So... a land-based, self-organized meetup, then?

Blue

This is kinda cruise-related but also not cruise-related.

Given that:

A. One of the best parts of JCCC is getting to meet and hang out with other people
B. Not everyone can attend a JCCC for all kinds of reasons
C. We have proven ourselves immensely capable of organizing things

Is anyone interested in another land-based meetup this summer similar to the Niagara Falls meetup last year?

Memorial Day weekend and a bunch of us booking a campsite or cheap hotel comes to mind.

I know that not everyone will be able to attend every meetup, so it might be best to organize a few meetups rather than attempt to create the optimal place and time for everyone to attend.

arenson9

I am interested.

This particular calendar year, all of my time off from work is already claimed.

So, unless we're talking about somewhere within a 3 or 4 hour drive of Indianapolis, I probably wouldn't be able to participate.

maletero

I think it's a fantastic idea. It does make me curious as to where (in general terms - no creepiness intended) most of the forumites, Monkeys and Ponies, both, hail from. I'm in northern Nevada, myself. Doubtful that any meetup will be within reasonable driving distance of me, but if one were somewhere around here, I'd try to make it. 

mikesphar

Wasn't there a map at some point someone put together with non-specific non-personal information showing distribution of seamonkeys who had willingly given out their location?

I think it would be neat to see an official complete map from Home Office of just cities/zip/codes/counties seamonkeys came from each year, but I understand there may be some privacy concerns even if no personal information is given out.  (Like, if you're the only person that came from South Dakota, and there's a dot in Sioux Falls, hey we know what city you live in now!)

I also think self-organized land-based events are a cool idea.

kate

@mikesphar, there is a map function in the Unofficial Manifest:  http://seamonkey.joelrichard.com

Grimoire

@mikesphar I believe you are referring to this:

It only gives you a rough idea of numbers.  It also roughly correlates to the size of the state's population.  Unsurprisingly, the more populous the state, the more SeaMonkeys.  

maletero

Thanks for posting that, @Grimore. Being a Land Pony, the link didn't really work for me. 

And I understand privacy concerns. I'm just curious to know whether I'm the only forumite within a day's drive, or so. From that map, it looks like I'm all alone in Nevada, nevermind the northern half of the state!

elgrigy

Given that this should be open to both sea and land monkeys, shouldn't
we develop something new that everyone on the forums/books of
faces/somewhere out there could register and provide whatever contact
data they wanted. 

The idea would be that they could submit
location (maybe zip or something else) and contact info and then those
who wish could see who registered from that location.  As you can see, I
write business requirements for IT folk, so I am happy to tell someone
what to do (but have no idea how to implement).

Seems something like the cruise crud map.....
Hint hint  @aliceandstuff

triciareneeb

There were five of us from Wyoming, our goal for JCCC4 is to get more Wyomingites on the boat, So far I think we are up to seven! That's more people then a few of our cities have :P If anyone in Utah or Colorado would like to do a meet up, We'd love to try and set something up.

BrettGlass

Would love to participate.

Oh, and by the way: this year, we had 5 Sea Monkeys from Wyoming -- perhaps the largest share of any state, because Wyoming -- the least populous state -- only has about half a million people.

If the gathering is in the center of the country -- say, in Denver or the mountains nearby -- I can help to organize. Might time it to coincide with Denver Comic Con, which will have Stan Lee, Wil Wheaton, and most of the cast of The Guild as guests. No word yet on whether @paulandstorm will show up again, but they were great emcees last year and hopefully will be back.

villicious

Like many others, I think this is a great idea.

Also like many others, 100% of my time off this year is spoken for already, making my participation sadly unlikely.

JJRRutgers

Mocy Fruvous fans, aka Fruheads, organized one during President's Day weekend in Toronto, because who doesn't like going to Toronto in the middle of February?  Anyway, it was scheduled around a mini-residency by the band at Lee's Palace, and Frucon 4 was scheduled around Fruvous's last show ever.  After that, it continued (Which is when I started going) for a few years.  Frucon 5 featured a Jian Ghomeshi solo show and a show by a side project of Murray Foster.  Frucon 6, also known as Frucon Survivor (There was a major blizzard in upstate NY that kept all of us there a couple of extra days) had us all attending one of Mike Ford's Canadian history shows at a local school.  Frucon 7 featured a rare Toronto appearance by Eddie From Ohio.

Another thing Frucon did was to invite the band to play a special short show just for the con.  You can find some of these songs on YouTube.

In any case, a land-based JoCon should be, if at all possible, centered around a group of his shows.  The location of such an event I'm sure is going to be heavily discussed and debated.  NYC would make the most sense since he is based out of there, but NYC is a VERY expensive place to get a hotel for 3-4 days.  So, any other centralized location that has the highest concentration of fans would probably be best, and see if something can be worked out with the booking agent to work out a deal.

Unrelated CSB time (Cool Story Bro) - Went to a free They Might Be Giants outdoor show in Baltimore once which just happened to be walking distance from and coincide with Balticon, which one of my friends was a panelist for.  You've never seen a con so empty than during the time that TMBG was on stage!

glenra

I'd be interested. I was the official musical entertainment for the Niagara Falls gathering and it was great fun!

The last time I looked at the unofficial manifest map it seemed like the biggest concentrated monkey groupings were in the general vicinity of either the San Francisco Bay Area or Washington DC. (With smaller clusters in all sorts of other areas.)

Blue

Keeping the meetups relatively small (on weekends or on three-day weekends) might help people who don't have a lot of vacation time.

That aside, I know full well that a dang lot of people (including me) work weekends. So that.

Blue

And @JJRRutgers I suspect we can pull this off *without* basing it around a JoCoShow or series of shows. If there's a show nearby, bonus; but we could also just meet up to hang out with each other.

YMMV and am curious what the rest of y'all think.

mtgordon

I'd be interested, though location might be limiting for a lot of people.  The Niagara Falls event had a bit of a regional feel to it, with people from New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and New England... and that may have been it. Did I miss anyone? Multiple small, regionally-focused events might be the best approach in terms of maximizing the total number of attendees.

villicious

I would go so far as to say the Niagara Falls event had such a regional feel to it that people outside of that region may be hearing about it for the first time right now in this thread.

bethbny

This sounds great! There was some discussion on the facebook about a sort of simulcast meet up, with multiple groups, and google hangouts. I don't know if ever went any where, but I thought it sounded fun.

bethbny

@villicious and also some people in the region.

JJRRutgers

@Blue The fact that you say people will get together without the need for a JoCo show nearby illustrates the 3rd part of the quote I made in my introduction post.  Just to remind you:

"First, we were the reason.  Then, we were the excuse.  Now, we're irrelevant." - Murray Foster of Moxy Fruvous.

mtgordon

@villicious It wasn't organized through the forums but through facebook, advertised in the "Sea Monkey Fun" group.

villicious

@mtgordon I check all the Facebook groups regularly, but the Niagara event still doesn't ring a bell. It's incredibly easy for stuff to get buried on the Facebook groups, especially because of the way things that have been commented on bump back up to the top. You can read to several in a row you've seen and think you're caught up, but miss something that you haven't seen before but wasn't commented on as recently.

TL;DR, I'm in favor of announcing things in multiple places, to catch the most people, especially since privacy issues (and other stuff) keep part of the population off of Facebook.

mtgordon

@villicious A completely valid point.

CindyLouWho

We were the Ohio monkeys at the Niagara Falls event, and it was a blast! I would be completely for regional meetups. On the cruise, I mentioned a King's Island trip to some Indiana monkeys, and most seemed interested. Maybe we could make a weekend of it, and go to Cincinnati Museum
center (aka the Hall of Justice) as well.

Colleenky

This discussion kinda reminds me of this discussion. :-) #OldFartForumite

Blue

Come on, @colleenky. Do you know how much time has passed between a 2013 thread and a 2008 thread?

There's been, like, seven iPhones!

mikesphar

Why that's five Pixar movies ago!

Also four Assassin's Creed games (not counting mobile).

But only one Song of Ice and Fire book.

lucioperca

I'll express tentative tentative interest in this. It's pretty dependent on the specific date and location that gets set; I'm over in California and won't be available in at least July.

robgonzo

eye two wood be interested in a landpony meetup but I already have a gig on memorial day. :-/

BrettGlass

Denver Comic Con is the weekend after Memorial Day; the convention begins on May 31st. This has both pluses and minuses: it won't interfere with holiday commitments but also is not a 3 day weekend for most people.

Encubed

Haha I remember the last 'JoCoCon' thread, but I had totally forgotten that I'd started it. That was ages ago.

Wish I had known about the Niagara meetup, despite not having gone on any cruises that sounds like fun and I'd have made an effort to attend as it's only a 2 hour drive away for me.

MJPM

I hear Arkansas is an excellent location.

St_Trousers

I've spoken elsewhere as I wouldn't be returning to the cruise. This does sadden me somewhat as there are many fine people I will miss as a result. I would however consider a return to a land based gathering be it centred around JoCo or not if it had half the awesome of the boat. Coming from the UK though the location would still be relatively important as it is a 10 hour flight. Also we couldn't do it this year due to Reasons but if it continued to be a thing then I would certainly consider it.