Comped scribblers the bane of conferences

[Tim May]

On Saturday, August 25, 2001, at 12:19 PM, dmolnar wrote:

> By the way, in case anyone knows Neal Stephenson, I know a science 
> fiction
> conference which would love to invite him.  (Yes, I've read his web 
> page,
> yes, it's a lost cause, but writing of luminaries...)

Both Neal S. and Vernor Vinge have been attendees at this conference I 
was mentioning. (I won't be coy, but I'll evade the search engines: the 
HHaacckkeerrss Conference, held each year.)

Both Neal and Vernor are far more interesting than Esther, John, and 
Mitch. (I had some dealings with Esther back when she was still mainly 
doing RELease 1.0, and I used to see her around town in Palo Alto, and 
she was reasonable to talk to. After she became a Globetrotting Pundit, 
she became too harried and scheduled and "important" to waste time just 
talking.)

The hard part is getting beyond the canned speeches. For one thing, 
these people (the SF writers especially!) are used to people running up 
to them at SF conferences babbling to them about some story idea, so 
they "put their shields up."

A few of us spent a Saturday evening and long Sunday with Vernor Vinge 
some years ago. It was only when we could talk and talk about all sorts 
of ideas that we got beyond the usual b.s. and defensive shields. Some 
of what we talked about made it into Vernor's last SF novel, which 
wouldn't have happened had I just been another SF con attendee who 
buttonholed him for a few minutes. (Doug Barnes, formerly active on this 
list, had similar contacts with Neal. I've met Neal a few times, but 
never got beyond the buttonholing stage...until he contacted me by 
e-mail after he realized the name of his novel, "Cryptonomicon," was 
awfully close to the name of my "Cyphernomicon." It turned out, much to 
my surprise, that Neal had not realized there was a tradition of 
"Necronomicon" uses, starting of course with Lovecraft. Neal had seen 
mention of "The Necronomicon" in a late night movie about "fighting 
skeletons" (I'm presuming it was "Army of Darkness" or "Evil Dead" he 
happened to see) and he thought the book title sounded cool. He was 
chagrinned, he told me, to find an entire range of such uses, including 
my own. He asked me if I objected to his book title, and I told him I of 
course did not.

I had a similar experience with Steven Levy, author of "Hackers" and the 
recent book "Crypto." I'd met him briefly at various conferences 
(including the H.C.), but never got beyond the buttonholing stage. 
Until, that is, he took an interest in crypto and list themes and sought 
some of us out for longer talks.

This is one of the main reasons I favor "relaxicons." In SF circles, 
these are, as you probably know, small cons with  very few scheduled 
events. Cypherpunks meetings used to be like this, ironically. (The 
trend recently, for whatever reasons, has been to schedule several 
speakers. So we end up, for example, with lawyerbabblers from EFF coming 
in to give a pro forma speech while people try to "buttonhole" the 
speaker to somehow get a point across. See above.)

>
>> CFP could have been a conference where tech types mingled with policy
>> types. Alas, very few of the Cypherpunks meeting folks ever go to the
>> CFPs, even when they're held locally to the Bay Area.
>> Mostly lawyers and spooks.
>
> There was that workshop on "Privacy by Design" at the 99 or 00 CFP, 
> wasn't
> there? The one report I had from that was not favorable, but it's not a
> *bad* idea.
>
> This year, there's a workshop on Privacy Enhancing Technologies being 
> held
> immediately prior to CFP in the same building. Maybe this will lead to
> more interaction.
>
> http://www.pet2002.org/
>
> (Disclaimer: one of the co-chairs is a co-author of mine. So yeah, this 
> is
> thinly disguised plugging for the workshop. No, I don't know how much
> it will cost.)

I'm skeptical. I haven't looked in detail at this one, but the one 
Choate forwarded twice to the list was filled with corporate folks on 
the committees. (Some of whom used to be list subscribers. Fine folks, 
I'm sure, but now it's a corporate task for them to on committees.)

I have another rant in mind, a rant about "affiliations." I'll just play 
the script and you can figure out what the rant is about:

Alice: "What's your affiliation?"

Tim: "I'm just a person, Tim May."

Alice: "Yes, but what's your _affiliation_? What organization do you 
represent?"

Tim: "Like I said, I'm just who I am. I don't represent anybody but 
myself."

Alice: "Uh...OK...Uh....Say, do you know anyone else who would be 
willing to speak on this issue?"


Our society seems obsessed with affiliations. Nearly everyone quoted in 
articles is "John Davis, V.P. of Interstitial Affairs at the Datawhack 
Corporation" or "Mindy Mannheim, Director, Global Progress Alliance."

A friend of mine was a space enthusiast (asteroid mining, single stage 
to orbit, all the usual b.s.). He could never just be "Joe Blow." He was 
always having new business cards printed up showing his latest project. 
Always either a V.P. or a Director, except when he was a Program 
Manager, President, Chairman, or Founder. Never mind that his 
organizations were either private corporations (usually not even 
incorporated officially) or 'foundations." It seemed that the way for 
him to be quoted was to be "Joe Blow, Director of Operations, Solar 
Satellite Corporation."

Being a misanthropic sort, it's great to get journalists out of my hair 
at conferences by just telling them I don't represent anyone, that I'm 
just at the conference for myself. If they had t.v. cameras and lights, 
I'm sure that's the point at which they'd yell "Kill the lights." 
Instead, they just nod politely and move on, hoping to get a sound bite 
from a Director or a Program Manager or a Professor.

--Tim May