Worldcon Intellectual Property, whose board of directors is the members of the Mark Protection Committee of the World Science Fiction Society, has issued the following announcement:
Worldcon Intellectual Property
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
30 January 2024
Worldcon Intellectual Property
Post Office Box 61363
Sunnyvale CA 94088-1363 USA
Worldcon Intellectual Property (W.I.P.) is a California non-profit corporation that holds the service marks of the World Science Fiction Society (www.wsfs.org) including the mark “Hugo Award”. W.I.P. takes very seriously the recent complaints about the 2023 Hugo Award process and complaints about comments made by persons holding official positions in W.I.P. In connection with these concerns, W.I.P. announces the actions listed below. There may be other actions taken or to be taken that are not in this announcement.
- Dave McCarty has resigned as a Director of W.I.P.
- Kevin Standlee has resigned as Chair of the W.I.P. Board of Directors (BoD).
- W.I.P. has censured or reprimanded the following persons, listed in alphabetic order, for the reason given:
- Dave McCarty – censured for his public comments that have led to harm of the goodwill and value of our marks and for actions of the Hugo Administration Committee of the Chengdu Worldcon that he presided over.
- Chen Shi – censured for actions of the Hugo Administration Committee of the Chengdu Worldcon that he presided over.
- Kevin Standlee – reprimanded for public comments that mistakenly led people to believe that we are not servicing our marks.
- Ben Yalow – censured for actions of the Hugo Administration Committee of the Chengdu Worldcon that he presided over.
- Donald Eastlake has been elected Chair of the W.I.P. BoD.
Please note that each year’s World Science Fiction Convention (Worldcon) is run by a separate organization which administers the Hugo Awards for that year. The Chengdu 2023 Worldcon has asked that any specific questions about the administration of the 2023 Hugo Awards be sent to hugoteam@chengduworldcon.com.
(For media inquiries on topics related to W.I.P. other than the specifics of the 2023 Hugo Awards, you may contact info@thehugoawards.org.)
I had not followed this story closely before. Thank you for informing the fans.
Any chance you’ll ever explain what happened?
China and their money happened.
Nothing worth more than money from a regime run by a dictator! *throws up*
Unless the organization can come up with satisfactory answers about why these works were disqualified, the Hugo award will lose all credibility. Sad that such a prestigious award is destroying its own reputation so thoroughly.
I used to go out of my way to read Hugo award winners. But if this situation isn’t fully explained, I won’t bother considering that a factor in my reading choices. Hugo has lost all credibility. Hopefully they’ll work to get it back.
Pretty blatant cop out, directing all inquiries to a group who either no longer exists in practical terms, or is at least ignoring all incoming email.
This is an excellent write up to consider when looking at where we go from here: https://wrongquestions.blogspot.com/2024/02/the-2023-hugo-awards-somehow-it-got.html