Just as in big-time sports and entertainment, the offseason for anime conventions has disappeared. There were only eight weeks between C-Kon, the last convention of 2002, and Ohayocon, the first event of 2003. The gap would have been shorter in North America had the promised December event in Pittsburgh not disappeared. (This year's late-March Tekkoshocon, outside Pittsburgh, is a different event.) And when you consider that the seasons are reversed in the Southern Hemisphere and there have been several spring and summer conventions in Brazil, the offseason really has disappeared.

The author of this site kept busy during the brief two-month gap by heading to hockey games and auto races to keep picture-taking skills sharp. He also worked up a preliminary version of the cosplay book, which fans got to see at Ohayocon.

The author was a little nervous to learn what people thought of the preliminary pages, and was relieved to find that fans liked what they saw. The fans also wanted to know when the version shown at Ohayocon might go into print: we're not sure yet. It was good to hear people, having seen the prototype, say they'd be glad to buy the real thing when it's finished. They were also curious to learn how much the book might cost: again, we're not sure yet.

The third Ohayocon got off to a comfortably slow start on Friday, but a few people wondered when the crowds would show up. That happened on Saturday, when the place was packed. The Saturday line for at-site registration stretched down one hall and around a corner when the table opened on Saturday morning and the backlog wasn't cleared until Saturday afternoon. That either showed that there were a lot of people who bought their memberships at the convention, or that the registrations were processed slowly. Those who registered in advance had no wait that we could see.

The only hotel complaint we heard came from a costumer who was unhappy because a water pipe broke and soaked his outfit. He was hoping to get more compensation from the Columbus Hilton than a 15 percent break on his hotel room. Otherwise, the facility was well-filled by the convention. Ohayocon could have used more space in its dealers' room, which was so crowded on Saturday that people had to wait to be let inside. Those who attended Katsucon in 2002 would have recognized the Ohayocon convention layout, with meeting rooms and ballrooms extending from a north-south concourse that was lined by artists' alley tables. While the Katsucon hotel had two floors, the Ohayocon hotel had only one floor.

After two years in Cleveland suburbs, Ohayocon moved south to Columbus for its third year. The convention chose one of the Ohio capitol's most fascinating areas, the Easton Mall north of the Port Columbus airport. Downtown Columbus has been dramatically rebuilt in the last two decades, growing skyscrapers like Ohio farmland grows cornstalks. But the suburban area that hosted the convention has changed even more dramatically. It was a collection of farm fields before it was cleared for the shopping mall, the hotel, office buildings that look like they were built on the Danube instead of the Midwest, and a replica of an old-fashioned two-lane Ohio main street. On that street is a Chicago-style saloon, Bar Louie; rumor was that this place was the location of more events of the kind that led to the Toshifumi Yoshida charity roast. 

With its winter dates and location in the snow belt, Ohayocon needs decent weather. The convention got snow on the second day of their inaugural year, but they've been lucky ever since, including 2003. They could have gotten warmer weather - temperatures dropped well below freezing just as the convention started - but they missed several snowstorms that had hit in the previous month.

The only snow that fell on Ohayocon was a group of flurries that passed through on the convention's first day. Midwesterners weren't impressed with the flurries because they could still see the ground, but the actors from Texas were fascinated. "I'm going to play in the snow," exclaimed Monica Rial as she dashed outside to watch the flurries," but people who live with the snow knew you needed at least an inch on the ground for serious sledding and snowball fights.

2003 could be another year of major growth for anime conventions...if all of the 2002 events are renewed for the new year. As of this writing, there were nine 2002 events that had not firmed up their 2003 plans, including some held as long ago as June. It's too early to be able to tell if the slow announcements are going to be a sign that the increase in conventions is going to stop, but it's probably fair to assume that the better financed and organized a convention, the better the chance that it will continue into 2003 - and the better the chance that the convention's web site will be updated.

Around the time of Ohayocon, there were hints that anime is moving as close to the North American cultural mainstream as it's going to get. In newspaper stories from the two biggest U.S. markets, anime films were treated as if it they were mainstream films.

In the L.A. Times, writer Kevin Thomas penned a review of the Patlabor WXIII movie, saying the film was "dazzling" but didn't like the subtitles. In Newsday, writer Diane Werts' story on the Cartoon Network and its Adult Swim block mentioned the "lavish Japanese anime" featured on that cable service as being a big part of the service's success in drawing adult viewers. (A Cartoon Network VP explained in that Newsday story that the anime shows are edited "Because even at midnight, there might be a kid who wanders in unsupervised.")

The group of industry leaders who appeared at Ohayocon were certain that the anime business was going to stay strong, and if there was a falloff it would come only when compared to sales that had leapt through the roof in the last decade. If fans led to the anime boom then fans could hurt it, and the industry leaders were worried about the broadband wave of anime downloading that could hurt sales. But the best defense seems to be getting the shows on sale faster than they can be ripped and pirated.