X-Message-Number: 22447
From: "Ben Best" <benbest@interlog.com>
Subject: Room Parties at the Toronto WorldCon -- Results
Date: Sun, 31 Aug 2003 22:28:03 -0700

    Hundreds of people dropped in to our cryonics room 
parties on Thursday and Friday evenings at the Toronto
World Science Fiction Convention -- with much more 
activity on Thursday evening than on Friday. In my 
experience parties on Saturday and Sunday tend to be 
more sparsely attended -- and would not have been
cost-justified. 

    Almost everyone attending these parties seem to be in
one of two categories (1) already convinced that cryonics
is a good idea -- signed-up or wanting to sign-up OR 
(2) having absolutely no serious interest in cryonics,
but wanting to check out the parties and the food. Only 
a few rare people knew little or nothing and were curious
to learn more or make contact with others who shared 
their interest -- my main target audience. 

    Most of those who were in category (2) did not stay
long. So the partying mostly consisted of people in 
category (1) talking to each other. I hope the information
exchange was valuable and increased the incentive of those
who are already interested in cryonics to sign-up -- 
and increased the ability of those who are signed-up to
find ways to grow cryonics or to make it better. 

    My main objective had been to meet Canadians with an 
interest in cryonics so as to involve them in the CSC list
and/or local networking and/or contributing to local 
response preparedness. The attendees were overwhelmingly
American -- there were few Canadians other than those 
already in our local group. We met far more Canadians at
the Winnipeg WorldCon. But in Winnipeg we had a Dealer's 
table and had parties for four nights rather than just two
and we had a panel. 

   As for those showing interest in joining the CSC list
(the Cryonics Society of Canada e-mail list),
I got 7 names about half of which were Canadians (although
one of the Canadians wrote an illegible e-mail address). 

    Overall, the experience is not radically different from
my past outreach activities -- a lot of effort for a small
response. I have been doing this for years, however, and
the cumulative incremental results have become increasingly
substantive. 
 
   Any Canadian interested in joining the CSC e-mail list
is encouraged to send a request to csc2@cryocdn.org

           -- Ben Best

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=22447