What does canon mean
canon = things that happen in the source material of the media one consumes
headcanon / fanon = things that don’t actually happen in the source material of the media one consumes, but are being talked about/discussed/written about and/or having art created about, as part of fandom activities and fan contents
Why are people so afraid of using the block button? Like my God you see a fic or a tag or a kink or what have you, when did we stop just blocking the author or blogger and blacklisting the tag? Like PLEASE just be liberal with your ability to curate your own internet experience. Discomfort and upset are not personal attacks and you HAVE to let yourself experience it as a feeling and just… move on?
The block button is not some horrible, horrendous, hideous thing!! Please use it and leave people alone!!
thank you! some people need to hear this. if something on the internet upsets you, you can block them. the block button is given to you for free, you can use it as freely as you want. instead of resorting to harassment, curate your own internet experience and block the things that upset you
I keep seeing all these posts about the wattpad folks trying to report ao3 or complaining about ao3, but i haven't seen a single screenshot or anything except hearsay. How much is actually happening? Is it real?
while I think a lot of them are probably lying about reporting fics (because unlike any other platforms, reporting a fic on ao3 takes more steps and time than just "click a report button and be done with it" you have to fill out a form and explain why you think a work violates ao3's terms of service, and no, portraying dark and taboo topics, even in explicit details and/or ways that romanticize/glorify said topics does not go against their terms of service) some of them may actually have done that. but even if they did, ao3 won't actually remove a fic simply for being "problematic" anyway. and reporting a lot of fics in a short period of time (mass reporting) can be seen by the platform as abuse and harassment, and then ao3 may take action against the person who reported those fics.
Everything about this post confuses and irritates me, I hoped this was sarcasm but this person was for real and blocked people in the comments. I don’t think we ao3 users are crying but rather it’s wattpad users crying about ao3 like what did they expect
I don't think these people understand that nobody is having a problem with wattpad users moving to ao3, people only voice their opinions against wattpad users who harass ao3 user and want ao3 to "be like wattpad by being pro-censorship."
I also don't think these people understand that "people who don't want censorship / people who don't want anybody to be harassed for the sake of fictional stories" do not condone real-life harm. a lot of people who are anti-censorship don't actually like taboo fics.
the only thing I can somewhat agree with the person in this screenshot is "people complaining about too much fluff" but as long as these people, who complain about there being "too much fluff" on ao3, simple voice their opinions without harassing, shaming, or mocking anybody for it then it's just an opinion/difference in preferences. there's nothing wrong with fluff. and there's nothing wrong with taboo fics. it's all fiction. it's all a form of art, and art can be either fluff or dark and macabre.
if you (not the asker, general you and also this person in the screenshot) are upset/triggered by something, and if you deliberately go out of your way just to think about and/or consume works about those things that trigger/upset you, then that is on you. nobody forces you to consume, or even think, about things that you don't like. and if you harass real people over fiction, you're a bully who either values the nonexistent life of fictional characters over the lives of real people you harassed, or just wants to find a noble excuse to harass people and feel morally superior about themself. but either way, you're just a bully.
I would like to marry AO3's tagging system please and thank you.
I SWEAR, the fact that filtering to find fics you want and avoid fics you don't want is a freaking GODSEND on AO3. How does this site have haters, I don't understand.
ao3 has haters because there are still people who think censorship (a fascist tool) is good the second they’re slightly uncomfortable with the existence of fictional stories that they don’t have to read or think about at all.
Just saw this blog post (It's cencored, no call-out) but damn, are they for real?
Also, they can't *take down* works 😂💀
ao3 themself literally just made an official announcement saying they will NOT remove any of these works that fell in the category of taboo works this person mentioned lol. the only thing these people can do is harass others over fiction in hope authors will take their own works down. but then they would be the ones violating ao3’s terms of service (ao3 does not tolerate harassment or mass report campaigns where someone hunts down various works under specific tags just to report them) and ao3 would take action against their (antis’) accounts. but to deal with harassment, ao3 provides ways for authors to prevent harassment by disabling comments, only allowing comments from registered users, or togging comment moderation on.
that said, while I do think this specific post may be a troll, it’s funny how these people will go straight to non-con tag and other taboo tags on the non-con and taboo factory just to get offended on behalf of fictional characters in fictional stories. I mean anything that involves characters who are minors being portrayed in a sexual manner makes me uncomfortable, so I just don’t go to underage sex tag and I don’t think about it. this way I don’t have to get angry or uncomfortable about fictional things that aren’t my business. but apparently the concept of being mature and curating one’s own internet experience is too difficult for these people to understand.
Does the order of your tags matter on ao3? For instance, is my fic more likely to come up first in a search if I put what they searched for first in the tags on my fic vs the last tag?
no. it doesn’t matter in which order the tag appears in. that’s not how ao3 works. because it’s an archive, not a social media platform with algorithms. the most recently published/updated fics are shown at the top of each tag’s page. and when someone else posts something with that tag after you’ve posted your work, their work will show up above yours, and yours will get pushed further and further down as more people post something with the same tag after your work. your work will only reappear at the top of the page again if it’s a multi-chapter fic and you update it by posting a new chapter.
you should also know that “changing date of public” just to push your work at the top is heavily frowned upon, it won’t get your works more views because people will avoid/block your work. I’m not sure if it’s reportable or if it’s against ao3’s terms of service, but it’s considered in poor taste.
This might be a dumb question, but does ao3 have a tag for transformation stuff? Like, turning into something else whether on purpose or forced. And is it taboo enough to be tagged with dead dove when I post my works?
although dead dove is heavily involved with taboo fics (and I personally use dead dove tag for fics of mine that are extremely explicit and taboo) the terms dead dove itself has nothing to do with whether or not a fic is dark. dead dove tag just means “read what the other tags say” so you can choose to use it or not to use it however you want.
whether or not your fic is “taboo enough” depends on how you write it / how it’s portrayed, not the topic itself.
I’m not sure about the canonical tag for transformation though. but if you type down the word into ao3’s additional tag box, you should get some suggestions. those suggestions are the canon tags ao3 has, then you can choose what fits your story best. or if there’s no canonical tag that fits your story, then you can use anything you want that best describes what goes on in your fic, even if the tag is not canonical.
illustration by sillyalexnorris
(I should not have to say this but this post doesn’t include normal wattpad users who are tired of censorship and just want a platform that gives people the freedom to create whatever they want. if you’re migrating from wattpad and if you don’t harass people for the fictional things they write on ao3, you are more than welcome here)
sending this for the other ask that asked about bookbinding and getting all the pages in order! :3
Personally, I typeset (format the fic so it's nice looking and has good margins) in Libreoffice, but you can do it on literally every other word processing program as well. It's really just personal preference. The fic just needs to be formatted all nice and neat somewhere and then pulled out as a pdf file.
While I'm doing the typesetting, I like to add a few blank pages like this:
1st page: simple title page 2nd page: blank 3rd: fancy title page 4th: metadata; tags, author, wc, publishing date, etc. 5th: blank (sometimes i add a nice quote from the fic or illustration here) 6th: blank 7th: fic starts
This keeps all my title pages on the right, and a whole blank page between the metadata and fic which I like.
I don't add any blank pages to the end.
THEN starts the page ordering :D (also called imposing)
Usually, I use bookbinder js to automatically take my PDF and churn out all my fully ordered files. It's a community run imposer that is very awesome and just rocks.
You input your PDF file at the top and don't touch most of the settings:
It's really good to know if your printer prints duplex or single-sided and if you have to flip your pages on the long or short side. This really tripped me up in the beginning.
After that, you set the page layout style to whatever size book you want to get.
Choose how many pages you want to be in a signature. I like to keep it at 3 for a folio and less for smaller books.
The imposer automatically adds in a flyleaf at the front - I usually keep it like this, but it lets you change it around to however you want.
At the end when all the settings are good, you scroll down to the bottom and click 'Generate PDF Output'.
The imposer sends you a nice collection of PDF files organized in separate signatures which are ready for printing out. They come in a zip file where you get a pdf of the whole typeset in one file, and a folder with the signatures. The signatures folder is where it's at.
I find it easiest to print out the signatures one by one otherwise I get confused. First, I print out all the odd numbered pages, then I flip them around and put them back in the printer to get all the even numbered pages as well.
After that, to fold the signature, you look for the page with two consecutive numbers and fold the pages inwards so those to numbers kiss. And voila! The pages should all be in the right order after that.
Then you do this with all the other signatures :3
this is amazing!! thank you for sharing!! ❤️
one of my absolute favorite fics unfortunately mentions the fact it was commissioned writing, and i'm learning from your blog that is one of the few things that is reportable. does that mean I should?
assuming the fic is on ao3, it doesn’t necessarily mean you should report it, although you technically could. but regardless, if you’re not going to report them, you are encouraged to tell the author that it is against ao3’s terms of service and that if someone reports it, ao3 will take the work down. all the author has to do is remove the “this was commissioned” part.
“I write this fic for / I gift this fic to / I dedicate this fic to” is okay to publicly mention on ao3. “this fic was requested by / this fic was inspired by” is okay to publicly mention on ao3. because there’s no money involved.
fic commission is okay as long as it’s done in a private one-on-one chat and nobody is talking publicly about how this fic was monetized, because nobody is going to find out if the deal/conversation/payment all happened in a private one-on-one chat and nobody is saying anything about it publicly. it becomes risky when/if fic commissions become normalized, mainstream, and talked about publicly. that’s when studios can start targeting fanfics and striking them with copyright infringement lawsuits.
right now fanfics exist in a legally grey area but are overall allowed because the etiquette is that nobody is monetizing fanfics. and ao3 can legally exist because its number one rule is that nobody is allowed to use their platform for anything that involves money.
reminder for the people who think they can report a fic to ao3 for being “dark and problematic” and that ao3 will listen to them and take the fic down
*the country in question is china. ao3 is banned there because they firmly refused to remove one problematic and taboo fanfic that upset chinese government.
ao3 was built with the main purpose to be completely against censorship. it was built because the founders, who were proship, got tired of pro censorship platforms like wattpad banning dark and taboo fics. ao3 founders built ao3 specifically to host and give a platform to dark and taboo fics that were reported and taken down on pro censorship platforms.
the fic you report to ao3 for being dark and taboo is the exact reason why ao3 was created in the first place. it’s the exact type of fic ao3 allows and protects.
mass reporting is not possible because on ao3, a fic can only be reported one time. if you try to report a fic that has already been reported, ao3 will tell you the fic has already been reported and is under their review, therefore your new report—and any new report from anybody—does not go through. the only time ao3 will remove a fic is if it violates their terms of service (by mentioning money, being a stolen work, not actually being fanwork, or deliberately mistagging things, although mistagging things won’t get a fic removed, ao3 will just ask the author to fix their tags) but they will not remove a fic simply for being dark and taboo, no matter how explicit or dark or taboo the fic is.
also, if you rapidly report several fics under specific tags / several fics from specific authors, your action can be count as you abusing ao3’s support system by ao3 themself — ao3 may consider your action to be a form of harassment, which is against their terms of service. and then ao3 may take action against your account.
ao3 has been fighting against censorship for nearly two decades now. they know what they’re doing. they know what they’re up against. they have their own team of lawyers to defend them, their users, and every fanwork that is posted on their platform.
ao3 abides by american laws. and everything ao3 allows is legal in america.
so no, they will not take down a fic for being dark and taboo when they don’t break any laws by allowing these dark and taboo fics on their platform, and they—as a non-profit organization that’s run by fans, for fans, on the donations of fans who are also against censorship—don’t have any sponsors or companies that they have to please by being pro censorship and banning taboo fics.
Since it keeps getting mentioned is it allowed to ask for donations for an author to continue like ao3 does cause it is keeping access to fix with help from money the way authors might?
if it’s not on ao3 then you can do whatever you want. but it is strictly forbidden on ao3. you cannot ask for donation, commission, or anything that involves money on their site. you cannot link a monetization platform anywhere on the site. that is against their terms of service—and they have to forbid it to prevent the platform from getting sued, since their platform hosts millions of works about copyrighted characters, no monetization is allowed on their platform—and your work or account can be taken down because of it.
I have explained more here.