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Forum - View topicJapan Expo USA 2013
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oriana3k
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Since there's no coverage, does that mean Friday's Digital Manga panel didn't happen? Or it happened and there wasn't really any news? I waited 10-15 minutes and the panelist(s?) still hadn't showed, so I ended up going to see something else.
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Cutiebunny
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This was a mediocre con. Getting rid of the French staff and their system would be the easiest way of improving it.
Several times during the course of the convention, I witnessed the French staff belittle the US staffers. Two of them came up to a nice Asian staff guy in the autograph area and said, quite angrily, "Do you even know who Sadamoto is?!" Wow, guys, was that really necessary? Yes, we know anime is more popular in France, but that doesn't mean that the majority of your con staff and attendees are clueless. And Sadamoto's translator, Emmanuel, was absolutely horrible; Incredibly rude (every attendee I spoke with all said this), and had great difficulty with the English language. Several times he failed to translate the question from English to Japanese correctly, and when Carl Horn and an attendee who asked the question attempted to translate, Emmanuel became upset and cut them off. Kudos to the attendee who asked the question in Japanese, translated it and then stated that her dream was to be a translator. I'm so happy you didn't let this jerk of a translator shut you down. The autograph system was horrible. First, you announce it's one autograph, per guest, per day. Then, on arrival to the con, you tell us it's one autograph per guest per convention. Then, on Day 1, we find out that you can get one first come/serve autograph and one draw autograph for the same guest on the same day. For a convention that is so interested in using social media, why they couldn't announce any and all changes to the autograph policy is beyond me. Also, your staff need to stop telling guests of honor that they can't draw certain things. There's no better way to tick off your guests than to tell they that they can't do certain things for fans. AM2 tried this in 2012, and look at where they are now. I also didn't like that this con tried to act as if they were Anime Expo by charging AX prices. No, Japan Expo, you are not AX. You have a long ways to go before you will ever be AX. I paid $100 to attend JX as a premier attendee for all three days. I paid $125 to attend AX, a four day con, as a Premier attendee AND got a free ticket to a concert for a musical group I actually had not only heard of, but loved. The notion of carrying a paper around for the con, when every other con gives out badges, is preposterous. How hard would it have been to have cut out the picture and bar/QR code and put this in a plastic cover? I'd also appreciate it if those items drawn by the guests of honor at the convention could be auctioned off at the auction (for charity or otherwise) instead of being shipped off to France and auctioned there. There were several people in attendance who had very deep pockets, and I assure you that the prices those items would have sold for would easily have rivaled anything you'd get in France. See the results from FanimeCon 2011's charity auction should you have any doubt. Should any JX staff read this, I seriously hope you take into account what I've written. This con was mediocre at best. The fact that less than half of the estimated 15K attendees showed up speaks volumes. |
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Asrialys
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What? Seriously? I know that on Day 2, the staff (at least the American ones) allowed us to get more than one ticket without having to get in line.
Well, the original idea was that there would be no re-entry at all upon exiting the festival. I guess that works in France, where they have a venue to hold their immense audience, where they probably have many options for food, rest, and being outdoors without stepping foot outside the festival. The Santa Clara Convention Center doesn't quite provide the same luxury.
Where did you see this number? I'm glad Day 2 picked up a bit. While it was still a weekday, Friday's attendance was a bit discouraging. Was there even 1000 attendees there at a time? The non-anime part of the festival probably helped boost attendance a little as family and friends came to see the exhibits and demonstrations. I wonder if there were any other exhibitors who decided to call it quits early. I saw on Twitter that Hen Da Ne left after Saturday. lol Did you see the lone man near the Info/Merchandise booth on Saturday selling stuff? That was a bit random... |
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Dfens
Posts: 462 |
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The con has a lot of potential and I think it can in the future give Fanime a run for it's money with the fact that you don't have to wait 4-8 hours to get in because of their numerous badge issues.
For the price of Japan Expo it was alright but what pissed me off was I wasted 2 days trying to get Sadamoto's autograph. It was rigged from the start if I had known that a premium ticket would guarantee you a autograph I would have paid the extra 50 bucks for one. The whole first come first serve for his or anybodies was BS all the premium people got in 30 minutes early and got all the tickets for them. So people like me who lined up 1-2 hours before the con and where first in line and went straight to the autograph desk had no chance from the start. I can afford the extra money, but what about everyone else what only the privileged get a shot and if not f-u? They should have had 1 signing for premium and 1 first come first serve and forget the random draw BS. By making the effort to get their early should the prize go to. Or at the very least have more signings those had the most people in line. I don't expect Sadamoto to sign his entire time at the con, but hell I would paid top dollar just to get a autograph if Japan Expo is that money hungry and many other people would have too. Yeah that French translator for Sadamoto was kind of a ass. The autograph festival on the listing for the panel was lame. Those 2 original art pieces Sadamoto drew I would have bid a few thousand for the one of Asuka on top of the old cobra car. All in all it was a ok con, but learned the hardway and this is a tip for everyone who plans to attend in the future. Get the stupid premium ticket if a guest is attending that you want a autograph from because if not you ain't going to get one. Last edited by Dfens on Mon Aug 26, 2013 6:37 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Cutiebunny
Posts: 1770 |
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The American staff would allow you to get multiple guests per run through the autograph line. The French staff would not. In one case, I was standing in the third line and asked the guy if I could just grab a ticket for Iwadere and Iwamoto on Day 2. There was one person behind me in this line. The French staff guy told me I couldn't because it would hold up the line. What line?! There was one person behind me.
The French location is like its own city, with lots of space and multiple options for eating. The Santa Clara Convention Center offered snacks ($2 for a bag of small chips) and a small eatery outside the exhibit hall which charged $11 for a chicken teriyaki bowl. With the free parking, I opted to drive to Jack in the Box and Carl's Jr.
The 15K number was the number that Japan Expo cited when attempting to sell vendor space. They assured all potential vendors that they would have 15K guests their first year. JX charged its exhibitors $1000 (starting price) for a small booth, which, incidentally, is what Anime Expo usually charges its vendors for a similar space. When Day 1's turn out was very low (maybe a couple hundred people), several vendors were absolutely disgusted and attempted to leave. Japan Expo staff begged them to stay, and cited that turn out would be better on Day 2. While it was, it was no where near half of what Japan Expo 'promised' them. I also don't like the fact that Japan Expo USA is deleting any negative feedback that they receive on their Facebook page. I have a hard time believing that it was a glowing experience for everyone. Not quite sure why cons believe that if they delete all negative feedback on their Facebook page that it'll make them look good. If the feedback bothers them so much, maybe they should take the advice seriously and take steps to rectify the issues. |
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ColonelYao47
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I'm a little disappointed to hear things didn't fare well at Japan Expo USA. This only reinforces the notion that people don't go to anime conventions in the US for anime-specific reasons. That the convention procedures were managed so poorly for a relatively under-attended con is worrisome.
To make matters worse, it's not like guests of Yoshiyuki Sadamoto's caliber come around often. EVA is my favorite anime and I envy those that got to meet Mr. Sadamoto. Let's just say I have my doubts he'll come around these parts again. |
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Cyclone1993
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Will the interview/panel with Minami be covered? I'd really like to hear what he had to say about Eureka Seven AO.
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Dfens
Posts: 462 |
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Cyclone1993 you didn't miss much, I was at that panel only 30-40 where their.
The only thing he mentioned about Eureka Seven AO that it's available to buy part 1 and part 2 is coming in October. He did make a comment that this ends his commercial for the product in Japanese that I got before the translator told the audience that broke out laughing. It was a small history about bones and how they got started, the majority was about their new show Space Dandy. My friend is a die hardcore bones fan so he got more out of the panel then I did. While I do love many of their works I'm not too excited for Space Dandy which reminds me of a rip off of the main character from Red Line. The prizes at the end of the panel where so, so. Now if they were giving away those black hoodies that bones panel staff were wearing I would have fought tooth and nail to get one of those. Also the day before was Minami's birthday so the staff had us sing him happy birthday and gave him a present. One thing I got a kick out of was him talking about what he did in his off hours when not at the con, eating out at various american food places and drinking too much and his first visit to Trader Joes for some shopping. |
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Brohimesama
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I'm gonna answer what I can, but I don't know everything in these posts.
Trust me, we are completely aware of this. Some of us aren't overly excited with how things were handled by the French side. You may have overheard our staff calling con ops for about ten minutes before just giving up.
They initially had a "passport" system which was all sorts of convoluted and ineffective. It didn't work very well, so they reworked it the week OF the convention. I can guarantee this was all from the French side.
Most of our staff didn't even totally get the autograph system.
The American team thinks it was stupid too.
Convention transplant. It makes sense that they want to grab the best stuff to sell in France. It makes them look better to those they actually give a shit about
This is all stuff we've chatted about internally, so don't worry, your concerns are our concerns as well.
As far as I've seen, you are the only person complaining about this. If you read the ticketing page, it says this about premium tickets.
So the premiums pay double what you pay to get in 30 minutes earlier almost exclusively for autographs. I've seen your suggestion of one line for prereged and normals, and another line for premium. The thing is, this doesn't rectify the problem at all. While I don't think the lottery system is the best idea, it's better than just two lines. You saw how long some of the lines were for specific guests, so how would the issue be fixed? There are 200 premium tickets, and they would more than likely get priority because they paid double of what you paid. So if any large amount of premium ticket holders decided they wanted autographs from specific guests, then you'd just be shut out regardless. The lottery system, as far as I know, makes no distinction between premium and other tickets so you have an equal chance from that system (they can retry but they might fail every retry). Remember, the guests are there for a block of time, not for X amount of people. If you can fully flesh out an idea that's better than "there should be one line for regulars and one line for premium" I'm all ears. Always assume that premium will be preferred by the con except in cases of random chance.
I have no idea who's doing that. I can assure you that the people that are on the social media team are not doing it, so it is most likely someone higher up. |
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Dfens
Posts: 462 |
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The only person complaining about the autograph system their is the guy who was ahead of me and first in line saturday who posted on the facebook page. Plus all the other people who didn't post on this forum or facebook, I can assure you everyone in the "first come first serve line" were pissed when they found out that every person with a premium ticket snagged all the passes for Sadamoto.
What the hell did we line up 1-2 hours outside for if their was not enough slots from the beginning. Do you think we were thank psyched to get into the con? No we all went straight to the Sadamoto line. The line was moving smoothly and even though it wasn't around the corner it had some people in it, but it looked like everyone their at the time was going to get a slot. And when the first of us were about to get our slot they were already gone. Look I wouldn't be this vocal if I was at the end of the line at 9AM outside to get it in or showed up at say 10AM to the autograph desk. I'm sorry I didn't read into the stupid premium ticket fine print, where it said in bold quotes "YOU MUST BUY ONE BECAUSE ONLY THE PEOPLE WHO PAY MORE GET THE PRIVILEGE OF A AUTOGRAPH". You said what exactly is the problem and what happened that premium ticket holders shut out everyone else so don't call it first come first serve if the system is rigged from the start. It's false advertising. Look all I am saying is the system is broken and you really need to word the fine print a hell of a lot better so that people know without a premium ticket their is no chance in hell of a autograph. The only thing I can suggest then is maybe a paid guaranteed number of autograph only tickets. A limited number of tickets that cost more than the premium ticket that only get you a autograph only, for the guest of your choice the price would be based on how popular the guest is. So if you want a sure shot at a autograph start saving your pennies for one. Or instead all first come first served. Forget the random draw BS, Sadamoto had 3 signing sessions why couldn't their had been you line up early enough for each one to get your spot you get a autograph. Much better to blame yourself for not being their early then blaming a stupid random scanner. For the most part I still got some joy out of the con, but I did miss for me and a lot of other people a once in a life time chance. The Sadamoto panel was great at least I was able to get into that, but the whole "autograph festival" got a lot of peoples hopes up that he would do one last signing their for some of the people who attended. |
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Cutiebunny
Posts: 1770 |
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Brohimesama, thanks for taking the time out of your schedule to come to the ANN boards to address this. Had JX had a forum where I could post my thoughts, I would have done it there instead of here. I had been watching JX's twitter feed as they retweeted only positive comments (largely from those who are vendors or industry and thus might be biased), and wondered if JX gave a flying F about what an actual attendee thought, well, short of the questionaires which, I believe, were probably placed in the circular file.
What I would like to see is JX adopt a small(er) con mentality like PMX and the former AM2 have. I like it when cons can take a well known guest and make them relatable. Some cons do this by offering a dinner with guests, a special meet/greet, after dark panels (popular with hentai guests), etc. Because Sadamoto was constantly guarded (possibly due to the fact that he had a Japanese stalker at one time), he felt so distant. And because of the rules established for Sadamoto and the way JX French staff treated him, I came away thinking that Sadamoto was kind of a jerk...even though, he's probably a really nice guy if you get to know him. On the other hand, because of the art battle panels and Q&A panels that Smith, Iwamoto and Kozaki had, I would love to see them at any con again. They all had a good sense of humor and were very nice. That feeling should be the goal of any con - Creating such a positive vibe between guest and attendee that both walk away from the experience looking forward to the next event. I felt that the vibe of the exhibit hall was more that of a trade show than an actual anime convention. I did like the koto performer on Sunday afternoon and was very impressed by her performance. Sadly, there were only a couple of people around to enjoy it. I really hope that, if there is a Japan Expo USA 2014, the disdain that the French staff had for both their US staff and attendees, be curbed. It really dampened my experience as a attendee and will be a major factor in deciding whether or not to attend this event again. |
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tuxedocat
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...how did I know this would happen?
Well, maybe because I live here! It's not like a festival based on Japanese pop culture can't succeed in the Bay area, you just have to attract the Bay area crowd. http://www.geekexchange.com/j-pop-summit-festival-2013-74527.html 80,000 attendees this year for this (small) J-POP festival. The Cherry Blossom Festival in April is HUGE, and takes place over TWO weekends. We have two Japantowns, one in San Francisco, and one in San Jose. This convention was placed between the two, charged a high admission, and NO RE-ENTRY. No food other than chips and a crappy, overpriced teriyaki bowl. The Bay Area is known for its foodies. Bad call. The no re-entry policy kept many people, including myself, away from this thing. Local Japanese vendors didn't find this particularly attractive either. $1000 for a booth? They can hire a kid for a couple $100 to pass out fliers outside the event and attract people to their store in one of the Japantowns, and why not just go there? At least there (San Francisco) you can get a freshly made taiyaki, crispy around the edges (yum). Or you can head down to the smaller Japantown in San Jose and get the wonderful, authentic mochi from the shop there. Japan Expo truly needed to vet the area and get a sense of what is going on here. The con can't just attract out-of-state visitors. It needs to attract locals with stuff they can't find in the two Japantowns. And they seriously need to re-think the restrictive policies that kept people at home this time around. For instance: a small daily admission fee, and an extra charge for special events would work much better. J-Pop summit attendees paid extra for movie screenings and sake tastings, and could come and go as they pleased. No stupid re-entry rules (worst idea ever. If anything, this kept people from attending more than anything else, IMO). The expo should have created sake tasting, and maybe invited a couple of famous Japanese chefs to create pop-up restaurants and give lectures. The foodie culture in this area is beyond huge. Foodies would have paid the entry fee AND whatever would be charged for the food just to taste the authenticity. I'm not kidding. |
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Dfens
Posts: 462 |
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Actually tuxedocat they changed their policy and you could leave and re-enter as many times as you wanted. The only sticking point was that you had to get your ticket scanned in and out every time or you could not get back in.
So they had only one entrance to get scanned in and one exit to get scanned out. All the doors were locked from the outside so you could not sneak in for free and if you exited other than the one special scan out exit you had to pay to get back in. I actually liked that part since at Fanime you can practically come and go as you please with out paying and I feel like a fool for paying when everyone seems to sneak in and they do nothing about it but love to complain about it. Comparing it to the J-pop festival is not fair that was a free event in SF Japan Town so all the events except the movies screening at the new people building were free. Of course people will flock to a free festival and if their is food and things they want to buy when they are their they can. Like Cutiebunny said part of it did feel like a tradeshow than a con. Some parts I liked more than your typical con like how their were no stupid fan panels that have nothing to do with anime or japanese culture at all but because they need to fill some space and put out some shit for idiots to attend they allow it. And don't forget the rave too. I do feel bad for the limited number vendors at the con if they had to pay that much and were promised so many attendees. But part of the problem is they tend to over charge at cons as well. When things are much cheaper online and unless you have something rare are hard to find people aren't going to over pay for something on impulse. One example I was looking at Durarara on Blu-Ray from one vendor he had a price tag of $189.99 that is $40.00 dollars more than on rightstuf free shipping to my door no tax. Why pay more for something I can order on my couch off my phone or at work on my break with the click of a mouse. Hell even the official Funimation booth was guilty of this charging practically full retail for every title they had for sale. Again right stuf, same product much cheaper. What's funny they were advertising hey get Guilty Crown and Last Exile Fam before street date when right stuf has already been shipping those out even before the con when available in their warehouse. I even asked about that and Funimation says they gave permission to ship stuff early. Their was some hot items reasonably priced that did sale, and if not it was just not enough foot traffic. But the location really sucks for food I ended up bringing a lunch for that sunday because their is nothing to eat in walking distance and even by car it's very limited unless you drive a bit down the road to even get to the nearest McDonalds. All in all it has room for much improvement, if they can get more people to attend and more vendors, especially more industry people, and special guests it could be worth attending in the future. Unless they line up some major guest that I would die to see and get a autograph from I don't think I would even bother going ever again if things stay the same. All my friends are in agreement we can live without the stupid badge if we don't have to wait in a 3-8 hour line just to get in after we've paid months in advance I'm talking about you Fanime and every other con cough Anime Expo. |
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tuxedocat
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Wow. I didn't know that. I'm happy that they came to their senses about that. Unfortunately, there was such a kerfuffle about it at the begining that many people, including my self, sort of gave up on going and didn't check back.
That is sort of my point though. If you are going to charge a big admission, you have to equal what the free event offered plus add a whole lot more. The absence of many Japanese cultural things and the food and drink offerings were not sufficient in comparison. Plus AX had already happened in the state. If Japan Expo was only depending on anime fans as attendees, they needed to offer something more. As it was, it just came off as a smaller anime convention. Also, AX probably was expensive enough for the attendees (teens) who go to anime cons. The Bay Area is notoriously expensive for food and lodging. I think that maybe most of the AX attendees who wanted to go to Japan Expo probably couldn't afford both. This con seemed really expensive for what was offered, and it taking place at the end of con season probably didn't help. So what Japan Expo needed to do was attract the large local audience that goes to the Cherry Blossom Festivals and J-POP Summit. They needed to attract that audience with authentic, Japanese cultural offerings in addition to all the anime/manga/pop events that are not normally on display at those festivals. This didn't happen. |
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Dfens
Posts: 462 |
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Not to defend Japan Expo even if they wanted to add much of the flare of the various SF J-pop events I don't think it was remotely possible.
San Francisco probably has certain connections and deals that they can swing to get the extra tourist to flock to the event which equates to more money in the local economy those weekends. The biggest selling point is it's location Japan Town and that it's free to attend. They have all the Japanese restaurants all ready their to choose from up and down the street and the main shopping center their. Japan Expo at the Santa Clara Convention Center their is no space in or outside for authentic Japanese eateries to set up. Then their is the movies if they had more movies to attract people to pay for tickets but I bet good money Viz and their New People Building has big connections that gets them all the good Anime movies and Live Action Movies exclusively. Next all the Japanese shops to kill time are their as well. The only real attraction would be the concerts J-Pop has free ones and ok, not so big guests. If Japan Expo got some big talent I wouldn't mind paying extra just for a concert ticket. But all they got were no name acts, which were fun to attend but if I had to pay I would be disgusted. I mean I had to stomach some group of lip singing 12 year olds J DeeZ come on couldn't they have done something better. But I heard it gets costly to bring people over from Japan to perform/attend. It was a somewhat fun experience but the older guests and over energetic fan girls were kinda of creepy over a bunch of cookie cutter wanna be idols. The con prices weren't that bad if you were local like myself but if you had to fly in and pay for hotels etc, then hell yeah would it be a total rip off for what they had to offer. Their is plenty of space at the venue but for various reasons low attendance, not enough vendors, places to eat, hotel accommodations, poor management, not enough events/guests, late in the con season etc I could go on and on. I want to wish them well but unless they have one specific draw whether it be a band or guest that no other con can get then I don't see them doing to well other than they got the badge/line issues down. |
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