BroadwayCon 2016 - Experience reports! — Page 10

gypsy - Without getting into too much detail because I don't think she'd want me sharing it all, she's completely blind in one eye. In the other, her cornea had detached and the initial surgeon messed up in reattaching it. She has had multiple surgeries on it and, with a contact, can see fairly well from it. Glasses don't work, for whatever reason - she's tried them and they seem to have no impact. Unfortunately she can't wear the contact for more than about 10-12 hours a day without getting stabbing pains in her eye. Most of the time she takes the contact out and, like George in Seinfeld, is a really good squinter.

gypsy101 said: I'm worried about your wife's vision! What is wrong with her eyes that glasses don't help? Astigmatism? Just curious.

Don't know about his wife, but my cataracts have gotten so bad I can't easily read text on a computer, text on television, signs on a highway, street signs in the city, and most text on product labels.

I'll be going for surgery soon. But I would have loved to know where the disabled seating in the front was since I was stuck in the back and couldn't see the stage. And the projection monitors in the back were hard to see.

This is why seniors need special accommodations.

jasonf said: "I was most excited about the trivia before the con. When they said what they were doing on the main stage at the time, though, we chose to skip the trivia. I don't regret that choice, but I would love to know how it was if anyone went to it - maybe share some of the questions?"

Well, if you're talking about the same event Broadwaybill3 talked about on the previous page, apparently it didn't go very well.

I attended the con only on Saturday, as it was my birthday/big birthday present from my family. I will say, considering the weather and what I had read about Friday's issues, I thought the con went pretty great. There were a few things to mention, which I though were interesting...

- Coat Check

As to be expected with the weather, most people brought loads of coats to the con if they were coming for just the day. I, along with my mother, were among those individuals and thus felt the need to use the coat check so we didn't carrying them with us all day. In the morning, there was a HUGE line to use the service, but it went rather quickly. The issue though came later in the day, when I noticed that many people were holding their coats. What was the problem? Well it seemed the convention didn't want to pay for the extra coat room, and the first one was full after 11am. The con attempted to make it sound like this was the hotel deciding if they needed to open the other coat check or not - but it was definitely the con's decision, as one of the Hilton staff members muttered to me. Granted, my crew never had an issue with our coats not being checked, but a know many people that were told the room was full and that they should come back later.

- Marketplace

As much as I enjoyed the Marketplace, I do think it was incredibly bad in the layout department, and if it wasn't for the snowstorm, Saturday would have been a hot mess - like DashCon levels of hot mess. First of all, never EVER should you have the autograph line go through were people are shopping. Unless you are hosting this event at the Javits were you can have the kind of space to do something like that, you otherwise should avoid it at all costs. This decision created a huge amount of confusion with people trying to figure out where to line for what, which line was for who, etc - etc. This also created a lot of unhappy faces, from what I could see, of people who were confused and frustrated with bumping into people, blocking booth space, and just annoyed with where they were standing.

I'd also like to chime in with what was said about a particular booth, one that sold Doctor Who and Harry Potter merchandise. Now, I get that the people that run this con run other conventions catering to those fandoms, but that booth (and others that were HP and other nerdom centric) seemed really silly and bizarre for a convention themed to theater. I also feel they need to get more of an indie artist crowd, such as the kind of people you find in an Artist Alley, for next year. Because though having the official booths and charities were cool, it definitely didn't offer the kind of things we were told/nor lived up to the hype of the Flea Market - which is another event associated with BCEFA.

- Fire Codes

GOOD LORD, the amount of Fire Codes being broken at this event were of insane levels. If you don't know what I mean - at most conventions, volunteers are given strict guidelines that a certain number of people are the fire code safety limit for one room at a time. But for the majority of the panels I went to, particularly the popular Palace Theatre one, those "rules" seemed to fly out the window. Many people were seated on the floor in a way that if a fire alarm got pulled, they would easily get injured. I hope next year the volunteers/staff take that into account, just for the safety of attendees and so they don't get a lawsuit slapped on them.

- Food

Some have mentioned this, but due to the blizzard and closure of NYC, getting food was an adventure during BroadwayCon. Me and my mom are not the pickiest of eaters, but we do get a bit hangry. The line for Herb and Kitchen seemed a bit confusing and lengthy, so we tried the Lounge restaurant - which ironically, turned out to be worse. First off, there was no one there to seat you to a table, so you basically had to fend for yourself to find a place to sit. Fortunately, me and my mom made friends with another mother/daughter tag team, and ended up sitting with them/chatting/eating. But that was the least of our problems - firstly, we ordered our meal/drinks at around 2pm. We did not receive our food until almost 4pm - with some of our food clearly coming from Herb and Kitchen, since they arrived in "To Go" boxes. Granted, we were fine with taking some time to relax between panels, but this was insane. They even sent our "complimentary nuts" without any word as to when our actual food was coming out.

Now listen, I get that it was a Blizzard and they were doing the best they could - trust me, working on retail/food is the pits. But at the same time, I'm shocked this hotel didn't have the "bright idea" to hire extra wait staff knowing that this conference could have upwards to 10,000 attendees, which if the snow hadn't happened, could have possibly doubled. In the future, if the Hilton is the future home for BroadwayCon, this needs to be improved dramatically. Maybe get more food vendors inside? Just an idea.

I otherwise really enjoyed the con, I hope they do more off the cuff panels like they did to cover up for all the snow cancellations. If we can get something as amazing as Rob McClure doing a one man Sweeney Todd again, I'll be pleased to the heavens.

neonlightsxo said: "Broadwaybill, do you not know who the moderator was? Just curious who he was if he was so terrible.

" I wish that I could remember his name. Apparently, he does quizzes at other Mischief Management events because when we arrived he asked the crowd if any of us had been to one of his quizzes before. None of had and I sincerely doubt any of us EVER will again.

Thank you, ren598!

Broadwaybill3 said: "neonlightsxo said: "Broadwaybill, do you not know who the moderator was? Just curious who he was if he was so terrible.

" I wish that I could remember his name. Apparently, he does quizzes at other Mischief Management events because when we arrived he asked the crowd if any of us had been to one of his quizzes before. None of had and I sincerely doubt any of us EVER will again. "

Oh, so he wasn't a theater fan to begin with? Bad idea.

dfrillsnedit said: "I'm shocked this hotel didn't have the "bright idea" to hire extra wait staff knowing that this conference could have upwards to 10,000 attendees, which if the snow hadn't happened, could have possibly doubled. "

In Rapp's periscope just before the convention, he said something like "low thousands" maybe 3-4k. I saw a tweet from the director person mentioning 5k right before the convention start as well. Then post-convention, an article (New York Times?) said almost 6k. Only the convention planners could have known how many advance passes they sold, so they should have communicated that to the hotel. Whether this was a communication issue or last-minute attendance uptick or poor planning on the hotel's part, I guess we'll never know.

There was a medical issue with an attendee at a panel on Sunday (I was in the same row as him), and while I don't really want to give details to respect his privacy, the food thing probably didn't help. I wouldn't be surprised if the Herb'n Kitchen lines being long and the food itself being expensive, compounded with the lack of food outside the building during the blizzard was a contributing factor. And maybe there were other problems at other panels too, who knows. With a con like this, people aren't sleeping regularly, they're forgetting to eat (as you mentioned, jasonf), they're not drinking enough water, etc...

I'm fairly certain that at other major conventions, minimal food might be provided at venue, but attendees are expected to fend for themselves at nearby restaurants within the vicinity. ComicCon provides a map, I believe. Or bring your own. The real exacerbating issue around BroadwayCon was the blizzard.

That was a great panel, too!

Is BroadwayCon going to send out a post-mortem survey? I'd love to take it. I hope they do have some kind of standardized, formalized way of asking for feedback from us.

neonlightsxo said: "But shouldn't they have been prepared for bad weather and all its repercussions? It is, after all, the end of January in New York City."

Yup. I also wondered if they had published the inclement weather policy before they had bad weather? It seemed like it wasn't published when tickets were on sale. Has anyone on this board pursued a weather-related refund?

I seem to remember they tweeted a link to the inclement weather policy as early as either Wednesday or Thursday. I'm not sure how long it was actually up on the site, though.

glad you all enjoyed yourself. as i said, everyone will take away something different. mine is mostly negative but i am not mad or upset about it... just annoyed. i'll probably end up giving it a second chance next year. we'll see. cheers

Wow, thanks for this! Very insightful actually hearing from a volunteer.

I was at most of the Why Didn't It Run? panel -- was running late -- and I wish it could've gone on more. Viagas and Filichia were a joy to listen to (their interactions were funny, too). They aren't recognizable by face and people weren't there to get their autographs, which was a nice change.

I forget which panel I was at, but the volunteer there was speaking way too loudly and opening the door way too wide. I was sitting near the back and the noise was distracting.