You know how you can tell that I’m not a good gamer? I name all my protagonists ‘Lauren.’ In Skyrim, my character even looks like me. (You know, if I were a wood elf with facial tattoos.) So it shouldn’t come as a surprise that I’m not exactly in my element at Magfest. Music And Gaming? I’m more of a Gunpla And Anime (GAAfest?) kind of girl.

But the DC area already has plenty of conventions like that, and nothing like Magfest. Perhaps that’s why Magfest is one of the fastest growing events in the area. According to press liaison Nick Marinelli, more than 6,100 people registered by the end of the convention. That’s not an official count; that could mean anywhere between 5,500 and 6,500. But just compare that to last year’s (capped) turnout of 3,000. Since Magfest moved to the elaborate, expansive Gaylord National, they’ve got plenty of room to grow. I was there on the busiest day of the con, but I never would have known from those open hallways. At least they gave me room to take photos of the Gaylord’s still lit holiday decor.

And that’s why I went: to experience the fandom itself. You don’t need to be the world’s most hardcore gamer to appreciate a geek-out on that level.

The Earthbound Papas, Magfest’s headlining guest, certainly did. Nick, who served as their personal attendant, following them around and bringing them their new American favorite food—Five Guys— told me they loved the fans. Good thing, too: there were 2,400 of those fans at their Saturday night concert.

“They said it was the best sounding EBP concert to date, and loved the energy from the crowd, the enthusiasm of the fans,” Nick told me.

I attended Magfest for most of Saturday, so I missed this convention highlight. For me, the highlight was finally meeting Colette Bennett, the most talented anime and games writer I know, in person. We met at the panel for Destructoid, a games journalism site where she used to work.

Patrick, Colette’s close friend (and a previous Otaku Journalist giveaway winner,) was there too.

Shortly after we took these photos, I won two games for correctly guessing the video game soundtrack a poll of Destructoid readers voted as their favorite to have sex to. It was a lucky guess; since I’m playing through Skyrim right now, it was the first game on my mind.

It was the only panel I went to. I also spent time outdoors, where my fiance and I took turns taking photos of Rich in his Samurai Champloo cosplay. (There wasn’t a lot of cosplay at Magfest, and I didn’t see another anime character aside from Rich, but that worked out for him. You should have seen this little kid’s face when Rich offered to pose with  him for a photo.)

And then Rich took a photo of us. If you haven’t been to the Gaylord, you should check it out just for this massive atrium, which contains actual houses.

John also played in a Magic draft, which made sense because even before they saw him the organizers knew I was somebody’s girl. One guy even asked me if I was familiar with the five different colors of mana in the game. It’s stuff like that which keeps me from playing drafts with people other than my friends. (I did, however, end up buying those lavender card sleeves I’ve been wanting.)

This is a far different convention review than I had planned to write. I used to try to make every convention experience a journalistic project: documenting everything I did, conducting interviews along the way. But post Anime USA, I’m a little burnt out. Now, I’m trying to recapture why I began attending these things in the first place and trying to experience the convention for the convention’s sake. I spent time with several of the people I’ve befriended through covering conventions: Patches, Viga, Tyler and Kevin and Sarah.

And no, I didn’t buy the fleece Skyrim helmet in the first picture. But if you want to, it’s handmade by The Prancing Unicorn, a pair of the craftiest bronies I’ve ever met. Here’s Rainbow Dash putting on the finishing touches.

Photo by Gregory Vann.

Previously, I talked about the tough parts of working as a press liaison. But it’s all worth it to see the results. I love the diversity of the photos, articles and videos members of the press have been sending me; it’s hard to believe they’re all different viewpoints of the same convention.

In the month that’s passed since Anime USA, I’ve been receiving some incredible coverage from members of the press. Here’s a selection of some of the most creative stuff I’ve received so far.

• Independent photographer Gregory Vann took more than 1,000 photos at the convention. His Flickr gallery shows off some of Anime USA’s most colorful personalities, and I mean that literally.

• Mike Penny of Penny Photography profiled Anime USA’s maid cafe, My Cup of Tea. Since I made a mini-documentary of Katsucon’s maid cafe in 2010, I’d been rooting for this project from the day I saw Mike’s press application. It didn’t disappoint; just listen to his polished voiceover.

• Online radio station 9.18 the Fan wrote a couple articles about Anime USA, but I especially liked Rayna Lewis’s interview with our guests from Mecha Software LLC about voice acting tips. Even they were impressed– the article is at the top of their Facebook wall.

• I’ve never seen anything like this! Ernie Layug of Out Of Time Productions covered Anime USA as a Choose Your Own Adventure video. You have to see this for yourself:

• Cosplayer Nation‘s Uke Li made me feel like I was getting old– in a good way. His video compilation of interviews with teens showed me a different con experience than my own– and makes it clear that Anime USA’s target demographic is always getting younger and cooler. Click here to watch it on YouTube– there’s a little too much booty shaking involved for my blog!

Out of 42 press outlets, I’ve gotten coverage back from 13 so far. So hopefully, there’s a lot more to come.

If you’re a journalist, independent journalist or a student reporter, why not consider applying to cover Anime USA in 2012? At our new hotel, we’ll have plenty of room for driven, creative members of the press. Drop me an email and I’ll keep posted on our guidelines, deadlines, and everything you need to know.

The exemplary One Piece Podcast interviews Anime USA guest Wendee Lee.

In my last post, I evaluated what I look for in a model press attendee. Thanks for all the understanding and appreciative comments. I have to re-emphasize that most of my press outlets, like the One Piece Podcast crew pictured above, were journalists I’m happy to have as colleagues.

Now that I’ve cleared my head a bit, it’s time to evaluate my own performance.

Press releases

I’ve always thought this part of PR was super sleazy. In journalism school, I would laugh with my classmates and professors at the notes the public relations class before us would leave on the whiteboard. It all seemed like a sidestepping swindle designed to fool journalists into writing stories about non-news events.

Now that I’ve played for the other team, however, I’ve realized press releases are only spam in the wrong hands. Over the year, I’ve learned to carefully curate a list of media outlets until I’ve learned which groups would be interested in which news. While I sent the same releases everywhere, Anime News Network picked up our Make-A-Wish Partnership announcement, while the Washington City Paper wrote about our event details.

As a journalist, the last thing I want to do is PR spam the media sites I like and read. My goal for 2012 is to make a more detailed press spreadsheet so I can send out releases more thoughtfully. For the rest of 2011, however, I’ll be working on another spreadsheet — all our press coverage. There are a lot more spreadsheets in PR than in journalism, I think.

Press outreach

In 2010, we only had nine press outlets attend Anime USA. In 2011, we had 43. I credit this spike to improved communication with press.

I put up the Press Policy in the spring and the webmistress gave it a more prominent position on our site. I sent formal invitations to press groups that had done a good job in 2010 and whom I wanted to return. Everyone else, I Googled before responding to make sure they matched the quality Anime USA expects of their press outlets.

In the end, I generally made acceptance and rejection decision on the group’s politeness (or lack of) in their correspondence with me. I didn’t want press acceptance to be based solely on audience. After all, Anime USA accepted me as press when I was a student with no credentials, and no (anime-related) writing samples. It was this opportunity that gave me the confidence to become a fandom reporter. It also got me on staff. So I have a weakness for student and startup applicants.

Press relations

In order to set a professional tone right off the bat, I designed a branded press kit with information, rules, and our press conference schedule.  I had to update it twice while our guests played musical chairs all the way up until November 14. While I’m not generally a fan of killing trees (web journalist, blogger and all that), I think making print copies of these cleared up a lot of potential confusion. I handed these out with press badges.

Even though I spent most of Friday and Saturday in the Convention Operations room greeting members of the media with press kits and badges, I definitely did not personally meet all 91 press attendees. So it gave me peace of mind to know that they knew how to contact me regardless.

Press conferences

This was my grand experiment. Last year, I watched Saint Tom Stidman schedule one-on-one interviews for every press group that wanted an interview. The scheduling, the logistics, everything, was a hassle. So I decided to take a cue from Anime Boston. They hold press conferences there, and if they didn’t, an unknown like me would have never had a chance to sit next to Nobuo Uematsu. I thought conferences would be more democratic.

There was a little pushback from press at first. Professionals were okay with it; actual reporters are used to conference style interviews. A few bloggers from small sites were upset. I assured them that there’d be a professional journalist — either me or Patch.com’s Tyler Waldman — moderating every conference and making sure everyone got a turn to talk.

Nothing went the way I planned. Only two to four groups attended each press conference, even though sometimes as many as 15 requested interviews with the same guest. I adapted to the situation and deferred to my press groups on what they’d prefer to do. Overwhelmingly, they preferred one-on-one interviews, even if they’d each only get 15 minutes with the guest. The other outlets would wait their turn, sitting and listening. This led to a huge decrease in repeat questions.

I’ve listened to what the press wants, and next year, we’ll divide conferences into 30 minute one-on-one blocks, all in the same room. That is of course, unless we snag somebody on Nobuo Uematsu‘s level.

Anime USA official blog

As you can imagine, my duties as press liaison forced me to dial back a bit on promoting the Anime USA official blog. Last year, I gamified blog visitations with an elaborate QR code campaign.

I promoted one of my 2010 bloggers, the talented Mike Fenn, to Lead Blogger. He moved the blog from WordPress to Tumblr, which made the blog instantly more social. It also allowed bloggers to update from their smart phones, netting us tons more posts than last year. We received a total 640 unique visitors (out of 5,000 attendees), so there’s definitely still work to be done.

I hope my recap has given you some insight into how I run press at Anime USA, as well as an understanding of just how hard we volunteers work to staff the convention. I’m still far from becoming a model press liaison, but I am feeling pretty good about how I handled myself this year.

I also sent this post to my colleagues Chad and Nick, press liaisons at Katsucon and MAGfest respectively, so I’m looking forward to their comments especially.

Thank you to everyone I’ve worked with this year at Anime USA, whether you’re a member of the press, a staff member or an attendee. You’re not only the reason I do this, you’re the reason I love it.

Do your research

Your teachers probably told you that there’s no such thing as a stupid question. However, in journalism, there is such a thing as a blatantly misinformed question. Don’t bother your source with questions you could easily find out from a quick Google search.

If your subject is a popular voice actor, don’t ask them questions like, “What are you most known for?” or “Can you name some of your recent projects?” It’s insulting to the guest, and it makes this press liaison cringe.

Don’t let your fandom blind you

I know what it’s like to be both a fan and a journalist. However, I know there’s a time to geek out as well as a time to be professional, and very rarely do those occasions intersect. I get that you’re a big fan, or you wouldn’t have asked to do an interview with one of Anime USA’s guests. However, “I love your work so much,” is not an appropriate interview question. Frankly, it’s not even a question.

Luckily, our special guests are troopers. They’re clearly used to dealing with sometimes socially awkward fans. But they shouldn’t have to deal with that sort of thing in a press conference.

Do keep your press liaison in the loop

When I corresponded with press groups before the convention, I asked them each a few questions about their plans. When do you plan to get here? What do you plan to cover? If there was a lack of reply in either of these areas, problems arose.

For instance, one press group asked me for four extra press badges (I only give a maximum of four to any group). Later, security found this group bringing people without badges into the convention center. They explained they were doing a project where they invited “con virgins” to Anime USA to gauge their reaction. I think that’s fascinating! If they had told me about this plan, I could have secured special permission. As it stood though, they were in violation of the convention and security stopped them immediately.

In another instance, one press group almost didn’t receive their badges. I asked each group to give me a general time they planned to arrive at the convention. When groups arrived at a radically different time than they’d told me (a group that emailed to say they were arriving Thursday evening showed up at noon on Sunday, for example), I wasn’t as easy to reach.

In both cases, these press groups experienced inconveniences that could’ve been avoided with a little communication.

Do NOT lie to me

You may have heard that press attendees get into the convention for free. Posing as a press member could save you some money in the short run. But if I find out, I will make sure the price you pay is steep. First, I’ll send security to remove you from the convention. If that doesn’t work, I’ll simply tell all my friends.

Here’s something you might not know: the press liaisons at Anime USA, MAGfest, Katsucon and Otakon are all pretty good friends. When somebody poses as a press member at one convention, word gets around. Pretty soon, you’re not only blacklisted from Anime USA, but every other local geek convention, too.

Hope you enjoyed that free press badge! It’s the last one you’ll ever get.

Do respect the convention policies

I don’t play favorites with press acceptance. When I was choosing whom to accept to Anime USA 2011′s press team, I checked for professionalism, quality work, a regularly updated publication, and respect for our organization. Unfortunately, I made a huge misjudgment about one press person when it came to that last attribute.

This press person did some interviews with some of our staff members, but unfortunately left behind her computer charger. She sent an email to me to ask if I, or one of my staff members, could deliver the charger to her on Sunday at her home in DC. I was appalled at her nerve for asking — it showed clear disrespect of our duties as convention staffers — but politely replied to let her know to pick up her lost item on Sunday at the convention.

This press person showed up at the hotel five hours after our convention was over. Our entire staff was at our annual post-con celebration party at a nearby restaurant. She called our convention’s hotel liaison, demanding he send somebody from the party to retrieve her charger from our locked equipment room. (Hotel staff wasn’t letting her in as per our agreement.) When the hotel liaison refused, she clamored for our convention chair to break the hotel policy for her and let her in. This request was once again refused. The liaison told her to wait until our ceremony was over.

Anime USA is still reeling from what happened next.

Somehow, this press person convinced the hotel’s security staff to let her into our locked equipment room. In the hour that followed, $4,000 of our equipment went missing. Thanks to this press person’s impatience and disrespect for our policies, our convention has been devastated.

I am certain Anime USA will recover from this setback. But we’ll do it without press attendees like her.

Don’t get me wrong; 99 percent of the press groups I invited this year were exemplary. But a few bad apples can spoil the whole bunch.

I’m not perfect either. In my next post, How to be a model press liaison, I’ll take a look at the ways I could’ve improved in my role, too.

If you think this blog post sounds familiar, you’re right! I wrote basically the same thing last year.

This year, I’m running press and it’s a whirlwind! Press is one of those departments that not only kept me active all year, but involves plenty of onsite work, too. I’ve spent nearly the whole day handing out badges or moderating press conferences. I tried out a bunch of new strategies this year; I’ll blog about how that worked out after the convention.

As you can tell by the photos John took of me (above), I’ve hardly left our Convention Operations room. Now that things are winding down for the evening though, I plan to check out the Dealer’s Room, order a cotton-candy martini at the host club, and visit with as many friends as I can possibly run into. If you see me and don’t mind a little awkwardness, be sure to say hi.

(Continued from part I)

There’s something infectious about being a nerd at a convention. Being around all these other nerds with their bold costumes and boisterous personalities, I just can’t be in a bad mood. Even though I was about to meet with the Washington Post reporter and I was nervous.

We had exchanged emails a couple of times just before Otakon. Since I was following him on Twitter now, I saw when he requested a press pass from the convention, and I saw when they replied and granted him one. I emailed him and asked him if he wanted to meet. He replied that he’d love to connect. And then, as an afterthought, he added:

the hall could smell interesting tomorrow, with the heat and humidity, eh? (people keep telling me that cosplayers can be a “ripe” bunch. some of them, anyway.)

Those two sentences stuck in my head. He didn’t have to add them. It just let me know what sort of knowledge he was going into this with. It reminded me of my talk last year with another Washington Post reporter, Dan Zak.

When I was featured on Jezebel, I said I wanted to write about the Katsucon maid cafe because I didn’t like Mr. Zak’s portrayal. Amazingly, kindly, Zak sent me an email along the lines of, “You wanted to talk? Let’s talk.” I said that he was biased toward the source material. He said, “…this is not the judgment or opinion of an outsider. It is observed fact.”

I’ve only recently understood his answer. That was, of course, the truth. Anime fandom looks very, very different to outsiders than it does to me.

This is why, when people ask me if I’m biased, I tell them my passion makes me a better reporter. I don’t think the best reporting comes from distancing yourself from your subject and steering clear of anything that might interest you in the slightest. It helps to have knowledge about the communities you are writing about, and it helps to have connections in the field. I can’t imagine, for example, that a crimes and courts reporter who isn’t close with the Chief of Police is able to write very accurate stories.

But I have to be careful about my audience. I have to worry about coming off as being “in too deep.” That’s why reporters like Dan Zak and J. Freedom duLac have much more sway over my preferred beat. Outside of the fandom, that is. And that’s why I care so much about meeting up with Mr. duLac at Otakon and offering my perspective to him.

Thanks to Twitter profile photos, we recognize each other instantly, shake hands, make small talk. I hardly remember what was actually said, but I remember just how it went. duLac is an excellent reporter, quiet and observant. I liked him immediately. I think it was because he let me talk so much.

He’d ask a small question like, “What are these girls wearing doll dresses and petticoats for?” and I’d explain that it’s Lolita street fashion from Harajuku, not actually from an anime. We were standing in front of the line for the Madoka Magica premiere, so there were lots of people to look at. He’d ask which costume meant what, and I didn’t always know.

“I don’t think anyone at this entire convention could accurately recognize every single costume here,” I said.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a man dressed as Char. I asked to excuse myself because I wanted to take a picture.

“Otakon is a little like Disneyland,” I said to duLac. “You can call people by their character names and they’ll respond so you can take their photo.”

duLac watched as I asked Char for his photo and set up my camera. “I love your costume, Char,” I said. “I’m working on cosplaying as female Char this fall.”

“Then we’ll have to meet up,” he replied. “And we’ll–” He made a lewd gesture with his fingers.

It was so uncalled for and I was so embarrassed I just said something like, “I don’t think so,” and returned to duLac, cheeks burning, mumbling about Disneyland some more.

He changed the subject.

“I asked a man in line over there what he thought the mainstream media gets wrong about fans. He said ‘That we all live with our parents still.’ So I asked him,” duLac continued, “‘Do you live with you parents?’ and the guy started stammering, ‘Not exactly, I pay rent and stuff.’”

I nodded. Was I visibly cringing?

“And I just thought, ‘If that was going to be the answer, why didn’t he LIE to me?’”

Yeah, I thought, why hadn’t he?

Today when the article came out, I read it over and wrote to duLac right away:

Josh, I just read your story. I was prepared to hate it, but I don’t. It’s an important part of convention culture that I would have never felt comfortable writing about. And you got the facts right, too.

He replied:

Thanks tons for the note. I really wasn’t sure what you’d think once I decided to go in that direction, since I know it’s a really sensitive subject — and you never know if you get something like this right.

He shouldn’t have been worried. I knew from the beginning which direction this story was going to go in. That’s why I don’t know if it was a brave angle or not. On the one hand, his comment section is already full of angry notes, making him look like this was a daring and dissented take. On the other hand, it’s exactly the kind of opinion non-fans already have of the fan community.

duLac’s story does make anime conventions look seedy. But there’s nothing untrue about his observations. And so, it needed to be said. When it’s over, our fandom will be stronger for it.

Even this biased journalist has to admit that.

If you’re reading this post, one of two things has happened: the Washington Post has scrapped a story about American anime fans and stigma or that story was published today.

I’m writing from the perspective of July 15, exactly ten minutes after getting off the phone with the Post reporter, J. Freedom duLac. When he emailed me to ask if he could call me about the post I had just written on my blog, Should anime conventions screen for sex offenders?, my hands shook while I wrote my affirmative reply. Carefully, agonizingly, I drafted a three paragraph statement that I would parrot out to him on the phone, basically a summary of my article.

However, when duLac called the next day, that wasn’t exactly what he had in mind. He was interested in anime fan stigmas. Nevermind this one incident of sexual assault. Is our community clouded by this unsavory misrepresentation in general, he wanted to know.

I explained Lolicon and Hentai. We discussed the demographic of fans, how it’s always getting younger. We talked about the upcoming Otakon.

“Of course,” I said, “If it turns out the sex offender didn’t like lolicon anime, then this is an isolated assault incident like any other.” I reminded the reporter that the instance itself didn’t happen at the convention, where there are hundreds of staff and Security personnel.

duLac asked if this incident really was isolated, or if local anime conventions are battling a problem with sexual assault. I let him know that this was the only one I’d heard of, and it didn’t even happen at an anime convention.

I steered the conversation to Katsucon’s policy. That it’s a reactive policy that treats future attendees like potential criminals. I mentioned how in the ANN forum post for the article, one commenter wrote,

“Leave it to the sickos to make the rest of us older guys that go to cons feel like eyeballs will be watching us double now. I already have issues with going to cons and being the odd man out, and this guy has to make it just that much harder. We as a fandom don’t need the stigma of jerks like this making us look like pedophiles and creepy rapists.”

duLac thought he might be able to build a story around that one comment. He said he’d do some research and let me know.

I wanted to keep talking about the case, how it was isolated. That’s when I had a flashback to my reporting days at the local paper in Fredericksburg, VA. I’d be on the phone with a source, trying to find out all the facts about the restaurant opening. And all the restaurant opener wanted to do was ensure that I was going to make her restaurant look good.

I have an agenda. I don’t want him to think anime fans are bad people. This isn’t one journalist talking to another. I’m in too deep here to be a journalist.

This should be a turning point for me. The moment I realize I’m too involved in the fandom community to report on it without my love pouring out. Instead, this is the moment I realized that nobody is completely objective.

In J-school, one professor suggested that if we wanted to be true journalists, we would stop voting in elections. We would take our voting cards and register as Independents, just in case somebody found them. In order to pretend we don’t have preferences, we should give up one of our rights as citizens.

After duLac and I hung up the phone, I sent him an email with a list of links. I included all the most recent string of anime porn related arrests. I sent him a Katsucon PR contact. When I thought I’d given him enough information to write an objective story, I sent it.

I’m compromised. I’m biased. I’m in too deep. But I’m committed to getting the awful truth out, if there really is one. If it turns out there’s no connection, he’ll see that. I know the fandom won’t let me down.

I spoke again with duLac at Otakon and gave this topic some more reflection. Read about it in Part II.

Blogging with a funny face at Otakon 2010

When I was younger, I would have never dreamed of meeting my Internet friends IRL. Now, some of my closest friends are people I met online. Otakon is the largest convention I attend all year, so it’s the perfect place to meet with people I’d otherwise only get to hang out with on Twitter.

Last year, I posted my Otakon schedule in advance and ran into a lot of cool people I might have missed otherwise. That worked so well that I’m doing it again.

Overall, I will be there from Friday morning to Sunday. I’d prefer to have gotten there earlier, but I was going through a rough patch with money last year when I reserved my hotel room. (I was fresh out of grad school, hadn’t even found my cashier job, and wasn’t even sure if I’d be able to get to Otakon 2011. So glad that’s no longer the case!) Though I was stuck outside during a fire drill last year, this time I don’t plan to leave the convention center at all if I can help it.

And now the details. By the way, I made my personal schedule with the Guidebook app for Otakon, aka the web’s gift to convention attendees. Be sure to download it before the con!

Friday

• 1:30 PM – Anime Parliament. My best friend, who is a bit of a policy wonk, has been talking this panel up to me for years. I think it’s time I finally attend.
• 3:00 PM – Anime News Network. As a journalist and anime fan, how could I not want to meet the ANN team?
• 8:30 PM – Ultimate Lolita Fashion Show. Modeling didn’t work out, but I’m still interested in supporting these indie fashion designers.
• 11:00 PM – Bad Anime, Bad!! This is another of those panels that has been seriously hyped up to me but I’ve never gone.

Saturday

• 9:00 AM – Gyaru Culture Revealed: Destroying the Myths. This is one convention subculture I’ve hardly explored at all! I’ll find out if being a gyaru is everything Super Gals! says it is.
• 10:15 AM – BTSSB/Alice and the Pirates Fashion Show. I also applied to model in this show, and just received an email that they are still considering my application (?) but I’m 99% sure I will be observing this.
• 1:30 PM – Uncle Yo’s Stand-Up Comedy. I met Uncle Yo earlier this year and thought he was great. I want to support his show.
• 4:30 PM – Japanator Meetup. I don’t write for Japanator anymore but it’d be great to see the staff again.
• 8:00 PM – Gundam: What Makes It Great. Hopefully I will be intoxicated during this panel and will get into an argument about various Gundam series.

Sunday

• 11:30 AM – Anime, Manga and Education. My college anime club was a positive force in my life. I met my current boyfriend and I learned leadership skills and how to take risks. I’d love to hear what teachers think of school anime clubs.
• 12:30 PM – Japan’s IP (Intellectual Property) Problem. I could really use a refresher course on copyright law, especially the way it pertains to anime. Maybe then I’ll have something to say when everyone chats about anime’s legal issues on Twitter.

Goals

• Find and report a story.
• Acquire the Gundam model of my dreams.
• Finally replace my blog portrait, which is a photo of me at Otakon last year.

Of course, this is all tentative. I might not get into a particularly crowded panel or I might get caught up somewhere noisy like Artists Alley or the Dealer’s Room and miss my alarm. In these cases, a DM on Twitter is the best way to reach me.

See you there!