Hugo Nominations & Awards: 2021 and Onward

[mormont]

Ormond: yeah, among the WSFS community there have been many people saying the same thing. The trouble is getting them to agree on a change. It took a lot of work just to get the Lodestar Award added to the Hugos. Literally years. To amend the Best Related category would be at least as much work and first you have to find people who care enough to do that work.

[Caligula_K3]

My impression is that the Hugos are just becoming too insular. I'm sure this has been a problem before, and familiarity bias is always going to be a thing. But when the same authors come up again and again, even when their new books aren't very good, the award stops being worth much. Leckie's Ancillary Justice was a phenomenal book. But Provenance up for a Hugo a couple years ago? Jemisin is another example here: the Broken Earth trilogy was great. Did all three books deserve to win the Hugo? I'm not so sure, but I do see a case for all of them to be nominated and for one or two wins. Does The City We Became deserve a nomination? I'm sorry, I don't see it at all.

And then there's all the fan categories. I agree with the poster who says that it's hard to take any of this seriously when important scholarly works are going up against blog rants or five-minute-long speeches about the Hugo Award itself and losing.

[williamjm]

1 hour ago, Caligula_K3 said:

My impression is that the Hugos are just becoming too insular. I'm sure this has been a problem before, and familiarity bias is always going to be a thing.

That sort of thing has definitely happened in the past as well. David Langford won the Best Fan Writer Hugo for 18 years in a row, for example.

[Padraig]

And yet the "Best Series" Hugo seemed to come from no where.  Or maybe I missed that?

Always struck me as a rather odd award (even though i'm much more likely to be familiar with nominations in that category than others).

[Werthead]

21 hours ago, Padraig said:

And yet the "Best Series" Hugo seemed to come from no where.  Or maybe I missed that?

Always struck me as a rather odd award (even though i'm much more likely to be familiar with nominations in that category than others).

Best Series I believe was introduced to stop people nominating series in the Best Novel category (like Wheel of Time in 2014), which they felt was not in the spirit of the award.

I think that's a reasonable precedent for splitting out Best Related Work from these kind of fandom essays/analyses.

[Ran]

Watched The Last Bronycon documentary from Jenny Nicholson, because I was a bit confused about it being nominated in Best Related Work. Was there a campaign for it? Who was recommending this as a nom?

While it is about fandom, it's about a very specific fandom which I'm not sure I'd consider to fit neatly within SF/F fandom. Sure, MLP is a fantasy cartoon, I guess, but this has more crossover with anime fandom than it does traditional SF/F fandom. While I recognized the whole form and shape of the convention from past Worldcons -- dealer rooms, programming, charity auctions, art rooms, music performances, awards, etc. -- and some of the dynamics discussed, it just...

I don't know. It was fine, some amusing bits, some weirdly interesting bits (like Nicholson, who had at one point been involved in making fan animations where she voiced many of the characters, recounting the occasion someone appeared at a con claiming to be her and even taking the stage to take questions), but mostly it was just a person speaking for an hour on Youtube about a topic. Which is cool! I have done this myself in a fandom capacity many, many times. But it didn't seem to me to be deeply illuminating. For example, she refers to the fact that in the later seasons the show began to cater increasingly to the Bronies, referencing their memes and so on, but she doesn't really delve into what the creators thought of this fact, and what fans thought of this fact, and what it really meant about the project and the fandom. Again, it's fine for what it is. That's just one area where there could have been more depth.

I just wonder who thought it should be nominated, really, merits aside. When something is so tangential to Worldcon's traditional interests, it seems odd. Are we expanding this to all fandoms? If someone nominates a documentary about the fan-ownership of the Green Bay Packers, is that okay (throw in some 'fantasy football')? How about K-Pop fandom? Because, according to the present wording of the BRW, those things qualify, because "fandom" is not qualified as being "science fiction or fantasy fandom". It just says "science fiction, fantasy, or fandom". Which does suggest any fandom can apply. This will be a problem as people realize it and start convincing one another to nominate more oddball things.

 

 

Edited April 19, 2021 by Ran

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

4 hours ago, Ran said:

Watched The Last Bronycon documentary from Jenny Nicholson, because I was a bit confused about it being nominated in Best Related Work. Was there a campaign for it? Who was recommending this as a nom?

While it is about fandom, it's about a very specific fandom which I'm not sure I'd consider to fit neatly within SF/F fandom. Sure, MLP is a fantasy cartoon, I guess, but this has more crossover with anime fandom than it does traditional SF/F fandom. While I recognized the whole form and shape of the convention from past Worldcons -- dealer rooms, programming, charity auctions, art rooms, music performances, awards, etc. -- and some of the dynamics discussed, it just...

I don't know. It was fine, some amusing bits, some weirdly interesting bits (like Nicholson, who had at one point been involved in making fan animations where she voiced many of the characters, recounting the occasion someone appeared at a con claiming to be her and even taking the stage to take questions), but mostly it was just a person speaking for an hour on Youtube about a topic. Which is cool! I have done this myself in a fandom capacity many, many times. But it didn't seem to me to be deeply illuminating. For example, she refers to the fact that in the later seasons the show began to cater increasingly to the Bronies, referencing their memes and so on, but she doesn't really delve into what the creators thought of this fact, and what fans thought of this fact, and what it really meant about the project and the fandom. Again, it's fine for what it is. That's just one area where there could have been more depth.

I just wonder who thought it should be nominated, really, merits aside. When something is so tangential to Worldcon's traditional interests, it seems odd. Are we expanding this to all fandoms? If someone nominates a documentary about the fan-ownership of the Green Bay Packers, is that okay (throw in some 'fantasy football')? How about K-Pop fandom? Because, according to the present wording of the BRW, those things qualify, because "fandom" is not qualified as being "science fiction or fantasy fandom". It just says "science fiction, fantasy, or fandom". Which does suggest any fandom can apply. This will be a problem as people realize it and start convincing one another to nominate more oddball things.

 

 

I would be delighted to see a group of Packer fan worldcon members nominate something about the Packers.  That would be really amusing.

[Werthead]

15 hours ago, Ran said:

I just wonder who thought it should be nominated, really, merits aside. When something is so tangential to Worldcon's traditional interests, it seems odd. Are we expanding this to all fandoms? If someone nominates a documentary about the fan-ownership of the Green Bay Packers, is that okay (throw in some 'fantasy football')? How about K-Pop fandom? Because, according to the present wording of the BRW, those things qualify, because "fandom" is not qualified as being "science fiction or fantasy fandom". It just says "science fiction, fantasy, or fandom". Which does suggest any fandom can apply. This will be a problem as people realize it and start convincing one another to nominate more oddball things.

I think this might be just another demonstration of how marginal the BRW category is. A couple dozen or so people were MLP fans, saw this, though it was cool and nominated it. I don't think it's much more than that.

Hell, the MLP fanbase is nuts. If you don't want the GRRM article to win, go on a few MLP fansites and publicise the fact this thing has been nominated, it'll win by a thousand votes.

[Ran]

12 hours ago, Werthead said:

I think this might be just another demonstration of how marginal the BRW category is. A couple dozen or so people were MLP fans, saw this, though it was cool and nominated it. I don't think it's much more than that.

A quick survey of past years suggests BRW tends to get roughly the same amount of nominations as Best Novella. In fact, last year's BRW winner was the work with the least nominations -- just 36. That's an interesting number, given that the least nominated work on this year's ballot got just 31. In 2018, it took 51 to get on the ballot. In 2019, it took 55.

I think that's probably a bit of a magical number -- much under 50 and you're going to get some oddballs. The double-hit of ConZealand and the pandemic has definitely left its mark.

Quote

Hell, the MLP fanbase is nuts. If you don't want the GRRM article to win, go on a few MLP fansites and publicise the fact this thing has been nominated, it'll win by a thousand votes.

Maybe. Nicholson has been targeted for mobbing by the same bunch that have mobbed Lindsay Ellis, and I'm guessing some of the things she says about the Bronies are not actually popular among them.

ETA: In fact, it looks like in 2016 an episode of MLP was on the ballot specifically because of the Puppies, which led it to being trounced by No Award. I don't think it's anything like a guaranteed winner.

Edited April 20, 2021 by Ran

[karaddin]

I feel like your references to "mobbing" quite dramatically simplifies the dynamic going on, I've seen plenty of criticism of Ellis (both before the current flare up and this time) but I've never seen any of the people that I've seen criticize Ellis go after Nicholson, even during times I know the latter has been getting harassed.

Dog piles are bad, but not all criticism is dog piling or in bad faith. By the same token there are absolutely always chambers looking to exploit when a woman online gets criticised, regardless of whether the original criticism had any merit or not. 

[Ran]

1 hour ago, karaddin said:

I feel like your references to "mobbing" quite dramatically simplifies the dynamic going on,

If some Youtuber trends on Twitter because people are angry at them, it's because it is in fact mobbing.

Quote

I've seen plenty of criticism of Ellis (both before the current flare up and this time) but I've never seen any of the people that I've seen criticize Ellis go after Nicholson,

The problem with mobs on the Internet is that they are clusterfucks of different groups who pile in like a pack of wolves when some injured member of the herd can't keep up. Ellis addresses this stuff in her video.

If you watched her video, she provided direct evidence. Put in "Jenny Nichsolson is next" in search and you'll see it being referenced, including by people decrying it. Here's one example from another Youtuber who screencapped a couple of examples:

Quote

Dog piles are bad

Yes. Which is why people really shouldn't do it at anything remotely on the scale that they do, regardless of whether the criticism is merited or not, especially when the context is the ridiculously unimportant matter like some Youtubers hot take on commercially-produced media. Ten thousand people demanding apologies (sometimes for things that the person already apologized for!) for the tweet of five seconds from someone who will never in their life have power over them is just bullshit. The very online people need to get themselves out of the completely warped view of the importance of anything said on Twitter and the importance of anyone who says anything on Twitter. 

 

 

Edited April 20, 2021 by Ran

[karaddin]

I didn't say none of the people criticising Ellis would attack Nicholson, yes some of them will and obviously that will include anyone that's exploiting the opportunity to take down someone they see as "an enemy".

But the people I saw engaging in good faith criticism before it transformed into a dog pile I have not seen lobbing criticism at Nicholson. They also aren't participating in an ongoing dogpile, they expressed a criticism that seemed quite reasonable to me and then the shit storm developed after that.

I'm not saying a dog pile isn't ongoing, or that it's ok, or that it won't strike out at others. I'm saying that the criticisms which predated the dog pile are distinct and conflating it all is oversimplification.

And for the record I've consumed plenty of videos from both of them over the last few years, I've been somewhat wary of Ellis since seeing her drop a transphobic joke that was at odds with how she positions herself with respect to the online queer community. Nonetheless I have still enjoyed some of her videos since then. Nicholson's channel feels entirely different without the adjacency to activism that would even open her up to the criticism like that of Ellis that I thought was reasonable, and again - I haven't seen any directed her way in my circles.

[Werthead]

Correction from the other thread: apparently the Stormlight Archive was eligible after all. Some people felt it should have gotten a nomination from the number of people who said they were nominating it, but it just didn't get enough votes to get on there (which, given how quickly it dropped out of the conversation, is perhaps not as surprising as it would have been a while back).

Having gone round the houses on the GRRM thing, I can't see how they can disallow it. As a few commentators have pointed out, a WorldCon's code of conduct (which isn't even a required thing) cannot override the rules for the Hugo Awards, so it appears that the nomination can stand. There also seems to have been a call to precedent: when faced with a large number of people trying to fuck over the Hugo Awards during puppygate, the response wasn't to disallow their nominations or use executive powers to boot them out, but to use the existing mechanisms to stop them (i.e. No Award and then mild reform of the voting process). The argument would seem to be the same here, except the fault line isn't between the normal Hugo fandom and outsiders but within the normal Hugo fandom, which will probably result in a strong number of votes for it to win and for No Award to triumph over it.

There is a marginal difference in that the GRRM blog entry mentions GRRM by name in the title, but some of the puppy entries (particularly the VD entries) were quite a lot more vicious and unpleasant in specifics and generalities and they were allowed to stand. I can't see them making a different call here.

Edited April 20, 2021 by Werthead

[Derfel Cadarn]

https://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/society/mans-diy-to-do-list-wins-award-for-best-fantasy-novel-20210426207490
 

Spoof site has an article about a man’s DIY list winning the Hugo’s best fantasy novel award

[Ran]

@Derfel Cadarn

Funny because of the kernel of truth that the Hugos are wide open for something like that getting nominated, provided it was published and 30-odd people wanted to nominate it.

I don't know when or how the Hugos will reckon with its overly-broad categories that have too few participants. Will be interesting to see if any proposals for amendments to the rules develop over the next months.

[SpaceChampion]

That really seems like watering down the category of what is considered fantasy quite a bit.

[Corvinus85]

8 minutes ago, SpaceChampion said:

That really seems like watering down the category of what is considered fantasy quite a bit.

Less than when Hidden Figures was nominated. Great movie, not SF. At least this one has murder elves.

[TazerFace!]

So uh, the entire Hugo Admin team just quit/resigned, and everyone on twitter is really mad, but I'm not sure why.

[Ran]

12 minutes ago, TazerFace! said:

So uh, the entire Hugo Admin team just quit/resigned, and everyone on twitter is really mad, but I'm not sure why.

See File 770 for probable causes. If it sounds weird that space at the reception and on the stage might be at issue, consider the fact that the last wave of resignations were about the number of nominees for each work, and then look at the Semi-prozine category.

[TazerFace!]

Eh, I   am not a fan of file 770, but that aside, it's all really speculation at this point.

 

Edit: Yah that's a lot of name. o.O

Edited June 23, 2021 by TazerFace!