It's been occupying everyone's mind lately, that much is obvious. Fans across the world have been anticipating this convention for a while now. I am of course referring to the latest GASS convention which, with only its third occurrence, has swept the world by surprise and has everyone asking for more. In this post I shall try, to give to you the history and significance of this recurring event.
The GASS conventions were established as a means for four
University of Waterloo (UW) alumni to meet annually. Gus, Albert, Steve and Sinan all completed their studies at UW (three Computer Scientists and one Actuary) and subsequently parted ways to split all over the globe. Two remained in Toronto, ON while the other two headed to two different parts of the US. It wasn't until the first GASS convention that the four of them met again.
The first GASS convention took place in
Montreal, QC in the Summer of 2006. Its importance was immediately apparent and a pact to guarantee its recurrence was established.
The second GASS convention took place in
Niagara Falls, ON in the Spring of 2007. One of the four founding members (Gus) was quite far away at the time (Greece) and consequently was unable to attend. Petitions raged on whether there should be a renaming of the convention but, as any astute reader can notice, the proposal would have raised many eyebrows and was quickly dropped. The name would remain the same with the prospect of the missing member return at a future convention.
The third GASS convention took place in
Washington, DC in the Spring of 2008. All members were once again present and able to witness the cherry trees, a gift from Japan to the US, blossom.
The archives and proceedings of the convention are not easy to be found. But after thorough scrutiny of the press I was able to unearth a picture from their latest convention, which I am posting here to prevent it from getting lost forever.
