SciFriday: Is San Diego Comic-Con Too Big?
Michael Hinman thinks it might be ... but what can be done?
You can't be an entertainment news outlet of any sort without planning a (very expensive) trip to San Diego Comic-Con each July.
A convention that started out with just a few hundred people sharing their love of comic books, this event has become a huge economic boost to the San Diego community bringing in more than 100,000 people each year to celebrate not just comic books and science-fiction, but pretty much all television and movies worth mentioning.
Each year, the convention grows even more. In 2009, some panels started popping up at a hotel or two just outside the convention center. Today, those hotels are just as busy as the convention center itself, with full schedules, and thousands of people traveling all over the downtown area to attend Comic-Con functions.
I reluctantly went to my first Comic-Con in 2008. I knew that more and more of the programs we cover on Airlock Alpha were being featured at the convention. But I live in Tampa, Fla., and a cross-country flight and overpaying for hotel rooms is not my idea of a good time in the middle of the summer.
But I'm glad I started to go, because I actually look forward to Comic-Con. I honestly don't know how organizers do it -- shepherding all these people around, making everything run smoothly, and with minimal problems. In fact, I believe they pull off a minor miracle.
However, even they must sit back after each one and think about how this convention has become way too big. And really, it has.
Being a member of the media, I end up attending press events, usually roundtable press conferences with the actors and writers of the television shows and movies we cover. These are invitation-only, so there are no lines to wait. However, the thought of even standing in line to get into a panel room -- it makes me almost panic, despite the fact that some very newsworthy things happen in these panels that I wish I could attend more of.
This past year, Rabid Doll editor Bryant Griffin and I made our trek to the convention, and I asked him not to stand in any lines for panels. We had enough press events to fill our schedule, and we needn't waste any time standing in lines. To me, panels are designed for the fans, and fans should be filling these rooms, not media.
But like me, Bryant is a huge fan of "Game of Thrones." In fact, it's because of him that Airlock Alpha was covering this show when it was early in development and almost no news outlets were paying attention. He wanted to attend the "Game of Thrones" panel in Ballroom 20, and got in line three hours ahead of time, believing he could get in about an hour or two later, and then just work on his laptop from his seat inside the convention center.
Bryant did make it in the convention center -- more than four hours later, and after the "Game of Thrones" panel. he didn't get to hear or see anything that happened in the panel, because the rooms are designed to hold just a few thousand people -- a small percentage of the actual full attendance of Comic-Con.
I'm not suggesting that Comic-Con find bigger rooms, logistics just don't work that way. But there must be ways that people can still enjoy the panels, even if they don't make it in.
Last year, I attended Star Wars Celebration V in Orlando (and by the way, it's coming back to Orlando in August), and I was impressed by many aspects of that convention. The biggest was how freely people could move about, despite the fact that the Orange County Convention Center was quite packed.
Even more, I was sad that I couldn't stand in line overnight to see George Lucas and Jon Stewart yack it up about Star Wars. Unless you were willing to put your iPad line-waiting skills to use, you were not getting in that room. But you didn't have to. All the monitors around the convention center broadcast a feed of the panel, and there were hundreds of people gathered around these flat screens to watch what Lucas had to say.
People attending Celebration who were not willing to wait in line, or who just couldn't get in, still felt like they were getting an excellent value, because they still had a chance to experience the panel.
Comic-Con, on the other hand, provides video screens of what's happening on stage -- but only for those already sitting in the audience. There are no feeds going anywhere else. Not into the hallways. Not into the line of people standing outside. Not even into a media room.
The chief complaint I hear about Comic-Con is not that it's crowded. It's that it's almost impossible to attend any of the major panels unless you're willing to give up your entire day to stand in line. While I'm sure we'd all like to be in the same room as George R.R. Martin has he talks about Winterfell and the Stark family, many would most likely be happy with the chance to at least get to hear and see what they are saying.
Reporters like Bryant and me could even pull ourselves out of line, making room for fans, by watching a feed elsewhere, likely in a media room, or even on a closed Internet stream. It's not a major technical obstacle for Comic-Con -- they would have to rent a bunch of televisions and have them set up, but they already have cameras and audio equipment in each room. Creating feeds to go outside the room is nothing more than flipping a couple switches.
Hell, Comic-Con has no problem selling out tickets each year, so why not even offer those who can't go to San Diego a chance to attend the convention virtually with online feeds for like $30 a person, or something that is reasonable to subscribers that still more than cover bandwidth costs to provide such a service?
I don't expect to see Comic-Con downsize anytime soon. The demand to attend, even with problems getting into panels, is very strong. And I don't blame anyone. It's an exciting and fun time, and a chance to share your love of the genre with about 140,000 of your closest friends.
But Comic-Con really needs to find a way to stop thinking it's a few hundred comic book enthusiasts getting together to talk shop. They have to acknowledge their size, and utilize technology that will make the convention accessible to so many more people. And then, Comic-Con truly could rule the world.
Photo courtesy of Parka Blogs
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by charlituna | Fri, 01/06/2012 - 14:07 #1
First step they can take is to drop everything that isn't connected to a comic book. Let all that stuff have its own convention.
Another step would be to either allow event tickets ahead of time before the whole Con. first come, first serve, starting at X time. Even perhaps putting up a limit of how many major events someone can attend to be fair to all.
And yes they could and perhaps should broadcast them to the outside areas, post them as podcasts or whatever. Hell they could sell them as a tv show on iTunes and probably make a small fortune. Paley Center for Media does this from time to time themselves.
by schurchman | Sat, 01/07/2012 - 12:05 #2
The problem is there is nowhere else it would work and still be what Comic-Con has traditionally been. Yes, there are other convention centers that are bigger, but none in the geographic area (Southwestern US) have the additional niceties that have made San Diego viable for the various interests beyond just the convention.
In theory I can see 3 primary contenders to replace San Diego: Anaheim, Los Angeles and Las Vegas.
Anaheim and LA have the convenience factor of being near Hollywood. So execs/studios would like it due to the ability to get talent in and out quickly for promotional reasons. Unfortunately there's no surrounding venues outside of the center. There's no place to go to beyond the convention itself without driving miles. Anyone who's been to Comic-Con can tell you there's just as much stuff happening outside of the convention center as inside. The near entirety of downtown San Diego get's converted to free ad space, promotional events, and walking billboards for any franchise committing to the event. (SyFy Channel for example now just "rents" out a cafe and slaps a 'Cafe Diem' logo on the side, and decorates the entire thing in promos for all of their shows). In addition there are quite a number of parties held downtown for the talent and executives coming in. In many cases some of those same people are taking a kind of mini vacation for the event, which involves being able to get a room and walk across the street.
This is now where Las Vegas kind of wins and loses out. Anahiem/LA have nothing near the convention center to foster that attraction. LV has probably the best shot at offering the same kind of media promotion as San Diego (and party, hotel venues). Unfortunately it also has a longer commute and has to compete with some of the other attractions in the area. This would be great for attendees wanting to go to the convention, but probably more of a problem for scheduling talent. Not to mention the potential impact of people perhaps spending less time at the actual convention because there's more to distract them.
What Comic-Con needs to do is what they've been doing. Raise admission prices (which have been absurdly low for convention the size of SDCC), work with local businesses to improve the promotional opportunities outside of the convention center), push to get the San Diego city council to find a way to increase the size of the San Diego Convention Center (SD loses out on a number of conventions anyways due to it's current size and is already evaluating an expansion. The Port of San Diego has granted a lease for the land needed and the various groups are working on financing http://www.portofsandiego.org/convention-center-expansion-project.html)
by mhinman | Sun, 01/08/2012 - 18:59 #3
Well, I wasn't talking about moving the convention. More about how to make the convention more accessible. They can do that in San Diego ... and maybe even better.
by dandrede | Mon, 01/16/2012 - 14:42 #4
Even since I started going just a few years ago, it's gotten much worse. I took some friends for their first trek to CCI last year, and we couldn't get into ANYTHING we'd intended to see (mostly TV panels). The lines looked like the Hall H lines, which ain't good for a room 1/3 the size! The good side was that we ended up choosing several smaller, more focused panels and saw some truly awesome panels. But I've often wondered why there isn't a better attempt to correct the growing problem.
I agree with your suggestion to run feeds so that people can enjoy the panels without having to stand in line for an entire day. It's not like they charge entrance per panel, so why the exclusivity? My other suggestion has always been to scale back the non-genre offerings, thereby weeding out some of the crowd and returning CCI to a more focused event.
I was disappointed with things enough last year that I'm skipping it this year and probably for the next couple of years. Or maybe we'll try the smaller version in San Francisco. For the cost and effort involved in going to San Diego, I need to know that we'll be able to enjoy at least some of what we come there to see.