How Organizers Can Ruin The Fun

Remember the times when there are people that disrupt the fun to a cosplay event? Otaku conventions are being more and more of a regular staple in pop culture society, and it seems that there are organizers who are pushing the direction backward. It's the same basic reason why we (by terms the regular "Juan" does not appreciate the same-old boring, overcrowded conventions these past two years. With the booming trend of geek ism staring to decline, there are things in the culture that needed to be fixed. Same goes to the organizers. If they keep treating conventions like "money bags," the entire image of the cosplay and anime community would be hanging in the balance or worse, would be rolling down the news drain.

A stage with no seats? Not worth the price.

1. Fun First, Moolah! Second

Don't blame us on it. Organizers need to make their bread and butter but fooling around and ripping other people's hard-earned cash for crappy conventions is not acceptable. If you analyze how many people went to a convention within the three-year period of the "cosplay boom," most people realized that they are not getting there money's worth. Are you willing to pay for overcrowded trade halls? Do we really get what we deserve and enjoy it at the same time? Organizers have the capability to make finest conventions if they stop thinking about the money and focus on keeping their regular patrons happy. It is best if they stop the competition and the indiscriminate back-stabbing of fellow organizers.

2. Giving a Mud-Slap To Fellow Organizers

When friendly competition is not enough to treat other organizers like trash, they will do the wrong thing in order to be one step ahead of the competition. This includes publishing black propaganda, brainwashing their regular customers and in some cases, intended rigging of the events themselves. Never in the history of Philippine cosplay that this went too deep among the cosplay groups in the country, especially this year when a simple mishap creates negative feedback that can ruin their reputation.

3. Not Sticking To Their Standards

Every convention has their individual set of organizers and with them includes their personal array of rules and regulations. Breaking your own rules just for satisfying the fans is not the precise way of promoting friendly competition. Cosplay competitions are not fast-food chains that have a "customer is right" policy. You can make sure that by adjusting to the participant's requests it will lead to problems later. Sometimes you need to have the balls to stay firm to what you believe in and to make sure that at the end of the day you make the decisions. That's the benefit of being an organizer. Why need to adjust?

4. Not Treating "You" The Right Way

Accepting con-goers into conventions is one thing. Making them happy is another. One of the biggest problems nowadays into conventions is the way organizers treat their guests as is they were "expendable assets." They tend to turn their roles around from responsible event organizers into escape artists when things go sour. Do we need to accept their stubborn practices? Can we allow them to treat us like we are just pawns or slaves into simply looting our money on crappy organizers being controlled by stupid, incompetent organizers? You and I are going to complain afterwards, and then their job is to ignore our rants and hoping time will let them improve. Not only, the investors and con-goers lose a lot in the process, but it creates confusion and creates boundaries for everyone involved.

5. Making Us Look "Dumb"

Speaking of ignorance, a lot of these so-called organizers have the bad habit of making the public feel like we are so illiterate that we can't do anything about it. They are real issues that turn cosplay into a seriously hobby-type joke for the rich who don't have a way of spending their money to the opportunists, hippies, and users who wanted to jump-start their way into fame. What do the organizers do? You can justify that these are wrong, but the evidence is right around every convention there is. From simple to the grandest, organizers have the responsibility to educate their fans, guests, and the general public about what is happening within the community, especially the ones who said, "they are making the difference."

So before you ask yourself if you are doing the right thing you should ask the organizers if they are doing their part to educate excellent cosplay ethics and showmanship. It's their great duty to educate and teach everyone what "good cosplay" is in order to create open-minded, and responsible citizens to everyone involved.

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