independent television and movie scene.

Here are a few of the shows I recommend:

https://www.youtube.com/user/geekandsundry

http://redlettermedia.com/

http://hitplayrecords.com/

https://www.youtube.com/user/vlogbrothers

https://www.youtube.com/user/HISHEdotcom

https://www.youtube.com/user/screenjunkies

https://www.youtube.com/user/Commandcombat

https://www.youtube.com/user/WorldOfTanksCom

https://www.youtube.com/user/nigahiga

https://www.youtube.com/user/WorldScienceU

https://www.youtube.com/user/PrinceofMacedon

https://www.youtube.com/user/collegehumor