Those 2015 Hugo Awards...

[duck2ducks]

[A couple of posts I recently made on Facebook. Cobbled together and reformatted because oh hey LiveJournal lets you do that sort of thing.)

.
.
.

"In any case, this slate of nominees has already launched a Twitter firestorm, and lots of people are planning to vote "No Award" in every category except "Best Novel." It's definitely a weird turn of

Comments

[mathuaerknedam]

I primarily know about the Hugos because I read Girl Genius and follow the Foglio blogs. It has seemed a little odd that they haven't won since the year they sat out, but I was surprised to see that they weren't even nominated this year.

[duck2ducks]

I'm not surprised, honestly, for a few reasons:

1) The most pertinent is probably that, from what I can see, GG didn't actually get a published collection last year! Amazon gives Vol. 12 a release date of 2013, which Wikipedia tells me is the most recent collection. Granted, the rules might be kind of fuzzy for always-running webcomics...

2) Remember that the Hugo Shortlist doesn't represent all the books that were nominated, but just the top 5 finalists in each category. (And we had LoserPuppies snagging one of those slots, to boot.)

3) Yet in all seriousness, I'd be kind of surprised if GG were to make the finalists again. And it's not because I don't think it's great. I've dug the Foglios for over 20 years.

But the thing is, there are so many good comics coming out today. So many comics and graphic novels that are just impressing the heck out of readers and critics alike, which are telling new stories and breaking new ground. And as enjoyable as GG is, it's kind of ... not doing that. It's kind of like what I feel

[mathuaerknedam]

Let me start by acknowledging my general ignorance of everything involved in this topic. :)

The funny thing is that, for me, "comics" means two different things to me. My view of the type of comics i see in comic stores (and formerly, anyplace that sold magazines) is stuck in the '80s, and has a nigh-complete skew towards superheros. My exposure in the '90s included an expansion in the tone and art, but the bulk of the content didn't change much. I'm aware that far more exists, but I don't really get it in any appreciable way. I don't really imagine this overlapping with the Hugos.

My other view of "comics" are various other things I read online these days. I imagine these as having some overlap with the Hugos. It's probably just a matter of associating what I read/saw, and how I was exposed to it, at different times of of life. There's 1980 - 1990, and 2010 - now.

Thanks for widening my perspective a bit.

[mathuaerknedam]

Is it normal for so many finalists to withdraw?

[duck2ducks]

Good Lord no! There's nothing typical about this year's Hugo ballot at all.

(There's a reason I called it a debacle, up above...)

However, a kind of awesome effect is that the number of people buying Sasquan supporting memberships, and thus gaining the power to vote, keeps going up and up. And while it's theoretically possible that some of those could be Sad Puppies / Rabid Puppies supporters, I think it's far more likely that the SF fan community doesn't like being bullied (who'd have thunk it?), and will put their dollars where they can to fight against it.

[mathuaerknedam]

From http://www.thehugoawards.org/
5,950 members of this year’s Worldcon voted in the 2015 Hugo Awards, according to Hugo Voting Participation Announcement. This breaks last year’s record of 3,587 ballots, and represents a 57% voter turnout, the highest participation level in the past decade. More people voted this year than attended all but eight of the 72 past Worldcons.

[duck2ducks]

That's pretty impressive!

Also, on an unrelated note - I'm seeing BJ tomorrow! I'm taking a train to Kansas, then we're heading to Big Bend, TX to hike and stargaze for a week. :)