Seattle Worldcon Posts Update On Post-ChatGPT Panel Vetting, Promptig Hugo Award Finalist To Encourage His Fans To Get Refunds
This month has been a bad month for Seattle Worldcon 2025, with their entire establishment sci-fi writers base turning on them over the use of ChatGPT for program selections. Now, they’ve provided an update on their “reselecting process,” which is receiving very little engagement excepting Hugo Award Finalist Jeff VanderMeer virtue signaling by encouraging his followers to obtain refunds.
At the beginning of the month, the science fiction writing community erupted in anger after learning the World Science Fiction Convention used ChatGPT to help sort some of the vetting information for those who applied as panelists. While what’s being vetted still isn’t clear, no one seemed concerned about that, but just the fact AI was used at all.
As a result, several authors and attendees voiced anger, including to the point where even Hugo Award Finalists like Jeff VanderMeer virtue signaled about not attending the convention.
The post updating on the process of how ChatGPT was used on BlueSky showed the system to be pretty innocuous, but the post got heavily ratioed on BlueSky with 418 angry comments in reply, about the only engagement that the convention gets on social media as their other posts rarely get any comments or likes
Now, they’ve issued a new statement:
Last week, I promised an update about the progress Seattle Worldcon 2025 has made regarding our next steps related to remedying our mistakes related to the use of ChatGPT in panelist vetting. Much of this update can be summed up as “we’re waiting to hear back from the people we have invited to help.”
Regarding re-vetting, we have invited two people, new to our team, to join, and we are waiting to hear back from them. We are still searching for at least three to four more people to join that team. If you would like to volunteer, please email feedback@seattlein2025.org. This new team will be working with our existing program team but be reporting to the chair.
We have reached out to a team of two people with prior Worldcon programming experience to audit our program process and the remedial steps. We are still waiting to hear back from them.
We have processed all refund requests that we have received; former members will be receiving them this week.
Our next update will be once we have identified who is helping with re-vetting and performing our program audit or in three weeks, whichever comes sooner.
The only comment on the post is an angry one demanding that whoever used ChatGPT be fired from their volunteer position, showing how unhinged these people Worldcon has catered to are. User SherbertAlex who in his profile says he’s a “Diet Furry,” posted, “One more thing that needs to be updated: Are the people who used ChatGPT and the people who approved the use of ChatGPT still involved in Worldcon? If yes, then those people need to be let go immediately. They do not care about human creativity and cannot be part of this convention.”
Jeff VanderMeer returned to virtue signal again, saying, “So, no real progress. I guess the main thing is it'd be nice if the folks in charge hadn't been this clueless in the first place. But do note they are processing refunds.”
With the urging of a Hugo Award Finalist for people to refund the convention, zero engagement on X where any real fans of science fiction would be, and almost no one paying attention to their posts on BlueSky, it appears as if Worldcon, after years of controverisies, political blacklisting, and worse, has found the one thing that can shut it down – artificial intelligence.
What do you think of Seattle Worldcon getting no engagement after a new update? Leave a comment and let us know.
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