Subject:
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Re: BrickFest registration fees (was: LEGO Adult Fan Convention at Legoland California?)
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.events, lugnet.events.brickfest
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Date:
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Fri, 8 Sep 2006 22:25:19 GMT
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Viewed:
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79 times
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In lugnet.events, Anthony Sava wrote:
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I’m sorry but the minute an organizer of Brickfest starts making money off of
the event itself, compensation or not, I’m not going. If this was the case
this year, I’m glad I didn’t go.
Yes, there are groups making money off of Brickfest - the hotels, the brick
bazaar sellers, etc. But Brickfest itself is supposed to be about the
comraderie, as you said. Quite honestly I can’t see how any one person
spends thousands of man hours on putting a single Brickfest together - all of
the events are fan-driven with the exception of the big group meeting/LEGO
Q&A. Yeah, I’m sure there’s plenty of behind-the-scenes stuff, but last I
looked every theme had its’ own volunteer organizer(s), so that just leaves
organizing the event as a whole.
No, I refuse to go to Brickfest if it’s no longer a passion of the heart
alone. Flame me if you’d like, but its just the way I feel. Christina has
worked very hard, as Joe has too, I’m sure (I wasn’t there but I know Joe and
he’s a good guy). But hard work or not, I’m not going to be part and parcel
to paying them for me to have a place to put up my work. I’m willing to
reimburse them for the cost of the space, but that’s as far as I’ll go - I’m
not going to fill anyone’s pocket just for the right to attend a hobby event.
--Anthony
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Anthony,
I think you may be underestimating the amount of time and effort that goes into
putting something like this on. Maybe not literally thousands of hours for any
one person, but for somebody like Christina or Joe and maybe others too, most
defintely many hundreds of hours over the course of a year go into organizing an
event on this scale.
While it is important for the community to remember that this is all a hobby and
a passion for us, the “Hey, let’s all just play” attitude that I often hear
simply reflects naivete of the realities. Sure, for hundreds of AFOLs, BrickFest
is an opportunity to come along play for 72 hours. Sure, most attendees are very
helpful at the event, perhaps helping moving tables around, manning
registration, showing off MOCs to the public and tearing down on Sunday. And
without all that help, the event would never work as smoothly as it does.
However, for the people who actually organize and set up the event, BrickFest is
the realization of months and months of advance preparation. It takes up lots
valuable time - time that could otherwise be spent with friends and family,
cultivating interpersonal relationships, maybe putting in that 110% effort
needed to get that promotion at work, or maybe building LEGO. For those
individuals who are most deeply involved, there is so much to do that there may
be scant time to actually enjoy the event itself.
Maybe not everyone who gets involved knows quite what they’re getting into, but
as a whole, the BrickFest staff works as hard as they can because they want to
put on an event that was even better than last year’s. Because they take pride
in being part of the biggest, baddest, coolest, most talked-about AFOL LEGO
event in the whole of the USA. It isn’t a committment that volunteers are
resentful to make (otherwise they wouldn’t volunteer), but make no mistake - it
is a genuine sacrifice made for the community.
Please don’t take this as a flame, I’m not trying to shout you down or vent
frustration at anyone or anything. I just think it is important that the AFOL
community gets a sense of how much work it takes to pull off an event like this.
I was involved in BrickFest in 04 and 05, and I had a great time but I simply
needed a year off this year. I’m hoping to be involved again in 2007 in some
capacity, because I want to help out again, but mainly because I know that being
personally involved in a successful event is hugely satisfying experience. I
encourage anyone who wants to get involved in 07 to do so. We need experienced
BF veterans, and we need fresh ideas from newbies.
As for where all the money goes: What I’ve been told during events I was
involved in - any surplus money from BrickFest is typically set aside to help
fund the following year’s event.
I think the issue of compensation may be a more relevant for volunteers than
regular attendees. If you are an attendee, I’m not sure why it is so important
to know where your 60 bucks went, so long as you had a good time.
On the other hand, if you are considering volunteering, it is perfectly
understandable that you’d want to know to what extent you might be compensated.
And if you aren’t going to be compensated, it is only natural to want to know if
anyone else working on the project is being compensated.
I don’t think it is realistic for the community to expect to see how every last
dollar and cent was spent. But it is also clear from posts on this thread that
organizers of future community events (BrickFest or otherwise) need to be clear
and transparent in terms of where they stand on where the money is going to go.
regards
Magnus
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