Tumblr Convention "Disaster" Unfolds at Illinois' DashCon
- Thread starter MovieBob
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If there's any lesson we can take from this, it's always ALWAYS get any business agreements in writing.
It seemed okay in an overall view, since they had Welcome To Night Vale and Steam Powered Giraffe coming, but ended up being a big waste of time money and effort.
WTNV walked out due to lack of payment. Dash-con staff wasn't being clear about WHY there was no payment. Though they said, (staff), that they were going to pay WTNV after the panel. WTNV canceled part of the Europe tour, and flew over there to not have their money upfront, so Dash-con kicked them to the curb, didn?t pay for their hotel room (which they said they would) so the crew ended up sleeping on a futon. Ginger-haze decided to leave the con early after discovering Dash-Con wouldn?t be covering her hotel room anymore and she was charged the full bill (and she toted with WTNV and slept on the futon too). Ginger-haze, WTNV, and The Baker Street Babes are also being forced to pay their hotel fees because Dash-Con refuses to cover the costs as originally promised.
Although they promised everyone who paid for special WTNV seating a refund, they couldn?t afford to refund them, (my friend Zee and her sister also got to be apart of this). They offered her about a quarter of her money back, an extra hour in a pitiful ball pit, and 2 entries in a shitty raffle. The ball pit that was supposed to ?Pay for the Night Vale walk out? deflated about half way in, also someone apparently pissed in it, (great, right?)
Steam Powered Giraffe actually canceled MONTHS before the con, but Dash-con continued to sell tickets and make an announcement last minute.
Now lets start with the whole 17k thing. First day of the convention, there was some misunderstanding about the hotel contract (they had a ?verbal contract?) and they needed to raise SEVENTEEN GRAND ON THE SPOT IN TWO HOURS. Now the fishy thing about this is that they received the goal of 17k on paypal and cash. Paypal takes about two days to transfer (the con would be over by then right?) and the hotel staff said they had no idea about that crap. There was no confirmation that the money donated in cash and via PayPal on friday ever made it to the hotel Its been pointed out that Marriott Hotel, the Renaissance would have required them to submit their full reservation payment 5 days in advance of the event. Therefore it?s very, very likely that the ?$17,000 fundraising? was a huge scam. Because DashCon would?ve had to pay that money 5 days before this weekend or the event wouldn?t even be happening in the first place.
Now the rumor about the BDSM panel is false but, (again with my friend), Zee?s sister, whos 16, got into the ?Can U Knot?? panel because, I quote, ?She looked old enough?, they didn?t ask for ID nor any sort of verification.
The game room consisted of some tables, one TV, and one gaming console.
Possible art theft by Dash-Con for the nebula graphic in their banner (not confirmed though).
The panels were honestly dumb, ?British men with?Cheek bones!?, the cringe worthy, ?Superwholock hunt? , also including finely aged meme such as, ?Such Karaoke. Very Sing. Wow. ?, ?Homo erotic subtext.? (that was not 18+ on the schedule, as well as BDSM was not marked 18+ either. Homo subtext was pretty damn good though), ?Hay there brony?s? which was probably just a large shade throwing party, ?Hateful Anons and beyond: How to deal with bullies?. What, seriously, how is there an one hour long panel on that? And also, the infamous ?Tumblr Language? Yes, learn what ?throwing shade? and other memes and texting language is in an hour long panel! I think i made my point.
Some panels were not organized, ?Name That Anime? panel was handing out hotel mints as prizes for correctly answering questions instead of maybe stickers OR ACTUAL CANDY???
Tons of vendors left because sales were so bad that they weren?t going to make the initial cost for the space.
The ticket prices were outrageous (65$ for a weekend pass, a larger sum than Anime eXpo) and for a first time con the price is insane. (First time cons can either be a hit or a flop so its better to price lower, and obviously this failed.)
Some people were having panic attacks and freaking out because they had no way on getting home until Sunday evening or they don?t want to waste 65 FUCKING DOLLARS.
Dash was expected to have 5-7k attendees, but only got, AT THE MOST, 1000.
They had attempted to show both Pacific Rim and Doctor Horrible?s Sing-A-Long Blog without the legal rights to host a public viewing party. Del Toro has reportedly been notified about the unlicensed showing of Pacific Rim at a convention, which occurred in a room of approximately 60 people.
So all in all, Escapist, that?s why Dash-con is a total ruin.
WTNV walked out due to lack of payment. Dash-con staff wasn't being clear about WHY there was no payment. Though they said, (staff), that they were going to pay WTNV after the panel. WTNV canceled part of the Europe tour, and flew over there to not have their money upfront, so Dash-con kicked them to the curb, didn?t pay for their hotel room (which they said they would) so the crew ended up sleeping on a futon. Ginger-haze decided to leave the con early after discovering Dash-Con wouldn?t be covering her hotel room anymore and she was charged the full bill (and she toted with WTNV and slept on the futon too). Ginger-haze, WTNV, and The Baker Street Babes are also being forced to pay their hotel fees because Dash-Con refuses to cover the costs as originally promised.
Although they promised everyone who paid for special WTNV seating a refund, they couldn?t afford to refund them, (my friend Zee and her sister also got to be apart of this). They offered her about a quarter of her money back, an extra hour in a pitiful ball pit, and 2 entries in a shitty raffle. The ball pit that was supposed to ?Pay for the Night Vale walk out? deflated about half way in, also someone apparently pissed in it, (great, right?)
Steam Powered Giraffe actually canceled MONTHS before the con, but Dash-con continued to sell tickets and make an announcement last minute.
Now lets start with the whole 17k thing. First day of the convention, there was some misunderstanding about the hotel contract (they had a ?verbal contract?) and they needed to raise SEVENTEEN GRAND ON THE SPOT IN TWO HOURS. Now the fishy thing about this is that they received the goal of 17k on paypal and cash. Paypal takes about two days to transfer (the con would be over by then right?) and the hotel staff said they had no idea about that crap. There was no confirmation that the money donated in cash and via PayPal on friday ever made it to the hotel Its been pointed out that Marriott Hotel, the Renaissance would have required them to submit their full reservation payment 5 days in advance of the event. Therefore it?s very, very likely that the ?$17,000 fundraising? was a huge scam. Because DashCon would?ve had to pay that money 5 days before this weekend or the event wouldn?t even be happening in the first place.
Now the rumor about the BDSM panel is false but, (again with my friend), Zee?s sister, whos 16, got into the ?Can U Knot?? panel because, I quote, ?She looked old enough?, they didn?t ask for ID nor any sort of verification.
The game room consisted of some tables, one TV, and one gaming console.
Possible art theft by Dash-Con for the nebula graphic in their banner (not confirmed though).
The panels were honestly dumb, ?British men with?Cheek bones!?, the cringe worthy, ?Superwholock hunt? , also including finely aged meme such as, ?Such Karaoke. Very Sing. Wow. ?, ?Homo erotic subtext.? (that was not 18+ on the schedule, as well as BDSM was not marked 18+ either. Homo subtext was pretty damn good though), ?Hay there brony?s? which was probably just a large shade throwing party, ?Hateful Anons and beyond: How to deal with bullies?. What, seriously, how is there an one hour long panel on that? And also, the infamous ?Tumblr Language? Yes, learn what ?throwing shade? and other memes and texting language is in an hour long panel! I think i made my point.
Some panels were not organized, ?Name That Anime? panel was handing out hotel mints as prizes for correctly answering questions instead of maybe stickers OR ACTUAL CANDY???
Tons of vendors left because sales were so bad that they weren?t going to make the initial cost for the space.
The ticket prices were outrageous (65$ for a weekend pass, a larger sum than Anime eXpo) and for a first time con the price is insane. (First time cons can either be a hit or a flop so its better to price lower, and obviously this failed.)
Some people were having panic attacks and freaking out because they had no way on getting home until Sunday evening or they don?t want to waste 65 FUCKING DOLLARS.
Dash was expected to have 5-7k attendees, but only got, AT THE MOST, 1000.
They had attempted to show both Pacific Rim and Doctor Horrible?s Sing-A-Long Blog without the legal rights to host a public viewing party. Del Toro has reportedly been notified about the unlicensed showing of Pacific Rim at a convention, which occurred in a room of approximately 60 people.
So all in all, Escapist, that?s why Dash-con is a total ruin.
The first thing that popped into my head was something like "Well, yeah. Of course it was." And then I remembered that adorable little cartoon with Tumblr as a little girl going around asking the other big-name websites "What is air?" and felt bad for her.
I think I may be a crazy person.
I think I may be a crazy person.
I'd be more inclined to say "Good, Tumblr deserved this". But... I can't...
How could I say such a horrible things to a con with a ball pit that MAGNIFICENT. I regret going to AX, needs more hour ball pits.
How could I say such a horrible things to a con with a ball pit that MAGNIFICENT. I regret going to AX, needs more hour ball pits.
Oh my god this is just perfect! While the stuff I subscribe to and read on tumblr tends to stay far, far away from any fandom or activism bullshit, I do occasionally run into re-re-re-blogs of this kind of stuff, and it generally makes me wonder if it's worth staying around on that site, just to follow a few funny comics and a blog that posts photos of ancient world museum pieces (really interesting stuff there, by the way).
But yes, that sad little ball pit, lying in the middle of an empty floor is just too good.
As for the people asking others not to stereotype - let's be honest here, I doubt many people truly and honestly believe that tumblr consists of nothing but people who cry for "social justice" (while generally not really being interested in actual social justice) and fawning over Benedict Cumberbatch's inhuman face.
But yes, that sad little ball pit, lying in the middle of an empty floor is just too good.
As for the people asking others not to stereotype - let's be honest here, I doubt many people truly and honestly believe that tumblr consists of nothing but people who cry for "social justice" (while generally not really being interested in actual social justice) and fawning over Benedict Cumberbatch's inhuman face.
http://www.twonkhammer.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Implied-Facepalm.jpgAsurasEyes said:
I seriously hope that you're being sarcastic here. Please don't make me have to go into why what you're saying is blatantly false.
Now I feel better about chairing "ZonieCon", back in the day.
It, too, was a disastercon in many ways, largely due to disorganization and flakeouts. And I really screwed up when it came to some of the basics, like ensuring transport for people to and from the (remote and somewhat desolate) convention hotel. But when things went wrong, I at least fought to pull something together, instead of making excuses.
When our hotel decided to rent our reserved rooms to other functions, claiming our contract was invalid because "the sales director who signed this no longer works here", we went guerilla, taking over unused space to hold functions.
We seized the penthouse suite we'd been promised and set it up as an open-guest consuite.
We had to threaten legal action to get our contracted water stations set up (Arizona has laws against refusing water, for obvious reasons).
The art show wound up being presented HORIZONTALLY, as the promised pegboards I'd personally seen when the deal was struck were nowhere to be seen. Turned out the hotel had lied about owning them, they belonged to a previous con which hadn't yet picked them up at the time. Adding insult to lies, when I demanded "pegboard", the new sales director brought a single normal-sized bulletin board... with a box of tacks. As soon as she was gone, I rounded up a load of tables and linen and we laid the art and auction sheets out decently, at least.
I personally ate every expense. I made sure everyone got paid as promised. And by the end of it all, despite a horrific first day of madness and panic, most of the attendees said it came off as a good "relaxacon". Good enough that we tried again a year later, though mostly just pulling in the same folks from the year before despite extra advertising. Because I could no longer support the convention personally at that point, and because I did not want to burden anyone else with the expenses, I put it on essentially-permanent hiatus.
Ten years later, one of the convention's big fans offered to bankroll another outing, but the old disorganization issues began to rear their heads almost as soon as I put down-payment on the hotel. Not wanting the fan (also an old friend of mine) to sink his money into a train wreck, I refunded what money he'd loaned and spiked the hotel contract, killing the convention entirely.
Honor before dosh.
It, too, was a disastercon in many ways, largely due to disorganization and flakeouts. And I really screwed up when it came to some of the basics, like ensuring transport for people to and from the (remote and somewhat desolate) convention hotel. But when things went wrong, I at least fought to pull something together, instead of making excuses.
When our hotel decided to rent our reserved rooms to other functions, claiming our contract was invalid because "the sales director who signed this no longer works here", we went guerilla, taking over unused space to hold functions.
We seized the penthouse suite we'd been promised and set it up as an open-guest consuite.
We had to threaten legal action to get our contracted water stations set up (Arizona has laws against refusing water, for obvious reasons).
The art show wound up being presented HORIZONTALLY, as the promised pegboards I'd personally seen when the deal was struck were nowhere to be seen. Turned out the hotel had lied about owning them, they belonged to a previous con which hadn't yet picked them up at the time. Adding insult to lies, when I demanded "pegboard", the new sales director brought a single normal-sized bulletin board... with a box of tacks. As soon as she was gone, I rounded up a load of tables and linen and we laid the art and auction sheets out decently, at least.
I personally ate every expense. I made sure everyone got paid as promised. And by the end of it all, despite a horrific first day of madness and panic, most of the attendees said it came off as a good "relaxacon". Good enough that we tried again a year later, though mostly just pulling in the same folks from the year before despite extra advertising. Because I could no longer support the convention personally at that point, and because I did not want to burden anyone else with the expenses, I put it on essentially-permanent hiatus.
Ten years later, one of the convention's big fans offered to bankroll another outing, but the old disorganization issues began to rear their heads almost as soon as I put down-payment on the hotel. Not wanting the fan (also an old friend of mine) to sink his money into a train wreck, I refunded what money he'd loaned and spiked the hotel contract, killing the convention entirely.
Honor before dosh.
The problem is that these sterotypes are the way most big tumblr communities actually act, and anyone willing to go to a tumblr convention is going to be part of one of these big communities. Of course, it is completely unfair for people to over generalize about about a massive group of people by pointing out the sins of the few, but this is the internet! We can't let logic and common sense halt the tide of our hatred!erttheking said:
You might as well be saying #NotAllTumblrs for all the good it will do.
Plus, this is pretty funny. I mean, protest songs at the hotel staff? What the hell were they thinking? No wonder they were told to go sit in the ball pit for an hour, they were acting like spoiled children.
Funny, I've been on tumblr for a while, and this was literally the first mention I've heard of this con... no posts saying it was coming, no hype, no warning... nothing.
You know the whole take that "special snowflakes" SJWs and what not are pretty shallow. I mean pretty sure people are aware that 4chan is not all anon you know know not all of Tumblr are the things you hate. We can do the same with Escapist and any other site that is intellectual laziness come on now people.
As for as tumblr has been concerned I see that most people are putting the blame the organizers which is rightfully so and making lemons out of lemons by turning the ballpit into unsung hero of the whole debacle. So as far as tumblr is handling it people are saying that it was terrible and are making jokes about it no is really panicking.
In nerd hate and superiority while pointless and inevitable is still groan inducing to behold.
As for as tumblr has been concerned I see that most people are putting the blame the organizers which is rightfully so and making lemons out of lemons by turning the ballpit into unsung hero of the whole debacle. So as far as tumblr is handling it people are saying that it was terrible and are making jokes about it no is really panicking.
In nerd hate and superiority while pointless and inevitable is still groan inducing to behold.
That's because it wasn't an official Tumblr con or anything. Basically, some people came up with the idea to organize it and they did (well, they made an attempt). I had no idea about it either, I started seeing posts mocking the whole thing and I had a good laugh, along with thousands of people who reblog the jokes.CelestDaer said:
... So in short, we're Something Awful, but without the paywall.BX3 said:
OT: This has got to be absolutely glorious. I am sorry for the folks who paid for stuff like Night Vale, but really- this was the only thing anyone could expect from the ever-expanding social justice trainwreck that is Tumblr.
Still a nice place for some cosplay for GOOD things, though- saw a great Corvo/Daud combo cosplay (Not romantic, just two people who saw each other at a con) last month. And there are some good jokes there.
That's the thing about Tumblr- it's honestly OK if you don't ever find yourself talking to one of the more... radical feminists.
Honestly? Yes, because they've been responded to with apologies and kindness before... To which they responded to by spitting back in the faces of those who offered it. Look at Wil Wheaton's apology for his supposed 'cultural appropriation':ayvee said:
http://wilwheaton.tumblr.com/post/76188837092/hi-wil-im-not-trying-to-be-antagonizing-you-seem-to
He apologizes for something he was KINDLY informed of using inappropriately and what happens? They 'continue' to chew him out. They show a continued favoritism towards hostility and attacking those they disagree with and frankly, this is just the ONE of MANY situations but the primary one I can think of off the top of my head.
When it comes to these kinds of people, it's 'never' enough. They want to continue to whine and kick and scream about whatever it is their feelings were hurt over.
And you know what? I will acknowledge that my choice of words is a bit overdramatic and exaggerated. They METAPHORICALLY need their faces stomped in and need to be locked in a cage. So honestly, I say that the trolling that has been done to bait these people into showing their true colors, like the July 4th raid on 4chan, #endfathersday and another more recent one making the rounds, I am firmly in the belief they deserve whatever non-physical harm based backlash is coming their way. This group of radical activists on the internet have gone for too long without some well due karma coming their way and the shit they're going through right now, they completely deserve.
But this has nothing to do with Dashcon so it's best we drop the topic. It's absolutely horrible that the people running that event scammed all the people they did out of their money and will probably be able to sweep it under the rug like they apparently already have tried and are continuing to do. What the SMART thing to do is NEVER let anyone forget. Reblog ball pit pictures everytime a tumblr based convention is brought up, point to the '$17,000' tumblr, just do not let those 'kids' forget how much they screwed up... Because unless they learn from past mistakes, they'll do the SAME thing AGAIN.
