SF3

Beginning the Strategic Planning Process

The board of SF3, WisCon’s parent organization, has posted the following statement on their blog. Please visit that post to comment.

As noted in our recent Anti-Racism Statement, SF3 will begin a process of strategic planning, starting in early November. The purpose of this strategic planning process will be to re-evaluate the mission, vision, values, structure, and policies of SF3 as an organization, in an effort to eliminate racism in organizational structures and projects, and to increase equity, safety, and inclusion for all members of our community — BIPOC in particular.
A strategic planning process is meant to deeply engage the full WisCon/SF3 community in the work of imagining what SF3 and WisCon can be — what the community as a whole wants and needs it to be.
To that end, over the course of the next year, SF3 will establish a temporary Strategic Planning Committee, created for the explicit purpose of planning and implementing organizational change according to community input and feedback. This committee will begin by developing a process for community engagement that allows all community members to speak about their experiences with WisCon/SF3: about the failures and successes of the organization and its projects, and to offer ideas for change and improvement . This listening process will consist of varied formats so as to give space for all who wish to be heard to do so safely. One example is a virtual Town Hall, currently planned for November 2021, in which non-officers who serve on the SF3 board (organized by Charlie Jane Anders and Annalee Newitz and moderated by Arley Sorg) will hold a community conversation to discuss and envision the future of WisCon/SF3.
A strategic planning process for SF3/WisCon will occur in two phases. The first phase, as noted above, involves listening to the community: gathering information, input, and feedback through events such as the virtual Town Hall, Board listening sessions, member surveys, etc. Some of these will allow people to provide feedback without disclosing identity. The Board and strategic planning committee will collect the details of these discussions; the Strategic Planning Committee will then move to the next phase — determining how to implement feedback, suggestions, and organizational change. This work will include developing a new Mission Statement for SF3 as well as revising organizational and project structures, practices, and more to support equity and empowerment of BIPOC members.
The first step, to begin in the weeks following the upcoming SF3 Annual Member Meeting, will be for SF3 to establish the Strategic Planning Committee, and to begin discussing and developing actionable plans and a timeline for holding community conversations and gathering feedback.
If you feel strongly about the future of WisCon and SF3, and would like to be a part of this workgroup, please email the SF3 President with the subject line: Strategic Planning Committee. You do not need to have previously been involved in either SF3 or WisCon to volunteer.
SF3 is committed to eliminating racism, white supremacy, and other barriers to inclusion within all of our projects and spaces. Through listening, accountability, and concrete action, we will work toward building an organization that creates truly inclusive spaces to explore and understand identities, injustice, and possible paths to a more equitable future, via speculative media.
SF3

SF3 Annual General Meeting: October 24 + Open Officer Positions

The board of SF3, WisCon’s parent organization, has posted the following statement on their blog. Please visit that post to comment.

SF3 is the nonprofit organization that’s responsible for WisCon; it provides long-term governance and financial management not only for the annual convention, but also for other projects and initiatives.

SF3’s Annual Meeting is coming up on Sunday October 24 at 1PM (Central). This meeting will be held virtually; you can join by telephone or online. If you are a current SF3 member you will receive information about how to join no later than Thursday, October 14 , via email.

This meeting is where officers on the SF3 board present their annual reports, and where significant business facing the organization is discussed. Anyone who is a member of SF3 can attend and vote at the annual meeting—you can join SF3 at http://sf3.org/join/. The deadline for joining SF3 prior to this year’s meeting is Wednesday October 20.

This year’s Annual Meeting is particularly important, because all current board officer positions will be open. At least three of officer roles—President, Treasurer, and Secretary—must be filled for SF3 to continue to legally operate and keep its 503(c)(3) status. At the time of this posting, we don’t know of anyone who plans to stand for any of these three positions.

We encourage anyone who loves the WisCon annual convention to consider standing for an open board position. At a very general level, board members are expected to participate in discussion about policies and governance for SF3, and to help ensure that SF3 is on sure footing for the future (financially and organizationally). This ranges from making sure our annual taxes are accurate and filed on time, to discussing our mission and values, to planning new projects or initiatives. More information about specific board roles can be found at http://sf3.org/about/board-duties/. Though the current officers are not able to remain in their positions, they will be available to help orient new board members.

One of the past failures of the SF3 board has been its lack of support for participation from BIPOC members of the WisCon community. As noted in our recent Anti-Racism Statement, we are undertaking a strategic planning process focused on inclusion and eliminating practices and attitudes that contribute to a white supremacist culture. This strategic planning work is separate from the board, although we expect both groups will be in frequent communication.

SF3 membership is free for BIPOC. Moreover, if you are Black, Indigenous, or a person of color and have any interest in joining the SF3 board as an officer, we hope you will do so! While the many officer vacancies is a hurdle, we also hope it will be an opportunity for renewal and reevaluation of SF3’s direction. This will be happening at the same time as we are updating SF3’s  interim mission, vision, and values to center inclusivity and reject racism and white supremacy.

If you have concerns about the commitment involved, or could join only with further support, you are welcome to contact any individual board member, or the board as a whole at board@sf3.org.

If you are interested in standing for a board officer role, please contact Jess Adams at vicepresident@sf3.org by Tuesday, October 19 to express interest. Jess is also available to answer questions you may have about board roles.

Summary Agenda

A more detailed agenda, and all materials for the upcoming meeting, will be sent to SF3 members after October 14, no later than Saturday October 23.

Old Business

  • Officer reports
  • Reports from committee chairs (WisCon concom, Personnel, Communications)

New Business

  • Elections to the board + open officer positions:
    • President (Jackie Lee vacating, 1 year left in term)
    • Vice President – vacant, 2 years left in current term (Jess Adams interim Vice-President, June – October 2021)
    • Treasurer – vacant, 1 year left in current term
    • Secretary (term ending, Bronwyn Bjorkman will not stand for re-election)
  • Notice of appointment of Committee Chairs
  • Other business

The terms of officer positions are set according to our bylaws.

“The president and treasurer shall be elected in years evenly divisible by three; the vice-president shall be elected in the following year; the corresponding secretary and recording secretary shall be elected in the year after that.” SF3 Bylaws, Section 4.3

(As of 2019, corresponding and recording secretary were collapsed into one role.)

Official Announcements

Vacancies on the Communications & Personnel Teams

We’ve got a variety of exciting roles that we’re looking for help with in our Communications & Personnel Committees. Unlike most of the Convention Committee (ConCom) roles, these tasks are spread over several months or are year-round, but because they are not all ramping up to a convention weekend, they are a LOT more chilled out. 🙂

Communications: Bloggers (up to three volunteers – one spot filled already)

WisCon’s blog is our primary method for communication with our community. It’s the main way that we recruit volunteers, share news that impacts the convention, fundraise, and keep conversations going. Our blog is published on our website, wiscon.net, and is collected into a newsletter format once a month for most of the year, becoming weekly in April & May. We’re looking for at least one and up to three volunteers who would like to help us tell people what’s up! Is that you? We’ll share a draft schedule of blog topics that will include some that we know we need, but you’ll be encouraged to write on any relevant topic — dig into WisCon’s history, to connect with our sibling organizations, and to spotlight our past guests of honor, attendees, and volunteers. You’ll also crosspost blog posts and newsletters to our social media, including Twitter & Facebook, in collaboration with the volunteers managing those accounts.

Commitment: 2-3 hours per month, increasing to 5 hours per month in April & May.

 

Communications: Facebook Wrangler (one volunteer)

Are you on Facebook? This role can be as big or small as you’d like it to be! Our Facebook content has generally been limited to cross-posts from our blog and some advertisements — so at minimum, we’d like you to respond to comments & messages there, as well as helping us run a few advertisements per year. At maximum? The sky’s the limit, as long as you keep it related to our mission & values.

Commitment: 1-2 hours per month.

 

Communications: Ads, Marketing, & Sponsorships (up to three volunteers)

This year, we’ll mainly be looking for sponsorships — businesses and individuals who would be willing to make a gift to support part of WisCon in exchange for our public thanks and a banner in that space. In the past, we’ve had sponsors for the Gathering and for various other events. In the past, this job has included selling advertisements in the Souvenir Program Book as well — we’re not sure what that will look like yet this year. This role is about reaching out to people and organizations that you believe WisCon’s community would love to hear about, and bringing them together!

Commitment: 1-2 hours per month October-May.

 

Personnel: Team Member (up to three volunteers)

You’ll follow a checklist to give new members of our committees or board access to the tools they need to make WisCon and all our other projects happen! You’ll also assist ConCom departments with documenting their roles, collaborate with the Communications Committee to write recruitment blog posts, and orient people to the tools they need (these include Google Docs, Gmail, and Basecamp).

Commitment: 1-3 hours per month.       

Please email personnel@sf3.org to volunteer!

Official Announcements

Organized? Responsible? WE NEED YOU!!

We’re seeking folks to Chair two of the committees that support WisCon!

What does a “Chair” do, though? And what’s all this about “Committees”?

Well, our Committee Chairs are primarily project managers — they make sure that the necessary tasks get done in order to carry out that committee’s purpose. When needed, they make the decision to cancel tasks that can’t be successful due to a lack of time, resources, volunteers, or all three. They are appointed by the board president of SF3, which is the nonprofit that provides oversight for WisCon.

You can think of our committees as workgroups, each of which has a clear purpose and purview.

There are currently three peer committees, and all are necessary for each others’ success:

  • The ConCom (Convention Committee), whose purpose is to carry out WisCon.
  • The Communications Committee, whose purpose is to maintain a flow of information between all of our projects (including WisCon!) and our community.
  • The Personnel Committee, whose purpose is to recruit, equip, and support all of our volunteers.

We need a chair for Communications, and a chair for Personnel. We have some volunteers ready to go to do the work in each of those committees, but we need you to step in! We’re also happy to help you find someone with whom you can co-chair, if you don’t want to go it alone.

Interested? Please contact president@sf3.org to express interest, or with any questions.

(Interested, but not in being a chair? Hold tight, we’ll have a post soon with information on volunteering for communications, for personnel, and for the ConCom! But we need to fill these two spots first, so tell your organized pals to reach out!)

SF3

SF3: Interim Mission, Vision, and Values

The board of SF3, WisCon’s parent organization, has posted the following statement on their blog. Please visit that post to comment.

As noted in our Anti-Racism Statement, the SF3 Board is undertaking work to reexamine our organizational mission with the intent to eliminate white supremacy and build an organization and convention where all members can thrive and contribute. In connection to this work, we are sharing interim versions of a mission statement, organizational vision, and a clear statement of our community values which center inclusivity and explicitly reject racism and white supremacy. These interim statements will guide our work over the next year, including community-wide conversations and strategic planning to develop a permanent and inclusive set of foundational documents for SF3 and its projects, including WisCon.

Interim Mission Statement

SF3 seeks to provide and support spaces to explore and understand identities, injustice, and possible paths to a more equitable future, via speculative media.

Interim Vision Statement

A world where we engage collaboratively in imagining and building a future in which all members thrive.

Statement of Values

SF3 values a community that is inclusive and that welcomes diverse voices without privileging any particular identity over others; as a result, SF3 and its projects are committed to identifying and eliminating white supremacy within all activities. SF3 values spaces in which no one is silenced or discouraged from participating due to racism, sexism, fatphobia, transphobia, biphobia, homophobia, ageism, classism, colorism, ableism, nativism, anti-semitism, xenophobia, islamophobia, anti-immigrant sentiment, and other expressions of identity based hate. SF3 does not tolerate those behaviors and does not welcome participation in any of its activities by people who seek to exclude others from participation. SF3 values accessibility defined broadly. We believe that implementing accessibility for one group can and often does create universal benefits; however, the implementation of a measure that improves access for only a single person is not less worthwhile. We strive to create and support spaces that are functional for people in all our physical and mental variety.  We also recognize that access needs can and often are in conflict. Every space may not be appropriate for or accessible to every person, but we will do our best in good faith to implement accessibility for as many people as possible. SF3 values the principles of restorative justice: encourage collaboration and reintegration rather than coercion and isolation; give attention to the unintended consequences of our actions and programs; show respect to all parties, including victims, offenders, and community members. SF3 values diversity of thought, except expressions which deny or invalidate the identities and experiences of others.We understand that there is no true objectivity.  Every person is part of society and has a history that has shaped them. Who we are as individuals influences our understanding and decision making; inclusion and exploration of multiple perspectives leads to better decisions. SF3 values environmental sustainability. We use vendors that employ green practices, conduct our planning meetings remotely, give our members the ability to opt out from paper mailings and self-select printed materials at events, and make use of carbon offsets to reduce the overall impact of events requiring travel in addition to encouraging our members to use public transportation or share common rides with one another. We are committed to reducing global environmental harm, and to supporting a sustainable future. SF3 values collaboration and consensus, while recognizing that the perspective and knowledge necessary for many decisions can be limited by role. The people who carry out tasks can and should be the decision-makers concerned with the methods used for those tasks. Strategic (multi-year) decision-making must be decided by the board, or proposed to the board for adoption, as the board exists and is configured in order to provide multi-year, overlapping personnel, appointed by member vote, and enabled to carry out those decisions. SF3 values trust in each other and in openness to learning. All SF3 and project-related roles are carried out by volunteers who donate their time, knowledge, and labor to advance the org’s mission and to carry out its projects. We seek to assume good intent on the part of everyone involved in SF3 projects and activities. We strive to offer grace where words or actions are unclear to us, and seek to improve our own understanding, while nonetheless holding everyone involved responsible for their actions. Every one of us is working toward a more full understanding of the world, and that is a life-long and non-linear process. SF3 values sincere effort to avoid harm, while recognizing that harm may occur with or without intent. A lack of intent does not negate or excuse harm. SF3 values the past while recognizing that the events, experiences, and truths that brought us to this point may not continue to be effective in the future, and that in many cases, aspects of the past which we individually found beneficial may have been actively harmful to others. We leave those things behind and seek new ways of thinking and acting that will benefit us all. SF3 values a process of continuous learning within a culture of accountability. As such, we appreciate that people change over time, and that mistakes are a part of that process. We endeavor to reshape our opinions of each other’s abilities and potential based on who they are now, rather than holding tightly to their past errors — once they have been held accountable for those errors. Conversely, past accomplishments and status do not excuse current harms done by any person in our community, and we cannot excuse anyone, including individuals who were held in high esteem, if their behavior causes harm.
Official Announcements, SF3

SF3 Anti-Racism Statement

The board of SF3, WisCon’s parent organization, has posted the following statement on their blog. Please visit that post to comment.

WisCon’s parent organization, SF3, has been thinking deeply about the recurring racism and white supremacy culture within the convention and within our committees (the Convention Committee aka “ConCom”, the Communications Committee, and the Personnel Committee). The presence of racism and of white supremacist culture, which impacts and injures people with any marginalized identities, are parts of our culture that we must address.

SF3 rejects white supremacy, racism, misogyny, transphobia, homophobia, and ableism. The SF3 Board expects the same of our membership and has no tolerance for racist acts or statements.

We recognize that racism has led to conflicts at WisCon every year. This is unsustainable and wrong, and these are not isolated or unrelated instances — they are part of structural and historical problems. We also recognize that it is the SF3 Board’s responsibility to solve this problem, and the solution is not and cannot be asking BIPOC members of the community to fix the organization.

Further, we want to acknowledge that over the history of WisCon, many BIPOC community members have volunteered in good faith for the ConCom, the SF3 Board, and other projects. Those volunteering situations were hostile, and this organization failed to keep those volunteers safe or to enable their success. Those situations were also not isolated incidents, and are part of a larger pattern and organizational culture.

It is the SF3 Board’s obligation, in engagement with the WisCon community and all current and past volunteers, to address and fix systemic racism and other problems within our organization and its spaces. Being a welcoming, inclusive, and equitable organization cannot be achieved without honesty with ourselves and with others.

We recognize that white supremacy is baked into the social and cultural landscape of the US. Members of SF3/WisCon must recognize and work to counter this; it is work that white people in particular must undertake in order to live up to WisCon’s values and purpose.

The SF3 Board, within their purview over nonprofit governance, is reexamining our organizational mission with the intent to eliminate white supremacy, and will be working to revise organizational bylaws and foundational documents to restructure a racist power system and ensure BIPOC empowerment. The Board has created interim versions of a mission statement, organizational vision, and a clear statement of our community values which center inclusivity and explicitly reject racism and white supremacy. These documents are intended for use over the next year, and will be shared in this space later this week.

Following that step, we will be undertaking a strategic planning process specifically focused on inclusion — in particular, on eliminating racism and empowering BIPOC members. We will be inviting everyone in our community to take part in strategic planning, which will create a permanent new mission, vision, and values for our organization and all of our projects, including WisCon.

We recognize that this is not a goal we can reach in a single year. Our strategic planning process will involve mapping out our goals for the next five years, along with broadly stated tasks for achieving those goals. We ask the full community to hold the SF3 Board accountable in this work.

We commit to sharing a monthly update on our progress, our goals, and what we have learned.

Within the next 30 days, we will be proceeding according to this schedule:

  • September 30, 2021: Share interim Mission, Vision, and Values

  • Early October (no later than October 14): Send out meeting agenda and information packet in advance of SF3 Annual Member Meeting.

  • October 11, 2021: Share overview and initial steps of strategic planning process and invite volunteers to join a committee established to carry out that process. The strategic planning process will include a plan for soliciting input, experiences, and feedback from BIPOC members of our community in particular. There will be a clear process for this; in order to treat feedback seriously and with care, we will not solicit that information before a system is created by the strategic planning committee, equipped with the resources they need to succeed.

  • October 18, 2021: Blog post outlining plans for the next month of work on these goals, with dates. This post will also include reports of the work accomplished so far.

  • October 24, 2021: SF3 Annual Member Meeting (details forthcoming)

Official Announcements, WisCon 45 in 2022

Updates on WisCon in 2022

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We would like to again thank everyone who participated in Visioning WisCon in May. Visioning WisCon was not intended to replace a full online con and was organized differently from our usual structure.  We’re glad that our community was engaged that weekend across a variety of virtual spaces, and we’re grateful for all of the feedback we’ve received on the event. We’re working to incorporate the lessons we’ve learned as we look towards WisCon in 2022. Speaking of which…

We have some exciting news about our next in-person WisCon in 2022!

  • Our wonderful host hotel, Madison’s Concourse Hotel and Governor’s Club, has opened room reservations! We have a group discounted rate that is available from now through April 26, 2022. Please show your support by making your reservation today.
  • Guest of Honor nominations for WisCon in 2023 are open! Anyone is welcome to nominate someone to be a Guest of Honor (GoH) by sending an email with the nominee’s name to gohnoms@wiscon.net. (If you already nominated someone any time during/after WisCONline in 2020, we have your nominations and will include them for 2023. Thanks!)
  • We have Co-Chairs! WisCon is organized by a group of volunteers called the Convention Committee (or ConCom, for short). For 2022, Aileen Wall (she/her), Ira Alexandre (they/them), and Kit Stubbs, Ph.D. (they/them) are co-chairing the ConCom. Aileen is a previous WisCon co-chair who has also served as our Hotel Liaison with the Concourse for the past six years. Ira and Kit co-chaired WisCONline in 2020 and continued volunteering as chairs of the Personnel Committee and the Communications Committee, respectively, throughout 2020 and 2021.While Aileen, Ira, and Kit are all awesome people, they need more volunteers to join the ConCom to help organize the con. If you’re interested in finding out more information about volunteering on the ConCom please let us know (signing up is not a commitment, just a request for info!) Look forward to role descriptions and an online information session coming soon.
We’ll continue to post updates about how con planning is going on our blog and email newsletter.
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Questions/Comments?

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Thank you for joining us for Visioning WisCon!

We have a Google Form where you can ask questions about the ConCom, give feedback on this event (Visioning WisCon), and make suggestions for WisCon in 2022. You can also request to join our email newsletter or request more info about volunteering on the concom (no commitments, just info).

The form will be open through Monday evening (5/31) at 9pm Central time. After that, you’re welcome to contact us or subscribe to the email newsletter through this website!

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Visioning the WisCon ConCom

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We have a new Spontaneous Programming item this evening at Visioning WisCon!

Visioning the WisCon ConCom: Do you have ideas for how to carry WisCon forward? Do you have questions about how WisCon is organized that you’d like answered? Start a conversation about #VisioningWisCon with several current ConCom members in Spontaneous 1 on Kumospace, today (Sunday, 5/30) at 6PM Central.

Official Announcements

NFTs are destructive horrors. Buy real stuff at our virtual con.

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Is anyone else SUPER distressed over the revelation that carbon credits may have been manipulated to such a degree for profit that they may have amplified ecological harm rather than reduced it?

TIL if you start a blog post in a super-depressing way, it’s hard to regain your momentum.

One of the many many ways that you can help ameliorate the harms of capitalism on communities and the planet is through careful, thoughtful purchasing. Local helps, and independent helps, and supporting each others’ creativity can be incredibly nourishing.

We know that WisCon isn’t a single community, and is in no way homogeneous, but rather is a web of interconnections between many different communities, individuals, and groups. As a whole, we have some practices, relationships, values, and ideas in common, even though we may not be able to see those connections so clearly on an individual level. There are reasons we come to WisCon, and the reasons are in those broad commonalities.

Supporting each other — buying or otherwise appreciating the writing, artwork, craftwork, skills, and services of folks you have attended panels with, sat next to in the Con Suite, split a cab to the airport with, to whom you’ve handed out a nametag, or with whom you laughed over a speech — that’s a small act of mutual support, of strengthening the whole. We need that strength.

We don’t have an Art Show this year, and we don’t have a Dealers’ Room, and we aren’t able to stroll down to Room of One’s Own to be at the Guest of Honor reception that usually kicks off the convention Thursday night. But we can gesture powerfully toward those things by supporting the vendors, artists, and businesses that we love to see at WisCon, so that they can join us again in person in 2022.

You can access a list of vendors and artists who would love to sell you things at this link, which is a google sheet.

You can also find many of these folks by using the hashtags #WisCon, #VWisConDealers, #WisConDealers, #WisConArtShow, and #VWisconArtShow on Twitter and (possibly) Instagram. Happy shopping. 🙂

Are you an artist or vendor? Want to be added to the spreadsheet? Please leave a comment on that sheet and we will add you. Want to show off your wares? Consider signing up for Show & Tell!

In the meantime…Register here to join us TODAY AND TOMORROW May 29 & 30 at Visioning WisCon!

Official Announcements

How do I find the virtual door?

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Good question! Apologies to all of you people who like to plan ahead. I am not one of you, but I admire your ways and regret any distress that the tardiness of this post has caused.

Our spaces for Visioning WisCon use Kumospace, a group video-chat platform that does not require any software beyond a browser.

We strongly recommend that you use Chrome browser to attend if possible, and that you take a moment to enable captioning within your own Chrome settings. Here are google’s own instructions on how to do that.

The first time you visit our Kumospace-hosted spaces, you will need to create an account, which requires only an email address. You can also use a Google/Gmail account as your login, if you are signed in to that account in Chrome.

You will have access to two different spaces. You can think of the first space as analogous to most of the convention space at the Madison Concourse Hotel (including the bar, the pool, the party suites, and the conference rooms). We’re calling this the Convention Space. The convention space allows you to hang out with other attendees, chat, and participate in spontaneous programming.You can think of the second space as analogous to the big ballroom where the Gathering, Dessert Salon, Vid Party, and SignOut happen. We’re referring to this as the Event Space. The event space allows you to hang out with other attendees, chat, and watch/participate in the scheduled events.

Why two spaces? Because everyone in every part of the event space will hear and see the events, as they are “broadcast” throughout all of the rooms in the space. Separate spaces allow us to have spontaneous programs happen simultaneously with the events, which would be difficult otherwise. Can you be in both spaces at once? If you have two computers, sure, why not. Please beware of weird audio double-echoes, though. Also beware of evil clones.

Speaking of evil clones…let’s talk safety.

Safety folks have Safety Stars on their names.

We ask that anyone who comes into these spaces register for Visioning WisCon, so that they have access to the information we are sharing via Eventbrite. We ask that you avoid sharing the links to the spaces.

Everyone who enters the spaces is subject to our Code of Conduct. If you have any concerns about behavior that you witness or are subjected to within the convention or events spaces during the hours that Visioning WisCon is underway, please direct message anyone with a star next to their name in the “people” list at the bottom of your Kumospace window. These folks are Safety staff, have admin powers, and can remove any attendee from the space.

There will be no Safety on duty prior to 4pm or after 11pm Central time. We will not close the space after hours and you are welcome to continue to use it as a social space, but please be aware that there will not be anyone enforcing the Code of Conduct.

Bad actors who are removed from the convention or event spaces will not be able to re-enter. Removals are permanent. Removal from Visioning WisCon may have lasting impact when we return to in-person conventions.

BUT WHERE ARE THE LINKS TO THESE PLACES???? At 4pm Central, please proceed in an orderly fashion to the Eventbrite page, where you will see a button with the text “Access the Event”. Ta da!

Official Announcements

Feeling impulsive? Wanna hold a panel?

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Technically, the “spontaneous” in WisCon’s “Spontaneous Programming” doesn’t mean that those programs are the result of stray or surprising impulses. It just means that the ideas didn’t make it into the regular program schedule, or that one of the regular panels or workshops or papers provoked enough discussion — tangential or otherwise — that it sprouted a part 2 that same weekend.

Or maybe someone woke up that morning and realized they’d had an epiphany about how Riker is symbolic of the textually un-examined specter of extractive colonialism in Star Trek: The Next Generation and they had to panel about it right away. In which case it is the result of a stray or surprising impulse. And that’s also valid.

So this weekend’s virtual spontaneous programs are sort of both of the above and sort of neither. Creating WisCon’s program schedule — including Readings, Gaming, Workshops, Panels, and Parties — is a massive undertaking that involves a small army of volunteers, several software platforms, lots of proofreading, surveys, reminders, data entry, and weeks of tweaks until it all fits together and is ready to happen.

We wanted to keep Visioning WisCon as an easy-entry, accessible, low stress event. Our (virtual) doors open at 4pm Central TODAY (Saturday), and you can either show up with an idea for a discussion — panel, presentation, demonstration, reading, roundtable — and people to have it with, or you can gather participants from among other attendees on the spot. We’ll have a schedule available for you to reserve a slot and promote your topic in one of our spontaneous programming rooms.

You know you don’t want to wait ANOTHER year before you talk through your feelings about Bill & Ted Face the Music, or Star Trek: Picard, or Lovecraft Country, or…how is time even real it’s making my brain feel funny. You get the drift.

Signups for spontaneous slots will open up today (Saturday) at 4pm Central, and will continue all weekend.

Register here to join us THIS WEEKEND May 29 & 30 at Visioning WisCon!