In an interesting turn of events, San Diego Comic-Con won the law suit against Salt Lake City Comic Con over the use of ‘Comic Con’. This is a term most fans just assumed was going to be used as a generic term for the big conventions. Just about every major city now seemed to have a Comic Con and we more or less knew they were not all connected. Much of the law suit seemed somewhat petty to me. San Diego Comic-Con as the Comic-Con, with all the others just being a comic con. And since SDCC always sold out and was about as crowded as it gets, I really doubt they were losing any business to those other conventions.
But the judgment has been made.
Here in Colorado we have at least four conventions that were using ‘comic con’, with the Denver Comic Con being the biggest of them. Well they have now changed their name to Denver Pop Culture Convention, DPCC now, although I saw two friends refer to it as D-Pop. Doing a quick check on-line, I get the impression Denver is ahead of the game on this one. Many of them have not yet made a change and a few have gone with Comic Convention as their name, which is not that creative and while the judge in the case said such was acceptable, it is still saying the same thing. That is one area of this case that comes off a little silly. Comic con means comic convention after all, and all the fans know that.
The bigger conventions like Denver will be the ones who have more at stake and are the big targets. The smaller conventions will most likely change their names as well, but may take some time as they do.
Of course the main reason so many used ‘comic con’ was because there was a ready body of fans that wanted to go to comic cons. By using that name, a convention could start off attracting a crowd and hopefully grow fairly quickly. That did seem to work here in Denver at least. With the need for name changes, what will happen to the smaller conventions that were using ‘comic con’? Will they be able to draw in the fans with a comic convention or other new name? Will it now be harder to get a new convention up and going?
This will change the geeky convention landscape a little. For one thing, you won’t be comparing comic cons any more.
There will be changes, there will be new dynamics introduced into it all now. Should be interesting to see how it all reshapes everything.
I think D-Pop will be able to do just fine without the ‘comic con’ title, but a big part of that is because it was able to build itself up using the title. They are making the announcements of the name change very loudly, so all will know and the attendees will most likely have no issue with switching. Could it have gotten as big as it did without saying it was a comic con? I don’t think so. Using comic con does make a difference.
Going forward, the big conventions that have already used ‘comic con’ to get established will most likely do well and be unaffected by having to do a name change. The smaller ones that used ‘comic con’ most likely will lose much needed attention by renaming, as comic convention just is not really as catchy. And any convention that was hoping to come out and use ‘comic con’ to get that boost is just out of luck now.
This may led to more creative names for conventions or less conventions, as the cost to get known grows. I myself enjoy the small conventions, which generally have the more creative names to them, but do not attract the crowds. The problem is there is no money to be found in starting those kinds of convention and are more often die-hard fans who start and run them.
I know I will continue to go to D-Pop, as will thousands and thousands of others. I someday would like to get to the comic-con, SDCC, just to experience it. And I would love to get out and see comic conventions in other states. I have no doubt these conventions will be with us for some time. But it does feel like there will be a change to it all now and we will just have wait and see how it all plays out.
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