newsdesk's blog

Arisia Town Hall

newsdesk — Mon, 15 Feb 2021 21:16:25 +0000

Arisia Town Hall newsdesk Mon, 02/15/2021 - 16:16

Arisia 2022 will hold a public Town Hall on February 21 from 4-6 pm, to hear comments and suggestions from our community. All may attend via Zoom, or post questions via Twitter or Facebook. We want to hear from you! To gain access to the Zoom session, please email conchair at arisia.org.

This is an opportunity to hear from folks who attend and/or staffed Arisia 2021, as well as folks who have done so in the past. We want to hear from our vendors, from our program participants, from anyone who has a connection with Arisia. We especially want to hear from those who had such a connection in the past, but have not attended in recent years, and would be interested in attending again someday.

Arisia is in a period of change, accountability, and healing. We have altered our structure significantly in the past few years. We have heard your voices and we will continue to work to make our community better. But, even as we continue that work, we want to continue to listen and make sure that we are inclusive of the needs and wants of our community.

To facilitate this, folks can participate in the town hall in several ways. You can join the Zoom meeting. You can comment on Arisia’s Facebook or Twitter accounts any time before the meeting on Feb. 21, and moderators will read your comments aloud in the meeting. Everyone will have an opportunity to speak who wants to. (We may limit speaking time in order to accomplish this.)

We hope to see you there!

Vivian Abraham

Arisia 2022 Con Chair

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Arisia 2021 Day 4: Early morning updates

newsdesk — Mon, 18 Jan 2021 12:58:41 +0000

Arisia 2021 Day 4: Early morning updates newsdesk Mon, 01/18/2021 - 07:58

Greetings & Salutations!

Welcome to day 4 of Arisia 2021. In this post, you will find updated schedule information, Art Show award winners, and information about how to register for next year’s Arisia. To access Arisia 2021 con space, events, panels, and more, make sure you are registered then click on virtual.arisia.org to log in to the virtual site. See this post regarding Discord & Zoom as well.

Updates to Monday, January 18’s Schedule are below:

12:00 PM (noon)

Masquerade Rerun

Missed the Masquerade last night? Here’s another chance to watch it in the Performance Hall!

At-Con Special: $50. Arisia 2022 memberships are available now! This rate is good until the 23rd. https://2022.arisia.org/registration.html

Guests of Honor: Arisia 2022’s guests will be Andrea Hairston (writer GoH), Reiko Murakami (artist GoH), and Elsa Sjunneson (fan GoH). Read more about them here: https://2022.arisia.org/bios.html

Discord Server

The server is going to become read-only on Tuesday. If you are interested in discussing other options for future Arisia-related online social spaces, please join us in the Discord channel #the-future.

Masquerade Replay

Arisia’s virtual Masquerade will replay Monday at 12pm in the Performance Hall with a live discussion in Discord channel #performance-hall. Watch on demand at https://youtu.be/5q_G1aN7rqU.

Art Show Awards

Congratulations to our art show award winners!

Best in Show: Atlas Kaysha Siemens

Popular Choice 2D: Entrance Sarah Morrison

Popular Choice 3D: Sea Change Sandra Van Vooren

Artist Guest of Honor award: Persephone in the Garden of Hades Kaysha Siemens

Writer Guest of Honor award: Reanimated Ammonite Sandra Van Vooren

Con Chair award: Procession I.S. Kallick

Art Show Director's award: Ice Fishing Ryan Klemek

Art Show Director's award: Jettycat #5 Catscratch Fever (cover) Hannibal King

Fan Guest of Honor award: Hard Landing, the Sequel, from Johnna Klukas

Feedback

We want to hear from you!

The Arisia Monday Feedback Session starts Monday at 2:30 pm in Zoom Room 5. Come tell us how to improve Arisia for next year!

You can also submit your feedback on panels, events, sessions, and gaming via the form at Arisia.org/ProgrammingFeedback. Please submit your feedback on the convention in general via the form at Arisia.org/Feedback. We appreciate your feedback and thank you for attending Arisia.

Access

If there’s an issue with a transcriptionist (poor typing, etc) please email the panel name/date/time and if possible, transcriptionist’s name and email that to access@arisia.org. The Access Division will follow-up with the transcriptionist’s company.

If you would like to request an access-related accommodation, please email us. access@arisia.org

Help Desk

Opens at 9:30 am

Email for Support: Help-desk@arisia.org | #help-desk on Discord

Incident Response Team

Arisia has a process to address issues that arise during the convention. Persons directly impacted by the incident and witnesses (attendees, staff, volunteers, guests, panelists, and members of the public) are welcome to file a confidential incident report regarding Arisia Community members inappropriate behavior.

Filing an Incident Report with Arisia's Incident Response Team (IRT) is one way to alert the Con Chair Team to Code of Conduct violations or a behavior issue during Arisia 2021.

Arisia's Incident Response Team (IRT) is specifically tasked with intaking and addressing any reports of violation of the Code of Conduct or other member behavior issues regarding Arisia Community members.

The IRT is only empowered to take actions that impact the convention at which the report is taken. At the end of the convention, all incident reports are handed off to the Incident Report Management Committee (IRMC) of the Arisia E-board for review, complete with all follow-up conducted at the convention, any actions already taken, and any recommendations from the IRT for further actions.

IRT can be contacted by:

Discord #irt-hall-desk

Arisia 2021 - Self File - Incident Report Form

E-mail: incidents@arisia.org. |. E-Mail: ir-team@arisia.org

Phone: (617) 657-9756

Artist Guest of Honor Takes Commissions

Our Artist Guest of Honor, Hannibal King, is hosting a commission table each day of the Con. Here’s your chance to commission your own Hannibal King original. Hours for Monday are below:

10:00 AM- 12:00 noon

Art Show Breakout Room

T-Shirts

Arisia 2021 and Arisia logo tee shirts are available on Redbubble as print-to-order. Many additional styles are available, and each style is available in many colors. Prices are around $20 plus shipping. Shirts from recent Arisia conventions are available at our website.

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Arisia 2021 Day 3: Updates

newsdesk — Sun, 17 Jan 2021 04:09:01 +0000

Arisia 2021 Day 3: Updates newsdesk Sat, 01/16/2021 - 23:09

Greetings & Salutations!

Welcome to day 3 of Arisisa 2021. In this post, you will find updated schedule information, key services access information, and a link to our T-shirt sales. To access Arisia 2021 con space, events, panels, and more, make sure you are registered then click on virtual.arisia.org to log in to the virtual site. See this post regarding Discord & Zoom as well.

Updates to Sunday January 17’s Schedule are below:

11:00:00 AM	Just the Facts: COVID 19	Richard Moore removed; Dr. Jim Prego made moderator
5:30:00 PM	In Memoriam Meetup	Cancelled
4:30:00 AM	Catalyze Short Plays	90 min "}" style="width: 434px;">60 min -> 90 min
7:00:00 PM	Tales of the Future Vol 1	Cancelled -- GM is ill
11:30:00 AM	Lightsaber Demo	40 min "}" style="width: 434px;">30min -> 40 min
11:30:00 AM	Working with Sensitivity Readers	Genevieve Iseult Eldredge removed; replacement panelist TBD

The Arisia Corporate meeting, at 1:00 pm will be using a special Zoom link so that Corporate members not attending this year's convention members are able to attend. The Zoom link is available to Arisia 2021 attendees in the #Announcements Discord Channel. You may also email @email for the link.

Access

If there’s an issue with a transcriptionist (poor typing, etc) please email the panel name/date/time and if possible, transcriptionist’s name and email that to @email. The Access Division will follow-up with the transcriptionist’s company.

If you would like to request an access-related accommodation, please email us. @email

Help Desk

Hours: 9:30a-11p

Email for Support: @email | #help-desk on Discord

Incident Response Team

Filing an Incident Report with Arisia's Incident Response Team (IRT) is one way to alert the Con Chair Team to Code of Conduct violations or a behavior issue during Arisia 2021.

IRT can be contacted by:

Discord #irt-hall-desk

Arisia 2021 - Self File - Incident Report Form

E-mail: incidents@arisia.org. |. E-Mail: ir-team@arisia.org

Phone: (617) 657-9756

Games Info

- Space Cats is meowing through a galaxy near you. Join the fun on the #SpaceCats Discord server at 10am!

- Are you looking for a LARP or game to play? So too are other attendees! Join the #Gaming channel and look for #looking-for-online-games, looking-for-larps, and looking-for-players to connect.

Artist Guest of Honor Takes Commissions

Our Artist Guest of Honor, Hannibal King, is hosting a commission table each day of the Con. Here’s your chance to commission your own Hannibal King original. Hours for Saturday are below:

8:30 - 10:30 PM	Art Show Breakout Room
1:00 - 2:45 PM	Art Show Breakout Room
3:45 - 5:30 PM	Art Show Breakout Room
8:30 - 10:30 PM	Art Show Breakout Room

Meet the Dealers

Come meet featured Dealers in the #questions-for-dealers Discord channel

1:00 PM        Silver Owl Creations,
2:00 PM        Louisa's Knit Knacks,
3:00 PM        Sabrina Kuchta Designs,
4:00 PM        Elizabeth Corrigan, Author,
5:00 PM        Cloak & Dagger Creations,
6:00 PM        Fanservice Nails

You can also see them at online.arisia.org/dealers

T-Shirts

Registration Update!

1400 registered as of 5pm 1/16/21

889 logged into online.arisia.org

796 have logged into Discord

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Arisia Code of Conduct and Transcription/Recording

newsdesk — Sat, 16 Jan 2021 21:56:01 +0000

Arisia Code of Conduct and Transcription/Recording newsdesk Sat, 01/16/2021 - 16:56

Friendly Reminder: per the Arisia Code of Conduct, all forms of recording in Arisia space by members are prohibited, including by attendees, panelists, event participants, staff, etc. Convention leadership has determined that this includes screenshots, transcripts of panels, copying of text in Zoom chat or Discord, and captions.

We expect to grant limited exceptions for screenshots necessary to report an incident. If you need an exception for an access-related accommodation, please contact our Access Team at access@arisia.org. Panelists are welcome to distribute handouts, post lists of books, etc. but please mark that content "Ok to copy.”

We are unable to support a model that allows Arisians to opt-out of the general recording policy. Attendees have not had sufficient notice for informed consent and for some, a last-minute request would be coercive. Arisia will not allow such ad hoc requests.

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Arisia 2022 Guests of Honor Announced

newsdesk — Sat, 16 Jan 2021 14:02:05 +0000

Arisia 2022 Guests of Honor Announced newsdesk Sat, 01/16/2021 - 09:02

The Arisia 2022 Convention Committee is thrilled to announce our Guests of Honor for Arisia 2022!

Andrea Hairston is author of Will Do Magic For Small Change, a New York Times Editor’s pick and finalist for the Mythopoeic, Lambda, and Tiptree Awards. Other novels: Redwood and Wildfire, Tiptree and Carl Brandon Award winner, and Mindscape, Carl Brandon Award winner. She has published essays, plays, and short fiction and received grants from the NEA, Rockefeller and Ford Foundation. Andrea is a Professor of Theatre at Smith College. Tor.com published Master of Poisons in Sept 2020.

Reiko Murakami is a U.S. based concept artist and illustrator specializing in surreal fantasy art. With her expressive gesture drawings she focuses on capturing moments filled with unspeakable emotions. In 2013 she started a series called Resonance, a project that depicts complex emotional reactions through metaphorical representation of a figure. Her work has appeared on many science fiction media including: Tor.com, Pyr, Subterranean Press, Tachyon Publications, DC comics, Wizards of the Coast and Lightspeed Magazine. Her work has been exhibited at Nucleus Portland, Helikon Gallery, Krabjab Studio, Light Grey Art Lab and published in Spectrum, Infected by Art, Exposé, 2D Artist, and many others.

Hugo, Aurora and BFA winning editor Elsa Sjunneson is a Deafblind hurricane in a vintage dress. Her nonfiction editorial work has appeared at Uncanny Magazine and Fireside Magazine. As an author, her work has appeared at CNN Opinion, Tor.com, the Boston Globe, and the Nebula nominated Fate Accessibility Toolkit among numerous other venues. She also co-authored Marvel's Jessica Jones: Playing With Fire which was produced by Serial Box. In addition to editorial and authorial pursuits, she destroys structural ableism in her spare time. Her memoir will be released in 2021 from Simon & Schuster Elsa lives in Seattle, Washington with two cats. Want to know more? Go to snarkbat.com!

Registration for Arisia 2022 will go live on Monday, January 18.

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Arisia 2021 Day 2: Updates

newsdesk — Sat, 16 Jan 2021 03:00:52 +0000

Arisia 2021 Day 2: Updates newsdesk Fri, 01/15/2021 - 22:00

Greetings & Salutations!

Welcome to day 2 of Arisisa 2021. In this post, you will find updated schedule information, key services access information, and a link to our freshly published souvenir book. To access Arisia 2021 con space, events, panels, and more, make sure you are registered then click on virtual.arisia.org to log in to the virtual site. See this post regarding Discord & Zoom as well.

Updates to Saturday January 16’s Schedule are below:

Time	Session Title	Update
11:30 AM	Recovery Check-in Meetup	Cancelled
8:30 PM	The Future of Food	David Shaw removed, Diana Hsu Added
12:00 PM	Doors to Darkness: An Intro To Call of Cthulhu	Cancelled
5:30 PM	Cut the Boring Parts	Christopher Paniccia removed, EC Ambrose added, made moderator
8:30 PM	Broad Universe Rapid Fire reading	Added: Sara Codair, Anne Nydam. Carol Gyzander, Roberts Rogow and Roxanne Bland
11:30 AM	Suzanne Palmer reading	Session added
11:30 AM	Just The facts: Batteries	Panel cancelled
5:30PM	Just The facts: Supervolcanoes	Richard Moore removed
1:00 PM	Saturday Feedback session	no longer being captioned

Help Desk

If you run into technical difficulties, the Help Desk on Discord is here to help! If you are looking for information about using the remote site or attending programming virtually, click here to access the Info pages. If you would like to chat with someone who can help you, you can do so via video (Zoom) here. You can also find a text chat in Discord in the #help-desk channel.

Incident Response Team

Arisia has a process to address issues that arise during the convention.

Persons directly impacted by the incident and witnesses (attendees, staff, volunteers, guests, panelists, and members of the public) are welcome to file a confidential incident report regarding Arisia Community members inappropriate behavior.

Filing an Incident Report with Arisia's Incident Response Team (IRT) is one way to alert the Con Chair Team to Code of Conduct violations or a behavior issue during Arisia 2021.

IRT can be contacted by:

Discord #irt-hall-desk

Arisia 2021 - Self File - Incident Report Form

E-mail: incidents@arisia.org

E-Mail: ir-team@arisia.org

Phone: (617) 657-9756

Games Info

Space Cats is meowing through a galaxy near you. Join the fun on the #SpaceCats Discord server at 10am!
Are you looking for a LARP or game to play? So too are other attendees! Join the #Gaming channel and look for #looking-for-online-games, looking-for-larps, and looking-for-players to connect.

Artist Guest of Honor Takes Commissions

Our Artist Guest of Honor, Hannibal King is hosting a commission table each day of the Con. Here’s your chance to commission your own Hannibal King original. Hours & location for Saturday are below:

When: 2:30 - 5:30 PM

Where: Art Show Breakout Room

Registration Update!

1363 registered as of 10:20p 1/15/2021

660 members on Discord as of 10:20p 1/15/2021

Souvenir Book is Online

We are proud and excited to announce that the Arisia2021 souvenir book is online for your viewing pleasure! Check out works by our artist, writer, and fan guests of honor here.

T-Shirts

PS....show off your fabulous costume(s) online with other Arisia fans by emailing us your pics at @email.

Please include how you would like the photo to be credited and captioned. Note: by sending pictures to this address, you agree that you are the person in the photograph, and you give permission to Arisia, Inc. to use your name and photo on its website and/or social media. All pics should be family friendly.

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Welcome to Day 1 of Arisia 2021!

newsdesk — Fri, 15 Jan 2021 15:55:20 +0000

Welcome to Day 1 of Arisia 2021! newsdesk Fri, 01/15/2021 - 10:55

Virtual Arisia website goes LIVE at 12pm today. Make sure you are registered then click on virtual.arisia.org to log in to the virtual site. See this post regarding Discord & Zoom as well.

Updates to Programming Scheduling for Friday, January 15 are below:

8:30:00 PM

Sing-Along Musicals and Show Tunes

Gillian Polack & Tori Queeno removed

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Arisia 2021

Virtual Arisia Accounts Information

newsdesk — Thu, 14 Jan 2021 16:10:34 +0000

Virtual Arisia Accounts Information newsdesk Thu, 01/14/2021 - 11:10

Hello from Arisia 2021’s Remote division!

Our virtual convention starts Friday, and we’re here with some important information to help you set up the online accounts you’ll need.

Most of this year’s online Arisia will take place through three platforms:

The Virtual Arisia Website
Zoom
Discord

To Set Up Your Accounts:

Virtual Arisia Site:

Make sure you’ve registered at reg.arisia.org and signed the Code of Conduct.

If you do not remember your username and password, go to reg.arisia.org, select “reset password,” and type in the e-mail address you used to register. The password reset process will also remind you of your username.

Use your same registration username and password to log into the Virtual Arisia site.

Please note that if you requested a rollover it will be processed after the convention; logging in to the remote site will use the registration and cancel the rollover.

The full Virtual Arisia site will open to attendees at 12pm EST on Friday, January 15, 2021.

Zoom:

Creating a (free) Zoom account will allow you to save settings like your name and pronouns you want others to see while you’re in Arisia Zoom sessions. An account is not required to use Zoom, to download and use the Zoom app, or to access Arisia’s Zoom content.

If you already have an account, you may want to check the information visible in your profile, especially if the name and photo you want to display during the convention are different from the name and photo you normally display for work or personal use.

Zoom has an app that you can download for your computer or mobile device and use with or without an account. You can also use Zoom in your browser, but some features are not available or don’t work as well this way.

If you already have Zoom downloaded, you’ll want to check which version you’re running and update to at least version 5.3.1.

Discord:

Please do these steps AFTER logging on to the Virtual Arisia site.

Have an existing Discord account, or make a new one on the Discord website.

Open the discord app or webpage and log in.

Join Arisia’s Discord server: https://discord.gg/arisia21.

Wait five minutes before moving on the next step to link your accounts (the Virtual Arisia site queries Discord once every five minutes for a list of new users).

Link your account on the Virtual Arisia site by going to https://online.arisia.org/user.

Your Discord nickname is set to your Arisia badge name. You can change your badge name on https://reg.arisia.org.

General Discord help can be found in the #discord-101 channel.

For more information, visit the Info section of the Virtual Arisia site. The full Virtual Arisia site will open to attendees at 12pm EST on Friday, January 15, 2021. There will also be two “Arisia orientation” panels to help introduce you to the virtual convention: 7pm EST on Friday and Saturday evenings.

Thanks, and we look forward to seeing you this weekend!

The Arisia 2021 Remote Team
(Chris, Deborah, Emily, Erika, Gail, Justin, and Raven)

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Zambia Email Error

newsdesk — Tue, 12 Jan 2021 22:08:25 +0000

Zambia Email Error newsdesk Tue, 01/12/2021 - 17:08

We would like to inform the Arisia community that we had a technical issue on Saturday evening that resulted in several error logs being emailed to our IT email box. The error log included currently available registration information (name, badge number, registration status, address, phone number, and email), for everyone “flagged” as a program staffer or participant for the current convention. That email alias then forwarded the error logs to fifteen current and former members of the Arisia, Inc. IT committee, including both current and former staffers of the convention.

We have contacted the recipients of this information and are in the process of confirming that they have deleted these error logs. We are in the process of ensuring that everyone who might see registration information has signed our Information Ethics Agreement. We have also contacted all affected community members via email. Anyone who has not received this email was not affected by the error.

We have revised our IT email alias so that is only forwarded to current IT committee members. We also updated settings on our server so that only a more restricted list of people receive error messages through email. Instead of going to the entire email list for our IT team, it now goes only to the four volunteers who need to see it. All of these are current Arisia staff who have signed our Information Ethics Agreement. We are reviewing other potential vulnerabilities and are taking steps to address them. We have also reviewed and revised IT policy regarding access and removal from email aliases and accounts access.

Arisia apologizes for this error. We are working to ensure that it does not happen in the future. Arisia is committed to transparency and will continue to keep the community updated if there are any further developments. Please send any further questions to eboard@arisia.org.

Thank you.

etana,

on behalf of the Eboard and conchair team.

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Progress Report 5 Arisia 2021

newsdesk — Sat, 09 Jan 2021 17:40:23 +0000

Progress Report 5 Arisia 2021 newsdesk Sat, 01/09/2021 - 12:40

Arisia Progress Report #5
January 2020

Arisia 2021
January 15-18
Gone Virtual

W elcome

Registration
Team Arisia Services

Welcome to Progress Report #5!

Arisia 2021 is coming! In roughly 6 days we will join together on multiple platforms tied together by a fantastic infrastructure being built by the amazing Remote Conference Division. We can't wait to show you, and we can't wait to gather with you in the New Normal. We are bursting at the seems to share with you this final Progress Report hopefully addressing all of the pre-convention questions, important details about joining us on your device(s) of choice, and sharing the heads up on some highlighted events you won’t want to miss!

Registration/Memberships to Arisia 2021

You can still purchase a membership to A'21!! The rates are $25 or a “sustaining membership” of $75 available to those who choose to pay that much. There are also scholarship memberships available ($0) to anyone who needs them. Go to arisia.org /Registration.

This year, Arisia plans to donate the greater of 50% of our profits or $1,000 to address systemic racism in the Boston area. The recipients of the donation will be determined by the Arisia Corporation.

With the Convention just a week away, we are no longer processing any further rollover requests as we are now well pas the December 31, 2020 deadline. The Con Chair team will consider requests we have in hand, once the Convention has finished. We hope everyone understands that staff need to focus on making A'21 the best possible event it can be within the next week.

How-To Arisia 2021

This year Arisia will take place on a newly created Virtual Convention website, built specifically for our attendees. We’re harnessing the usual suspects, Discord and Zoom as well as the newly created Arisia Virtual Convention website.

Interactive Schedule
The interactive schedule will have live links to the Virtual Site room for each of the panels, where you’ll find panel information and Zoom links. Discord will have a myriad of channels for you to chat with other convention goers or ask a few more questions of panelists after the panel ends. Fan Tables will be using Discord this year as well!

Due to privacy concerns, the panels on Zoom will not be recorded. Associated Discord channels will be active for the length of the convention for you to catch up with panels you missed.

Getting Access

As we get closer to Con, our registered attendees will receive email instructions on how to access the member content and set up Zoom and Discord so you’re ready to go. You’ll need to log into the new website using the login information you use to register for the convention. Please keep your username(s) and password(s) in a safe and yet easily-accessible-to-you place as they will be needed any time you want to log in to Con space.

As always, our Help Desk will be standing by, ready to assist with any technical issues you encounter while setting up your account.

For online help and prep tips, check out https://arisia.org/help

Team Arisia Services

Hello from Team Arisia Services!
We still have several opportunities to volunteer for Arisia 2021!
Current jobs looking for volunteers:

Con Suite Staff
Help Desk Staff
Incident Response Team (IRT) Staff
Gaming Expeditor
Gaming Zoom Greeter
Minecraft Helper
Party Room Hosts

To see the full list of jobs click here: https://www.arisia.org/VolunteersWanted
For more information on volunteering, see: https://www.arisia.org/Volunteer

Have questions? Contact us at @email

Access Division

The Access Division is committed to ensuring that our 2021 Virtual Convention will be accessible to all Arisia community members, inclusive of those with and without disabilities. This year, we will have CART services available by default to over 90 hours of programming and events. We have also built our platforms using guidance from web content accessibility guidelines 3.0. If you would like help on how to prep your assistive technologies, the list of CART-default programs and events, or would like to make a request for other access needs please contact us as soon as possible.

Note: please keep your username(s) and password(s) in a safe and yet easily-accessible-to-you place as they will be needed any time you want to log in to Con space. There are a few cool apps for smartphones/computers that can help keep them organized and accessible. Contact us if you'd like recommendations!

If you have any questions, concerns, or suggestions please reach out to the Access Division. Thanks!!

Annual Arisia Blood Drive

Arisia '21 will be going virtual and so will the Blood Drive!

Heinlein Society Blood Drives, including the successful Arisia Blood Drive we've held since 2004, are reimagined this year, as so much else has been. Please consider donating whole blood, power red cells (double reds), platelets, plasma for transfusion, or COVID-19 antibodies via convalescent plasma any time from now through the end of the con at a place, time, and with an agency convenient for you. Special thanks for those going to our long time partners, Massachusetts General Hospital and Boston Children's Hospital!

Please take a selfie with:

"I donated today" sticker
the institution's name and/or logo
something with the con name (T-shirt, badge, water bottle, Souvenir Book, hand drawn sign...).

As long as the photo has the required items, you don't need to be in the photo. Please send the selfie to @email y.org and include:

Type of donation (Whole Blood, Double or Power Red, or other)
How you want to be listed on our website (Badge name or "Attendee at [Con Name]" is OK)
Do we have permission to publish a thumbnail of your photo?
If you would like a Heinlein Society Blood Drive pin
Name and a valid USPS return address so we can send you a thank you card, ribbon for your next in person con, and a pin (if desired).

Selfie thumbnails are on a virtual Blood Drive page under each con on the Heinlein Society Web Page.

For more information, please go to arisia.org/BloodDrive

Art Show

Over 30 artists will participate virtually this year! Several artists are exhibiting with us for the first time including Kaysha Siemens and Kristin Richland. Make sure to visit the Art Show to check them out.

We are *also* very excited to be part of the Virtual Duck Hunt. Several artists contributed images for you to find around the virtual con including at least 1 piece created especially for us. Keep an eye out for them!

Events at Arisia 2021

Be on the lookout for some of your favorite events at Arisia this year. In our new on-line format, we'll present:

Post-Meridian Radio Players with a gender-swapped Star Trek episode
A new Mrs Hawking play
Teseracte Players traditional of shadow-cast events

.....and much much more!

We're bringing our Masquerade, too, to a new online format. See the costumes presented in our online Presentation Hall on Sunday night.

Trailer: All New Mrs. Hawking Play!!

Gaming

Gaming is doing lots of things this year using lots of platforms. As such, we have lots of information for you! Here are the highlights:

There will be LARPs! Yes, even online. Read further below for detailed information
We have tournaments this year! Read more here https://www.arisia.org/Gaming#tournaments)
We will have a Minecraft server this year. We need helpers/mods who know Minecraft and can help folk out when they run into technical or gaming issues. This is a great gig for folks 11+, who are willing and able to work a 2hr shift paired with a responsible older teenager. For more information or to volunteer, email videogaming@arisia.org
Space Cats (the game): You're a cat working on a Class 8 cargo space-freighter, transporting an important shipment of kibble to Sector B. You're not just any cat. You're Space-Cat. Sadly Captain Fig has found a vole in the airlock and is permanently focused on staring at it - you won't be getting through to the good Captain anytime soon. You and your colleagues are going to have to fly this ship yourselves! Your systems computer, C.A.T.B.O.T is finicky and demanding but that's ok, you and your team of Space-cats can surely fill all the technical requirements to get you to sector B even without Captain Fig. It'll be easy! Like herding...something. Check out the Discord channel throughout the convention (teams of all ages are welcomed & encouraged)
If you are running a game during Arisia 2021, you should have received a email from tabletop@arisia.org. If you did not get an email (or did) and think this is an error, please contact us as soon as possible.

On Friday, 1/15/21 at 7pm gaming staff will run a panel to introduce the many facets of gaming at Arisia 2021 to attendees.

For more information and all the details fit to print, click here https://www.arisia.org/Gaming

Get Your T-shirts (and more) Here!!

Do you love collecting Arisia merch? Would you love to claim some Arisia history? We can help with that! This year, we are selling Arisia logo t-shirts, stickers, and magnets. We are also selling Arisia 2021 t-shirts with one of Hannibal King's designs (Artist Guest of Honor).

There is also a limited (size and quantity) supply of t-shirts from Arisia 2017, 2018, and 2019 available for sale with priority shipping! Supplies available while they last.

Priority 2-day shipping is included in the price of the t-shirt(s). To get your order in, please click here https://corp.arisia.org/merchandise.

Guests of Honor

Suzanne Palmer, Author Twitter | Facebook | Website

Hannibal King, Artist

Kat Tanaka Okopnik, Fan Twitter | Facebook

Live Action Role Playing (LARP) ONLINE!

It is now possible to sign up for LARPs at Arisia 2021! It’s possible that many games will fill early, so check them out as soon as you can if you want a spot!

You may sign up for as many LARPs as you'd like, but please be considerate to others, but please be considerate to others and only sign up for those that you are actually planning to attend. The system doesn’t enforce this, so it is up to you to follow the rules. If your GM needs additional information for pre-casting, they will contact players who have signed up via the signup links.

Some games may require specific technology, so please make sure you have access to that technology before the game runs.

By signing up for a LARP, you are making a commitment to show up and play. If it turns out you cannot make it to your LARP after you sign up, please remove your sign up for it and also send an email to the signup contact to let them know. Several of these games require a specific number of players or have pre-game reading, so please be respectful.

Descriptions and Signups

As an Arisia event, Arisia LARPs are covered by the Code of Conduct. https://arisia.org/Code-of-Conduct

Larping online is a new format for some, and many of these games were written specifically for online play, so we’re excited to be able to share these excellent games with you.

Schedule Time!

After much anticipation, we are thrilled to share the convention schedule with you. Currently, there is an HTML version of the schedule that is updated manually. Once the Con goes live, we will use a KonOpas-like schedule that will be updated in real time.

Check out https://www.arisia.org/Publications and get your calendar ready!

Ribbons

We know collecting ribbons is a huge part of the fun of going to a convention. We're planning to provide ribbons that can attach to a "badge" (actually your profile) on the Virtual Arisia website. At previous in-person cons, anyone could order ribbons to pass out as they socialized. We've gathered the list of physical ribbons we've used in the past and added some ideas already. Still, we would very much like to get your ideas for additional ribbons. What would you like to see?

Submit your ideas using this form: https://forms.gle/r2r87cxqJkPqFSaz8

Blog tags

news

progress report

newsdesk's blog

Arisia Town Hall

Arisia 2021 Day 4: Early morning updates

Arisia 2021 Day 3: Updates

Arisia Code of Conduct and Transcription/Recording

Arisia 2022 Guests of Honor Announced

Arisia 2021 Day 2: Updates

Welcome to Day 1 of Arisia 2021!

Virtual Arisia Accounts Information

To Set Up Your Accounts:

Virtual Arisia Site:

Zoom:

Discord:

Zambia Email Error

Progress Report 5 Arisia 2021

Arisia Progress Report #5 January 2020

For more information, please go to arisia.org/BloodDrive

Arisia Progress Report #5
January 2020