His novels are published by Tor Books and simultaneously released on the Internet under Creative Commons licenses that encourage their re-use and sharing, a move that increases his sales by enlisting his readers to help promote his work. He has won the Locus and Sunburst Awards, and been nominated for the Hugo, Nebula and British Science Fiction Awards. His latest novel, New York Times Bestseller Little Brother, was published in May 2008, and his latest short story collection is Overclocked: Stories of the Future Present. In 2008, Tachyon Books published a collection of his essays, called Content: Selected Essays on Technology, Creativity, Copyright, and the Future of the Future (with an introduction by John Perry Barlow) and IDW published a collection of comic books inspired by his short fiction called Cory Doctorow's Futuristic Tales Of The Here And Now. His next novel is Makers, due from Tor Books in October, 2009.

He co-founded the open source peer-to-peer software company OpenCola, sold to OpenText, Inc in 2003, and presently serves on the boards and advisory boards of the Participatory Culture Foundation, the MetaBrainz Foundation, Technorati, Inc, the Organization for Transformative Works, Areae, the Annenberg Center for the Study of Online Communities, and Onion Networks, Inc.

In 2007, Entertainment Weekly called him, "The William Gibson of his generation." He was also named one of Forbes Magazine's 2007 Web Celebrities, and one of the World Economic Forum's Young Global Leaders for 2007.

He is presently working on a new young adult novel, FOR THE WIN (about union organizing in video games).

On February 3, 2008, he became a father. The little girl is called Poesy Emmeline Fibonacci Nautilus Taylor Doctorow, and is a marvel that puts all the works of technology and artifice to shame.

Date: Friday, February 20, 2009 - Sunday, February 22, 2009

Iowa Memorial Union
North Madison Street
Iowa City, IA 52242
Ph#: 319-335-3114

Why: Because someone suggested it a few months back and I had the time to set it up.
What can I expect: Sharpen up your brains because we are looking to have a multifaceted picnic folks.

10:00am Book Review: What books should you be looking at.
10:30am Fall TV Review: Look to talk about new shows like the Bionic Woman, Moonlight and Reaper. Also look for returning shows like Heroes, Eureka and Smallville
11:00am - Lunch Money Tournament (unless someone can suggest a better game!)
12:00pm - Lunch is served! (roughly)
01:00pm - Scrabble Tournament (Please bring your scrabble boards as mine is locked up in storage)
02:00pm - Tournament to be named
03:00pm - Mindbridge Meeting (general overview of what is going on)
04:00pm - Apples to Apples Tournament (once again, my copy, in storage)
05:00pm - Eat some more!
06:00pm - Go Home!

The winners of any tournament will win a fabulous prize to be determined by the budget!

The current pre-registration price for AnimeIowa 2007 is $35. To be eligable for this price, your pre-registration must be postmarked no later than 6/30/2007.

Update 2007-07-05: AnimeIowa's domain name issues have been resolved. www.animeiowa.com is now working properly.

We've got trouble.

Right near Iowa CIty

We've got Terrible Terrible Trouble.

And it starts with N and it ends with N and it spells NO ICON

For over 30 years we have made for ourselves a home, a gathering a place to share stories and art and fun and friendship. A chance to meet other like-minded folk, who appreciate the joys that we have found in all the forms of fandom.

But we are having trouble keeping this society alive. Sociologists report that all forms of communities are failing in America. The blame is put onto all the distractions that have made it possible to stay at home and be isolated. My stamp club and my comic book reading friends all report the same trend. Nobody wants to do anything that requires effort or participation or time!

I've always felt that the rewards of fandom are directly proportional to the effort you put into it. I've also felt that a convention should be inclusive enough to accept the wide range of genres and all their forms.

The challenge we all face is this: Icon has lost about $6,000 for each of the last 4 or 5 years. Our three options are

1. Cancel the con.
2. Cut expenses
3. Increase attendance.

These are all hard problems to solve. But we can solve them by working together.

A meeting will be held at ICON this year, like the meeting that was held at last year's ICON. We need YOU to come forward with ideas, with energy and with a commitment to do something to keep us going. If you enjoy this activity as much as I do, then join us.

Dennis Lynch
Survivor: ICON 1-30

After some consultation at the last Mindbridge meeting in October, it was decided that a document along these lines might be a good idea to share with the membership of Icon, lest some rumors fester into fact.

On the whole, the Mindbridge Board wanted Icon to continue, but finally as a group we came to the stark realization that Icon could not continue. Our main motivations were as follows: continued financial loss and lacking volunteer base. In this memo, I plan to deal with each of these in turn.

Financial Loss

Any rumors that Mindbridge is absconding with Icon funds are unfounded, given that Icon has steadily lost money for the past several years. As always, the Mindbridge books are open, and we will be happy to share the gory details with interested parties. Financially, the con has not been able to support itself for a long time. Icon’s deficits were usually covered by Mindbridge’s general fund, and not carried into the next year’s convention.

A serious restructuring of Icon is necessary if Icon is to balance its budget, based on current membership, number of paying members, and financial outflow.

Lacking Volunteer Base

This is perhaps a much more serious problem. While it is often possible to drum up a convention committee at the last minute, that convention committee often has huge issues staffing its major departments and finding adequate volunteers to carry out the duties of the convention.

Last year, many new things were tried to increase the vitality of the convention. New programming and guests were used to attempt to draw new people to the convention. These plans did not help. A meeting was successful in pulling together this year’s con committee, and helping us find a list of potential contacts.

This year, the Mindbridge Board needed two criteria for the convention to continue. The first was that we needed to have a convention committee in place our September meeting. This was advertised on fliers and on the Mindbridge Boards. It was discussed frequently. No interested bids stepped forward. The other criteria would be that this year’s convention would have to break even. When we had no convention committee step forward in September, we decided to close down the convention as a Mindbridge Project.

We know that there is a great deal of interest in Icon from its regulars, and we are sorry that Icon is being discontinued as a Mindbridge project. This is a highly emotionally charged decision. However, we feel as a board we can not continue to run a project that loses money and is difficult to staff.

Mindbridge would welcome a bid in the future from Icon if Icon can present a balanced budget and a staff list for its major departments. Mindbridge would also be happy to negotiate Icon putting together a con without Mindbridge backing. These are matters for the new board of Mindbridge to discuss.

If you are interested in helping, but do not have enough people to form a committee, plese attend the September meeting and join a bid already in progress.

Board members are availble to help answer questions or supply help completing bids. Please pass this information along to anyone whom you feel may be interested in a staff or con committee position.

Please submit bids to a member of the Board of Directors: Michele Maakestad, Catherine Schaff-Stump, Brian Womachka, Jennifer Todd or Christine Cromwell. You can reach the Mindbridge Foundation board via their contact page.

Thank you!