2016 Hugo Awards Ceremony Tonight

~ Kevin ~ 6 Comments

The 2016 Hugo Awards ceremony is tonight, August 20, 2016, at 8 PM Central Daylight Time, at the Kansas City Convention Center Grand Ballroom (aka The Pat Cadigan Theatre, or more prosaically as Room 2501).

Live video streaming of the 2016 Hugo Awards ceremony provided by MidAmeriCon II is at the UStream Hugo Awards page.

Text-only coverage of the 2016 Hugo Awards ceremony through CoverItLive, suitable for lower-bandwidth connections, is in the window below. Our coverage of the ceremony will start just before 8 PM.

Live Blog 2016 Hugo Awards Ceremony
 

The CoverItLive feed is generally a few seconds to a few minutes ahead of the video streaming on UStream.

Ad-free streaming of the 2016 Hugo Awards ceremony through UStream is sponsored by Worldcon 75, the 2017 Worldcon in Helsinki, Finland. Internet connectivity for providing the video streaming of the 2016 Hugo Awards is sponsored by Harvest Productions.

1941 Retro-Hugo Awards Announced

~ Kevin ~ 4 Comments

The 74th World Science Fiction Convention, MidAmeriCon II, announced the winners of the 1941 Retrospective Hugo Awards at a ceremony on the evening of Thursday, August 18, 2016. 869 valid ballots were received and counted in the final ballot.

BEST NOVEL

Slan, A.E. Van Vogt (Astounding Science‐Fiction, December 1940)

BEST NOVELLA

“If This Goes On…”, Robert A. Heinlein (Astounding Science-Fiction, February 1940)

BEST NOVELETTE

“The Roads Must Roll”, Robert A. Heinlein (Astounding Science-Fiction, June 1940)

BEST SHORT STORY

“Robbie”, Isaac Asimov (Super Science Stories, September 1940)

BEST GRAPHIC STORY

Batman , (Detective Comics, Spring 1940)

BEST DRAMATIC PRESENTATION, LONG FORM

Fantasia written by Joe Grant and Dick Huemer, directed by Samuel Armstrong et al. (Walt Disney Productions, RKO Radio Pictures)

BEST DRAMATIC PRESENTATION, SHORT FORM

Pinocchio , written by Ted Sears et al., directed by Ben Sharpsteen and Hamilton Luske (Walt Disney Productions, RKO Radio Pictures)

BEST EDITOR, SHORT FORM

John W. Campbell

BEST PROFESSIONAL ARTIST

Virgil Finlay

BEST FANZINE

Futuria Fantasia edited by Ray Bradbury

BEST FAN WRITER

Ray Bradbury

The 1941 Hugo Award winners were announced at a ceremony held at MidAmeriCon II on Thursday August 18th, 2016 in Kansas City, Missouri.

The 1941 Retro-Hugo trophy base was designed by Brent Simmons.

2016 Hugo Trophy Unveiled

~ Kevin

The designs of the 2016 Hugo Award trophy and 1941 Retrospective Hugo Award trophy were unveiled during the Opening Ceremonies of MidAmeriCon II, the 74th World Science Fiction Convention, on the afternoon of August 17. In keeping with recent practice, MidAmeriCon II elected to showcase the trophy early in the convention so that members could see it before the final night of Worldcon. The trophy has been on display in the convention’s Hugo Award history exhibit since shortly after the convention’s Opening Ceremonies.

While the Hugo Award trophy always includes the rocket originally designed by Jack McKnight and Ben Jason as refined by Peter Weston, each year’s Worldcon can design its own base. In recent years, most Worldcons have had an open design competition to design the Hugo Award base. The 1941 trophy base was designed by Brent Simmons and the 2016 trophy base was designed by Sara Felix.

The 1941 Retrospective Hugo Awards will be announced and presented at the Retro Hugo Swing Dance Ceremony on Thursday, August 18, 2016.

The 2016 Hugo Awards will be presented at a ceremony in Kansas City, Missouri on the evening of Saturday, August 20, 2016, starting at 8 PM CDT. The ceremony will be broadcast live on Ustream and described on the Hugo Awards web site as a CoverItLive Broadcast.

2016 Hugo Ceremony Coverage Plans

~ Kevin ~ 4 Comments

The 2016 Hugo Awards Ceremony is scheduled for Saturday, August 20, 2016 at 8 PM Central Daylight Time in the Kansas City Convention Center’s Grand Ballroom in Kansas City, Missouri. The Hugo Awards web site will once again offer text-based coverage of the Hugo Awards ceremony via CoverItLive, suitable for people with bandwidth restrictions. For those with the bandwidth for it, MidAmeriCon planns to offer live video streaming of the Hugo Awards ceremony via UStream. Details of the live-streaming coverage will be available at the 2016 Worldcon web site.

Internet connectivity for providing the video streaming of the 2016 Hugo Awards is sponsored by Harvest Productions. Ad-free streaming of the ceremony through UStream is sponsored by Worldcon 75, the 2017 Worldcon in Helsinki, Finland.

The Hugo Awards web site coverage team of Kevin Standlee, Mur Lafferty, and Cheryl Morgan will be “on the air” approximately fifteen minutes before the ceremony. You can sign up at the CoverItLive event site for an e-mail notification before the event starts. Remember that the CoverItLive text coverage is text-only, and is likely to not be in synch with the video streaming. Also, the CoverItLive team here at TheHugoAwards.org is not responsible for the video streaming coverage and cannot answer any questions about it.

If you can’t be in Kansas City, we hope you’ll join us on CoverItLive or watch the ceremony on UStream.

The 1941 Retrospective Hugo Awards will be announced and presented at the Retro Hugo Swing Dance Ceremony on Thursday, August 18, 2016. The Retro-Hugo ceremony will not be streamed or otherwise broadcast, but the results will be published on the MidAmeriCon II and Hugo Awards web sites after the live presentations in Kansas City.

2016 Hugo Award Voting Closed July 31

~ Kevin ~ 2 Comments

Voting for the 2016 Hugo Award and John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer and for the 1941 Retrospective Hugo Awards closed Sunday, July 31, 2016 at 23:59 Pacific Daylight Time. The votes are now being tabulated, and the results will be announced at MidAmeriCon II, the 2016 World Science Fiction Convention, in Kansas City, August 17-21.

The results of the 1941 Retrospective Hugo Awards will be announced and trophies presented on Thursday, August 18, 2016 during the Retro-Hugo Swing Dance/Ceremony at MidAmeriCon II.

The results of the 2016 Hugo Awards will be announced and trophies presented at a ceremony on the evening of Saturday, August 20, 2016 at MidAmeriCon II. This year’s Worldcon will broadcast the Hugo Awards Ceremony live on streaming video. Lower-bandwidth text-only coverage of the event will be provided through the Hugo Awards web site. Details of the live streaming and text-based coverage will be announced later this month prior to the convention.

1941 Retro-Hugo Novelette Category Changes

~ Kevin ~ 3 Comments

MidAmericon II’s Hugo Award Administrators announced a change to the 1941 Retrospective Hugo Awards finalists on June 19. “Darker Than You Think” by Jack Williamson was mistakenly categorized as a novelette and initially announced as a finalist in that category, but has been removed from the ballot. The story is a novella but did not receive sufficient nominations to qualify as a finalist in that category. “Vault of the Beast” by A.E. Van Vogt (Astounding Science-Fiction, August 1940) should have been listed as the 5th finalist and has been added to the 1941 Retrospective Hugo Awards ballot.

MidAmeriCon II encourages anyone who has already registered votes for the Retro Hugo contest online to update their ballot as they feel appropriate. Members voting by mailed in paper ballot may write in “Vault of the Beast” and rank it as they see fit. The administrators will count their ballot appropriately.

Hugo Voter Packets Available

~ Kevin ~ 3 Comments

MidAmeriCon II, the 2016 Worldcon, has made available to its members selected Hugo Award finalists in reading packets, so that members can be better-informed voters. See the 1941 Retrospective Hugo Awards voting page and the 2016 Hugo Award voting page. for the respective 1941 and 2016 Finalist Packets. In both cases, members will use their online voting information to access the Finalist Packets.

Hugo Finalists Packets are organized by the individual Worldcon committees, and obviously there is no requirement that a shortlisted work appear in the Packet. For questions about this year’s two sets of Finalist Packets, contact MidAmeriCon II. The Hugo Awards web site does not organize the Hugo Voter Packet or the voting on the Hugo Awards.

2016, 1941 Hugo Award Base Designers Announced

~ Kevin

MidAmeriCon II, the 2016 Worldcon, announced on June 13 via their Twitter feed that they have selected designers for the 2016 Hugo Award and 1941 Retrospective Hugo Award trophy bases. Sara Felix (president of the Association of Science Fiction and Fantasy Artists) will design the 2016 Hugo Award base and Brent Simmons will design the 1941 Retro-Hugo Award base.

The Hugo Award trophy consists of a standard rocket design on a base. Each Worldcon is responsible for the bases for the Awards presented at their convention. In recent years, the design has been selected through an open competition judged by the current Worldcon committee.

Both the 2016 and 1941 bases will be revealed on August 17, 2016 at the opening ceremonies of MidAmeriCon II, the 74th World Science Fiction Convention, at the Kansas City Convention Center in Kansas City MO. The trophies will be on display throughout the weekend at the convention. The 1941 Retrospective Hugo Awards will be presented on Thursday, August 18, 2016 during the Retro-Hugo Swing Dance/Ceremony at MidAmeriCon II. The 2016 Hugo Awards will be presented at a ceremony on the evening of Saturday, August 20, 2016 at MidAmeriCon II.

Voting Open for 2016 Hugo Awards

~ Kevin ~ 2 Comments

Voting for the 2016 Hugo Awards, 2016 John W. Campbell Award, and 1941 Retrospective Hugo Awards opened on May 15, 2016. Members of the 2016 World Science Fiction Convention (MidAmeriCon II) may vote until 23:59 Pacific Daylight Time on July 31, 2016 using the online ballot available at the 2016 Hugo Awards Voting web page, or by using the paper ballot that will be sent to members and can be downloaded from the MidAmeriCon II web site. Persons who join MidAmeriCon II by July 31, 2016 (the close of voting) are eligible to vote. Members who registered an e-mail address with the 2016 Worldcon will receive instructions including a Personal Identification Number (PIN) for accessing the online ballot.

Finalists for the 2016 Hugo Awards and 1941 Retrospective Hugo Awards were selected by nominations received by more than 4,000 members of the 2015, 2016, and 2017 Worldcons. Only Attending, Young Adult, and Supporting members of the 2016 Worldcon can vote on the final ballot. The ballot includes the finalists for the Hugo Awards and the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer (sponsored by the publisher of Analog). The Campbell is not a Hugo Award but is administered and voted upon using the same system as the Hugo Awards and is presented at the Hugo Awards ceremony.

The Hugo Awards Final Ballot uses the “Instant Runoff Voting” (IRV) system. Voters rank their preferences among the nominated works. They mark the work they want to win with a 1, the work they would prefer if their first choice was not on the ballot with a 2, and so forth. Voters need not rank all choices. For more information about how the voting system works, see this page.

A choice of “No Award” is always listed in each category. If this option wins, no Hugo Award is presented in that category for that year.

MidAmeriCon II is preparing a “Hugo Voter Packet.” This is a collection of shortlisted works or excepts of such works provided by the publishers and rights-holders to allow the voters to be better informed about their choices. MidAmeriCon II expects to release the Hugo Voter Packet in late May 2016. The Hugo Voter Packets (both for the 2016 and 1941 Awards) will be available from the 2016 Hugo Awards Voting web page.

The results of the 1941 Retrospective Hugo Awards will be announced on Thursday, August 18, 2016 during the Retro-Hugo Swing Dance/Ceremony at MidAmeriCon II in Kansas City, Missouri. The results of the 2016 Hugo Awards will be announced at a ceremony on the evening of Saturday, August 20, 2016 at MidAmeriCon II. The ceremony is planned to be shown live on streaming video and lower-bandwidth text-only coverage of the event will be provided through the Hugo Awards web site. Details of the live streaming and text-based coverage will be announced in August.

Two 2016 Hugo Award Finalists Withdraw; Replacements Named

~ Kevin ~ 3 Comments

MidAmeriCon II, the 2016 Worldcon, announced today that two previously-announced finalists for the 2016 Hugo Awards have withdrawn from consideration and have been replaced.

The short story “Cat Pictures Please” by Naomi Kritzer (Clarkesworld, January 2015) replaces “The Commuter” by Thomas A. Mays.

The fanzine Lady Business, edited by Clare, Ira, Jodie, KJ, Renay, and Susan, replaces Black Gate, edited by John O’Neill.

We have updated the list of 2016 Hugo Award finalists to reflect these changes.