Last year, during our feedback panel in Boston, we made a commitment to get the location of the next Mysterium out as quickly as possible, so that attendees would be able to work the event into their budget earlier, and so that the committee itself would have more time to plan the event. We have also stated that we would be working on a way to better balance the distribution of Mysterium events across the four time zones in the United States and Canada, and again make it easier for people to plan their attendance. To that end, we are pleased to be making the following announcements:

First, we are establishing a time zone rotation schedule that will better ensure that we don’t favor one side of the country over another. Each year, Mysterium will move to a new time zone in a predictable and repeating pattern. The rotation will run as follows:

2010: Central
2011: Eastern
2012: Mountain
2013: Pacific

Anyone with an interest in seeing Mysterium come to their city may submit a proposal for that opportunity when Mysterium is scheduled to be in your time zone. If your city is selected, you will not be able to bid again for one full rotation (so if St. Louis is selected for 2010, it will not be able to bid again until 2018 to give another city the opportunity to host in 2014). These rules also apply for the city of Spokane. Because of the expense generally required to attend Mysterium in Spokane (where the cost of living is low but the cost of travel can be high), and because we do not wish to be impose on Cyan by inviting ourselves over, Spokane will be treated just like any other city from now on; we will not be maintaining the every-three-year visiting schedule that has been used in the past largely by accident and coincidence. There is one exception to this: if Cyan does explicitly invite us to Spokane in a year when Mysterium is scheduled to be in another time zone, we will still add Spokane to the list of candidate cities so that if the community wants to visit Cyan at their invitation, we can do so.

Second, we intend to announce the location of Mysterium 2010 on the last day of Mysterium 2009. To make that possible, we need your help! If you live in the Central time zone and want to see Mysterium come to your town, please let us know! Because we suspect that you know your town better than we do, we ask that you provide us with the following information when making your bid:

• Round-trip airfare for one person on coach to the, for a few major cities for mid-summer (preferably covering a range of locations within the U.S.)
• Map/list of neighborhoods in and around the city
• Sample hotel costs (ideally 3-5 two to three-star hotels)
• List of local activities and associated costs
• List of events that may potentially coincide with Mysterium (large conventions, festivals, etc. again during mid-summer)
• Local transportation options and costs
• Hotel/Sales/Food/etc. tax rates
• Any links or resources relating to the area that may be helpful in planning Mysterium

Local Chamber of Commerce or tourism offices have resources at their disposal that should be able to assist with this.

We also ask that if you submit a bid, that you commit to assisting the committee with local planning efforts, including:

• Attending 1 committee meeting a month, beginning in September, following your bid’s selection.
• Performing location legwork in a timely manner including: Calling & visually inspecting hotels; Locating attractions/food within walking distance of chosen hotel; Negotiating group deals for activities and attractions; Obtaining visitor information from city/area.
• Assisting with on-site responsibilities such as manning registration, cat-herding events, and other tasks as needed.

Bids must be received by June 14th, 2009. To submit your bid, please use the form on this page at the Mysterium.net website. Thank you for your interest in Mysterium, and we hope to hear from bidders soon as we move Mysterium into a brand new time zone: Central Time!

Mysterium 2008 attendees, check your inboxes. The 2008 wrap-up survey has (finally) been released. If you attended Mysterium 2008 and did not receive an invitation to take the wrap-up survey, please contact web [at] mysterium [dot] net.