Those of you who follow me on Twitter and/or Facebook will have seen this already, but I thought it was worth putting into a longer post: I have decided that, given the news that PAX has sold out completely this year, a “PAX” should clearly be the default measurement unit for any gathering of nerds.
I am given to understand that in recent years, PAX has had upwards of 30,000 attendees. It seems therefore reasonable to estimate a PAX at 30,000 nerds. Which gives us the following measurement units:
- 1 megaPAX = 30,000,000,000 nerds, or the approximate number of nerds required to buy your book before you can outsell J.K. Rowling
- 1 kiloPAX = 30,000,000 nerds, or the number of nerds buying tickets to the latest SF/F blockbuster
- 1 PAX = 30,000 nerds
- 1 deciPAX = 3,000 nerds, or the approximate annual attendance at Norwescon
- 1 centiPAX = 300 nerds, or the approximate number of attendees at any given showing of a Harry Potter movie
- 1 milliPAX = 30 nerds, or the approximate number of attendees at any given SF/F convention panel
- 1 microPAX = .03 nerds
Actual attendees of PAX should let me know if this year’s PAX surpasses the estimated number of a single PAX measurement. We wouldn’t want the math to be wrong, now would we?
Also, I am willing to entertain suitable counter-theories that a PAX could also be considered the unit of “amount of force of interest required to gather 30,000 nerds in a single location”. If you would like to support this theory, show your work in the comments!
And, props to 
kirbykalfvaen