Dragon*Con Is So Big That …

I checked in on the TheOneRing.Net’s live road trip page a few days ago. Several members of the TORN team packed a car with a Webcam and set out from California for Atlanta for the 2011 edition of Dragon*Con, which as I write this has now come and gone.

Dragon*Con is an incredible experience, and I am sure it is even more incredible now than it was when I last attended the convention a few years ago. As Peter Jackson’s semi-official proxy among Tolkien fan sites, TORN carries the banner for “The Hobbit” movies in the minds of most fans. They are almost obligated to put together some sort of movie panel for Dragon*Con and other conventions so that fans will feel like someone is on the job.

This year the TORN team broadcast their panel live over their Website (and YouTube). Other sites picked up the live stream as well. On the several occasions when I checked in there were anywhere from 150 to 240 concurrent viewers. The TORN chat room was almost always active as well. And the TORN team invited fans to send them questions via cell phone, too.

TheOneRing.net is not the first Website to broadcast over the Internet from Dragon*Con but to do it live as they travel across country, set up at the convention, make their presentations, and now as they drive home — I think that is a first. In fact, when I saw a tweet with their phone number last week I called them up not realizing they would talk to me “on the air” (my voice was not transmitted so you only heard half the conversation).

Something I thought was interesting was that Middle-earth Network also sent a team to Dragon*Con this year. But when I asked in the TORN chat room if the two Website teams were coordinating in any way, a couple of people said they didn’t think so. It’s not like the two sites haven’t heard about each other, as TheOneRing.Net has graciously provided coverage over the launch and transformation of Middle-earth Network.

11 years ago when I first invited TheOneRing.net and Tolkien Online (now rebranded as TheOneRing.Com) to join me on the Tolkien and Middle-earth fan track at Dragon*Con, there was an air of apprehension as the two Websites were part of what was then seen as a four-way rivalry between Tolkien fan sites (five if you count Xenite.Org but wasn’t looking for rivals at the time). Once I got everyone in the same room they warmed to each other and realized that, hey, we’re ALL Tolkien fans.

I think it’s important that Tolkien fan sites work together, at least during major events. It’s not like we’re in danger of losing the franchise but we ARE in danger of losing the joy. I remember losing the joy in the news groups when a small group of people decided to poison the experience for the rest of us. I reacted badly to those people and I share in the responsibility for driving hundreds of once active posters away from those discussions. The memory of the good times, however, will always be with me. It was fun to talk about Tolkien when people didn’t try to bully you simply because they couldn’t get you to change your mind on the silliest and dumbest of arguments.

Tolkien fan sites don’t need rivalries. They don’t need an “Us and Them” attitude. For that matter, no fan franchise benefits from that kind of division. The Kevin Sorbo fans pretty much ruined the fun from their constant strife, and now that international fan community is smaller and less productive than it once was. It only takes a few toxic people to destroy a fan community’s joy, and that environment once destroyed can never recover — at least not until the old toxic personalities fade away and new people discover the franchise and bond over new shared experiences.

I checked out Middle-earth Network’s Dragon*Con coverage a little bit but was kind of disappointed. Frankly I don’t have as much time to follow either of these great fan sites as I would like. You can hear some voiceover promos I did for the network throughout their programming. But what I would like to see for next year is for TheOneRing.Net to bring together as many of these big Tolkien fan sites for a huge Tolkienrama at Dragon*Con as can possibly be arranged.

Heck, I might even find a way to make my way back to Dragon*Con in 2012. We’ll all be building up anticipation for the first “Hobbit” movie. And, who knows? Maybe Hawke Robinson and I can even do a livecast of Middle-earth Talk Radio from Dragon*Con. That would be the ultimate fan experience, I think.

And Dragon*Con is easily big enough to accommodate such an ambitious project. Let me think about it. I may have to knock a few heads together but this should be doable. There is no reason why we cannot show the world that we are ALL Tolkien fans.

Again.