This website deals with running the annual UK National Science Fiction Convention or "Eastercon". The first Eastercon was in 1949 and has been held regularly ever since. If you don't know what the Eastercon is, or if you want further information about science fiction fandom in general then you should check out these links. If, on the other hand, you have run conventions before, parts of this will seem a bit simple and obvious. You might want to check out the Useful Lists, though.
Eastercons are entirely amateur-run, with committees of 5-10 people bidding for the right to hold a convention in two years' time. In recent years, fewer bidders have been coming forward and so I have been recording some of the information required by a convention committee in order to persuade people that it isn't really that hard. I have been on 5 Eastercon committees in the last 15 years, and I chaired Reconvene, the 1999 Eastercon.
Although this site is primarily directed at the British Eastercon, a lot of this information is also relevant to running other SF conventions. However, you may want to skip some of the sections on things like running bidding sessions. Additionally, many US conventions have very different policies in some areas. If you completely disagree with something, put it down to cultural differences. Of course, please feel free to email me with suggestions for changes, amusing anecdotes and locations of other useful information.
You should note, however, that this is necessarily a very skimpy overview at times. Some things that I cover in a sentence, other people could write pages about. Please don't email me saying that I must write lots more about, say, tech or handicapped access. It's probably not going to happen anytime soon. Put your own document on the web, send me the URL and I will link to it from the appropriate places.
State of the Rat (a Chairman's diary by John Richards)
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