I seem to have neglected to mention that I was on a panel at WorldCon. I think this was my first WorldCon panel, actually. It was about \"SF on the Web,\" and was billed in the pocket program guide as being a \"URL swap and review panel.\"<\/p>\n
Now, I have a theory about panels. Actually, I have many theories about panels,\nbut the relevant one here is that any panel which can deteriorate into the panelists\nand audience listing their favorite whatevers will do so.<\/p>\n
Clearly many people in fandom like such panels. You can build a good recommended-reading\nlist from all the panels that are all about listing favorite books in a given\ncategory. But I find such panels boring these days; I just don't consider\na panel to be the right format for providing a list of books and\/or authors.\nA Web page is a good format for such a list: easily reachable by most people,\n easily printable, can be accessed from libraries, can be easily updated, rearranged,\n split into multiple pages by category, etc. (If it's backed by a database,\n even better!) A paper handout or an\narticle published in a magazine is a reasonably good format for a favorites list;\nreaders can carry it with them. But saying the names of authors and books in\nfront of a big audience seems to me to be a waste of everyone's time, especially\nsince the person saying a given name usually has to repeat it two to three times\nand then spell it.<\/p>\n
And usually the only information given in those contexts is the author and\/or\ntitle. Panelists almost never explain why they like a given work or author; it's\nalmost always "Oh, and here's another book that fits the broad category suggested\nby the title of our panel. Oh, and here's another one. And I just thought of\nanother one. Also this one. And that one."<\/p>\n
I've done this on panels myself; it's very easy to fall into, and in fact\npanel audiences often request it. "Can you recommend any books that fit category\nX?" Panels are often structured around brainstorming booklists: I was on a feminist\nSF panel at WisCon, the point of which was mostly to recommend feminist sf\nfor younger readers.<\/p>\n
So anyway, I had nightmare visions\n of three-quarters of the panel's time being taken up with panelists saying\n "Here's another one of my favorite websites:" and then saying the site's name,\nand then spelling the URL. Slowly. Several times. "H, P, T, T,\nno wait I mean T, T, P, colon, backslash, backslash—yes?" Audience member:\n"Don't you mean H, T, T, P, colon, slash, slash?" Panelist: "Yes, that's what\nI said." Audience member: "No, you said—" It would be excruciating.\n
So I contacted my fellow panelists via email ahead of time (not nearly as\nfar ahead of time as I'd originally intended, alas) and asked them for the URLs\n that they were going to mention, so I could put together a paper handout to\ndistribute at the panel.\n
It turned out there were differences of opinion about what the panel was going\nto be about. Some panelists,\nI think, expected it to focus on reviewing various sites (actually talking about\nthem, not just listing URLs); others expected it to be a general discussion of\nthe state of sf online, and of business models, and so on.\n
But most of the panelists provided me with a dozen or so URLs apiece, and\nthen the night before the panel I made a handout. I decided to fill in a few\ngaps by adding a dozen or so URLs of my own, but things got really out of hand:\n I kept finding new stuff I thought deserved to be on such a list. I finally\nnarrowed it down to "few" enough items that they fit on two sides of a sheet\nof paper (in landscape mode, with two columns). Then I printed it at Kinko's\nand photocopied it. And during the panel itself, every time we referred to a\nsite we could say "The URL is on the handout."\n
It was probably entirely unnecessary, for two reasons: First, there are literally\ndozens of sites out there that already provide big listings of SF on the Web;\nand second, given a site name, it's trivial to Google it and find it without\nhaving to know the URL.\n
But I'd already made the list by the time I thought that through. And I figured\nif stuff came up during the panel that wasn't on the list, it would be nice to\nbe able to update it, so I put it on the Web.\n