Okay, before I get started: I’d just like to apologize that this Cosplay Mania report will not be covering the entire event, but will be focusing on the activities held at the Conference Rooms. The explanation is very simple: we were holed up in the Mech Cafe for almost the entire day taking care of the cafe’s operations. That goes without saying that this report will also be lacking event pictures; our apologies to all our readers for the quality of this report or lack of thereof.

First up on this report is the Cosplay Blogging Workshops with Otaking and Mistervader, where we talked mostly about finding a niche in the blogosphere, blogging with your own voice, and optimizing your blog so you reach more readers in less time. The focus of my portion of the talk was how to write about Philippine Cosplay for the international audience, as well as tips on how to include international viewpoints for locally-targeted posts.

The talk was fun, if a bit rough around the edges. I swear I prepared an outline – I even had notecards!, but that all went kaput in the stress of preparing for the Mech Café. And no, I am not using that as an excuse – I am simply stating a fact, and would like to keep that as a reminder to myself that while our audience was entertained by my antics, they might not be so forgiving when I put together two half-assed workshops in a row.

Next on the agenda was the Mech Café, a special Event-only cosplay café held by Cosplay.PH with Lights Out and Dokissaten. The café featured a menu designed for them by Lights Out and Sweet Geeks, served by the lovely maids and saucy butlers of Dokissaten. The café was an unprecedented success and was one of the sold-out mini-events at the con.

However – and this might sound overly critical given my stance on cosplay cafes and the fact that I was one of the key organizers for this mini event, I was not 100% happy with our operations. The guests may have had a great time, the food was of better quality and variety than the other maid cafes at other cons, and our maids and butlers were not used and abused, but I still found a hundred things I wanted to fix.

The queuing and entry system was one of them: many con guests would ignore our designated queues and simply enter the café without regard for our posted signs and designated doorkeepers. I’d like to take this opportunity to remind all guests that it might be an anime convention – a chance to have fun and let loose, but that does not excuse you from line-jumping and trespassing on restricted space. Please respect our café house rules.

The passport system was another thing: many con goers were unaware that to get their passport stamped for our box you had to purchase tickets to Mech Café, and many have walked away grumbling about having to pay an extra PhP 100 for the stamp. Again, I’d like to remind our always lovely but sometimes clueless guests: please read the convention primers, raffle guidelines, and space maps distributed by the organizers. They were created to make life for you, me, and everybody else infinitely more pleasant.

Last but not least is the scheduling for the café rotations. Some of our guests arrived ten to twenty minutes late for designated entry times, and as a result were denied entrance to the café without a refund. I would like to personally apologize to these guests, but I would also like to remind them that the call-times were issued for a reason – and that is to keep the flow of operations in sync. Please do your best to follow the schedule at the next Café (if there will be another one), and we will also give our best efforts in serving you.

With that, I’d like to extend my congratulations and thanks to the admin, staff, and volunteers of Cosplay.PH and Cosplay Mania. Thank you also to all our convention attendees, cafe guests, passersby, hangers-on, lovers, haters, and everybody else in between. Here’s to more success with Cosplay Mania 2010! That’s about it for this report; rants and raves go in the comments box. Play nice

Thank you very much to the Cosplay Mania team for the support.