2023 Hugos

The 2023 Hugo Awards, for works disseminated in 2022, were presented at Chengdu Worldcon, the 81st Worldcon, on Sunday October 21 and caused an unprecedented controversy when the voting details were released three months later.

The concom's Hugo Awards Subcommittee, also called Hugo Awards Selection Executive Department of the WSFS Division, were Dave McCarty (Administrator or Co-Head; also one of the con's 11 Vice Chairs), Ben Yalow, Chen Shi (both Co-Heads of the WSFS Division and two of the three con Co-Chairs); Ann Marie Rudolph, Diane Lacey, Jiang Zhenyu, Joe Yao, Tina Wang, Guo Dongsheng, Pang Bo.

The nominations opened on March 1 and ran until April 30. As reported by the con, 1,847 valid nominating ballots (1843 electronic and 4 paper) were received and counted from members of Chengdu and Chicon 8, the 2022 Worldcon. To sort fiction in Chinese to length categories, the conversion factor of 1.6 Chinese characters to an English word was used.

The nominees were announced on July, 7. The final voting ran from July, 10 until October, 1. There were 1,674 valid Finalist ballots cast, the lowest number in the past decade, over 500 fewer than in 2022 Hugos.

Controversy

Both nominations and final voting were delayed from the usual timeline and the convention's earlier promises.

Chengdu's belated Progress Report 2 of July, 17 said (p. 5):

Eligible members vote according to the “one person, one vote” rule to select Hugo Award works and individuals that comply with local laws and regulations. The Chengdu organizing committee will review the nominated works and validate the votes.

The "local laws" part caused some comments at the time but was largely ignored and found significant only in the hindsight.

While it is usual to release the Finalist voting numbers immediately after the ceremony, Chengdu did so over six weeks later on December 3, 2023.

The details of the nominating ballots and EPH tables were released only on Saturday, January 20, 2024, the last possible date per WSFS Constitution, and immediately All Fandom Was Plunged Into War since a number of nominees, including Babel by R. F. Kuang for the Best Novel Hugo, Paul Weimer for the Best Fan Writer Hugo, Xiran Jay Zhao for the Astounding Award, and the episode “The Sound of Her Wings” from Neil Gaiman's The Sandman TV series for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form, as well as some Chinese works, had been declared ineligible with no explanation, and there were various irregularities in the numbers.

According to Mike Glyer,

File 770 asked Dave McCarty, a Chengdu Worldcon vice-chair and co-head of the Hugo Awards Selection Executive Division", about the “not eligible” rulings. He replied: 

  After reviewing the Constitution and the rules 
  we must follow, the administration team determined
  those works/persons were not eligible.

Commenters speculated that “the rules we must follow” refers to Chinese governmental oversight. McCarty denied on his Facebook page that either he or anyone on his team acted under government orders, but refused to explain the reasons the particular candidates were deemed ineligible, repeating the one officious sentence and attacking his interlocutors. The expression became an instant catchphrase.

Committee documents later released by Diane Lacey suggest that if direct Chinese government interference wasn’t an issue, then the Hugo administration itself acted to cut out candidates they thought would offend government sensibilities.

Aftermath

On Tuesday, January 30, 2024, Worldcon Intellectual Property issued an announcement that it “censured” Chen Shi and Ben Yalow (each) "for actions of the Hugo Administration Committee of the Chengdu Worldcon that he presided over", Dave McCarty for ditto plus "his public comments that have led to harm of the goodwill and value of our marks", and “reprimanded” (this was explained as a “lesser penalty” by Donald Eastlake) Kevin Standlee "for public comments that mistakenly led people to believe that we are not servicing our marks." The same announcement said McCarty resigned from the Board of Directors and Standlee as Board of Directors chairman.

On Sunday, February 4, at Capricon 44, McCarty gave a 42-minute interview to Chris Barkley, whose 2023 Best Fan Writer Hugo win may have been affected by the exclusions. It was published on the same day as a recording and a day later as a transcript. While providing some vague explanations including an "SQL error," it just poured oil into the fire.

Links

• Nominations announcement video (July 7, 2023).
• Chengdu Worldcon website.
• 2023 Hugo Award winners at the WSFS Hugo website.
• “Panic! At The Hugos” by Aidan Moher, Astrolabe 36, January 20, 2024.
• “2023 Hugo Nomination Report Has Unexplained Ineligibility Rulings; Also Reveals Who Declined” by Mike Glyer, File 770, January 20, 2024.
• “The 2023 Hugo Nomination Statistics Have Finally Been Released – And We Have Questions” by Cora Buhlert, January 21, 2024, with overview of responses.
• Hugo 2023 category at Camestros Felapton, with various analyses of the numbers and discrepancies.
• Reporting in mundane media:
  • The Guardian, January 24, 2024.
  • Publishers Weekly, February 1, 2024.
  • Esquire, February 2, 2024.
• Public apology by Diane Lacey.
• The 2023 Hugo Awards: A Report on Censorship and Exclusion by Chris M. Barkley and Jason Sanford.

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2022

Hugos

2024

2023

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