As sci-fi fans well know by now, it wouldn’t be the Hugo Awards without some spice on the side. In recent years, the esteemed prize—handed out annually at the World Science Fiction Society convention, also known as Worldcon, whose members vote on the honorees—has weathered its share of controversies, with negative headlines (take your pick: geographical censorship; racism; ties to defense manufacturers; anti-“woke” backlash before anti-“woke” was even a thing) sometimes getting more attention than the books and other media the Hugos aim to celebrate.
As io9 previously reported, this year’s flashpoint is the use of ChatGPT—but fortunately, not in a way that has any impact on the actual Hugo Awards. The Hugo ceremony is just one part of August’s Seattle Worldcon 2025; it’s also a convention that hosts panels featuring authors and other sci-fi and fantasy luminaries. Within the past two weeks, it was discovered that ChatGPT had been used to help vet program participants; three people involved, including two Hugo administrators, resigned as a result, and Seattle Worldcon 2025 chair Kathy Bond issued first a statement on the issue, followed by a separate apology.
However, the issue is still rankling sci-fi and fantasy fans on social media, not to mention would-be Hugos honorees; as blog File 770 reported, author Yoon Ha Lee went so far as to remove his novel Moonstorm from Hugo consideration (it had been nominated for the Lodestar Award honoring YA works). Yesterday, Bond posted a third message about the controversy, with an additional statement from program division head SunnyJim Morgan.
Bond’s portion reiterates how ChatGPT was used, with details and specifics. Of particular note, it was not used for “creating the Hugo Award Finalist list or announcement video” or “administering the process for Hugo Award nominations.” She also includes a renewed apology not just about the use of AI, but the way she initially responded to concerns by releasing a “flawed statement” when the issue was first brought to light.
She also says that “we are redoing the part of our program process that used ChatGPT, with that work being performed by new volunteers from outside our current team” and pledges that Worldcon—whose staff is all-volunteer, she notes—will do all it can to regain the community’s trust moving forward.
To that end, Morgan’s statement is also both apology and even deeper dive into how ChatGPT was used, including the actual prompt used to vet potential program participants:
REQUEST
Using the list of names provided, please evaluate each person for scandals. Scandals include but are not limited to homophobia, transphobia, racism, harassment, sexual misconduct, sexism, fraud.
Each person is typically an author, editor, performer, artist or similar in the fields of science fiction, fantasy, and or related fandoms.
The objective is to determine if an individual is unsuitable as a panelist for an event.
Please evaluate each person based on their digital footprint, including social, articles, and blogs referencing them. Also include file770.com as a source.
Provide sources for any relevant data.
Morgan reports that his team “did not simply accept the results that were returned” as a result of ChatGPT’s vetting. “Instead, links to primary content returned during vetting were reviewed by our team and myself before a final decision whether to invite the person was made. Ultimately, this process led to fewer than five people being disqualified from receiving an invitation to participate in the program due to information previously unknown.”
Read the full statements from Bond and Morgan here; Bond writes that Seattle Worldcon’s next update will come May 13, so it’ll be interesting to see if there’s more coming on the ChatGPT issue, or if the organizers will be moving forward from this point.
What do you think of this latest olive branch—and do you think Worldcon is handling its latest dust-up effectively? Let us know in the comments.
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