See a complete change of topic as promised and not a graph or spreadsheet in sight. I deserve a biscuit!
Well...not a complete change of topic. I'm still trying to catalogue everything going on in the 2023 Hugo statistics.
Back in January 21, fan writer Arthur Liu pointed out this inconsistency in the stats:
"The second question is that 菌歌(Song of Fungus) was listed in both Best Novelette and Best story. I'm not sure how this is usually handled but leaving it as it is seems to be weird."
https://twitter.com/HeavenDule/status/1748933818558607855
菌歌(Song of Fungus) got 74 votes in Best Novelette and 128 votes in Best Short Story. I don't know when it was published in China but an English version of the story was published as Do You Hear the Fungi Sing? by Chen Qiufan (translated by Emily Jin) in the climate change anthology Tomorrow's Parties: Life in the Anthropocene published by MIT and edited by Jonathan Strahan. There is a preview of the story at the link.
The plot involves an attempt by a technician to bring a remote Chinese village into a network that is being used to stabilise the climate amid rising temperatures. The village appears to cling to many premodern beliefs but during her time there, the technician learns a lot more than she bargained for.
Now, I'll confess that I'm a bit hazy on the rules here. With short fiction there are going to be stories that fall between categories. My understanding was the the admins pick a definitive category and count the ballots accordingly, but I'm not entirely sure which rules apply or the extent to which this process is in their discretion.
3.2.9 suggests this is an option rather than a requirement:
"3.2.9: The Worldcon Committee may relocate a story into a more appropriate
category if it feels that it is necessary, provided that the length of the story is within
twenty percent (20%) of the new category limits."
https://www.wsfs.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/WSFS-Constitution-as-of-October-23_2023B.pdf
The mechanics of the issue are unclear to me in the rules though. For example 3.8.7 also appears relevant:
"3.8.7: The Committee shall move a nomination on an individual ballot from another
category to the work's default category only if the member has made fewer than five
(5) nominations in the default category."
ibid
I assume here the implication is if I nominate what is clearly a Novelette as a Short Story, then the admins SHALL (i.e. must?) change the category of my vote so long as there is space on my ballot to do so.
However, 3.8.9 covers a similar but different situation:
"3.8.9: If a work receives a nomination in its default category, and if the Committee
relocates the work under its authority under subsection 3.2.9 or subsection 3.2.11,
the Committee shall count the nomination even if the member already has made five
(5) nominations in the more-appropriate category."
ibid
In this circumstance, the Committee have moved the work for their own reasons i.e. if I nominated it as Short Story (and I was technically right to do so) and the Committee decides it fits better in Novelette, then even if I've nominated 5 other Novelettes already, I get a sixth nomination on on my ballot.
As is, 菌歌(Song of Fungus) got more votes in Short than Novelette but placed higher in Novelette than Short. The combined total of the votes would be 202, which wouldn't have made much difference in Short Story but which would have placed in maybe fifth in Novelette (obviously, no way of knowing how EPH would play out).
The thing is, I'm not sure of the word count (which may differ anyway between the translation and the original) and I'm not sure of the rules. If 3.8.7 applies then only some people's ballots would change.
In short, I can't tell if there is an issue here or not.
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