No, Virginia, There is no Stare Decisis

My story ‘Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus’ was disqualified by Mr John Lorentz and Miss Ruth Sachter in the name of the Sasquan Hugo Administrators, on the grounds that a first draft of the story was put out on my blog for my readers as a Christmas gift eight days before the beginning of 2014.

I did politely question the decision on the grounds that this case did not differ materially from a parallel case, where Mr Scalzi’s  OLD MAN’S WAR was posted to his blog in 2006 but was granted an award in 2013.

The reply I received was this:

John,In retrospect, “Old Man’s War” probably should not have been allowed on the ballot in 2006.</p>

But things weren’t as clear-cut when he first posted the novel on his web site in 2002.  I was able to attend more Worldcons in the early 2000’s than I have in recent years, and I remember there being a lot of discussion during the business meetings during those years as people tried to define what was meant by “published” (we were coming out of the years when only only way to distribute stories or books was by printing them on paper).

They finally settled on that it meaning whenever the text was presented to the public, whether it was on a web site, in an e-book or printed on paper.

Now, with many stories and articles being nominated that came from online magazines or sites like Baen.com and Tor.com, there’s no question that web publishing is a major means of publishing.  So posting a work on a public web site is treated as equivalent to printing it in a magazine.

I sincerely believe that a situation such as Old Man’s War won’t happen again–as long as the Hugo Administrators are aware of the initial publication.  (Since the Hugo Administrators change from year to year, I can’t guarantee that to be the case.  But if a future administrator reverted back to how Old Man’s War was treated, I’d certainly disagree with that action and I think most other people would, also.)

[…]
I hope that helps clarify the situation.  The Hugo administrators each year are only human, and we all make the occasional mistakes.  But we try to do our best in interpreting the rules clearly and impartially.
John Lorentz
Sasquan Hugo Administrator

This response, in my mind, raised more questions than it allayed, and so I wrote a second time, but have so far received no further answer.

I suppose the answer came when I stumbled across Mr Mike Glyers’ 770 blog, where the announcement of the decision was made.

N.B.: Mr Glyer has been nominated for 50 Hugo awards in his career.

Now, I did not think it proper to speak to Mr Scalzi himself on the matter, since he has no power to influence the Hugo judges, nor was he privy to the note sent me, and if there was any further written record of the decision or the reasoning involved in my case, it was not shown me.

But it seems someone did ask him, apparently in a fashion to which he takes  exception. In reply, Mr Scalzi holds forth his legal opinion as to why the two cases differ.

N.B.: Mr Scalzi has been nominated for 15 Hugo Awards in his career.

http://whatever.scalzi.com/2015/04/15/the-latest-hugo-conspiracy-nonsense-involving-me/

I invite your comments. Is his legal reasoning sound?

The words below are his

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Originally published at John C. Wright's Journal. Please leave any comments there.