Some Things Of Value That Last

[nemorathwald]

If you want to get up in the morning and feel like you get to spend at least part of your time on something that matters, you could do a whole lot worse.



You know, the capstone of Penguicon that tips it over from a great idea to a brilliant motivational structure is that it's centered around fun, so we don't take ourselves too seriously. If it weren't for that element, there would be self-righteous one-upmanship and pious guilt-trips, and that would kill it. If you don't step up to the plate, and the convention were to fade away because somebody dropped the ball, all we've lost is a silly little costume party, right?

It's as if the motivation were "ha ha only serious". And yet I still get the motivation to work harder than I've ever worked on anything in my life. That's a neat little mind hack.

Such intersections seldom come along, and I'm grateful for the unique opportunity.

Comments

[etain.livejournal.com]

I'd argue that both sf/f and open source should only be in the vision/contribution sections. sf/f-fandom and open source-community/developing should be in all three! *That's a happy all three, not an angry one. Exclamation points often look angry to me.*

[stormgren.livejournal.com]

If it weren't for that element, there would be self-righteous one-upmanship and pious guilt-trips, and that would kill it.

Actually, it was those two things that contributed to me putting Penguicon at arm's length a couple of years back, from a volunteering and attending standpoint. There were other factors, but to say that those two do not and did not exist isn't entirely accurate.

I will say this has improved greatly in the last year, now that certain key personalities aren't around as much anymore. The concom for this year seems to be a decent group of folks, if the mailing list postings are any indication.