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Silicon is over
2002-10-14 05:57 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mdlbearSiliconM, one of the local SF conventions, was this weekend. It's come back from the brink of extinction several times now; this year it has grown to about 400 people (from maybe 250 last year). I found it enjoyable, but mostly for the people and conversations.
Programming was good, but limited and very sparsely attended. A couple of panels folded for lack of audience; there were only three or four for Kelly Freas's slide show, for example, and less than a dozen for my filk concert. Filking, indeed, was very poorly attended.
The hotel, on the other hand, was excellent: the Crowne Plaza in Foster City; I wouldn't hesitate to go to another con there. The coffeeshop is gorgeous, built around a series of koi ponds, and there's a waterfall across from the elevators. Quite a contrast to Baycon this year at the Doubletree in San Jose -- it's really gone to hell in a handbasket since its heyday as a Red Lion. (Colleen is now working as Baycon's hotel liason, and has them running very scared.)
We didn't stay in the hotel, though 45 minutes proved a bit long for a commute. It wouldn't have worked at all if the filking had been any better or the parties more numerous.
The dealer's room was OK, though small. That didn't keep me from picking up three books, most notably War of Honor by David Weber. It's the first of that series I've read (fans can all gasp in surprise now); I bought it mainly because of the bound-in CD-ROM that has the rest of the series on it. Baen Books is one of the few publishers that realize that making entire books available in electronic form is actually good for business, and I want to encourage them.
Well, I'm about to pass out now, so I think I'd better post this and go to bed.
Programming was good, but limited and very sparsely attended. A couple of panels folded for lack of audience; there were only three or four for Kelly Freas's slide show, for example, and less than a dozen for my filk concert. Filking, indeed, was very poorly attended.
The hotel, on the other hand, was excellent: the Crowne Plaza in Foster City; I wouldn't hesitate to go to another con there. The coffeeshop is gorgeous, built around a series of koi ponds, and there's a waterfall across from the elevators. Quite a contrast to Baycon this year at the Doubletree in San Jose -- it's really gone to hell in a handbasket since its heyday as a Red Lion. (Colleen is now working as Baycon's hotel liason, and has them running very scared.)
We didn't stay in the hotel, though 45 minutes proved a bit long for a commute. It wouldn't have worked at all if the filking had been any better or the parties more numerous.
The dealer's room was OK, though small. That didn't keep me from picking up three books, most notably War of Honor by David Weber. It's the first of that series I've read (fans can all gasp in surprise now); I bought it mainly because of the bound-in CD-ROM that has the rest of the series on it. Baen Books is one of the few publishers that realize that making entire books available in electronic form is actually good for business, and I want to encourage them.
Well, I'm about to pass out now, so I think I'd better post this and go to bed.
no subject
Date: 2002-10-14 11:43 am (UTC)no subject
Between the three of us, we have a SF&F library. Ain't marriage grand?