Memorabilia convention

[AndyThomas]

Quote Quote: from mike on 9:08 pm on Aug. 4, 2002I was quoted a Dai X for under  £100 as opposed to £180 at Offworld.  Also to prove X-Bomber is not dead in japan, you know those plastic egg things they get from machines?  There was an X-Bomber series made around two years ago!Price £5 each.  Also, Lamia dolls, hand held mini fans, pencil cases all available if people let him know.MikeMike, if people are interested, does he have a public point of contact? From what you and Gareth are saying it would make sense for people to contact him directly to avoid the markup which this Offworld shop will presumably add?

[Shane]

Off World are pretty excessive with their prices, considering the ease in which you can still get the merchandise in Japan. I know the Dengeki Gasshin Big Dai X was being sold by them for nearlly a grand a year or too back, whereas if you get it direct from Japan it'll cost you far less, something like 2-3 hundred pounds. Those plastic egg things sound like the Go Nagi series of pocket robots that was out in Japan a few years back by Banpresto. I've got the Dai X which comes in a little plastic bag. Incidently I've still got a spare dai x on a bike if anyones interested at a knock down price of course for forum members.Shane.

[Chris Snape]

Mike, just to throw my experience into the pot for the amount of people interested in this kind of thing. I have had over 600 requests for Starfleet videos. About one third of them actually go through with it but the original number is what your interested in. They are out there but, like Andy says, they don't hang around the forum.

[AndyThomas]

Obviously not been going as long, but it's a similar thing with the T Shirts. I've had more requests than actual firm orders so far. And when did you start doing your tapes Chris? Three years, now? How do your numbers average out? Say 70 a year actually buying, perhaps? Simon's figures would probably be interesting too, and I imagine the random eBay bootlegs probably up the figure a bit higher.Some obviously do post here to leave feedback, but even having gone to that length they don't seem to hang around to chat - if I were to trim down the numbers on the forum still further (which I could do) the number of repeat posters would probably only be 20, if that...Based on page hits, SFXB gets roughly 25,000 hits a year to its front page. But that's just hits, not unique individuals. If you were to start stripping that down, e.g. people who thought it was a Trek/Wars site, people returning to the front page (not uncommon), site spiders etc then the number of people who actually arrived and were interested in Star Fleet (as opposed to something else on the site) could be far far lower.That said, one thing I do notice is that the number of daily hits is relatively steady, and around 80% of the hits are from the UK (others may be as well, it depends on the ISP's name). So depending on how you treat the figures, there appears to be some ongoing interest in general.Unfortunately, short of a really decent poll which might or might not get participated in, it's impossible to discover the motivation and mind-set of visitors. The only way that can happen is if they post here or send an email or put an entry in a guestbook. I certainly do get contributions every now and again, but they're relatively rare.So I think you end with a split between people who just want to name check the series from their childhood, people who want to watch the series again, and people who remember it really vividly and want to discuss it. The latter are the ones that might go to a meeting, but they seem to be in a minority, especially when you consider that hundreds of people must now have had access to the show again. I think it takes a very unusual set of circumstances for someone to remain quite so interested in an old kids TV show for so long.If we actually look at the interests of those posting here it's actually quite revealing. The SFP crew are clearly into BOTP and Gatchaman and anime in a broader sense, as is long time Star Fleet supporter Justin Palmer. Shane is into similar things, plus Transformers (judging by the original plans for Superbadassrobo?). I'm not a massive BOTP fan although I was fond of it in childhood; I do have an awareness of anime, but I tend to follow mainstream shows more so (Farscape, Stargate et al).So, I think if you're looking to have a Star Fleet meeting of any sort, you might be better off going to an anime themed convention rather than a mainstream event. Because I think a lot of us actually look back at Star Fleet and think, yes, that's what got me interested in the genre even if I didn't know what its origins were at the time. Probably because in many ways it's more "real" than traditional anime, so it left an impression.So having given it a little more thought, if you could find a national anime con (which do happen I believe) then you might be able to generate a greater level of interest, which in turn might create a larger community which I assume is what you're looking to do?

[Shane]

I always thought that a Transformer convention would be a really good place for an unofficial SF minicon it's probably the common ground that we all share, I think if you liked Star Fleet as a kid you more than likely were in to Transformers as well, and as a franchise it's still going strong today in 2002. I think you're probably right with those figures Andy, I hate to compare my self to an obsessive but there must be a little of that in me to still visit a forum about a 20 year old childrens show everyday. But hey I only post here and on 80s nostalgia so that isn't too bad is it? I guess you are only looking at a hardcore of a dozen or so people who would probably go to an event, but who know's the amount of interest such an event might create?Shane.

[Chris Snape]

I agree with Shane, I think Transformers was probably themost popular of the 80's cartoons when Starfleet was about. That would be the best place to target. Me, for instance, I love Transformers.

[AndyThomas]

That bloke who appeared on I love 198? scares me though, and my Transformers the Movie DVD always starts with the clip from that show! Gaaaaah! :shocked:Transformers is an interesting one, actually, in that it's never really stopped. Someone I know at work who's a few years younger than me has a big "casual" collection at home, which for some reason suprised me but when I think about it I was into them very early and stopped being into them around the time Pretenders and such like were coming out, but they remained a big seller.I was more into the comics in a way, and there are some interesting fan comics out there. Plus the excellent new official ones, although some of them are clearly done with a view to pushing the new merchandise.Yeah, I don't know if I'd want to go to a Botcon as such but I agree that it would be an obvious choice - in fact, the Dai X on my T Shirt has now been mistaken for a Transformer twice and I'm seriously thinking of changing the design to include a disclaimer along the lines of a speech bubble saying "I am NOT a Transformer!"