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A Manifesto For BiCon Organisers

  • Mar. 4th, 2005 at 1:20 PM
Thanks to the hosting of [info]djm4 the finished BiCon Organisers guide is now available online at resources.bi.org: A Manifesto For BiCon Organisers, 373k PDF.

It has suggestions, advice and tips on how to run a good BiCon and includes sections on venues, finances, publicity, entertainment and programmes. It has been written by me with contributions by [info]ajva, [info]djm4, [info]envoy and [info]lolliepopp.

If nobody other than BiCon organisers read it, I won't care. But I do hope it will be read by people wanting to organise UK BiCons at least. BiCons generally copy what the previous year did right but forget the years before - as I don't foresee myself being involved in the organisation of another BiCon for several years I wanted some way to ensure my methodology could be referenced without my being on the team.

I've emailled a copy to the person at IBC8 who said they would be spearheading IBC9 (due next year in Toronto).
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[info]lolliepopp wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 01:44 pm (UTC)
It's beautiful. Looks fabulous and reads well too.

Well done that man!

Hurrah!
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[info]booklectic wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 02:01 pm (UTC)
Did you look at my suggestions?
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[info]adjectivemarcus wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 02:06 pm (UTC)
Yes - I changed the footnote about BDSM playspace following your sensible concerns over clarity. (c:
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[info]elfgeek wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 02:55 pm (UTC)
Looks great! I didn't find anything in your document on the legal side of things, whether the bicon committee should be a public limited company or a charity or whatever. I remember us having discussions about financial liability when things go wrong...would it be a good idea to put a brief chapter about that into the guide as well?
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[info]adjectivemarcus wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 02:57 pm (UTC)
That's not something on which I have any advice to offer. Becoming a charity is, iirc, a lot of work and quite restricting though.

It's intended as 'a' manifesto, not 'the' manifesto. (c;
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[info]elfgeek wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 02:59 pm (UTC)
The reason I'm asking was because a friend of mine wanted to know how we solved this specifically with BiCon. Do you remember whether we became a plc or whether one person alone became liable?
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[info]adjectivemarcus wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 03:08 pm (UTC)
We did neither - everyone was jointly liable for stuff done as "BiCon" or solely for stuff they signed themselves.

We hoped for the best. We did, however, get event insurance.
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[info]lovingboth wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 03:57 pm (UTC)
I think the only people who have gone down the limited company route are Manchester, certainly in 2000.

There's an argument that for everyone else, only the signatories to the account are liable for any loses, but it's not one I'd like to have to make.
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[info]davidmcn wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 06:12 pm (UTC)
Becoming a charity is, iirc, a lot of work and quite restricting though.

The most problematic restriction being that when the charity is wound up (i.e. after that year's BiCon) surplus funds need to be used for similar charitable purposes. That doesn't work if you want to hand over the funds to next year's BiCon, because you don't know whether they are going to be a charity. We are considering making BiCon 2006 a limited company though.
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[info]lovingboth wrote:
Mar. 7th, 2005 10:14 pm (UTC)
The, erm, an answer is to have a continous BiCon charity / company / whatever that holds onto the assets from year to year. People who are running the next BiCon have whatever structure they like (so if they don't want limited liability, it's up to them) and get just enough money to pay for the agreed costs.

If there's a disaster - and there have been more and more near misses than most people realise - then it has the assets and the team have the liabilities (and wish they had limited liability / are glad that they did!)

More here.
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[info]skibbley wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 03:09 pm (UTC)
Well written Marcus.
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[info]lovingboth wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 03:52 pm (UTC)
Some stunningly good stuff in there.

I recognised some of the past problems, and most of the others just made me very glad (again) that I didn't end up being able to go to last years IntlBiCon.

One other comment:

"Unfortunately hotels are far more expensive"

It depends. A dance group I know of gets a long weekend in a 4* hotel in Bournemouth, three days, two nights, with two breakfasts, two dinners, and two lunches for about the cost of accommodation at this year's event.

It'd need to be somewhere off season in somewhere with a serious surplus of hotels, but I think it could be done. I wouldn't want to be responsible for allocating rooms, but that's the case anyway.
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[info]adjectivemarcus wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 05:17 pm (UTC)
Thank you.

Mmmm, but a hotel with the sort of conference rooms we'd like would be usually able to find out of season conferences. Dance groups, I suspect, don't have five workshops running at the same time.

Which hotel - Royal Bath?
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[info]topbit wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 08:01 pm (UTC)
I know that The Carrington House Hotel (on Knyveton road, used to be called the Moat House) is a big conference hotel (there has been a big Trek/SF con there mid-feb for several years) with 145 beds. With a few different video rooms, guest talks and the main sales room, it'll easily get to at least five sessions. They do have a lot more people coming through than Bicon though I suspect.
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[info]lovingboth wrote:
Mar. 7th, 2005 10:25 pm (UTC)
What I'd do, if I wanted to do 2007, and wanted to do it in a hotel, is say now, "Hello hotel. I will book your entire place for a long weekend, off season. I do not care which weekend, provided it's in (say mid-Sept to mid-Oct). I will give you some money as a deposit now. By say February 2007, you can tell me which of the weekends is good for you - feel free to book weddings etc in other weekends and leave us with the one that's left.

"I do not care about half the things you normally provide: if you have not had an SF con here, talk to someone who has and they'll tell you you'll get a hotel full of well-behaved but oddly dressed people who drink like fishes. We're like them."

Oops, I gave it an extra star, and I can't remember the name. In Westcliff, anyway, and it has enough rooms for sessions.

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[info]mankylarry wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 04:27 pm (UTC)
Wow

That's impressive.

Laurence
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[info]aegidian wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 04:49 pm (UTC)
Excellent stuff.
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[info]barakta wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 05:11 pm (UTC)
I'm impressed. Most of that document struck a chord in some way, either in a YES! or 'ohgod *groan* yes' kind of way....

Natalya - Still in recovery...
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[info]envoy wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 05:48 pm (UTC)
Heeee! *happy bounce*
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[info]davidmcn wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 06:09 pm (UTC)
Looks excellent. Well done all!
*goes to wake up the other BiCon 2006 organisers with rolled up copy of manifesto*
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[info]barakta wrote:
Mar. 4th, 2005 07:21 pm (UTC)
Indeed. I scoured the net lasy year for a variety of postbicon reports, some more available/easy to find than others. I can heartily recommend it if nothing else as a trigger point for discussion/ideas within the team.

This is the most organised, concise and collectively useful resource I have seen thus far - I also like the fact that different people's opinions are clearly laid out as such. I think it becomes something an ex organiser gets to do, be opinionated at everyone for ever more.

I also recommend checking what remains of the past BiCon websites.
This has links to old websites http://bicon.bi.org/past.html the 2001 site and 1999 ones were very useful in terms of feedback reports. The 2001 site loads v-e-r-y slowly. And of course the team LJs from 2002-current are interesting to read if not handy for little things.

Natalya
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[info]memevector wrote:
Mar. 6th, 2005 11:25 am (UTC)
The words "Marvellous" and "Excellent" sprang to mind instantly on viewing this publication and are still there!

::takes off imaginary hat::

Thank you!
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[info]lovingboth wrote:
Mar. 13th, 2005 09:58 pm (UTC)
The thought I'd been meaning to post is that one big difference between the (fabulous and fabulously successful) IBC in Boston 98 and the (less fab) IBC last year is that the main people behind the former had been to UK BiCons and I don't think any of last year's lot had.

Someone should invite the Canadians along this year...
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[info]adjectivemarcus wrote:
Mar. 14th, 2005 10:14 am (UTC)
*nods* They were being told by a Prominent Bisexual that they should hold up the 'con as an example of how easy it was to run an ICB so I did strongly suggest seeing how the UK ones worked and coming to ours in 2005.

I hope they do come.
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