Steampunk cosplayers at ComicCon

This year's ComicCon featured a strong contingent of steampunk cosplayers, as evidenced by this gallery at KPBS.

Steampunks At Comic-Con International, 2009 (Thanks, Fipi Lele!)

• [pAULbOWEN]

  “OK guys, let’s go get laid.”

• [Anonymous]

  BB should also cover this ridiculous and sexist eff up at comic con.

  http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2009/07/ea-puts-sexual-bounty-on-the-heads-of-its-own-booth-babes.ars

• [Thieving Magpie]

  @EEYOREX About living steampunks, you’ll note I commented “At least a few are…living steampunks”. Yes, a few, especially at a convention known for it’s heavy costumer/cosplayer attendance. However, I still stand by my statement that some of the steampunks at the con were of the living steampunk variety.

  The difference between a “living steampunk” and a cosplayer is like the difference between a goth and any of the multitude of vampire cosplayers. They both may wear fangs on occasion but the similarity ends there. A cosplayer by definition is playing in costume, an identity to be removed at the end of the “play”. Goths are dedicated to a subcultural music scene and dress accordingly.

  Steampunk can be a form of activism based around questioning why we use the technology we do and who controls and produces that technology, not just cosplay fantasy. To see what it is to be a living steampunk, see
  http://www.johnnypayphone.net/blog.php

• [Thieving Magpie]

  This photo set accompanies the KPBS Culture Lust blog coverage of the Steampunk meetup at Comic Con this year http://tinyurl.com/nnqzm5 . Certainly at the con steampunks are in their best outfits & costumes, but many are not cosplayers. At least a few are, as Johnny Payphone calls it, living steampunks. Hard to get a sense of that in a convention center filled with over 100,000 people many in pop culture costumes. The comments on the Culturelust post are also becoming a nice discussion on steampunk. Worth reading.

• [EeyoreX]

  @Thieving Magpie:
  Yeah, I have surfed around johnnypayphone’s site – and his friends sites – for a while now, and I’ve come to the conclution that those people who call themselves “living steampunk” are essentially makers wearing cravattes.

  Now, I don´t blame them at all for not wanting to be called “makers” – as has allready been pointed out in other threads on Boingboing “maker” is a pretty effin stupid term in itself. “Tinkerer” might be slightly more appropriate, or whatever.

  But why is it even an issue to anyone weather you’re a “cosplayer” or a “living steampunk”?

  At the end of the day, there are really only two kinds of people in the world: first there are those who go out and get things done, to shape our existence into a form that appeases them.
  And then there are those who waste life obsessing about images and labels; those who really, really want the world to know that they are indeed a true “goth” or a “nekko” or an “anarchist” or an “i-wanna-be-bad-ist” or a “dandy” or a “steampunk” or a “hipster”. Or whatever.

  As long as you spend your time and brain power coining a brand new, ridicolus terms such as “living steampunk” just to differentiate yourself from the rest of the “makers”, I´m sorry but you’re stuck in category 2.

• [Klink]

  @#1

  Who posted under the veil of anonymity I might point out that you point to EA’s alleged sexist competition, the mistake they made was not having scantily clad men. Even so regardless of whether or not EA acted in poor taste is little reason to tar all ‘gamers’ with the age old brush of fat unwashed and sleazy men which is surely hypocritical of someone shouting about discrimination.

• [EeyoreX]

  “Living steampunks”, huh?

  I think Scott Kurtz said it best:
  http://www.pvponline.com/2009/07/27/clothes-make-the-fan/

  Sure, the outfits are gorgeous, but a prop cybernetic eye doesn’t magically become a functional cybernetic eye just because you insist on wearing it on a regular basis. Rather the opposite, actually.

• [Emma Byrne]

  @KLINK

  Umm, WTF? Where did #1 wield any kind of brush?

  Even EA has decided that rewarding attendees for “commit[ing] acts of lust” with the “any booth babe” lacked a little something in class.

• [empathy44]

  Klink~I don’t agree that the best way to bury worker exploitation is under another mound of the equally exploited opposite gender.

  As to your second point, by your own logic as long as they mentioned fat, overweight sleazy women, there would be no problem.

  The actual point was/is: selling your booth personnel as sexual bounty is bad hiring practice.

• [mwilliamrice]

  So wait…horrible tan in a bottle is steampunk? Who knew!

• [The Lizardman]

  Eeyorex beat me to it – Kurtz pretty much nailed that one. I almost always enjoy his reports and observations at conventions.