Any Japanese Seiyuu, Directors, idols planned to attend OniCon 08?

Yeah really! I think Oni-con should break some ground here and bring a Japanese Seiyuu to the US. Namely: Aya Hirano :D

Heh she was at Anime Expo, that would be awesome for her to be here in good ole Texas.

I think thats the problem with most anime cons.

Alot of the ones that start up usually cant get the funds to get the type of guest that people are really looking for (thats why I always ask how much I need to donate wink wink) or they are cons that usually recycle amongst each other (from guest, workers, etc) and pretty much you get the same con over that everyone else has in Texas. Also Im not trying to bring down the american VA yet im much more interested in the japanese va more along the english va (not unless its the english va of El-hazard ova they were awesome!)

Yet I digress, to me thats what I look for in a con, to go the distance, because usually if they go the distance then it will bring in alot more attendees.

Oh I definately agree about all your points. What I do see however is a major saturation in american anime industry guests -- which isn't bad, but also shows an area of weakness that the convention can work on in the future. I am very happy with this year's guest list save for the pending musical guest. Getting half the names that they did was an excellent job and many old school anime fans I'm sure are very appreciative of their participation in the con especially.

But yeah. Next year Oni-Con should try to break some ground and be the first(?) Texas anime convention to bring over a Seiyuu.

Yeah, there are some guest on the list that im happy to see because they havent attended a Houston con in a few years.

I still wonder about the musical guest though, I checked alot of the most notable suspects on who it could be the musical guest and alot of them are on tour in japan at same time as oni-con.

Hopefully something comes out of all of this!

I honestly wouldn't be surprised if the musical guest this year isn't VK. For the sake of not having to deal with the aftermath I hope that the band is VK lol. Though it'd be great of Asian Kung-Fu Generation could come <---Cheap Personal Preference Plug :D

Lets see.. the first thing i would need would be contact information.. You would not believe how hard it is to find contact for most of the Japanese guests. Then, because it is so expensive to fly them into the us (a couple thousand dollars round trip), a donation to the convention would be awesome...
But to start it would definitely need to have contact information.

I can put together a contact list of all the agencies, and groups alot of them are with. My japanese is a little rough, yet manageable.

Here is a notable one Ken o agency for alot of actors/actresses (ie Misaki Itoh)
http://www.ken-on.co.jp/

This is a notable seiyuu agency
http://www.artsvision.co.jp/

All with contact information

I guess if more people post who they would want, might be able to get someone cool for next year (^_^)

So let's do the math.

Bringing a band over from Japan. Let's say an average 4 piece band. Then you have their entourage which is the stage and sound crew, their manager, a separate rep from the studio, let's say another 8 people to keep things simple.

With just those people averaging $2k per plain ticket, that's $24,000 just to bring them over here.

Now you have to figure in hotel costs. Say we put them all up those nice $101 x 17% hotel tax rooms. The band members will want their own rooms. The entourage will have to share more than likely. So that's 8 rooms total which boils down to: about $3000 for three nights at the hotel.

So the convention would need a good $30,000 in donations, hypothetically speaking, in order to bring a band over from Japan each year.

Now that's just a band. To bring industry guests over you have to figure that each guest will have an entourage of their own of about 3 or 4 people. So one guest will cost a good $10k (rounded up) just to bring to the US.

Ouch x.o!

Well usually in those situations this is where agents, and a bands label comes in hand. Usually alot of stuff is covered by those, and a fee for apperance. The hotel thing is a different sort because usually a con makes some sort of deal with the people in advance to set off a number of rooms for there industry guest and so forth, and that is taken care of in a lump sum bill that is usually alot cheaper then booking each room. (they also make alot of profit by trying to get all there rooms booked that they have set to them.) It changes here and there.

Alot of times some sort of deal will be set with a guest from japans agency in order to get them down there. Alot of times some sort of press, item sales, autograph sales etc will be added on allowing for the bill for them to be alot less than usually expected.

There are alot of other determining factors that goes along with this, yet the more succesful a con does each year (and or if they get alot of sponsors plus attendance) you will see alot of different guest show up at cons. (a major example of this would be like anime expo etc).

This is just coming out of experience years ago when I had to help in getting certain guest to show up for concerts, shows, 2 day events etc.

Ohh okay. Man when I thought there was already enough to think about, there was so much more barried underneath. -.- Your ninja skills are better than mine.

lol no seriously though if the con were to ask for additional donations I think a good number of the attendees would be willing to contribute. I won't be here next year despite what my signature says, but I might be able to make Oni-con 2009. In which case I'll be checking up on the convention around that time. If donations are needed I'd be happy to drop a few K down.