About the race
GUFF 2008 is now on. Candidates for the Australasia-to-Europe race are: Sue Ann Barber and Trevor Clark, Norah Ding, and Alisa Krasnostein. You can vote via Paypal (see http://users.on.net/~juliettewoods/ guff2008.html) or send cheque or money order or cash in person to Angela Rosin, 26 Hermitage Grove, Bootle, Merseyside, L20 6DR, United Kingdom (cheques made out to "Angela Rosin", email ang.rosin [at] gmail.com), or Damien Warman, PO Box 3017, Norwood SA 5067 (cheques made out to "Damien Warman", email dmw [at] pobox.com).
Voting ends 2008-November-24 23:59 UTC.
About the candidates
Sue Ann Barber and Trevor Clark can't wait to meet lots of fans at Eastercon LX. They love conventions and fandom and all of the opportunities they present. Between them they have: run conventions; edited fanzines; programmed conventions; run awesome panels; created a Fan Fund; started an SF history project; been SF club and convention committee members; and have just been there to make sure events come together. They are passionate about Lego, SF TV, graphic novels, stereo photography and flying cars. They really want to experience UK fandom first hand and are looking forward to seeing you all in the bar.
Sue Ann and Trevor's nominators are Bruce Gillespie, Danny (Heap) Oz, Grant Watson, James Bacon, and Claire Brialey.
Norah Ding at almost two years old represents the future of fandom. She is the child of an Australian and a European fan who met at Eastercon '06. She has been attending conventions in Australia and the UK and would like to meet more fannish children!
Norah would be accompanied by her mother Kylie. Kylie has been attending cons since the Worldcon in '99. She likes corsetry and won the best hall costume at Eastercon '06. She found UK fandom friendly and welcoming (particularly Norah's father
;-)and would like to meet more.Norah would like to visit her daddy.
Norah's nominators are Ju Landesse, Sarah Parker, Shay Telfer, Julie Faith Rigby-McMurray, and Oscar Logger.
Alisa Krasnostein says: I have been active in fandom since 2005 but what I lack in mileage, I more than make up for in enthusiasm. I am Executive Editor of the multi-award winning review web-site ASif! (http://www.asif.dreamhosters.com), a manic blogger (http://girliejones.livejournal.com) and short story reader (http://community.livejournal.com/lastshortstory/). I have a passion for small press publishing and edit two ezines (Shiny, http://shinymag.blogspot.com and New Ceres, http://www.ceres.dreamhosters.com) and co-edited the print anthology 2012 (http://www.twelfthplanetpress.com), also released this year. I love cons, long discussions at the bar, room parties and general silliness. I'm interested in meeting European fans, trading ideas and building bridges to establish some collaborative projects to connect Australian and European fandom in the long term. I'd love to bring my room party GirlieCon to LX 2009.
Alisa's nominators are Lucy Sussex, Cat Sparks, Gene Melzack, Robert Shearman, and Fran Dowd.
About you
Please write your name and some contact details in case the administrators need to get in touch
_________________________________________________________________________
_________________________________________________________________________
Please indicate your voting preference by numbering the following
_____ Barber and Clark
_____ Ding
_____ Krasnostein
_____ Hold over funds
_____ No preference
Please do not repeat any numbers; please use only the numbers 1 to 5; you do not need to number all options.
maguffin
the 2008 guff race ballotAbout GUFF
What is GUFF? GUFF was created in 1979. Known as the Get Up-and-over Fan Fund or the Going Under Fan Fund, depending on which direction it's running, GUFF exists to provide funds to enable well-known fans from Australasia and Europe to visit each other's national (or other) conventions and to get to know each other's fandoms better. GUFF, like other fan funds, exists solely through the support of fandom. The candidates for each trip are voted on by interested fans, and each vote is accompanied by a monetary donation. These votes, and the continuing generosity of fandom through auctions and other donations, are what make GUFF possible.
Who may vote? Voting in the race to send an Australasian fan to Eastercon LX, the 60th British Eastercon is open to anyone who was active in fandom prior to June 2006, and who contributes at least GBP5 or AUD10 (or the equivalent in other currencies) to the fund. Larger contributions are encouraged and will be gratefully accepted. Only one vote per person is allowed. You must sign or otherwise verify your ballot, but your vote will not be made public.
Voting Details. GUFF uses a preferential ballot system which guarantees automatic runoffs until a majority is obtained. You rank the candidates in order of your preference for them. If the leading first-place candidate does not have a majority of votes after the first round of counting, the first-place votes for the lowest-placed candidate are discarded, and the second-place votes on those ballots are counted as first-place votes for the candidates concerned. This process is repeated until one candidate has a majority of all the votes cast. Votes for second and third place candidates are therefore important, but you may not rank any candidate in more than one position on your ballot.
Hold Over Funds. This choice, like 'No award' in award balloting, gives you the chance to vote for no GUFF trip in 2009 if for any reason th candidates do not appeal. Hold over funds may be voted for in any position on the ballot.
No Preference. This choice is for voters who do not wish the GUFF trip to be held over, but who either cannot or prefer not to decide between the candidates.
Donations. GUFF gratefully accepts your freely given money and material for auction. If you're not eligible to vote, or for some reason you don't wish to vote, why not donate anyway?
Candidates. Each candidate has posted a bond of AUD25; promised that barring force majeure they will travel to Eastercon LX, http://lx2009.com, if elected, and provided nominations and a short platform displayed above extolling their many interests and virtues.