Newspaper of (W)rec(k)ord

 If you're a member of a conrunning organization, you know you're in serious trouble when the Guardian - an internationally known newspaper of record, for crying out loud - starts paying attention to the gigantic mess you've created for yourselves.

 As somebody who's watched the Chengdu Worldcon Hugo Awards debacle unfold with an appropriate sense of increasing horror, one thing I can say about the situation is that any good that was engendered by having a Worldcon in the People's Republic of China has now been canceled out by the backlash among fans (just one example here) towards the way the Hugo Administrator handled (or rather, didn't handle) questions concerning Hugo nominees being ruled ineligible by the Chengdu Hugo Awards committee. The controversy is continuing to explode all over the place, and it's brought up other questions concerning the legal status of the Hugo Awards that are potentially just as threatening (if not more) to the WSFS than the negative publicity caused by the Chengdu controversy. 

As for the Hugo Awards Administrator himself, he's got a serious problem on his hands. I know him personally and have worked with him on more than one local convention. I know that he can get quite salty at times. Big deal - any number of us can, myself included. But his continual response to this situation has been a combination of obfuscation and outright hostility towards anyone asking questions he doesn't particularly like, and he's done it over and over again ad nauseum. At that point, you start wondering exactly what he's trying to prove - or trying to hide. 

The Hugo Administrator in question has dug himself quite a hole, and at the time of this post is continuing to dig it deeper and deeper still. He's done so well at generating negative attention for himself that I've seen commenters compare him to someone far more toxic in terms of the damage he's done to the Hugo Awards. That's not a comparison anyone wants, but there it is.

What he seems to have accomplished is the fannish equivalent of career suicide. I can't imagine him working for any other Worldcons or the WSFS in any capacity. I can barely imagine him working for Chicago-area conventions, for that matter. What he needs to do is either keep a low profile until at least some of the current anger blows over, and if that doesn't work, gafiate.  

To be honest, he doesn't seem to have much in the way of other choices left.