Avatar photoSteven Savage

Convention Idea – Speak to Parents, Teachers, and more

by

(The rest of the Convention Idea series is here).

I love convention professional events, as you've pretty much guessed.  I've  certainly done enough in the past, and am always looking for new things to do and new ideas.

However I noticed one thing lately – convention events focused on professional issues such as writing careers, artists, etc. focus on the people doing the work and looking for jobs.  They focus in short, on the people who need the advice.

Read more

Convention Spotlight: Icon 34

by

The round-up of convention spotlights and ideas is here.

Icon is a long-running convention in
Cedar Rapids, IA, so it's no surprise it came up in my continuing
research on conventions with fan-to-pro elements.

In
fact, Icon is one of those smaller, intimate cons with a serious
pedigree.  Started by a University of Iowa's writers group, led by Joe
Haldeman himself, it stays firmly rooted in its literary/writing
background while expanding over time to cover more genres and media.

Icon stays old-school, delivering the kind of fan-to-pro events that never go out of style:

  • It delivers a writer-heavy experience by having panels covering all
    sorts of writing aspects – starting out, presentation, and more.
  • It goes out of its way to do events on how to get published in the first place.
  • It's recently experimented on adding portfolio preparation for
    artists to their lineup, expanding the offerings available.  Many
    conventions do portfolio reviews, but preparation is often an area
    forgotten.
  • It leverages it's smaller size (perhaps 350-400 people) to have intimate discussion groups and heavy audience participation. 

Icon
hits the classic notes for writers by delivering a broad range of
events to help them out – and isn't afraid to experiment and add new
ideas.  If you're in Iowa – and if you haven't ALREADY heard of them –
it sounds like they've got some good events, and know how to deliver. 
I'm going to keep an eye on what they're doing as it sounds like
they're looking to add new ideas . . .

– Steven Savage

News of the Day 10/10/2009

by

Mobile:
Bloomberg estimates 100,000 Droids sold the first few days. I can't say if that's legit or not, but this IS Bloomberg. A nice initial sell through. So let's see what happens.

Publishing:
Remember the Wal-Mart/Amazon smackdown about some big titles? It appears Wal-Mart jumped the gun on some of the book releases. Accident or another shot across Amazon's bow?

Social Media:
Twitter usage in the Enterprise is up 250%. Not surprising it's up, but that sounds like a big trend.

Technology:
Adobe lays off 9% of it's workforce. I'm still keeping Adobe on the "don't send a resume list" because I'm really not sure what they're up to.

AOL is also having layoffs.

Video Games:
More detail on the EA Layoffs – 900 people in development, 500 in publishing, 100 in corporate affairs. It's a hefty amount no matter how you slice it.

Speculation on changes in game release strategy – A good read if you work or want to work in the industry. What strategies work for releases in these changing times and in a troubled economy?

– Steven Savage