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[Thank you to all the Rovers who are my second family, for making FanimeCon (and all the looong training meetings leading up to it) the absolute highlight of my year <3 Every. Single. Year <33]

Thank you to all the Rovers who are my second family, for making FanimeCon (and all the looong training meetings leading up to it) the absolute highlight of my year <3 Every. Single. Year <33

Thank you to Registration staff for all your hard work in processing 17,000+ attendee badges.
Thank you Con-Ops for all your hard work throughout con ( and as a Rover... uh... We're sorry about stealing one of your Totoro shrine plushies ^^'' And keeping it as a mascot... )
Thank you to Info Desk for all your patience with attendees demanding schedules.
Thank you Dance Staff and DJ's for being AMAZING as always. The Dance is my favorite event at Con. We love you guys <3 [ Though that empty bottle of Crown Royale I found on the desk by the DJ booth... Makes me wonder, lol. ]
Thank you Logistics for all you do, despite being often forgotten (they're NEVER looking for Logistics, lol.) And ESPECIALLY THANK YOU for parking your truck in front of the protesters and making our job so much easier.
Thank you Volunteers for all the help, especially with those boring jobs of sitting there for four hours and... Uh. Guarding a curtain.
Thank you Artist Alley, Swap Meet and Dealer's Hall staff for satisfying all my shopping needs, lol.
Thank you E-Gaming, Maid Cafe, Stage Zero, Autographs, Panels, B&W Ball, Video Programming, Masquerade, MusicFest, and Tech staff for all your hard work in putting on all the live events that bring so many people to con. [Though I slept through most of them, lol. What I get for working Graveyard shift.]
Thank you EMTs and SJPD for being present at con and keeping us safe.

Am I forgetting anyone? lol. Thank you to all the staff that works behind the scenes and I didn't think to mention!

And finally, THANK YOU attendees. Because despite the complaints, the drunks, the trouble makers, the crowds, and the long hours, YOU GUYS are why I LOVE my job and CANNOT WAIT to come back next year.

Does anyone have pictures of the dance? I did see a few people there with cameras out.
I'm also still looking for pics of Rovers :)

there was a Rover i was hanging/helping out with at the Marriott Saturday (?) night/sunday morning/ whos name was Kameron/Cameron

he was in a purple shirt with a black hat and had to tell everyone going on the elevators about how 2 of them broke xD and i ended up sitting there for at least an hour waiting for a friend of mine to come back down from the 25th floor D;

We only have one Rover named Cameron, I'll let him know C:

Who was the awesome rover in the purple shirt on saturday for the yuya signing? she did an awesome job keeping everyone in check :DD

oh.. i know her! yes.. she's awesome. :P

please tell her i said thank you and that she did an awesome job :DDD

I was wondering was it saturday or do you mean sunday because saturday there was a girl in a dress. was that her?

I was wearing a purple dress on Saturday, but I worked the Yokota signing C:

[ P.S. Dood, add me on facebook! ]

I worked Yuya's signing and was wearing a purple scarf as a shirt.  interesting...

Sounds like it was you, then C: Well deserved recognition, J-pan!

Did anyone take pictures of Rovers in the yellow armbands? I would love to post em on the Rovers facebook wall C:

Who was the awesome rover in the purple shirt on saturday for the yuya signing? she did an awesome job keeping everyone in check :DD

oh.. i know her! yes.. she's awesome. :P

please tell her i said thank you and that she did an awesome job :DDD

I was wondering was it saturday or do you mean sunday because saturday there was a girl in a dress. was that her?

I was wearing a purple dress on Saturday, but I worked the Yokota signing C:

[ P.S. Dood, add me on facebook! ]

Anyone get any pictures of Rovers in our yellow armbands?
Even waaay in the background behind all the cosplayers, lol. I would love to post em on our Rovers facebook wall.

I saw what looked like a pro photographer taking pictures at the dance I believe every night... Anywhere we can see those pics posted?

[There are 120 or so Rovers on the stafflist this year (for 16,000+ attendees at con)]

I've been a little scared to post here because there is a LOT of Rover hate flying around, even though most of the bad experiences seem to be directed at one or two staff members that had a bad attitude or were stressed out and allowed the stress to show.

I'd like to point out: There are 120 or so Rovers on the stafflist this year (for 16,000+ attendees at con), as well as a handful of "dedicated volunteers" that joined Rovers on-site due to the department being short handed. If you had a bad experience with ONE Rover, please don't let that speak to the entire department. It is literally one or two in a hundred.

2011 Positives:

Maturity Level of Attendees I'm not saying it's perfect, but I'm seeing a lot more maturity from the attendees. In years passed ('04-'07ish) I noticed a lot more annoying squealing/glomping/general discord. I remember seeing people do stupid and dangerous things (back in the days of Der Cosplay, on my way out, I saw 2 guys having a battle with the swords they bought from a booth) and reflecting back on that, it seems it's gotten 100x better.

In response to this:

TRUST ME, having worked Graveyard shift the past three years, the attendees have NOT gotten more mature, and there is still a LOT of stupidity going on at con. This year we especially had a problem with hotel room parties and individuals carrying alcohol ON THE CONCOURSE despite Fanime being a DRY CON. [ Really, guys? lol ] There have been multiple other incidents during con that Rovers have responded to that just make me wonder...

[ But those incidents involve individual attendees and I don't want to post them here. It'd be rude. Just as it is rude to lodge complaints on a public forum about individual staff members. ]

But Rovers HAVE gotten better at handling situations such as hug lines, people swinging swords around, catching weapon policy violations faster, etc. so that the situations are handled BEFORE they become a large problem for other attendees. So if you saw an improvement in the overall behavior of attendees, THANK A ROVER.

[ It should be obvious, but everything posted here is my opinion and does not speak for the department. ]

Definitely having some major post-con depression. It didn't hit me until I got back to school and got into bed and found myself unable to sleep. It's totally weird sitting here with no work to do, and with no radio chatter in my ear.

This weekend I worked 37 hours since Thursday - including 12 hour shifts on Friday and Saturday nights. Transitioning back to everyday life is hard! Missing Rovers already, they're my second family, missing the con-goers (even the ones who gave us attitude when we were trying to do our job), missing the ache in my feet, lol. No, wait, I still got that!

Can't wait until next year :)

Where we stayed: Fairmont, 4th floor
Was it good or bad: Great :)
Would you stay again? Yes.

Comments:
We had four people staying in a room with 2 queen size beds.
The room is spacious, with couch-chairs, lots of counter space, separate bathroom with a closet, a vanity table (outside the bathroom), a bath AND a shower, and a toilet with a sliding door for privacy. Overall, VERY nice for cosplayers. We had two cosplayers with us and two casual con-goers.
Also, there weren't people constantly going up and down the elevators or running up and down the hallways, so it was nice and quiet.
When we did take the stairs, however, we got pretty easily lost.. Those staircases are a maze.

Oh, the Fairmont also has a pool on the 4th floor... We didn't use it, but we saw plenty of other con-goers who did.
There is a 5 minute walk between the Fairmont and the con. It wasn't too bad, but there definitely were a lot of instances of, "Hey, I would get this from my room right now... But I don't want to waste 15 minutes going back and forth."

They also had a late check out for Memorial day. They charged us $10 for it, but we got to check out at 4pm, and sleep in on Monday, instead of clearing out in the early morning. Overall, the front desk was super nice about everything. We did ask them to lock the mini-bar, which they never did, but we also didn't touch it. And yes, the mini-bar is sensor activated. If you touch anything, you'll get charged.

The cons: Parking is EXPENSIVE. AS. HELL. Luckily, I didn't have a car, but my friends who did paid out the ass for parking for the weekend. I think it was something like $60 for the 3 days. You would be much better off parking in the Con parking garage and walking to the hotel.

Also, room service came at 8:30 AM. This is probably because we were on the 4th floor, so they started with us, but after the first morning we put the "Do Not Disturb" sign up and were not disturbed... We took it down when we were all awake in the morning, and so we still got clean sheets and towels and all that, which was nice.

Finally, I did have some problems with billing. First of all, they have a $100/night deposit for the room. So I got a hold on my debit card for like $700 for the weekend, and had to rely on cash. Also, everyone in our room was staff, and we had a Fanime staff room, but I got charged the rate for a regular con-goer. However, I called the billing department as soon as I found out, and after sending them a copy of my original reservation, they refunded me right away, and were super nice about it.

There is a mini-fridge option, but they charge you $25 for it. We didn't use the option, and used ice-buckets instead.

I think it's because they've banned the "hug lines" and the "dance lines" this year. The hallway that is between the Game Room and the Hilton seemed empty to me. Don't get me wrong, I understand the perspective of why people complained about it the previous years, but it seems like a "anime convention" tradition that shouldn't be taken away. Maybe have a section of the center dedicated for the hug-liners that can be overlooked by Rovers for safety? I don't know, I don't want to start an argument, cause I'm sure there's a solution out there that can satisfy both sides, just don't try to figure it out in this thread.

YESSSS!!!!!!!! THAT IS EXACTLY WHAT I THINK!)&$*)@&$*@_#_R why would you destroy the hug line D: i just noticed how much of an impact it does to fanime. I think it opens people up, like last year i was all quiet but i went through the hug line and got me pumped up! it got people to dance and do the things that they do at fanime! sorry its just an opinion. sorry if i offend anyone. I started one this year but got messed up by rovers...

As far as I know, "Hug lines" and spontaneous dance parties were not banned this year, as long as they did not block the general flow of traffic. This year we had the spontaneous sing along/jam session, as well as the cuddle fest and Spin the Bottle in the gaming room, and we didn't really care about them, though Spin the Bottle did get eventually shut down because not all the participants were over 18.

"Hug Me" signs have always been forbidden -- California has pretty strict laws about solicitous signs, and we have no choice but to enforce those. It's the same with weapons.

You also have to keep in mind that Rovers aren't the ones who decide what is allowed or not. Any time there is a question about something being allowed, Rovers report to Con Ops, who then report to... someone else. Not sure where it goes from there. And then Rovers just enforce whatever decisions are made, whether we agree with them or not.

I missed the Masquerade, but I saw you guys at the raves looking awesome xD I was one of the Rovers staffing at those.

Selling "informally", especially on the concourse, can be considered soliciting and is a big no-no. Generally hand-made items are sold in the Artist Alley, but unfortunately registration for Artist Alley has closed. Sometimes you can come to the Artist Alley and ask if anyone backed out of their reservation last minute and if you could take their slot... I don't know how much luck people have had with that in the past.

WE ARE LOOKING FOR ONE MORE ROOMIE.
We're staying at the Fairmont, from Friday night to Sunday night. It will be about $80 a night. This is a no drinking or smoking room.

I'm a Rover, 19 years old. This is my 7th year coming to Fanime and 2nd year working staff. My roommates are also Rovers, both female, between the ages of 18 and 21. We're all really awesome, really laid back. The only issue you'll have to deal with is that we keep somewhat odd hours (I'm working the midnight shift.)

We are in a STAFF room, so you must be staff.

If interested, please email me at [email protected] or call me at 650-283-5991.

The rovers should have stickers that say "must shower" or something so that they can stick them on people.

Staff has been explicitly forbidden from spraying stinky people with air freshener this year. Shame. Rovers do give "friendly" reminders, though.

About sneaking in a rice cooker and a microwave... The best solution is, don't do it. Hotel staff WILL know that you have them there. Even if you have the "Do not Disturb" sign up all weekend, room service is still allowed to go into your room (especially if they suspect something funky is going on.) Besides that, if you cook food in the room, the smell lingers once you leave. And you can get charged for it after you leave.

Not to mention, it creates a bad bad image for Fanime goers. We want the hotels to like us, remember.

"Published" includes published on the web. This means Deviantart, blogs, webcomics, what have you, as long as it's posted BEFORE Fanime. It doesn't have to be official in the sense that it's published by a major publishing company or anything like that.

I'm a Rover working the midnight shift, so it's pretty much in my job description. Stop by and say hi if you see me :D

I snapped some pictures, but they turned out to be extremely blurry v_v' Guess all the excitement got to me xD I asked for a Kirby plush for my birthday so we could play again, in case Pikachu didn't show up.. but never got it *sigh*

I'd love to play again, though xD Can't wait for this year ^^'