I have been fortunate enough to be closely involved with the Hugo Awards and the Arthur C. Clarke Award, and many years ago I was briefly the paid administrator of the very non-sfnal Christopher Ewart-Biggs Award. I helped tally BSFA votes a few times before the electronic age. I generally love the concept of awards, provided that the process is rules-bound and at least minimally transparent.
I was sorry to see that the folks behind the Kitschies have decided that this year’s awards will be the last. This was a British juried award for science fiction, which tended towards the eclectic and slightly overlooked, and always brightened my days when the nominations and winners were announced. I also note with concern that the Otherwise Award (formerly the Tiptree Award), has had its own travails, though it looks like they do plan to make awards for 2024 after a couple of years without.
I have been asked a couple of times if the Hugos are under threat from, for instance, the Ignyte Awards, which were specifically set up to celebrate diversity and inclusivity in 2020, in the wake of Black Lives Matter and (less important but still painful) that year’s Hugo ceremony debacle. I say, let a hundred flowers bloom. It’s great that people want to celebrate the sf that they love, and slapping a label on it saying “This wins our prize” is a very effective way of celebrating it. The more, the merrier as far as I am concerned.
The worst threat to the Hugos is not competition from other awards, but self-inflicted damage, of which the grievous abuse of process that we saw at Chengdu is the most obvious recent case. These things take time, energy and money. We should not take any of them for granted.
I don’t think that any award is diminished by any other. I am interested to know what other people enjoy, and I find collective wisdom – whether from a jury or a vote – all the more interesting from both a political and literary perspective. Sometimes I will agree, and more often I won’t. And that’s fine.