Events

Get To Know Mythicon

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Mythicon is a convention in Orlando Florida that draws quite a cast of guests, runs a variety of events, and does their best to serve the fans, geeks, and otaku in Florida and beyond with one big convention.  They’re in their first year and are hitting the ground running – you may have heard about them if you’re in the area.

But what you may not here is how they make sure there’s great career-oriented events.

First, they do open casting stage events – and the people who make it in get 3 to 4 months of training.  That’s right, actual training and experience they can use (and put on a resume).  It also helps when your convention is near, say Disney and Universal!

That’s the kind of practical work I like to see – and it goes beyond the convention’s 3 days.  It’s about making a real comittment to the attendees and their ambitions – and taking advantage of the local area.

But that’s not all.  Mythicon also relies on their guests and helps them create good events.

Each guest is specifically asked about how they can do panels to help the attendees reach their goals and their dreams.  It may be a guest who’s a big name speaking on how to get known.  It could be a well known actor explaining how they broke in.  Mythicon cultivates the guests to find what they can share – and encourages them to connect with the fans.

Between the long-term commitment of the show to cultivating guests’ panels, Mythicon sounds like a convention a lot of us could be following.  Come to think of it, a lot of us should be attending as well . . .

– Steven Savage

Steven Savage is a Geek 2.0 writer, speaker, blogger, and job coach.  He blogs on careers at http://www.fantopro.com/, nerd and geek culture at http://www.nerdcaliber.com/, and does a site of creative tools at http://www.seventhsanctum.com/. He can be reached at https://www.stevensavage.com/.

Go Farther: Anime Cons

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So I discussed how I think Comic Cons can go farther career-wise, next up is a focus on one of my personal favorite: anime cons.  What do I think they can – and should – do career-wise in the years to come?

Well anime cons have a few unique traits:

  • Despite being anime they tend to be multi-media and often cutting edge.  Anime's always had a hip thing going for it, even when it was being made fun.
  • There's a heavy emphasis on creativity and use of talent – art, web-pages, costly, etc.  Go to even a small con and be amazed.
  • The attendees also tend to be very technical – from programmers to being internet-savvy to digital art.
  • There is, in my experience, more emphasis on professional development.  I'm not 100% sure why this is, but I should analyze it.
  • People have a more intimate knowledge of the industries they're fans of.

So my take is that anime cons have a good foundation, but need to leverage what's really unique about them.  To do career events, I recommend anime cons:

  • Leverage the diversity.  You can experiment with all sorts of career panels and events because, if your con is of any size, someone is probably going to want to attend these events.  This gives you a chance to find out what works best.  In short a decent-sized con is a great laboratory.
  • Use the skill-development focus.  Many cons already do such panels, so adding a more professional emphasis to them – such as lists of professional resources and associations – would be a good idea.
  • Try project-oriented educational and career events – from works at a con to a project outside the convention such as a group manga, novel, etc.  Since anime fans tend to be "product-oriented" this will help them and help your con's relations.
  • Feel free to try more technical panels such as ones on web-design, programming, and so on.  You'll probably find a lot of response.  For extra fun, tie it into your own technical elements – such as if you use webcasting for events.
  • Take your industry panels into professional directions, such as talking about trends, industry issues, etc.  There's plenty to cover in international media, video games, and so on.  You'll get a good response I'm sure.

Anime cons are already a pretty powerful package career-wise, with a strong cultural foundation.  Working with this will let you turn it into a powerful career engine.

– Steven Savage

Go Farther: Comic Conventions

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So with Convention Career Connection out, I can't seem to step away from speculating on what can be done in the con scene to help people's careers.  So of course, I'm writing about it.  I've decided to analyze what more can be done at specific kinds of cons (in my opinion) to help people's careers.

First up?  Comic conventions.

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