Never look a gift Angela in the mouth

Or I just might ridicule you on my blog! Heh!

The latest affront to my generous nature has occurred via DragonCon, of course, the source of the phrase: "No good deed goes unpunished". I was poking around the DragonCon LJ and came across a costuming entry, so I went over to the DragonCon site to check out some other programming tracks. I read the Costuming track blurb then went to their "site". I use that term loosely. It's a retina burning monstrosity that takes the breath away. So, since this is a new track and all, I thought I'd offer to redo their "site" for free just so it could be read by interested Con attendees. I send an email to Brian Holloway, the track director, knowing that I'd get the typical DragonCon Approved™ rejection.

I did get the DragonCon Treatment™ as I've come to call it any time I try to offer help to anyone who is in the upper echelons of DragonCon. Here's his response (from an AOL addy, of course) to my offer to redo his "site" for free:

"[...]The page we currently have is WAY ahead of what we had last year and allows for easier accessibility for myself. I am sorry that you are not happy with it, but so far, you are the only one. Since it is JUST designed to give a general idea of what is to come and to generate some interest as well as a bit of buzz.....we will stay with what we have.
Thanks for our [sic] offer though, [...]. I have done design work for years and have a strong background in computers and programming, however even though I have taught FrontPage I have never actually done my own site. I am enjoying the experience and being able to play with it some. [...] I am quite happy (as is the staff) with the site this year."

Yep, Brian, it's just me, I'm sure. I can tell you have a "strong background" in programming, that would account for your total and complete lack of style or design ability. I can see your "years of design" shine right through, oh yeah! 1996 retro is really IN right now! Nothing screams "professional" like an AOL address and a nasty ass MSWord written website!! What a complete asshat. I may not be able to write programs (assuming this guy is even a programmer at all) or even a complicated website, but I sure as hell can design a site that doesn't cause an eye poking headache. I can't WAIT to see the Dreamweaver site, can you? Does Dreamweaver import MSWord/Frontpage sites? Jaysus gawd.

Trust me, just don't waste your time offering help to anyone at DragonCon, EVER. They want plenty of grunts to do their dirty work, but if you have a real skill, forget it. The track directors OWN their tracks and they want no help from any pesky con goers, thankyouverymuch. A few years back Nick and I offered to redo the main Con site (since it was circa 1995 with animated gifs and all), but were spurned because Matt Foster wanted to do it himself. Fine. Then we asked if we could at least fix the damn PayPal link so everyone could buy multiple badges (it's a simple bit of code to make it a PayPal Shopping Cart). That little suggestion got a response akin to us asking if we could take down the whole site and put up porn instead. You'll notice that you STILL cannot buy more than one ticket at a time via PayPal. Assholes.

It's just not worth it to offer help to any of these track directors. They are all so enamoured with themselves and the heady power of running a track at DragonCon, OMG!! I'm done. No matter how bad the site is, no matter how easy the fix, no matter what, I'm not offering anything to anyone at this Con ever again - I do NOT need the abuse. This gift Angela is CLOSED.

Posted by Misangela at February 14, 2006 11:51 AM