From: areid@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk (Alastair Reid)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.fandom
Subject: Scone - a tasty convention
Summary: See keywords
Keywords: SF Convention, Iain Banks, Anne Page, Glasgow
Date: 29 Jul 92 20:54:47 GMT
Organization: Glasgow University Computing Science Dept.

The short version:

Name: Scone
Other name: Unicon 13
Name I thought of which noone else on the committee liked: Nocinu '92 
Date: 7-9th August 1992
GoH: Iain M. Banks
FGoH: Anne Page
Site: Clyde halls of residence, Jamaica Street, Glasgow
Cost: 14 pounds attending membership
      (cheques should be made payable to `Unicon 13')
Contact:  SCONE
	  c/o Kenny Meechan
	  80 Otago Street
	  Glasgow G12
Other contacts:
  Alastair Wheeler-Reid (areid@uk.ac.glasgow.dcs) phone: 041-334-3048
  Niall Jackson	(jacksonn@uk.ac.glasgow.dcs)
  Phil Raines (chls18@vaxe.strathclyde.ac.uk) phone: 041-334-5270


The longer version:

                 What, you may ask, is a Unicon?

A Unicon is  an annual science  fiction convention run by students for
students.   For those who've  not been to a SF  con,  they are weekend
events where sciffy fans gather  to celebrate their mutual enthusiasms
through panels, speeches by guest authors,  films, drinking, games and
general socialising ---the sort  of  thing accountants always dream of
doing when they go to special conferences, but never get around to.

The Unicon ---which is short for the British National  Student Science
Fiction Convention (roughly)--- started  back in 1980,  and every year
since then it's travelled  around the country  to different locations.
In recent  years, it's been  in  Belfast, Cambridge and Bangor  --- to
complete the tour of the UK, it's in Glasgow this year.  [Rumours that
the Universite de Paris Sud are bidding for next year's con to make it
a ``Grand Slam'' have been denied.]

                     So what's the con about?

We sat down  and  thought about a theme  for  the con, one  that would
unite students and SF fans,  and what we  came  up  with was: Fun  and
Games in SF. Science fiction (and SF cons) have always been about fun,
so why  not have a con devoted  to it?  This  means that there will be
things ranging from panels about the future of fun in the modern world
to silly and bizarre games, as well  as the  traditional features of a
Unicon, like the costume masquerade.

                      Why is it called Scone?

Well,  seeing that  everyone else will  be having fun  at the con, the
committee decided  to have some fun before  by naming it  Scone.  This
does not   mean we'll be inviting  the  KLF to  perform in giant scone
costumes for their   new video, but it  does  mean we'll  be holding a
scone-baking   competition,  arranging   scone-tasting  sessions,  and
serving hot, buttered scones at 4 in the afternoon.

                    Who is our Guest of Honour?

None other than  Iain Banks (better  known  to sciffy  fans under  his
science fiction pseudonym, Iain M. Banks).   Iain emerged in the 1980s
as one of Britain's best known young writers.  Within science fiction,
he's famous  for  taking that  old  leaky   genre,  space  opera,  and
attaching  a couple of  thermonuclear (literary) dynamos  to it.  He's
been widely acclaimed for   novels such as `Consider   Phlebas',  `The
Player  of Games' and the  recent  `Use of  Weapons'.  Outside science
fiction, Iain has dazzled the Literary Establishment with his gumption
(such  as   his infamous  horror   novel,   `The Wasp  Factory'),  his
imagination (as  in `The Bridge', a  fantasy novel set on an imaginary
Forth Rail Bridge) and  his diversity (in writing  in a range of genre
styles, from rock `n'  roll  fictional  biographies to   international
thrillers).  In person, he's as  dynamic  as his   books, and we  look
forward to him being at Scone.

See you there.

-- 
Alastair Reid, Computing Science Department, Glasgow University, rm G091,
17 Lilybank Gardens, Glasgow G12 8QQ, SCOTLAND. Work:no phone;home:041 334 3048
JANET: areid@dcs.glasgow.ac.uk   BANG!net: via mcsun and ukc  FAX: 041 330 4913
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