Forgot to add color information! That is also now in the main post

Honestly I get where you guys that have been around even longer than I have are coming from, but personally I think we're making a mountain out of a molehill here. Keycon has been US exclusive since it began AFAIK (I got into the hobby late 2015) so I feel it's just fine to let the EU have one. I mean everything us US based people are worried about with it being in Germany is what EU based people have had to contend with if they wanted attend in all the previous years. I do agree on the point that with Mike & NK taking the reigns it does make it a much less a GH based event, but we all full well know that if there one vendor in the community that will do right by the Keycon ethos & community it is Mike. Really instead of making a big deal about this I think we should give Mike a chance to realize his vision of what Keycon will be in the future. As I fully agree with Jacob that Keycon has grown well beyond being just a GH based event & grown well beyond something that can be properly accomplished without the working relationships a great vendor like NK has. I for one am really excited from what I have heard of Mike's plans to make Keycon a bigger & better event for all of us.

All that said, let's let the man cook. There is nothing stopping us from organizing a US based, GH driven national meetup more in line with the Keycons of pre pandemic times. I would love to see something like that happen as well & would be more than happy to help it come to fruition if the ideal proves popular enough to do. In fact that seems the most sensible route to take IMO. Let Keycon keep growing to truly be a one of kind yearly event that makes every effort to give community members worldwide a chance to attend one every few years. Then start a new strictly GH driven spiritual successor to Keycon that stays within the capabilities of being organized by those of here that are willing to take the task on. If things were to go that way I'd see it as a win win really. The community gets another bigger meetup every year & the new GH driven meetup can go back to Keycons roots being a experience closer to what the older Keycons were like. I mean we can look at this development in Keycon in two vastly different ways. Negatively like we have been reacting here & act like we're losing something. Or positively & take the opportunity to let Keycon keep growing bigger/better while adding another US based national meetup to our calendar. At least that's my two cents on the more negative reaction some have had to this post.

Can we go back to voting on locations? I understand how fractured communication is for the community in 2024, but I think we can recapture a lot of the magic by letting the people feel like they have some say in the location. I appreciate the initiative, and definitely understand wanting to make things simple and straightforward, but I think what makes this feel like a community event is more involvement from the community.

I think my issue really is the location for 2025. If GMK wants to host, that's amazing, and I understand, but it feels like it's too far for me to personally travel just for a meetup. Call it Keycon, call it Keycon EU, I'm not offended. I don't attend the existing EU meetups, so from that perspective, this is no different than another EU meetup in my eyes. What does change this is the potential of a GMK tour.

I would ask you do a very public IC of sorts for an event in Germany, especially if you're telling people there will be a limited attendance GMK tour. I would guess there is a lot of price sensitivity relative to whether or not they would attend the tour. If I had to guess, many people from the US would shell out the money to go to Germany if and only if they have a spot on that tour. That isn't even getting to how many of our EU friends would surely want to attend. It'll be at least $1000 for a flight, and adding in hotel, transportation, food, etc. This is pricey. A trip to Utah for the weekend would be half the price simply because of the plane tickets.

this whole weeks has been cold and miserable

There are literally hundreds of millions of people who envy you.

Oh I love this!! Can you make more of this style?