Hearthingstone is still nebulous- quasi-real in the way of things half-remembered, half-imagined. Part of the process of planning a convention is to more thoroughly lay out what you want it to be (or become). This is critical for scope and scale issues, such as locations and dates. For instance, if you’ve decided that your conference is not about hot air balloons, you can probably scratch “large, open field for launching balloons” off of your requirements list.
Hearthingstone is intended to serve a small subset of the polytheist populace- namely those in (or being groomed for) positions of responsibility and service to some tradition and/or community.
This immediately shrinks the size of facility down. Even if Hearthingstone grows miraculously large, we will probably never need hotel rooms and seating for 50,000 people. This might seem obvious, but if I were planning a media fandom event I’d have to consider such a possibility.
I can’t find my materials from the 2014 PLC in Fishkill, but I recall the attendance being around 50 or so. It might have been larger, but I’m pretty sure there were less than 100 attendees. Once I can give this conference a little more life of its own, I’ll ask the organizers if they recall.
My hope is the have between 100 and 200 attendees for the first Hearthingstone. This will require more in-depth outreach to bring in leaders from local and regional pockets who aren’t necessarily connected to the same networks as the folks at the 2014 PLC. In picking a venue, I’d also like to be able to roughly double that size over time without having to change locations.
This brings up another very important issue- transportation. In order to bring in attendees from around the nation (and world), good transportation is a must. I’ll explore host city considerations in another post, but figuring out how to get people to the conference will consume a considerable amount of time.
As far as programming, I’m thinking that a main “stage” and 2-3 smaller sessions per block will provide a good variety of options without spreading people out too much. Given that there are several “big” categories of topics and nearly endless subcategories of each, this should also help ensure that nearly every block has a session appropriate to any given attendee.
Why is this important?
Hearthingstone is asking folks to expend considerable time, effort, and money to attend- as host, I owe them my best effort to make sure they feel it’s worth the trouble. The first time someone attends a conference and rubs shoulders with a famous blogger or author, that’s usually a big deal to them. The novelty wears off, though- it’s the general quality of programming that enables a conference to attract people again and again.
If we are going to be successful in building up the strength of polytheism in the world, we need people coming back.
That’s enough for one night’s noodling. Keep an eye out for more detailed posts in the coming days and weeks.
-In Deos Confidimus
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