Balticon 48’s come and gone. The dealer booths are gone, the panel rooms are returning to more sedate Hunt Valley Marriott uses, and really interesting looking people in memorable tee shirts or even more memorable costumes are no longer walking the halls… or at least not in such numbers.
I’m not as avid a SF conventioneer as some, but I’ve been to a few cons here and there, and, over the decades, to more than a few Balticons. I was there last year, although not the year before. I plan to attend next year as well. From what I’ve seen, I think Balticon is different than many cons, to which I can only add, ‘vive la differènce.’
SF conventions fall into broad categories: ‘media’ conventions, focused on television and movies, which are often ‘fan cons’ for media celebrities, , comic conventions, special interest cons, focusing on a topical theme such costuming or music (filk), and literary cons, with a focus on the literary side of SF, books and authors. Balticon is a literary convention.
But the SF world isn’t that simple, and the literary world isn’t either these days. Technology has ripped a huge hole in traditional book publishing. Consider distribution- Amazon for instance (Amazon’s currently involved in a dispute with publisher Hachette over how to split the profit margins on ebook versions of Hachette books, a battle of titans (Hachette is owned by giant French media group Lagardère.) Consider how self-publishing and print on demand have changed author/publisher relationships and contracts, or what print on demand has done to small press and academic publishers (hint: it’s wonderful), or what ebooks and print on demand have done to restore the backlist (authors’ older books, which in recent decades were falling out of print rapidly, but which, thanks to digital printing, have rebounded enormously.) Consider ‘new media’ – blogging, podcasting, and social media. Consider advertising- it’s common these days to see books advertised with their own video trailers, shown on author and publisher sites and on YouTube, and the nature of book promotion, and in particular author self-promotion, has changed dramatically.
What makes Balticon unique is it’s depth: it has programming to cover this evolving gamut of changes. Hundreds of panelists participated this year. If you are a reader, and not aware of these changes, you should be. The internet has been called a great equalizer in many domains- education, news gathering and dissemination, for example. It’s clear that it’s equally true in the publishing / literary domain. Balticon is a great place to catch up on what’s really happening in SF. There’s also has a wide range of events in media, gaming, hard science, and costuming (one of not just Balticon’s but SF’s great costumers, Marty Gear, passed away this year, but his legacy is alive and strong at Balticon.)
Balticon, first held in 1967, was 48 years young this year. The best is yet to come. Here’s hoping to see you there next year.