Real People, Real Life, Real Sex, Real Rights

Here in California we have an proposition on the ballot that would constitutionally revoke the right of homosexual marriage. I’ve given up arguing with the scaremongering that’s going on to promote it. Other writers have dissected it, but I’ve found that people who believe it usually are not playing with the same deck of cards that I am. The legal construct of marriage and its “protection” don’t matter, except on the surface; the Proposition 8 crowd is selling fear and morality, and it’s hard for people - on any side of any political fence - to change their perceptions of morality, especially when they’re afraid. People want to believe in an Enemy.

In this case, it seems important to remind them that there is no Enemy. Nobody wishes them harm. There are only real people, real lives, real concerns, and real relationships, seeking legal recognition. That’s all.

On a tangentially related note (you’ll see how in a moment), I’ve been meaning to check out Comstock Films for a while now. When they created the “Real People, Real Life, Real Sex” series, they named their company after the historical Anthony Comstock, which has to be one of the smarter up-yours gestures I’ve seen out of the industry. From their trailers and the reviews, it looks like they go out of their way to show off the emotional chemistry and relationships behind the couples in their films. Naturally I approve of this.

Today, though, I especially approve of them, because they’re running a pre-election home-stretch special:

It’s going to be from Tuesday, Oct. 28, 12AM Eastern to Oct. 29 3AM Eastern. For 27 hours, 100% of the purchase price on our erotic documentary DVDs (excluding S&H) is going to the No On Proposition 8 Campaign to preserve marriage equality in California.

So get your blog on. Get your Twitter and your Facebook and your MySpace on. Text a friend, e-mail a loved one. Tell them that if they buy any Comstock Films DVD on October 28, 100% of the purchase price will go helping stop Ballot Measure 8 in California.

That’s not “100% of the profits“; that’s 100% of the sales. It’s a totally selfless gesture. If you’re interested in checking out the Comstock films, or just want to pitch a few dollars into the campaign against Proposition 8, now’s your chance to do both.

YaoiCon 2008 In Pictures

My YaoiCon attendence tends to be a very organic kind of experience, partly because of my volunteer hours (ten this year, rarely fewer than eight) and partly because I only plan to attend a few events here and there. I like letting things catch my attention. Given that, it’s not surprising that my photos don’t form any kind of coherent narrative.

Rather than try to force them, I thought it would be best to just share them with you all at once. I hope I’ve captured some feeling of the con’s friendly exuberance for you.

A Polished Little Jewel: Café Verführen

Last year, I served in the YaoiCon café. It was a lot of fun, but I think our guests deserved better, and I felt compelled to apologize. senshixdoukeshi linked it over on the YaoiCon forums, where some people thought I was being unreasonable, some were supportive, and more than a few mentioned Café Verführen. I’d heard about it, of course, but I hadn’t actually attended, and I made a point of going this year. I was lucky enough to secure a reservation for one of their Friday-evening sessions.

To visit, I had to leave the frantic, hurried energy of the con; it takes up an inconspicuous, well-furnished suite tucked away on the third floor of the hotel. There was a small line waiting by the door when I arrived, but Café Verführen seats only twenty-two at capacity, which kept the group small and patient. Everyone was seated in short order, more or less on time. I can’t imagine that the two cafés attract substantially different clientele, so I’m left crediting the room’s accoustics for keeping the background noise to a low murmur. The quiet was a very nice touch; even when the evening ran a little behind schedule, the atmosphere stayed relaxed and graciously unhurried.

Having experienced (and enjoyed) the (non-professional) host-café as both server and guest now, I have a hard time expressing how much I admire what Café Verführen has created. Details like that make the difference between a great event and a mediocre one, and the details are where they sweep the field. They’ve created something full of little refinements, tiny considerations of the nuances of their guest experience. Some of them are as simple as sheets of paper; the menus weren’t printed on plain white bond, and they weren’t stack-cut to quarter-sheet. The drinks are served in glass, not Styrofoam. Those sound small, almost inconsequential, and on one level they are, but on another they’re tactile, hardwired directly to the brain, and I felt the difference even through gloves. Those choices have weight, in a very literal way, and even if they weren’t made consciously, weight has meaning; it feels like a natural manifestation of a commitment to do things right.

I felt a sense of pride coming from the staff - not arrogance, just confident, fannish pride, a friendly sort of Look at this wonderful thing we’ve made to share with you - and I think it’s well-justified.

I Survived YaoiCon 2008

YaoiCon 2008 is well and truly over; midnight has struck, the coach is a pumpkin, and all the celebrants have wandered home, watching the magic fade into memory for another year. My brain is still congealing from the experience, but you can expect my thoughts and pictures to come trickling through this site over the next week or so. I hope you’ll excuse my absence lately; I wanted to finish the latest story, First And Last And Always in time for the con. I came very close; there are only a few polishing edits left for me to make, and then I’ll put it to bed and see whether I want to post it or offer it to Anne for the Anthology. The YaoiCon Anthology has been dormant for two years now, but Tybalt stories have always been been tied to them; if the staff plans to resurrect it next year, I may hold the story for them. We’ll see.

Every year I start looking forward to the next convention almost before I finish recovering from the one just past. Every year I’ve made new friends and caught up with old ones; every year I’ve found a few special thoughts and memories to digest and make part of myself. I don’t think it’s an exaggeration that falling in with this particular crowd has actually helped me become a better person for all the experiences I’ve found with them. Obviously I have a tendency to overthink just a little bit, but it’s a tremendously inclusive event: some people go just to shop; some go to meet other fans; others still just enjoy the sheer exuberant energy that cons always seem to breed. I’m convinced that some people go because they are incredibly bad at masturbating, but this is another essay entirely.

I’ve attended five YaoiCons now, but this was the first time I didn’t have any specific, official involvement. Originally I was slated (tentatively) to work the Sunday Brunch, but when I called to check in that morning, Gothkitti told me not to worry about it. At first I was a bit worried about letting him down (he’s a good friend of mine and I do enjoy helping out with his events where I can), but after a good night’s sleep and some time to unwind I think he was being merciful. By that time I’d already worked ten hours as a regular volunteer, and I’m sure would have knocked myself out completely trying to bring my best game to the tables. If any of you out there attended, I would love to hear your impressions.

On the other hand, I did attend Café Veführen, the other café held at YaoiCon. I heard it mentioned several times after I posted about my serving experiences last year, and it felt important to see what others were doing with the concept. Later, after I’ve organized my pictures a little bit, I’ll post my thoughts about it in a separate review; right now, up front, I will say that I was thoroughly impressed and I would love to visit again.

Being such a long-time attendee does have one drawback, though; the con has grown enormously and I’m sometimes a bit unsure what people want to know or hear about. For the month of October, then, if you have any questions or you’d like to hear my thoughts on something in particular, please do feel free to speak up. I’ll try to cover as much as possible.

Edit: That was YaoiCon 2008, not 2009. Thanks, senshixdoukeshi.

Moo Harder!

LiveJournal entertains me, and not only because so many of users throw fits of hysteria at the drop of a hat. For a very long time, it survived entirely on selling subscriptions to about 5% of its users, upgrading their accounts for extra avatars, picture upload space, and a few spiffy (if rarely-used) extra features. Every so often, it sells permanent upgrades, typically for $150.

This five percent is, by definition, LiveJournal’s most profitable five percent of users. Out of these five percent, permanent accounts are, I suspect, the best deal… for LiveJournal’s coffers. $150 buys five years of upgraded service, not counting the interest earned by not paying up-front. I suspect that a Permanent account actually stays profitable more or less forever - on a commercial scale, a gigabyte of bandwidth costs about fifteen cents, a gigabyte of storage about the same - but they get less so if they’re active for more than five years. For comparison, LiveJournal has only existed at all for nine years this March, and as a paid service for eight this September.

Unfortunately, once a user buys a permanent upgrade, that user immediately and forever-after becomes deadweight to the company, an expense that has no hope of bringing in future revenue. Let me repeat that - permanent account holders are not LiveJournal’s customers. LiveJournal has precious little incentive to care what they think. Customers write checks. Once LiveJournal cashes the user’s check, a permament account is a liability, pure and simple.

In 2006, though, they found a way around this problem, which recently became the default for new users: the ad-supported upgrade. I think this was a brilliant decision, in this twirling-moustache, corporate-Machiavelli kind of way. The advertising program means that permament and basic accounts, which ordinarily generate no revenue, are still financially valuable - LiveJournalers (LiveJournalists?) maintain extensive lists of interests and associations in their profiles. This giant database can be mined, and the interests and demographic information mined to target advertising to their friends.

I suspect that people willing to pay $20/year or more for LiveJournal are probably pretty good at keeping their profiles up-to-date, people willing to pay $150 up-front even more so. That’s good, and very important in this business model. Targetting is money in advertising-land.

I have a point in this long and rather unwieldy setup, a reason for this little Gedankenexercise.