FanimeCon 2010

When: May 28 - May 31, 2010
Where: San Jose McEnery Convention Center (San Jose, California)
2009 Attendance: 15,000

An Overview

Located in the beautiful Bay Area of Northern California, Fanime Con occasionally lives in the shadow of its southern California sibling, Anime Expo, but with over 15,000 attendees in 2009 (2010 numbers have not yet been released), Fanime more than stands on its own, and the beautiful weather for the weekend brought out plenty of fans, leading some events to max out their capacity.

This year the guest list included rockers LM.C, voice actress and singer Halko Momoi, the BlazBlue/Guilty Gear duo of Daisuke Ishiwatari and Toshimichi Mori (who also attended Anime Expo last year), Fanime regular and acting Gainax president Hiroyuki Yamaga, Dark Horse Manga editor Carl Horn, and quite a few others.

Fanime Con launched in 1994 and was held at California State University of Hayward, run by a collaboration of anime clubs. Ten years later it was large enough to move to the San Jose Convention Center in the prime Memorial Day Weekend slot. As of 2007, the convention generates over US$5 million of revenue for the area.