Messages

Still hoping for an official post announcing details of the event this year.

Or at least with more warning for it than what.... 2 weeks last time?

My bad you sounded so authoritative. I was thinking about sending an email to the old email, gogospeeddate @ fanime . com or whatever it was.

Hopefully they read this anyways, cause by the time they announce an email for it, it'll probably be too far along to make many changes.

Good to know Jerry. If I may make a further suggestion(s).

1) (this should go without saying) Give advanced warning when sign-ups are to be made active, OR have multiple events such that number of seats becomes less of a limitation, OR assign seats via a raffle so that it no longer matters whether you signed up early, or 5 min before deadline.
2) Provide time for both the men and the women to be the ones rotating. Reason being, its fair, and according to recent studies, the party that is stationary, is more picky than the one that is moving (regardless of gender, they controlled for that).
3) (this may be a moot point if it was already addressed in the sign-up form, which I didn't see, and don't have access to). Age might be a factor, so sorting participants into age ranges may be beneficial. Perhaps 3 categories: Age doesn't matter (self identified on the sign-up sheet), 18-22 (college), 23+ (after college) (those ranges could be whatever... just throwing out there), and then each range has their own rotation setup.

I totally support a speed dating event. I think it would be far more practical than those "how to talk to guys" & "how to talk to girls" panels.

I am entirely shocked that I somehow missed the fact that there was such an event for fanime 2010..... and here I thought I was brilliant to think of such an idea.

Is there any place where the feedback on this event was posted? Basically, did it go well, or was it a disaster? I certainly hope the event is renewed (and or expanded) for 2011 so that I might have a chance to participate.

Would it be possible to get more staff to process the badges. That line was atrocious. There have to be more computer systems than that since the other side of the ground floor registration area was used during the rest of the con, just not for Thursday pickup.

If its a volunteering issue, I'm sure you could get A LOT of bored people in the line to volunteer their time. It would be a heck of a lot more interesting to be doing some sorta data processing (or account lookup, or whatever) than sitting bored in a line moving at a snails pace.

As I'm not sure what type of organizational tricks or filing systems are already in place, I won't try to make more specific suggestions.

Though, it has been suggested to offer a "fast pass" option for additional fee.

Would it be possible to build in some downtime every 4-6hrs for video programming rooms. It doesn't have to be long downtime, and some random shorts, or amvs or something can be shown in the interim. But especially in the marathon rooms, once things got behind schedule.... they stayed behind schedule. Allowing some breathing room in the programming lineup would alleviate unforeseen episode delays and give people a great excuse to duck out for a few minutes and use the restrooms or grab a bite to eat without feeling like they are going to miss some of their show. You could even work out a tiny short catchy intermission short that can be stuck into the playlist at predetermined points.
Basically the intermission idea is this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DxtmQDCyLE8  just something dumb to fill up time with that can provide a variable length buffer before the next block of programming.

[The dance lessons.]

I won't bother listing pros and cons of the ball, since I have no basis for comparison with previous years (and all the pros were already listed in this thread)

I do have several ideas to improve the black & white ball though.

1) The dance lessons. I think that fewer lessons but longer lessons would be more beneficial. Attendees show up, get the very basics of a dance, but never get much of a chance to become comfortable/confident with dancing in that way. I think 2hr lesson blocks for a particular dance would give the students much more opportunity to cement the basic dance moves. Give more time to get used to leading or following. Practice navigating the dance floor (very necessary for traveling dances). And of course meet more people.
Furthermore very little instruction time was given towards actually dancing to music. The instructors calling out 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 for the various steps is so much easier to make out than the beat of the music. Therefore more practice at listening to the music for the dance rhythm rather than simply for enjoyment would be beneficial.
Now, extending the lesson time would require either larger blocks of the day to be allocated to dancing (which of course places demands on the instructors), or cutting the number of dances taught. I believe there could be less redundancy in the lesson schedule and cut some of the harder or less popular dances maybe. I definitely believe it would be better for the students to learn 1 (or 2) dances well, than to have a whole jumble of dance moves getting mixed up by beginners.

2) The Projector. The slide layout needs a lot of work. First of all, the screen was only clearly visible from the dance floor itself. This may have been one of the reasons for people standing around on the dance floor. Trying to read the screen from a 45 (or higher) degree angle is not easy. This was further compounded by the low contrast of some of the text. Blue text on a black background...... bad.... bad. Additionally the text size of everything except the name of the dance was a good deal smaller than it could have been. Again making it difficult to read from a distance.
Specific suggestions on this front.
A) Remove the Black & White banner from the top 50% of the slide. Its pointless..... everyone already knows they are at the B&W ball. It takes up valuable screen real-estate.
B) Change the screen location to off to the side somewhere. Perhaps add 2 projectors 1 for each side of the room. Or hell, put it on the ceiling somehow. If I remember correctly, the room is rectangular, so to maximize view-ability place the screen on the shorter wall.
C) Setup the slide such that it shows the name of the song, and then a list of preferred dances. The upcoming list could be on a separate slide and alternate with the "now playing" slide (say 10 sec interval) OR the entire playlist could be on another (smaller?) screen nearby.
D) Be generous with labeling songs as one type of dance or another. Yes, its been mentioned many times that generally you can dance to anything if you know how. Key word, know how. But, with inexperienced dancers will be more concerned with trying to find something that is labeled a dance they can do rather than improvise. So, as a rule I would label each piece as "preferred dances" and then "secondary dances". List the best fits in the preferred section, and then list everything else in the other section (unless.... it totally, completely absolutely doesn't fit). That way, more people will look at slide, see something that they know how to do, and try for it.

3) The playlist itself. I personally believe a rough schedule of when certain types of songs would be played might help some people plan out their night a bit. If for example someone only learned W.C.S. then it might be nice to have a stretch of songs that could all work with that dance (not exclusively mind you). Often it felt as if things just started getting into a rhythm, and then the song changes to something entirely different. Don't get me wrong, its nice to have variety. But for instance if maybe the first 30 minutes of the ball had all songs that could be Waltzed, and then the last song in that set, would definitely be danceable with Waltz OR {next dance set}. Smooth transition.

4) I think more clearly marked areas for dancers lacking partners might have been beneficial. Similar to how the dance lessons were split with leaders on 1 side, and followers on the other. Perhaps the north side of the room could be designated leaders-looking-for-partners while the south side is followers-looking-for-partners. It would make it easier to figure out who was resting or just chatting with friends as opposed to those who currently wanted to dance. Also it provides an easier avenue for shyer people to be found by ... no so shy people.


As a miscellaneous note (from the other posts). I think the checkpoint for entry into the ball and the corresponding line that forms should be further back down the hallway. Included past the checkpoint should be a bathroom, so that attendees won't have to "leave" the ball to use the facilities.

Was there a "rave" type event held at fanime this year? I think there was in years past, and if one were held concurrently then perhaps it would attract that crowd away from the ball to prevent solo dancers from taking over the floor.

I'll probably think of more later.