timwburke

Tom Purdom at http://www.philart.net/tompurdom/
Tom Doyle at http://mysite.verizon.net/vzexlq38/tomdoyle/
Steve Miller and Sharon Lee at http://korval.com/
Jim Freund from “Hour of the Wolf” http://hourwolf.com/toc.html
Jay Smith at http://zebrapix.wix.com/hg-world-entry
Pam Spinks Smith
Muriel Hykes at https://www.facebook.com/murielhykes
Keith DeCandido at http://www.sff.net/people/krad//
Edward Carmien of Mercer County (NJ) College
Neil Clarke of clarkesworld.com
Sally Wiener Grotta at http://www.grotta.net/
Ken Altabef
Anatoly Belivovsky at http://belilovsky.com/

Take-aways:
Coming up with ideas to improve PhilCon outreach to younger fans.
Accomplished authors Tom Purdom and Ken Altabef saying I’m doing right by working part-time so I can write.
Doing well on the panels. The attendees were all great.

In my experience, PhilCon went without a hitch. A number of ideas came from the “It’s Our Lawn Too” panel:
Bringing in more media tie-in and YA authors
Skyped guests
More panels about podcasts, epublishing, and electronic media
Resuming LARPs
Story readings for kids
More panels critiquing writing and art from attendees (I would be glad to run one)

Hi!
As you’ve seen from the previous post, I am moderating a couple of panels on Saturday.
Maybe you know me personally, maybe not. Either way, you should know that I think that if someone pays money to attend a con and go to a panel, then dammit, the panel should stay on topic.
I can’t count how many times I’ve paid for a con and gone to be informed, only to discover an 800 Pound Gorilla of a Grand Old Writer talking about what snacks were served at PhilCon 3 back in 19 whatever.
Money is tight with fans. They should get their money’s worth.
So I:
1) contact the other panelists ahead of time
2) and propose questions around which to structure the discussion.
3) I gladly accept ideas and other approaches to the subject matter.
4) I go online or read material to become acquainted with the topics.
5) On the day of the panel, I take deep breaths and keep caffeine to a minimum
6) and tell the audience to phrase their responses in the form of a question to keep pontification to a minimum.
An hour goes very quickly. We should all make the most of it.