The Theory of Related-ivity: Segment IX

The Theory of Related-ivity:

A History and Analysis of the Best Related Work Hugo Category

by Heather Rose Jones

(This is a serialized article exploring the history of the Best Related Work Hugo category in its various names and versions. If you’ve come in at the middle, start here.)

Contents

Part 3: Historic Trends

3.2 Media

3.2.2 Book

3.2.3 Album

3.2.4 Article/Blog

3.2.5 Dissertation

3.2.6 Ephemera

3.2.7 Event

3.2.8 Game

3.2.9 Periodical

3.2.10 Podcast

3.2.11 Social Media

3.2.12 Speech

3.2.13 Video

3.2.14 Website

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Part 3: Historic Trends

3.2 Media

3.2.2 Book

Definition: This includes works published as a physical text object in bound form, even if other distribution methods are available. It could include works published only in electronic text format that are presented as a Book (as opposed to a Website or Blog), but no such examples appear. While it may include individual works that are part of a Series (such as the Spectrum Art Books), it does not include items better classified as Periodicals, even if the specific nominee is a “special issue” of the Periodical.

Though this is by far the most common format of nominated work, even during the Related Work era when other formats appear, there isn’t much to say about it as a format. We all know what a Book is, and no special pleading is needed to explain why Books have been nominated. Considerations of which Books get nominated will be discussed in the Category and Other Tags sections in great detail. There are some initial comparisons between Books and the Article/Blog format in discussion of the latter.

3.2.3 Album

Definition: An audio compilation of musical pieces, released as a single coherent work.

There have been 3 Best Related nominees that are classified as Albums, all occurring during the Related Work era. The first two appear during the initial expansion of Media types, in 2012 (Finalist) and 2014 (Long List), with the third in the 2025 Long List.

The initial two are both created by prolific and popular author Seanan McGuire and are drawn from the body of musical work that she’s been producing beginning several years before her fiction debut. She has been a prominent performer in the “filk music” community (best described as “the folk music of science fiction conventions”) for which she has won multiple awards as composer and performer. In 2010 she won the Campbell Award (now Astounding Award) for Best New Writer and has won multiple Hugo, Nebula, and Locus awards for her fiction, as well as being part of the team that twice won the Best Fancast Hugo for SF Squeecast. This level of detail on her career is presented to suggest that the nomination of two of her Albums under Best Related should probably be seen as relating to her overall name recognition and popularity, rather than necessarily indicating a general opinion that musical Albums fall naturally within the scope of the Best Related category.

There’s a broader history of nominators seeking to find ways to honor musical works and artists within the Hugo (and Hugo-adjacent) award program.[1] In theory, a musical Album could be eligible under Best Dramatic Presentation (Short Form), and in fact this was the case in 2017 when the Album Splendor and Misery by the group Clipping (featuring Daveed Diggs) was a Finalist in that category. The group finaled in the same category in 2018 for their single The Deep (inspired by the novella of that name by Rivers Solomon). In 2025, Dune, The Musical received enough nominations to final in Best Dramatic Presentation (Short Form) but was determined to be ineligible due to prior performance.[2] There may have been other similar nominations under Dramatic Presentation (especially on Long Lists) that were not identified, as a deep dive into the subject is out of scope.

The 2025 nomination in Related Work of the Album Epic by Jorge Rivera-Herrans is similar in concept to Splendor and Misery and The Deep in being a musical interpretation of a literary work, in this case The Odyssey (as contrasted to a collection of independent songs, like the McGuire Albums) and thus could easily have been considered to belong under Dramatic Presentation. As one of the eligibility requirements for Best Related is that the work not be eligible in any other category, and as certain musical Albums have been determined to be eligible as dramatic presentations, it’s a valid question whether they properly fall within the scope of the Best Related category. The question of whether certain types of Albums might fit certain specific categories better than other types further muddies the waters. The concept Albums presenting a fictional storyline more clearly fit Dramatic Presentation than a collection of individual songs does.

At various times there have been discussions proposing the creation of a Hugo award for musical works or musical performers, however it doesn’t appear that these discussions have ever gotten as far as a formal proposal in the business meeting. Enthusiasm for this project within the filk community in fandom has sometimes been dampened by the understanding that mainstream musical works with science fictional aspects would likely attract more nominator and voter support than works known primarily within a fannish sub-community.[3] Non-professional fannish musical performers should also be eligible in the Best Fan Artist category, although no search of the Long List has been done to determine if this has ever happened.

Conclusions

The overall conclusions are that the nominating community has not embraced Albums as a natural Media format for the Best Related category. Albums hold an ambiguous position and have been nominated in more than one category.

3.2.4 Article/Blog

Definition: An individual short non-fiction prose work, typically distributed electronically via the internet. (Collections of Articles would generally fall under Book.)

For every “minority” format other than this one, a point-by-point analysis is presented of the nature and context of the specific works that might contribute to understanding why nominators considered them to be in scope for Best Related, and why those specific works might have been of interest to nominators. For the Article/Blog format this makes less sense, not only because of the number of works involved, but because this format is most similar to the default of Books. So a different approach has been taken, primarily comparing Articles/Blogs to the behavior of Books in the same era.

Article/Blog only appears as a format during the Related Work era, due to the eligibility definitions for the two earlier eras. Yet we might expect the content and behavior to be similar to Books, as both focus on long-form written prose, and indeed many of the works classified as Article/Blog might be expected to be similar to items included in collection-type Books. So with that introduction, how does the Article/Blog format compare to the Book format during the Related Work era? (Comparisons of Content for Books with other eras and Media types will be in the Category and Other Tags sections.) To simplify the prose, this discussion will use “Article” rather than “Article/Blog.”

Starting with the structural data, there are 34 Article works and 179 Book works in the Related Work era. Articles overwhelmingly had a single author while Books averaged 1.33 authors with 74% having a single author. Author gender fractions were inverse in the two formats, with Articles having 0.38 male and 0.62 non-male authors, and Books having 0.61 male and 0.39 non-male authors. (This suggests a possible bias towards male authors in traditional publishing with Articles being a more accessible format for marginalized authors, assuming that nomination proportions reflect the total available pool, rather than being driven by a more complicated set of factors.)

The proportion of works in the data set that made Finalist status are also startlingly similar (38% for Articles, 34% for Books).[4] However Books were proportionately twice as likely to be Winners (3% of nominated Articles won while 6% of nominated Books won).

Out of the 22 content Categories identified in the analysis, only 16 appear for Articles or Books in the Related Work era.[5] Books appeared in all of those categories except Journalism, while Articles appeared in 8 categories. Three categories were significantly popular in both formats (Criticism, Essays, and History), while Journalism, in addition to being absent from Books, was the most common Content for Articles. This is understandable given the approach to categorizing works as Journalism, which includes temporal proximity to the subject matter. Some categories appearing in Books are understandably absent from Articles due to format, such as Art and Graphic. While other categories that are quite common for Articles in general (such as Humor, Interviews, Reviews) have not been nominated for Hugos.

When content Categories are grouped into Super-Categories (Analysis, Associated, Images, Information, and People)[6] we find that Articles are most strongly associated with Analysis (at 76%, compared to 47% for Books). Both formats are roughly equivalent for Information (18-20%), while Articles less commonly cover People and do not include the Associated or Images content at all.

A discussion of the Publishers/venues associated with Books will be considered in the Other Tags section, however we can take a look at where and how the Articles in the data are being published. It appears that 23 works (68%) were published as part of a professionally curated magazine/website that publishes a variety of content and exercises some level of editorial control. Publications associated with 2 or more nominees include Baen.com (2), Fireside Fiction Magazine (3, all editions of the #BlackSpecFictionReport), Tor.com/Reactor (6), and Uncanny Magazine (2). Two works were published on Blog aggregation sites that do not appear to exercise editorial direction over content. Finally, 10 works (29%) were published on the author’s website or on the personal website of an individual who has editorial control over the content.[7] It was surprising to see the dominance of professional magazines/websites, but in terms of visibility of the works to nominators this makes sense. An Article published on a personal website would have a harder time reaching a large enough audience to reach the nomination threshold.

Conclusions

The Article/Blog format behaves as a natural extension of the Book format, with the primary deviations in behavior between the two largely due to limitations of the shorter format of Articles and of their usual online context, their ability to address topics in a more timely fashion, and the gender of authors. That said, voters appear to prefer the longer Book format over Articles when awarding the prize.

3.2.5 Dissertation

Definition: A non-fiction research project created for an academic degree not distributed through standard publication channels.

Dissertations are an unlikely format for Hugo award nominations due to their limited visibility and restricted distribution (although many Dissertations are available electronically online, if one knows how to find them).

As noted in the introduction to this section, only one nominee falls in this Media type: The Semiospheres of Prejudice in the Fantastic Arts: The Inherited Racism of Irrealia and Their Translation by Mika Loponen, created to satisfy the requirements for a doctorate in Language Studies at the University of Helsinki, Finland. How does a work like this come to the attention of enough Hugo nominators (11 in this case) to make the Long List? As we see for other outliers, the answer appears to be in the intersection of visibility and timing. Loponen is active in Finnish SFF fandom, having been chair of Ropecon, an annual convention there. He has presented his research on topics related to fantastic fiction and roleplaying games at conventions as well as in academic settings, including a panel presenting the topic of his Dissertation at Ropecon 2020, the year it was nominated.[8] Furthermore, Worldcon had just been held in Finland in 2017 so, while the significant increase in Finnish membership specific to that year would not directly affect 2020 nominations, it’s highly likely that there was an increased interest in Worldcon and the Hugos among Finnish fans that continued in subsequent years. Given all these factors, it isn’t surprising that an academic study on fannish topics written by a visible member of Finland’s SFF community could attract 11 nominations without any more widespread familiarity among Hugo nominators. As noted in the chapter Basic Nomination Data, the number of nominations necessary to make the Long List can be relatively small.[9]

Conclusions

Given that many academic Dissertations are later published (usually in re-worked form) as Books, the only reason for separating this format out as a distinct Media type is to explore the means by which a not-yet-published Dissertation might attract sufficient attention to be nominated. In terms of format and content, this work is fully in the mainstream of Related Works.[10]

3.2.6 Ephemera

Definition: Printed matter (or electronic versions of material that historically has been printed matter) produced for a specific and transient context and not distributed through traditional publication mechanisms. Generally, this applies to convention-related publications.

Six works are classified as Ephemera, distributed fairly equally across the 3 eras: 1 in Non-Fiction, 3 in Related Book, and 2 in Related Work. Five are official publications by Worldcons. Traditionally (before the ubiquity of the web as an information source) conventions would publish periodic Progress Reports, a glossy souvenir Program Book, and usually a local restaurant guide or guide to other local attractions.

Progress Reports served both to give information about planned activities, deadlines for various actions, and contact information, but also to serve as advertisement and promotion to encourage attendance. They might include Art, Essays, and even Fiction by featured guests. The 2006 Long List nominee Ion Trails falls in this Media type, being similar to a fanzine in format and content, but created specifically in the context of promoting the 2005 Worldcon.

Program Books are always designed as a collectable souvenir as well as providing information to convention attendees. Typically, they will include articles on the featured guests as well as briefer biographies of other program participants. There will be information on activities and events. Before the advent of electronic program schedules, the Program Book usually had a full listing of programming events (supplemented by a briefer “pocket program” that could include last-minute changes as well as being easier to carry and reference). With the adoption of online apps for program information, it has become less typical for the Program Book to include programming listings. Depending on the ambitions and imagination of the convention committee, the Program Book may include additional content that elevates it from “informational” to a significant work of art, and it is in these cases that Worldcon members may nominate it under Related Work (the only category where it is in scope, as the Fanzine category requires regular publication). On 2 occasions (1990 and 2007) a Worldcon Program Book was nominated and in one case (1990) became a Finalist.

The convention Restaurant Guide seems a less likely candidate for consideration, however twice (2000 and 2018) the creativity and additional content (often including detailed reviews) has inspired nomination under Related Work, in one case becoming a Finalist (2000).

The 6th item that was nominated under Ephemera is a calendar (2013) of artwork created by World Fantasy, Chesley, and Hugo Award winning artist John Picacio. Picacio had been a Finalist for Best Professional Artist every year from 2005 to 2012 and won the category in 2012 (as well as in 2013, with many subsequent Finalist nominations).[11]

Conclusions

The nomination of convention-specific Ephemera seems to have been consistently considered in-scope for Best Related regardless of the specific era. In the Related Book era, three different types of Ephemera were nominated (Program Book, Restaurant Guide, and fanzine-like Progress Report). It’s unclear whether a non-convention item such as a calendar would have been considered in scope prior to the Related Work era, however that nomination was likely influenced by the specific popularity and visibility of the artist.[12]

3.2.7 Event

Definition: An organized, time-bound, interactive experience, such as a Convention or a specific activity held within the context of such an Event.

A total of 6 works in the data set are tagged as Events, 4 of which were Finalists and 3 of which (an overlapping set) were nominated in a single year. A significant subset of Events is closely tied to virtual experiences organized in the context of the Covid pandemic.

One work stands out as distinct: the 2019 nomination of the Mexicanx Initiative (Finalist), a project organized to support and promote the participation in Worldcon of people of Mexican origin or heritage. The Initiative was strongly associated with artist John Picacio, who was one of the founders and promoted the Event in connection with the 2018 Worldcon where he was Artist Guest of Honor.

The other 5 Event nominees are in the form of virtual Conventions or book clubs, or virtual programming associated with (but not formally part of) a Convention. Three of these were nominated in 2021 for Events held in 2020, the first year of Covid quarantines which resulted in the cancellation or onlining of many conventions: FIYAHCON (Finalist, also on the Long List in 2022), CONZealand Fringe (Finalist), and the Concellation Facebook group (Long List).

FIYAHCON is a virtual Convention first held in 2020 created to center the contributions and experiences of BIPOC[13] people to SFF. The Convention also launched and hosted a new awards program, the Ignyte Awards with a similar focus. Visibility for the Event was supported by its sponsorship by FIYAH Magazine, which first published in 2017 and has been a Finalist for the Best Semiprozine Hugo in 2019-2025, winning the category in 2021.

The idea of a fully virtual Convention was a product of necessity in 2020 and became viable largely due to rapid expansion and improvements to online meeting and presentation software spurred by business needs during Covid quarantines. Many Conventions shifted to this format either on a permanent basis, temporarily during the height of the pandemic, or shifting to hybrid formats as in-person Conventions again became viable. There is no evidence that Best Related nominators had previously considered Convention-like Events to be in scope for the category. Therefore, it seems likely that the novelty and context of fully virtual Events, combined with the multi-pronged visibility and novelty of FIYAHCON made it an obvious candidate to pioneer the idea. The Convention was on the Long List in 2022 for its second iteration.[14]

However, two other responses to Covid dynamics also made the list. The facebook Concellation group (following the popular fannish tradition of pun-based convention names) was a grassroots response to the unavailability of in-person fannish activity during the pandemic. The group functions as something of a social forum and networking space.[15] In format and function, it has some parallels to items nominated under the special Hugo categories for Websites. Concellation is not classified as a Website as it was not clear at the time of nomination that it would be an ongoing resource, however that classification could be considered valid.[16]

The ConZealand Fringe Event was a set of organized programming scheduled in conjunction with the 2020 Worldcon (ConZealand) but not officially affiliated with it. The idea of holding “fringe” Events in conjunction with Worldcons was not new—one had been held in conjunction with the Dublin Worldcon in 2019. Some reporting indicates Dublin was the first instance of a Worldcon Fringe, but it has becoming common since then.[17] The ConZealand Fringe programming was scheduled outside the hours of the convention’s official programming and—given the virtual nature of both Events and the potential worldwide audience—intended to make programming available for all time zones, as well as covering additional topics. As with FIYAHCON, visibility of the Event to Hugo nominators is likely to have been a combination of the novelty of the idea (it was the second instance of having Fringe programming in conjunction with a Worldcon) and both the visibility and value of virtual Events during the first year of Covid.

The 2025 Finalist, the Reddit Event r/Fantasy Bingo, is more similar to the Concellation Facebook group than either of those is to the virtual Conventions. The r/Fantasy Bingo Event was a communal reading challenge. It’s classified as an Event due to being time-bound to a specific period (rather than being an ongoing social forum). As with Concellation, there are valid arguments for classifying it either as an Event or a Website, but when compared to other members of those groups, it seemed to fit most naturally in Event. The group/communal nature of the work may have contributed to the level of nominator support. Reddit postings about the Bingo challenge noted that the project was eligible for the Best Related Hugo and provided members with information on how to nominate. While such reminders and pointers are common when people make “eligibility posts” around the turn of the year, the sense of group ownership of the Event may have encouraged participants to follow through.

Conclusions

Overall, Best Related nominators appear to have embraced the idea of Events being in scope for the category, but the timing and specific works indicate that innovative responses to the impact of the Covid quarantine on fannish activities were a key factor in when this type of Media reached nomination thresholds. Other socio-political contexts are likely to have contributed to interest in the specific Events that made the nomination lists. The r/Fantasy Bingo nomination suggests that while responses to Covid pushed this type of work into consideration, nominators continue to be willing to entertain it as in-scope for Best Related.[18]

3.2.8 Game

Definition: A work for which the consumer interaction and input shapes and affects the nature and outcome of the experience.

Only one work of this format appears in the data set and the nomination is most likely attributable to recommendation slates associated with the Sad Puppies campaign. See the discussion in the Games chapter of the Overlapping Categories section.

Conclusions

In general, Best Related nominators do not appear to have considered Games to be in-scope for the category, although works discussing Games as the subject matter are common. This is interesting given that there was no procedural basis for excluding Games during the Related Work era and Games are clearly a popular aspect of SFF culture, as witnessed by the creation of the Best Game or Interactive Work category. So the general absence from the nomination data during the 11 years of Related Work before Best Game was created would seem to reflect a communal understanding about the Best Related category’s scope.

3.2.9 Periodical

Definition: One or more issues of a publication issued, well, periodically. This is distinguished from Book in that the nominee is from an ongoing sequence of related material rather than being a complete and finished entity. In this Media type, it is possible that awareness of the ongoing Series contributed to the nomination of specific issues.

Only one work has been classified as a Periodical, appearing during the Related Book era. Mechademia 1: Emerging Worlds of Anime and Manga appears in 2007 in the extended list of all Best Related nominees with 2 or more nominations (it received 2) and therefore is not a Long List work. Mechademia is an academic journal (in English) covering Japanese popular culture. It has been published annually or biannually since 2006, with the debut issue being the one in the data set. As similarly extensive nomination data is not available for other years, it is unknown whether subsequent issues also received nomination at similarly low levels.

The usual Hugo categories for Periodical literature would be Semiprozine and Fanzine, however as a professional publication (by the University of Minnesota Press) Mechademia would not be eligible in either of those categories.

There are other Periodicals that cover similar material to the content of Books and Essays nominated under Best Related, such as the Journal of Irreproducible Results (science humor) or Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts (academic studies on science fiction, fantasy, and horror literature), however no other such publications appear in the nomination data for Best Related. It seems likely that individual issues of such Periodicals would have difficulty attracting a threshold of interest for nomination, even if the name recognition for the journal is high.

Conclusions

Based on the preceding and the low nomination numbers for Mechademia, it can be concluded that Hugo nominators do not consider Periodicals (either as an ongoing Series or as individual issues) to be in scope for Best Related.

3.2.10 Podcast

Definition: An audio periodical.⁠ In theory this could include isolated, single, non-musical recordings, but there weren’t any of those so the familiar term is used.

See the discussion under Overlapping Categories in the Fancast chapter for interactions between works appearing under Best Related and works appearing under Best Fancast, especially with regard to factors affecting eligibility and nominator choice of category.

Eight works classified as a Podcast appear in the data set, consisting of 4 different shows, one of which (Writing Excuses) has been nominated 5 times. Writing Excuses has been a Finalist 4 times (2011, 2012, 2013, 2014) on the Long List once (2010) and won the category in 2013. The other 3 works (Geeks Guide to the Galaxy, LeVar Burton Reads, and Imagining Tomorrow) were on the Long Lists in 2011, 2022, and 2025.

The visibility and popularity of the hosts of Writing Excuses (in particular Brandon Sanderson, and later Mary Robinette Kowal) likely account for this show breaking ground for the format being considered in scope (as well as accounting for the repeat nominations), however in the second year that Podcasts were nominated at all (before the creation of the Best Fancast category) a second show also appears in the data, indicating an acceptance of the format in general. This trend was short-circuited by the creation of Best Fancast, starting in 2012, which became the natural home for works that fit the non-professional requirement. (Writing Excuses continued to appear in Best Related due to being a professional show.) After Writing Excuses won the category in 2013, it appeared as a Finalist in the following year then dropped off the list.[19] There followed a 7-year gap before another Podcast appears in the Long List, but there have been 2 in the last 4 years indicating a continuing acceptance of professional Podcasts as being in scope.

Conclusions

The data is inconclusive as to whether nominators firmly consider Podcasts to be in scope for Best Related. The presence of the initial break-through nominee was most likely influenced by the visibility and popularity of the creators. After the creation of Best Fancast, nominations have been sparse and one might more naturally belong under Dramatic Presentation, though the other has no other natural category eligibility.

3.2.11 Social Media

Definition: A work appearing in the form of a Social Media posting that doesn’t conform to the look-and-feel of another Media type such as Article/Blog.

This is an eclectic set, defined primarily by appearing as a “micro-blogging” format, as opposed to long-form Essays, with a large audience that consumes the material directly as it is posted. Given the vast amount of this type of Social Media in circulation, one might (accurately) guess that the threshold of attention for a specific post to be considered for nomination is fairly high. None of these items were Finalists, although in one case it was due to the author withdrawing from consideration.

There are 4 items in this group, quite varied in nature, appearing in 2022, 2024, and 2 in 2025. The items are:

• An extended exchange of poetic posts labeled “Mari Lwyd Twitter Thread” by Seanan McGuire and Ursula Vernon. This interchange is based on a traditional Welsh Christmas folk practice of going door to door with a “Mari Lwyd” (a decorated horse’s skull on a pole, representing a supernatural creature) challenging householders to a battle of poetry with a forfeit of food and drink to the winner. McGuire and Vernon are both prolific, popular authors and regularly do tag-team performance art on convention panels, as well as being known for entertaining individual performances at conventions.[20] While the poetic exchange is creative and entertaining, it is unlikely that it would have been nominated in Best Related were it not for the specific authors involved.
• A tweet by a person using the handle Bigolas Dickolas urging followers to read the novella This is How You Lose the Time War (by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone) that resulted in a massive spike in sales of the book 4 years after its release. Although the tweet received enough nominations to make the Final ballot, the author declined. The incident was a nine-days-wonder on Social Media and illustrated the power of the medium to drive book sales. In this case, it was this effect rather than the substance of the original post that gave the work sufficient visibility to be considered for nomination. Even if the post+effect is a repeatable phenomenon, it’s likely that novelty was a key factor and that similar posts would not attract the same nominator attention.
• A cartoon by artist Lars D’Souza labeled “Dave McCarty Is Excoriated By A Woman In A Fabulous Hat” depicting and commemorating an altercation at the 2024 Worldcon, provoked by McCarty’s involvement in, and subsequent actions related to, the 2023 Hugo nomination and voting irregularities.[21] Although the woman depicted in the cartoon is not named, it is generally considered obvious based on circumstantial evidence that it represents author Ursula Vernon.[22] The concerns surrounding the 2023 Hugo process had high visibility and interest in Worldcon fandom,[23] creating the context in which this artwork was considered noteworthy, however it is also likely that the visibility and prominence of the (presumed) wearer of the Fabulous Hat were essential to drawing attention and interest to the work.[24]
• Postings by a person identified as “G @Book Roast” promoting a read-a-thon (Magical Readathon: Orilium). No further information could be identified for the social context of this work or its author.

Conclusions

The collection of nominees in this group point to the willingness of Best Related nominators to consider Social Media posts to fall within the scope of the category. To some extent, the difference between these works and more traditional formats is quantitative rather than qualitative.[25] However, as with other Media formats with marginal numbers, the specific works nominated had contextual reasons for the visibility and interest they received that stand apart from the content itself. This topic will be discussed in a later summary.

3.2.12 Speech

Definition: A work appearing originally as a live verbal presentation even if later appearing in the form of another Media type such as Article/Blog.

There are two works classified as Speech, one on the Long List in 2018 and one winning the category in 2020. The classification of the Media type as Speech relies on the context of original presentation as a live verbal performance. Both works have subsequently been published in text format and would have been classified differently (most likely as Article/Blog) if that had been the original format. However, in both cases, the context, audience, and emotional impact of the original presentation were likely key to their subsequent nomination.

A Hugo acceptance Speech also appeared as a Finalist in 2012 under Dramatic Presentation - Short Form. The award was for the Fanzine The Drink Tank which won the Best Fanzine category in 2011.[26] Valid arguments can be made for either Hugo category for this type of work. 2012 was very early in the Related Work era, when the possibilities for expanded Media scope were only beginning to be explored. Therefore, it’s understandable why it didn’t occur to nominators to place The Drink Tank’s Speech under Best Related. One can only speculate as to why the two Speeches discussed in this section were not similarly considered Dramatic Works by the nominators, but that category is strongly associated in people’s minds with episodic television.

Motivation for the specific works is more explainable. As mentioned in a footnote under Social Media, Ursula Vernon’s award acceptance Speeches are legendary for being a platform for humorous, entertaining essays about scientific facts that are unrelated to the nature of the award being accepted. As Vernon is (as previously noted at several points) a prolific, popular, and award-winning author, she has had numerous opportunities to make such Speeches. Her Hugo acceptance Speech at the Helsinki Worldcon for “The Tomato Thief” as Best Novelette, formally titled “An Unexpected Honor” but known colloquially as “Whalefall,” described the biological and ecological consequences of the deep sea death of whales.[27] In terms of content, the Speech aligns with entertaining and informative Science writing that has frequently been nominated for Best Related. If the material had been published as a Blog or in a collection of Essays, its nomination might be unremarkable.[28]

Jeannette Ng’s Campbell (now Astounding) Award acceptance Speech in 2020 was an impassioned and biting critique of the history and legacy of John W. Campbell for whom the Best New Writer award was named at the time.[29] Ng recounts that she had not prepared a Speech in advance, not expecting to win the award, but had been persuaded by a fellow Finalist to draft something during the ceremony. The Speech hit a nerve at a time when the fannish community was experiencing growing concern over issues of racism within the genre (both historic and contemporary). Within the next year, the sponsor of the award, Dell Magazines, changed the name of the award to the Astounding Award (named after an earlier incarnation of Analog Magazine, edited by Campbell).[30] As author John Scalzi (a previous Campbell/Astounding Award Winner) noted, as quoted in Wikipedia, “Ng wasn't an errant spark that caused an unexpected explosion; she was the agitant that caused a supersaturated solution to crystallize", and that she "could not have precipitated a change so suddenly if there wasn't already something to precipitate. This was a long time coming.” While it is possible that the same opinions, presented by Ng speaking as a Campbell Award Winner in the form of a Blog or Essay after the fact might have had the same persuasive pressure, the presentation as a live Speech in the context of the Hugo Award ceremony gave the work high visibility to the nominating community and its effectiveness in motivating the name change cemented the Speech’s noteworthiness. As a new author (the award is for authors first published within the previous 2 years) nomination of the Speech under Best Related is unlikely to be attributable to her personal visibility, but rather to the high visibility of the work’s presentation and its alignment with the zeitgeist of the nominating community. In abstract terms the content of the Speech is aligned with works in the Article/Blog format that address socio-political concerns within the SFF fannish community such as race, gender/sexuality, and disability. (See discussion of these Topics in the section Other Tags.)

Conclusions

Two works don’t lend themselves to general conclusions regarding whether Speeches are generally considered to be in scope. The content of the existing examples falls well within the Category parameters of other nominated formats, but the nominations are highly likely to have been driven by non-content aspects of the work. Would the same content have been considered if originally presented in text format? Perhaps not. Attendees at the Worldcon award ceremonies have a strong overlap with people interested in making Hugo nominations. Nor is it likely that a humorous Science Speech would have been nominated if given by someone with less name recognition. But honestly, this is always the case in all Hugo categories at all times. Popularity creates visibility creates nominator familiarity creates nominations.

3.2.13 Video

Definition: A work presented in visual format, comprising both audio and non-static visual elements.

Video works first appear in the data set in 2014, the first year of peak diversity of formats, and have appeared in a majority of years since then. A total of 13 nominations are tagged with this format (including one work appearing twice due to extended eligibility). Of these, 5 works were Finalists, but no Video works have won the category, although Video is the third most common format overall (a far third after Book and Article/Blog).

The primary distribution method for Video nominees is YouTube (8 out of 13), while other nominees have been distributed through theaters or broadcast television.

Within those 13 items, we find a significant presence of repeating creators as well as quite varied topics and approaches. Video is the most numerous format where all the nominees will be discussed individually.

The pioneer in this format is Anita Sarkeesian who was on the Long List two years in a row for episodes in her Tropes vs. Women in Video Games explorations of feminist issues in 2014 and 2015. Sarkeesian founded the Feminist Frequency website and is a spokesperson for feminist critiques of the video game industry, for which she became a target of intense misogynist harassment and threats in the context of the “Gamergate” hate campaign. This context contributed to her visibility in the community.

YouTube blogger Jenny Nicholson has 3 works on the nominee list, 2 of which were Finalists: The Last Bronycon: A Fandom Autopsy (Finalist in 2021), The Vampire Diaries Video (Long List in 2022), and The Spectacular Failure of the Star Wars Hotel (Finalist in 2025). Nicholson generally produces reviews and critiques of media works and theme parks and has a substantial YouTube following.

Lindsay Ellis appears twice among nominees, once in partnership with Angelina Meehan for The Hobbit Duology (Finalist in 2019) and once as solo creator for Into the Omegaverse: How a fanfic trope landed in federal court (Long List in 2021). Ellis is a prolific creator of video essays and reviews of media, available through YouTube among other venues.

Arwen Curry’s biographical documentary Worlds of Ursula K. Le Guin was on the Long List in 2019, but due to limited release very late in the year, it was granted an additional year of eligibility and was a Finalist in 2020.[31] The film was released in theaters, primarily independent art house venues.

Jodorovsky’s Dune directed by Frank Pavich was distributed by Sony Pictures Classics and is a documentary about an unsuccessful attempt to produce a film adaptation of the Frank Herbert novel. It made the Long List in 2015.

Discover X (雨果X访谈) by Tina Wong (王雅婷), a Finalist in 2024, is a professionally produced SFF Interview show. As noted in the Hugo Administrator’s report, the show received enough nominations to be a Finalist in both Best Related and Best Fancast, but was disqualified for the latter due to its professional status. As the show made the Finalist list in Best Related there was no need for transferring nominations between categories, and many ballots had nominated it in both categories (which would not be transferrable).

Science Fiction Fans Buma (科幻Fans布玛) by Buma (布玛), Liu Lu (刘路), and Liu Chang (刘倡) was on the Long List in 2024 and is a SFF commentary show. Like Discover X it received nominations in both Best Related and Best Fancast. The disqualification of two works in Best Fancast due to professional status brought Science Fiction Fans Buma into consideration as a Fancast Finalist, at which point it was evaluated regarding professional status and was determined to be a non-professional show. Being a Finalist in Fancast would have made the show ineligible in Best Related, even if it had sufficient nominations due to the clause in the constitution that requiring that a a work cannot appear on the ballot in more than category.[32] As it didn’t reach the Finalist threshold in Best Related, no ruling was necessary. Both Chinese-language nominees benefitted from the nominator status of Chinese fans who had joined the Worldcon held there in 2023.

The final Video nominee (Long List in 2025) is the most unusual: the NASA coverage of the 2024 Total Solar Eclipse.[33] See further discussion below.

Categorization Questions

There is potential overlap between the types of Video works nominated under Best Related and works eligible under Best Dramatic Presentation.[34] The Constitutional definition for Dramatic Presentation (with long and short forms combined) is: “Any non-interactive (theatrical feature/television program) or other production, with a complete running time of [length specification], in any medium of dramatized science fiction, fantasy or related subjects that has been publicly presented for the first time in its present dramatic form during the previous calendar year.”

The prototypical Dramatic Presentation nominee is a fictional work, while the Best Related Video nominees are all non-fictional. Non fictional works have appeared in the Dramatic Presentation categories. The 1970 Dramatic Presentation Winner News Coverage of Apollo 11 is directly comparable to the 2025 Best Related Long List nominee NASA Coverage of the 2024 Total Solar Eclipse. Other non-fiction Dramatic Presentation Finalists include Carl Sagan’s Cosmos in 1981 and The Drink Tank's Hugo Acceptance Speech in 2012. The earlier 2 of these Dramatic Presentation nominees would not have been eligible for Best Related due to the narrower category scope at the time they occurred. The 2012 Speech is comparable in format to the two Speech nominees in Best Related, but occurred very soon after the expansion to Related Work in 2010 when nominators were only beginning to explore the potential for non-text Media formats. The question of whether the solar eclipse coverage should have been reclassified under Dramatic Presentation was not explored as it did not make the threshold for Finalist.

Categorization overlap with the Fancast category has already been discussed in the Overlapping Categories section under Fancast.

Conclusions

The prototypical Video nominee in Best Related is a non-fictional, isolated work generally characterizable as a documentary or critical analysis, but works diverging from this prototype also appear and the format has raised several complex questions about categorization and eligibility. The prevalence of repeat works by the same creator suggests that the visibility/popularity of the creator may play a factor in which Video works are nominated.

3.2.14 Website

Definition: A work where interaction is with complex elements of a web interface (as contrasted with a specific static text presentation appearing as part of a Website). In general, the site will be dynamic to some degree.

There were 8 nominated works classified as a Website, representing 5 different sites, one of which was nominated in 4 different years. This last was the only work that made Finalist and also won that year. Websites begin appearing in 2014 and have appeared regularly since then (although none were nominated in the last 3 years). Many Related Work nominees were made available via the internet and thus were accessed via websites, however items are categorized as Website if the site as a whole is relevant, as opposed to a particular piece of content on it.

There is an extensive discussion of category considerations for Website nominees under the section for Overlapping Categories in the chapter on Special Categories. The following covers the nature of the Best Related nominees.

The works in this group are:

• Organization for Transformative Works (aka Archive of Our Own, AO3)—This is a repository and organization system for fan fiction and fan art, including functions for tagging, searching, and providing feedback to authors. Archive of Our Own was the first Website appearing in the data. It made the Long List in 2014, 2017, and 2018, and was a Finalist and Winner in 2019. The site has significant visibility within the fan fiction community, although there are other similar repositories. Due to nomination in multiple years, conversations developed around the question of whether the site was in scope for the Best Related category. Discussion covered issues such as whether the site was sufficiently different from year to year to have new eligibility, and to what extent the work being considered was the administrative structure as opposed to the cumulative contents.[35] In effect, the question of scope was settled by the “let the nominators decide” approach.
• The Tingled Puppies, by Chuck Tingle (Long List in 2017)—This was a satirical Website with various items poking fun at the Sad Puppies movement. (As the web site no longer exists, only a general understanding of the content could be determined.) It is classified it as a Website rather than a collection of Essays as it appears that the site itself was a work of conceptual art, however it’s possible that this classification could be challenged.
• Fanlore (Long List in 2020)—A Wiki-style encyclopedic site with crowd-sourced contributors documenting people, works, and concepts relevant to SFF fans, organizations, events, and works.
• Hugo Spreadsheet of Doom, curated by Renay (Long List in 2021)—A crowd-sourced list of works and people eligible for Hugo nomination. This resource has no official connection with the Hugo Awards but provides a central repository for suggestions and does some degree of vetting for category eligibility (at least for the length-based fiction categories). There is a new iteration of the spreadsheet every year.
• The Historical Dictionary of Science Fiction, by Jesse Sheidlower[36] (Long List in 2022)—An ongoing glossary of words appearing in or related to the field of science fiction and the fannish community. Originally the glossary was associated with the Oxford English Dictionary but is now independent.

As with some of the other less common Media formats, the works here are eclectic in nature, but could be grouped into works whose content is similar to that found in some textual nominees (Tingled Puppies, Fanlore, Historical Dictionary) and works where the organizational structure is the important aspect of the work (Archive of Our Own, Hugo Spreadsheet).

Conclusions

The diversity of content suggests that nominators consider Websites to be in scope for the category, and this is also suggested by the administrative discussions over the issue of Website eligibility which addressed questions such as content stability and how one evaluates year-related content. The community discussions around the Archive of Our Own nomination and win indicate that some aspects of the topic remain controversial.

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(Segment X will cover Part 3 Historic Trends, Section 3 Category, Chapter 3.1 Introduction.)