A couple of months late, we've got the info for buying 2008 DVDs set up on the website! Go here to place an order.
Note: If you were a paid member of Escapade 2008, you should have already received your DVD either at the convention or via mail. If you did not, drop us an email with your name and address and we'll get one out to you.

Dearest moderators, I hope this blatant advertising is okay - if not, I will unbegrudgingly remove! I thought it would be of interest to those of us slashers in the area and/or who plan on hitting up the corporate-con Mecca.

Where: San Diego's Comfort Inn Gaslamp
When: Friday, July 25th – 7:30pm

Come join us for an evening of fun and friendly company for the fourth year running! Just in case you're unsure, yes, we do mean slashers of the "homoerotic fanfiction" sort. This year we've taken the plunge and rented out our own meeting space to hold a buffet - no more not hearing your neighbors! - in the heart of the Gaslamp. In addition to the usual tasty food and great conversation, we'll be almost like our own little mini-convention, complete with custom badges, door-prizes, a swap-table, raffles, and more! A great way to meet new people and have a great time.

Full Details and Registration Information Here
Because of the format of this year's gathering, advance registration is necessary. We had around 30 folks last year, and we hope to make it an even bigger and better event this year!

It's a great time to tell your friends to register for Escapade 2009 NOW, as the rate sneaks up a little on May 1.

Spread the word. And get your registrations in please!

We just sent confirmation notes for everyone who registered at the convention, or who has paid by Paypal since the convention closed. Remember that members of Escapade 2008 have through midnight Monday (3/31) to register and receive the “at convention” price of $85. After that, prices go up to $100.
( Read more... )

Hello! Welcome to the planning for Escapade 19. (Yes, I'm planning already. )

First let me introduce myself, for those of you who might not know me; I'm Charlotte Hill, and Jenn and I have produced Escapade since 1991 together, though in recent years I've been more in the background and Jenn has been in the foreground. This year we're switching roles so Jenn can take a bit of a break, especially in pre-con planning and other pre-convention work.

Email me at charlotte@escapadecon.net with any questions, and if I don't get back to you quickly you can try me at charlottechill@yahoo.com.

Okay, here's the information I'm putting out, with a request for feedback.

The current, tentative date for Escapade 2009 is March 6-8, 2009. The good news is that this date doesn't currently conflict with any other known slash cons (like RevelCon, or the newer Washington State relaxacon). The bad news is that yes, that is the weekend of the Daylight Savings Time rollback.

Thoughts? Questions? Concerns?

Regards,
Charlotte C. Hill

(posted with permission)

Like all of you, we love cons, and we figured the best way to show that was to throw one of own! So, in the spirit of Escapade and all of it's slashy, meta-y goodness, we came up with CON.TXT....

CON.TXT is a multi-fandom, tech-friendly slash con held June 13 - 15, 2008 in Silver Spring, MD. We have a bit of everything for everyone: panels, a combined dealer's room and con suite, a vid show and a Friday night dance party. For more details, go to the con website, or to our LJ, con_txt.

To register, go to here; memberships are $90 until March 31st.

We'd love to see you!

Thanks to everyone who submitted questions and answers in the FAQ thread a while back. (Also, thanks to the folks at Con.txt who kindly suggested we crib from their FAQ, which is awesome indeed.)

Beneath the cut-tag: a vast list of questions! Some have answers; others don't. If you can answer one of the orphan questions, please do. I'll collate responses, and once we have answers for all the questions I'll send the whole thing to the concom!

( Escapade FAQ-in-progress )

Been home a whole week and a half now, and it's about time I said a public THANK YOU!!! to Aukestral and Denise Raymond, who took it on themselves to input the zine library to an Excel spreadsheet and organize it by fandom.

Can you two get in touch with me offlist? I think my brain is ready to work further on the cataloging project, and I'd love to get a copy of the spreadsheet from you...

As you all know, Escapade had a potentially huge shortfall this year and we asked for your support to help retire the debt. The support was… phenomenal. So generous that we were deeply moved by your contributions. The total amount contributed to retire the Escapade debt was $2,456.

And then we lucked out with the hotel. Due to some very sharp negotiating from Charlotte, we reached a settlement that was covered by our initial contract plus an mount far less than the $5,000 Jenn feared and, in fact, far less than the $2,456 you contributed.

So. If you wrote a check directly for the debt retirement fund, we have torn up your check and will contact you privately. THANK YOU—we're grateful for your support, and grateful that we are able to return it to you. If you contributed via the art show charity auction (thereby receiving a valuable service ), or in cash, any remaining funds are in a kitty that we're trying to decide what to do with. More on this below. If you
contributed in your pre-reg check for 2009, we can refund you by check or paypal, or place your contribution in the kitty to be discussed below. We will contact you privately via email and act per your wishes. Again, our thanks to all of you.

WHAT TO DO, WHAT TO DO.
So. We have approximately $600 in cash remaining in the debt retirement kitty, and no clear idea to whom this money belongs. Because part of our negotiation involved a much more strict contract for next year (that we believe we'll be fine with—we were very careful about our room guarantees and such), it might be wisest to leave this money sitting in case there is a shortfall next year. If there is NOT a shortfall (and we should know this based on room blocks by early February of next year), those of you who so generously contributed would be "sponsors" for the post-convention dead dog party, with some really nice food and drink. If there is a shortfall, then the hotel would get it anyway. ;)

We're open to ideas about how to identify contributors and return the money to you, or to any other thoughts you have on what to do with the remains of the contribution. To those of you who contributed, please email us with your thoughts or comment here or on the con LJ, and let us know what you'd like us to do.

Well, it’s almost 96 hours since we finished negotiating with the hotel to close out the bill for Escapade 2008, and we’re already in the planning stages for Escapade 2009. There has been much sleeping, and some re-engagement with real life.

Closing out 2008 includes:

• Mailing art (and payment) to non-attending artists – DONE
• Mailing vids to non-attending vidders - scheduled for this weekend
• Mailing reg packets and vids to supporting members – scheduled for this weekend
• Making the bank deposit (DONE) and closing the books – scheduled for this weekend

• Creating a new database (with enhancements per comments from attendees) – this weekend
• Choosing dates – today
• Update critical information on the website – this weekeend
• Begin plan to revise & expand the website info - rest of the month

So, several of you made me promise to find the serious SPN mpreg story I talked about in the panel. You know, the one I actually admitted I liked?
Anyway, it's here.
Okay, I feel dirty now.
It's all Sandy's fault.

Panel: SPN: John: Good Hero, Bad Dad?

At Escapade this year, kathyem1 and I ran a panel called John: Bad Dad. But then we (K'Kathy) changed it a bit to be less provocative, because really, I don't know any fan who thinks that John was totally horrible. So at the end, this was the description about the panel, and points for discussion, in case we ran out of things to say, which, needless to say, didn't happen:

***

Panel: SPN: John: Good Hero, Bad Dad?

Description: Leave your weapons behind but I think it would be interesting to discuss what kind of father John Winchester actually was. He has so many good qualities and so many bad ones....people get so riled about this subject, it might be nice to hear some debate on it.

I've noticed in a few con reports that folks didn't realize that the con would begin on Friday morning, and hence arrived late on Friday only to discover they'd missed a day of fun. It occurs to me that we might consider collectively writing an Escapade FAQ, which could eventually get posted on the con website and lj. Folks who've been coming for 18 years probably don't need questions answered (and may not even realize what the questions are), but folks who are newer to the con might have some insights there...and having these answers easily-available might be a step toward getting a broader group of fans excited about the con.

Anyway, I'll start the ball rolling with a few Q and A that come to mind. If you have others, comment! (And if you'd answer these questions differently than I did, by all means comment and say that too...) ETA: And if such a thing already exists and I missed it, let me know where it is? :-)

( Escapade FAQ-in-progress... )

In the genderfuck panel a Buffyverse story was mentioned that was set either during or after the last episode. The upshot was that the person (slayer) narrating the story was a woman in a man's body. Can anyone please point me to this story? Thank you.

Hi all,

Many of you know I had to leave the con early because of illness. I thought (and said a few times) that it was probably non-contagious because I believed it was asthma triggered from a previous virus. Today my doctor said it's probably whooping cough, which is extremely contagious. This isn't a positive diagnosis because the test is a bitch and not very reliable anyway, so I didn't get a test -- but it's likely enough and serious enough that I thought I should send out a warning. I'm really sorry about this; when I said we should all be going out and spreading fandom like an infection, this was not what I meant.

Fortunately there were no children at the con, but immune-compromised people, or people living with babies or immune-compromised people, might want to check out some info on whooping cough and be aggressive about treating early if you get any signs.

ETA: I keep forgetting about the name thing! My badge name was Russ McMillan.

( More info )

I've posted my usual fairly long con report here. It includes notes from all of the panels I attended, plus some miscellaneous meta nattering. :-)

If I got anything wrong, or if I'm missing a livejournal username and you can provide it, please let me know!

It was awesome to see all of y'all this weekend. Hope everyone's travels home are going smoothly!

Here is the link to defunct Issues of Consent page, now found through archive.org. Some of the story links are still valid, but some are not. Good luck and happy reading!

http://web.archive.org/web/20010121172100/www.trickster.org/fannishbutterfly/non_con.html

This is what happens when you happen to be innocently sitting around the con suite with your computer and the wackos at the con start brainstorming.....

ps. Sandy made me do it. Aral and Sinead and Rachael and Brak and Denise were extremely complicit. Several others around the room were not-so-innocent bystanders...

( Roller Derby girls are hot! )

Playlist and links to vids that are online are here
http://community.livejournal.com/vidding/1390526.html
and will be updated throughout next week

Several people in the Smallville panel asked about my recs for recent Smallville stories; they are available here: http://norwich36.livejournal.com/tag/sv+recs.