Where Has the Time Gone?

You've all got something like 24 hours in which to nominate me for a Hugo Award!

Better get cracking!

Online and Away

So . . . I'm off to Dragoncon. I'll try to check in with you all, but I may be having too much fun.

But since I'm going to be away for a while, I thought I'd leave you with a question.

Actually, it's the usual question. How can Walter get more fame and money?

I couldn't help but notice that this year's Hugo novel list was tilted toward people with a high online profile. Cory, Charlie, Neil, and John Scalzi all have a big web presence, and while Neal Stephenson doesn't, he's nevertheless idolized by cybergeeks for writing stuff like Cryptonomicon and Snow Crash.

It's not like I'm particularly letching for awards per se, but rather the sorts of things you get when you win lots of awards, which is to say a very large readership, respectful attention for your work, editors beating down your door, and money.

I had the whole interlinked web scenario laid out for me at this last Worldcon. "Your tweets bring people to your Facebook page, and your Facebook page brings people to your blog, and your blog brings people to your web page, and your web page brings people to your books." (Nothing in the advice about writing well, because that seems to be secondary. As we all knew, I'm sure.)

It was also explained how one person on the panel one an award. "I told all my online friends to vote for me, and they did."

More online charisma than me, I thought. Or very suggestible online friends.

How many people are really interested in tweets about what I had for lunch? If you are interested in my lunch, would you also vote me an award and buy my books when I told you to?

I asked the audience, two thirds of whom tweeted, whether they'd do Twitter if they had to pay for it. Two people raised their hands. (Just a data point, I don't really have a point about this one way or another.)

Oh well. Late night, after packing, and me not thinkin' too clear.

Nine Votes

The stats released from the Hugo voting at Worldcon have shown that Implied Spaces came just nine votes short of getting a Hugo nomination. Of course that also means that Implied Spaces came but nine votes short of being turned into an asphalt angel by Neil Gaiman's Invincible Award-Winning Steamroller--- but then if that happened, I'd find myself in pretty good company.

I would like to offer sincere thanks for any of you who voted for Implied Spaces. And if you didn't, there's a copy of This Is Not a Game I'd like to sell you.

It was George RR Martin who told me about falling short in the Hugo voting, and he immediately suggested a remedy that would get me on next year's Hugo ballot.

"You've got to go out and seduce nine women," he said. "Preferably Australian, preferably members of the 2010 Aussie Worldcon."

"Of course," said Gardner Dozois, who was kibitzing. "Strictly speaking, it doesn't have to be women."

"Yes," I said firmly, "it does."

Leaving aside the moral and family questions of which Kathy will doubtless remind me some time in the next 24 hours, George's plan seems problematic. Since female Australian fans presumably talk to each other, and since some might object to my pursuit of others while I pursue them, they might get angry and vote against me. Which means that I have to acquire a safety margin, and seduce more than nine women. Say, 20. And do it all before next March or so, when the ballots are distributed.

That would mean I'd be pretty busy for the next six months, and my expenses would include tickets to Australia as well as lodging.

I think George's plan is getting overcomplicated. Maybe I should try something simpler.

Ballot-box stuffing? It has a stirring history, even in fandom.

Getting the Hugo committee drunk and tampering with the results while they're not looking? Considering that they're Aussies, the cost in booze would probably equal the cost of flying Down Under and seducing 20 women.

Campaigning for the Hugo?

No, I couldn't do that. Campaigning is unethical, whereas outright cheating is just fun.

Hugo Pimping

You have a little less than two weeks to nominate me for a couple Hugo Awards, so it's time to get busy! We need to pull together for this to happen, but if we succeed in coordinating our efforts, my mantelpiece will have two shiny new rockets, a massive injustice will have been laid to rest, and you will have the satisfaction of a job well done!

You are eligible to vote if you were a member of last year's Denvention, or this year's Anticipation in Montreal. If you don't have a membership in either convention, then you'll have to get cracking and buy an Anticipation membership toot sweet!

Once you've got your membership, you can go to the Hugo page and download the appropriate forms, or vote online.

Here what to vote for.

Novel:

Implied Spaces, by Walter Jon Williams, Night Shade Press, July 2008.

Novelette:

"Pinocchio," by Walter Jon Williams, The Starry Rift, ed. Jonathan Strahan, Viking 2008.

You can nominate anything you like for the other categories, but if you nominate anything else for the novel and novelette categories, please make sure they're works that don't have a chance in hell of winning. Thank you!

I know I can count on you guys. We've been through a lot together, but I just know that if I can get a couple Hugos, all the wretchedness and misery and neglect will seem like a faraway dream.