Juried awards have their place, but the Hugo Awards is not that place. While I'm not certain how I'd personally vote on adding a Lifetime Achievement Hugo Award , I do know that I'd oppose any version that delegated the selection of the winner to a small, select committee. Some people seem to have an odd idea about what the Hugo Awards Administrator does. I do know what the Administrator does because I've been in the job myself three times (1993/1994/2002). What Administrators do not do is select the "best" works ourselves. As I said in a reply on John Scalzi's blog , letting the Hugo Awards Administrator pick the winners is equivalent of letting the Registrar of Voters decide who gets elected to political office.