Voodoo board

A voodoo board is a device used to facilitate communication between attendees at a large in-person gathering, such as a science fiction convention, by providing a simple way for them to leave messages for each other. It was invented by Erwin S. "Filthy Pierre" Strauss in the 1960s and is widely used at science fiction conventions. It works like this:

# The gathering's organizers put a bulletin board or cork board in a central place at the gathering. This bulletin board must be the type you can stick pins in (hence the name "voodoo").
# On the bulletin board they post a list of all the attendees, alphabetized by name. Some conventions made the mistake of sorting the attendee list by membership number or something similar, but that doesn't work nearly as well.
# Finally, they put out a box of file cards with alphabetic dividers, and a box of map pins (the type with the colored plastic blob at the end), a supply of blank cards, and instructions for using the system.
# As attendees arrive and check in, they put a mark by their name.
# If you want to leave a message for someone, write their name at the top of a blank card and write your message on the card. File the message in the box under the appropriate alphabet tab for the recipient's name. Stick a colored pin on the bulletin board, next to their name.
# If you want to check for messages left for you, just see whether there's a pin next to your name on the board. If there is, remove the pin and find your message in the box.

External links

* http://www.vraidex.com/guide/ch11.htm#11.1.4