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Yoshiki abruptly canceled an event in San Francisco to go to Japan as reports came out that Heath had died. Now we have official confirmation from the band. https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2023-11-11/x-japan-releases-statement-confirming-passing-of-band-member-heath/.204340 Pata and Heath joined Yoshiki onstage at Otakon 2014:

I am planning on it, just figuring out logistics. It's not exactly in a major city and all that. I don't currently have anybody to room with so I'll probably grab an Airbnb nearby. The con is being run by Media Blasters. John Sirabella has made it a pet project. Koichi Sakamoto never ever does cons. The last one I know for a fact he was at was Power Morphicon, waaaay back in 2007.

I think the off year and Discord caused traffic here to take a hit. That's just me talking. I don't know anything about anything. I remember the old mailing list and how that fell out of favor as the board and then social media came in.

There's a CVS across from the WEWCC and a Giant and Safeway each a few blocks away.

Yeah, there was someone handing out flyers about it when I went into DC the other day for my Global Entry interview. I'm taking the train to Union Station, though, so it's not an issue for me.

From experience: Yes. Therefore, the earlier you can do orientation the better. I've gofered reg and such on the Thursday.

I'd like to see Shocker OH!NO! I didn't even know he did cons and all of a sudden he turned up at Momocon and I missed it. For those who don't know who he is, he's a former tokusatsu stuntman with scattered voice roles in projects like DD Fist of the North Star and Perfect Blue. He got his stage name from no less a figure than Shotaro Ishinomori. He trains stunt actors, emcees events and is just deeply embedded in Japanese pop culture. I'd compare what he would bring to the con to Takamasa Sakurai.

I can't think of many events that blare the fact they'll have hentai content front and center but hentai is what pays John Sirabella's rent. I'm interested in seeing what else is planned for this event but I'm not sure if I'll go.

Here's the thread for that. Parenthetically, I don't think a lot of people check the board so much anymore.

https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2023-02-28/singer-maon-kurosaki-passes-away/.195420 She'd had health issues dating back to September 2021, when she collapsed during a live-streamed concert. She was 35.

Oof. Always something with Metro.

Congoers and especially cosplayers of a certain age may remember him and his camera from various cons in the late 90s and aughts. He was everywhere. https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2022-11-15/cosplay-photographer-kevin-lillard-passes-away/.191951

I don't think I've seen staff pool represented at any orientation that I'd been to prior, that's why I mentioned it as something I appreciated. But it's good to learn there's more coordination than I was aware of.

Music: Yuki Kajiura, m-flo, Granrodeo, renewing my request for MONKEY MAJIK Voice: Yuri Lowenthal, Johnny Yong Bosch, Monica Rial, Jamie Marchi Other: Toshiki Inoue (who hasn't done a con to my knowledge), Yasuhiro Nightow

According to Otakon's policies, if it has wheels and isn't a mobility device, it's not allowed in. They indicate that that rule is from the venue but they probably wouldn't let them in anyway, IMO, because of liability.

To add context, an appellate judge denied his appeals and remanded the case to trial court to figure out exactly how much more he owes Monica Rial and Ron Toye in legal fees, since the cost of their representation exceeded the amount they were awarded in the case. Yeah, for those who forget, he and his lawyers bungled this lawsuit so hard that he ended up owing them, Jamie Marchi and Funimation. https://kotaku.com/vic-mignogna-lawsuit-dragon-ball-z-funimation-court-1849435479 I hope we never have to hear from him again but I know we're not going to be that lucky.

I was a close contact with somebody but came up negative on multiple rapid tests.

I've said versions of parts of this already elsewhere. Good: Excellent diversity of guests and panels. When I wasn't gofering (and boy oh boy did I gofer a lot this year), I was seldom bored. This con was jam packed. Observance of masking rules was excellent. While gofering reg, I noticed and appreciated the change from laptops to tablets and easier QR scanners. I was also pleased to learn about the satellite registration areas at the hotels. Please make that a thing going forward and explore options for later in the con as well. Speaking of gofering, that's always spo

Reiterating what I said at feedback, I appreciated that someone from staff pool was at gofer orientation to recruit potential staffers. As far as I'm aware, out of the orientations I've attended, that was a first and it really should have been done sooner. It's difficult to join Otakon staff because, if you don't come up as a gofer, it's hard to get the two recommendations unless you know somebody. A comment that came up multiple times was that staff was short-handed. Has Otakorp looked into (or will Otakorp look into) easing that requirement and posting a public-facing application on the

Maybe at least in part because they don't have the roles they used to. Sue is no longer running Gofer Ops (though she remains part of Gofer Ops and a member of the Otakorp board) and Jim is more behind the scenes in GR AFAIK. The board isn't as active as it used to be probably because people didn't use it that much the year there ended up not being a con. And Otakon itself has tried to reach out more on various social platforms, including Instagram and Twitch. I go back far enough to remember the mailing list. Other cons still have message boards and I think there's a place for Otakon's a

You can also put your SmarTrip on your Apple Watch or iPhone now: https://www.wmata.com/fares/MobilePay/ApplePay.cfm I stayed in a Westin for Tekko and they had the usual accoutrements in the room and, after our luggage failed to follow us from Baltimore (we got it the next day), they had toothbrushes and toothpaste available for us at the front. I couldn't really avail myself of that because of an allergy but I appreciated the thought.

I’m not staff but I believe I saw a reply to something on social after the ACen mess saying that Otakon wasn’t relaxing its rules.

I don't go back far enough to have anime on VHS or LD. I bought Boogiepop Phantom as a DVD set back in the day and now I own it on Blu-ray. I'm probably going to do the same with Project A-ko and Otaku no Video at some point, maybe Bebop.

I’m glad that he got a sense these last few years of how loved he was.

Dovetailing on the feedback panel comment about keepsake programs and T-shirts, one thing that's in the program that I kinda missed was the staff list. Let us, you know, know who was responsible for putting all this together so they can take a virtual bow. Also, though I wasn't interested in autographs this year, a fun feature of the program book was the autograph page you could have a guest sign, no questions asked. I don't know if any kind of alternative was provided but it would have been nice if that were the case.