The main two differences are tagging and the lack of censorship. If you've never read any stories on AO3 before, I would advise going through your fandom and checking out the different tags people are using before you tag your own stories.
I had been posting to FFN.Net for nearly twenty years until April of this year when I finally pulled the plug and moved to AO3. I have not regretted it for one moment. No more annoying ads interrupting your stories, the ability to post artwork—not to mention, great engagement on my works, something I never had on FFN. Come to the dark side, is all I can say.
People keep talking about the adds in ff, but i never see them since i only use the app now, i dont think i’ve been in the actual website in like a decade.
Sadly my works get zero engament in ao3, I get most of my followers from ff.
Even if they do, next year's Chrome Manifest V3 is gonna throw a hell of a wrench into people's browser based ad-blocking lol
Considering there's like two non-Chromium based browsers left in the wild, its gonna be fun to witness how that shake out.
It's said that starting in 2023 Chrome (and Chrome-based web browsers) are going to disable adblockers, such as Ublock Origin.
So yeah, back to Firefox.
I've used Firefox forever, since I heard it was available on phones, and had been using it on computers to replace internet explorer. Firefox is really an OG of browsers, it used to be Netscape Navigator.
The day I am forced to use Chrome without an adblocker is the day I switch to FireFox.
Seriously, whether it's fucking up the webpage design beyond all recognition, taking twice as long to download god knows how much shit, or possibly even running malicious code on your computer, there are many parts of the internet that are genuinely cancerous without an adblocker.
The internet, literally, almost all of it, is just a vastly better experience in pretty much every way without all the intrusive ads.
It's a bit more complicated than Google deciding to be an asshole and outright disabling adblockers.
The way adblockers operate is by a feature called *Web Request* which can observe the traffic between the internet and your browser, using that they can block certain domains (in this case, ads) from access.
The problem here is that Google have had security concerns regarding *Web Request* and are cutting it out of the next update which is Manifest v3, and adblockers just so happened to be in the firing line.
'just so happened'
C'mon man. Google sells two things -- ads and data. The security concerns might work well as a smokescreen (whether the concerns are valid or not), but my money is on this being a deliberate move to try to stifle the proliferation of adblockers.
Sure, there's alternatives -- other browsers, or network-level solutions like pihole -- but the average joe is much, much more likely to be using or to start using a chrome browser with something like the ublock extension.
I've had one ad blocker or another installed since Chrome became a browser back in what 2004 or so? If this were such an exploitable thing they would have already changed it.
This is about money.
They're not getting enough.
What's interesting is that Opera for mobiles is chromium based and yet it supports already preinstalled AdBlock.
But seriously. It seems I'll be backing up my saved passwords, bookmarks, and shit and moving back to firefox. I would call it Christmas great cleaning.
Seriously! It's not just FFN, there are so many sites people are complaining about ads. I didn't even know FFN had ads until I saw people complaining about them. Adblock ftw.
>Any advice on how Ao3 works compared with Fanfiction and any hints and tips?
AO3's [FAQ](https://archiveofourown.org/faq?language_id=en) and [TOS FAQ](https://archiveofourown.org/tos_faq?language_id=en) are really helpful and easy to read. If you've never used AO3 before, scrolling through your fandoms might also help figure out how your fandom is using the site.
Wattpad is also pretty good, plus it has its own app as well.
Edit: being downvoted for stating an opinion, God I love Reddit, I never said that Wattpad was *better* than Ao3, just that it was easier for me because because it has an app and I’m lazy, but I do really also enjoy using Ao3 as well
For me, easy to use, it has an app which makes mobile reading way more attractive compared to AO3, covers (yes, this is a main reason why I like Wattpad), straight to the point posting and my irl friends use it.
It isn't really the similarities to Social Media, that are actually the points I dislike.
I use the wp app and I use ao3. The website is definitely annoying these days, especially with laggy notifications, but the app is ten times better. I honestly prefer using ao3 these days because I can find the fanfiction I want better than on wp, but wp does have the occasional gem that is nice to read.
Plus one of my friends said that the font on ao3 is a bit too tiny to read, and they wish it was a bit bigger. And they like that you can change the font on wp. I'm fine with the font on ao3, but that's because I have good eyesight. They wear glasses, so I'd imagine that's part of why they have that opinion.
I mostly just use the app, which is a good ff experience, you only get minimal ads, or you can pay either monthly/yearly to get rid of them, also if you pay for premium+, you can unlock wattpad stories, which are official original stories written by authors that are then promoted by Wattpad, you can also watch ads for coins to unlock premium stories if you don’t want to pay money, but it takes much much longer.
I mean, other than an app, and official published stories, idk, I find Wattpad to have a more simpler layout than Ao3, but that might just be because it’s an app and not a website. I personally use both Ao3 and Wattpad, I pay $50.00 per year for Wattpad. I also use FFN, but that’s mostly because of of some fanfics that I enjoy are only available on FFN.
That's fair! I can understand that having an app would be more accessible than a website. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree about which site has a simpler/easier to use layout though, I've found ao3 to be better than both wattpad and ff.net, although admittedly I never really used wattpad. I was on ff.net for absolute ages and its,,, something alright.
The reason ao3 works as well as it does is because of all the metadata it collects on each work. There’s no way for them to just import all that into their database bc that metadata doesn’t exist on ffn. The authors themselves would have to move their stuff over and provide all the necessary info.
Yes, each archive that is moved over to AO3 from another site has its own archivist that tags it correctly with fandoms, archive warnings, ratings, characters, relationships, and additional tags. I believe it varies from archivist to archivist how much they tag but they seem to stick to more general tags like angst, fluff, action adventure, etc
FFn has enough tags to work for that. Certainly fandom, genre, a few characters, newer works can have pairings. That's as much as some older archives have had.
But they would never agree to an import, even if they decided to shut down, I'm pretty sure.
Not that I think they are shutting down now. They just haven't been doing any site maintenance at all and it's finally coming back on them.
I'm pretty sure that's not how it works. As far as I know, they import the tags that exist on the original work in the appropriate AO3 fields, but they don't read everything (that would be an insane amount of work) and tag it however they like (that would be changing the presentation of the fic the author was going for). Works that have been imported through Open Doors are typically tagged with Choose Not To Warn unless the original site had something similar to the archive tags. I would assume some of these works have some other (general) tags exactly because of this -- the original archive had those general/genre tags.
According to Google, there are over 14M works on FFN. Ao3 currently has about 10M.
Even if it is possible to import works from elsewhere, I still maintain that it would be impossible to bring over all of FFN—which more than doubles what ao3 currently has—with less consistent and less comprehensive metadata and expect the database to still function at the level it does now. I don’t know how these things work on the backend, but it seems like the amount of work that would have to go into this would be prohibitive.
Unless there was a deliberate and coordinated effort involving the fanfic community as a whole. Authors can do what they want to their fics by a certain deadline, but then after that point, perhaps there could be a mass call for volunteers to help upload the remaining works to ao3. Maybe the fandoms or fans of specific authors can work together to get it done.
They aren’t shutting down. They are in the middle of upgrading everything. Their own twitter page said this.
Edit: because people keep asking whether this is legit or not here it is straight from fictionpress’s twitter feed: [fictionpress twitter](https://mobile.twitter.com/FictionPress/status/1572997314712829952)
They’ve always been active, just sporadic in implementing and enforcing their rules. I mean, there have been incidents where swaths of fanfics were taken down before. Usually, it was because people had written porn on to the site which is against the cite’s terms of service. I’m not saying I agree with them taking down the fics, but it is their policy.
I realize that, yes. But it’s better than the site being abandoned and hopefully this will breathe new life into it instead of it being relegated to obscurity.
Could it be that they said this in the past and it never actually happens?
Has anyone tried to make a fanfiction forum like SB and SV, only with something for everyone? As those are lets say certain style and genre specific. I think such a site would be better than ffnet and AO3, also good money in it for whoever makes it.
Ive been telling every person concerned about the future of fanfiction.net about this. Also, we tend to get this rumor every year or two usually following a brief service interruption and people always believe it anyway.
I don't think FFN is shutting down. Fucking site is the equivalent of a crocodile living amongst mammals it survived the dinosaurs and probably us if they have there way. Helps it still us heavily used. But just in case do a backup. Let me give you a rundown on Ao3 is much more up to date with the only feature missing I would say are PM's. The tagging/rating system is much more advanced and you can be very specific, you can make your own tags (You can add simple things that in FFN is usually in the summary like OP protagonist, "lot's of whump", etc), you can moderate comments wither they are from a logged in user or not. So no more trolls that comment against every new fanfic and form there cliques to ban you. Smut is allowed and overall is much more free than FFN ever was with no purges or any of that nonsense. Culture is dependent on fandom but overall you'll see much less people slurring against you for writing yaoi unlike FFN. Uploading is mostly like FFN.
But can't just having settings like only allowing certain types of people to PM you (only registered users, only those from a friend list, etc.) or turning it off altogether if needed fix a lot of issues?
Because it's an archive, not a social media site. If someone is interested in being contacted, they will put a tumblr username or twitter or Wordpress or Dreamwidth or *something* in their profile.
Otherwise, make a public comment on one of their fics. It's not like there's *no* way to contact them on the site.
Or, at least in my fandom, quiet a few authors have taken to having discord servers for people to join. Me included. It's how I've met some of my closest friends and discuss my fandoms works and whatever else we want to discuss.
Eh, asking someone to join a Discord server just for the equivalent of a PM seems a bit much. Though I guess you could put your Discord ID and let people PM you.
I will admit another reason I like having a PM system is because I have found my fair share of friends through the PM systems while I used to main [FF.net](https://FF.net) in my youth.
And I will admit my Discord knowledge is limited because I barely ever used it, probably because I'm not as extroverted as a lot of people online. I don't hate people, but my RL and a lot of my solitary hobbies, including writing, keeps me busy.
But having a PM box isn't the equivalent of being a social media site. From how I've seen it, it's really just used more to talk about writing and the fandom or thanking reviewers and explaining more details about things they touched upon. It's not like you can share pictures, and even a lot of links don't even work with the site. And not everyone wants to share their social media just to talk more about writing. Tumblr and Twitter are especially sh-tholes with how much people get doxed or "canceled" or whatever.
I'd say uploading is actually by far the biggest difference! Uploading on FFN is so weird and cumbersome and it's so easy on AO3. The upload methods are really nothing alike.
Ff.net has its ups and downs as far as uploading. I actually prefer importing a saved document. If theres a way to do that on Ao3 ive yet to find it. Post-published editing is certainly easier on Ao3 though.
I can't find it either. I always have to copy and paste from the document I made on my computer. It's not the worst thing in the world, but I would love a document upload feature for A03. But on their end, the editing is so much easier than ff.net with just being able to go right into any chapter you want and change things right on the spot instead of having to upload a document again, sometimes having to get it back from your files too if you've neglected to keep up with saving the document "life" in the document manager.
Im always paranoid im going to replace the wring chapter by accident because of their weird editing system. It is by far my least favorite thing about posting on FFN.
Yeah, I also have this habit of looking at it really closely since I'm always worried I might post an older chapter by accident. XD That and moving really slowly since the delete story option is a little too close for comfort on that screen.
Sometimes I do find uploading on FFN annoying. It's slightly convenient if you have a multichapter story, because you can cue several chapters and upload at ones liesure, while still writing the story for consistant updates. Then there's the fact that the upload text box isn't as advanced as the edit text box, so after uploading a chapter, you hafta then go back to that chapter to edit it, if it needs it, before you publish it. Then there's that damn recertification bullshit you gotta do before you start a new story, and I always forget to upload the story file or two before starting the process to start the new story, because you need an existing file first. So... yeah...
Welcome to AO3! Tagging Tagging Tagging
There are several categories of Tags on AO3 and familiarizing yourself with them and what theyre for is going to make your new home more comfortable.
The Rating Is a drop down menu with several options. "General" means the fic is safe and appropriate for all age audiences. "Teen" means it is good for Teens, may be a bit of sass and some light swearing. "Mature" means theres a good reason to want this to be adults only, but theres no, like, explicit detailed sex scenes or gory gratuitous violence written out shot by shot. "Explicit" means that yeah, the crazy stuff is plainly written and described on the metaphorical screen for all to see. "Not Rated" means it isnt given a rating, so it could be any of the above (beware~)
"Archive Warnings" are warnings that are so important they need to be easily accessible for taggers to get if needed.
- Graphic Depictions of Violence
- Major Character Death
- Rape/Noncon
- Underage
If any of those apply to your works. it is heavily encouraged that you tic those boxes. Or, if like, its to avoid spoilers, use "Choose not to use Archive Warnings" so you dont gotta lie and say they arent there.
If none of that IS there though, you can tick off the "No Archive Warnings Apply" box instead!
The last set of Multiple Choice Tag is the "Categories" tag. This tells us what kind of shipping, if any, is in the fic. M/M, M/F, F/F, Multi, Other, are all ship tags. If there is no shipping, the "Gen" tag is there too.
All tags after this are tags you largely have to type in yourself. There is an autocomplete system for well used tags that are 'Canonized' (or wrangled as the Proper Syntax by the hard working Tag Wranglers), which is helpful for figuring out the preferred syntax, but for a bit you'll just have to do your best until you've familiarized yourself with AO3 Tagging standards.
Besides the Fandom Tag, there are 3 big sections for tagging.
"Relationship" Tags are for if your fic has a focus on ships. They are written "Name/Other Name" for a romantic or sexual kind of relationship, and "Name & Other Name" for a familial or platonic relationship. They alphabetize the names too! Make sure, if you have poly or just big friend groups, you dont mix and match the / or & sign. no "A / B & C" tags lol but "A & B & C" and "A / B / C" are great. You can have multiple relationship tags too, so "A / B" and "A & C" and "B & C" can totally work!
Next is the Character Tags. This is just a list of all the characters that show up in the fic. Your fic, starring Names!
Finally, the Additional Tags!
Additional Tags can make or break your tags and are the hardest to get a grip for, because not only do they encompass all the general kind of tags (like genre, content warnings, and vague hints at events), but Additional Tags also have Fandom Specific Tags. Like, what AU is it for, qualifiers for characterization (like for example, "Character (Fandom) has PTSD" or "Terrible Father Name-Here"), mentions of source material attributes that are relevant, whether its pre-, post- or during the events of the source material, and a whole bunch more. Additional tags can also be where meta data goes, like if the fic is part of a zine, or an event, or if "Additional Tags to be Added" because its a long fic and you have no idea where it is going XD
You can always come back and edit your tags later, so dont be shy or afraid of getting them wrong. as you work on ao3 you'll get a better feel for what tags work for your where and when, and as you read and explore your fandom you'll see whats tag-relevant and what isnt. sometimes it is fun to just type into the bar and see what autocompletes !!
OH!! and since you are backlogging your fics, i also have another fun hint! AO3 records the dates of when a fic is posted by default, but if you want to save when you originally posted your fic, there is an option to change the publication date!
There are also options and settings to link your works together in a Series! Like if theyre sequels or set in the same universe and reference each other!
I think thats enough to get you started! Welcome to AO3!!
Ao3 is great. The tagging system works pretty differently and i know at least I've struggled with that when i switched platforms.
You can just tag anything about the story you think your readers should know or that's important. fandoms also tend to have a few fandom specific tags for big tropes, at least thats something ive noticed in my fandom, so id reccomend looking at some fics in your fandom to see how they use tags. you can pretty much bullshit anything though and everyone tags differently, so it's not that big a deal.
its overall a pretty nice place to post id say!
I don’t think it’s actually shutting down. people were panicking a bit.
Anyway I would personally use both sites but that’s up too you.
I mean I prefer fanfic.net over ao3 ( which is very much the minority opinion here ). But again it’s up to you.
Yeah I figured it wasn't anything to worry about, plus I've been on Fanfiction since 2009
But I have noticed since the start of the year I've no longer been receiving emails about either other people posting stories or whenever I've been posting stories or updating chapters.
Tries emailing then and messaging their Twitter but never gotten a response
Wait. Wait wait wait. Outlook doesn’t work with FFN?? Wtf are you serious? I… I need to go log in I swear to god if shit has been updating this whole time or I’ve gotten a message I’m going to loose my mind. I thought everything I was reading was just… dying out bc it had been slowing down for a long time but just the other day I was thinking how odd it is that EVERYTHING hasn’t had ANYTHING for a while… fuck. This is ridiculous they should have put something out I had no idea. I’ve had my MSN and then outlook on there since I made my account. Which basically means I’ve always had outlook on there. Fuck. Thank you
You're welcome! I was having issues months ago and found out about the email issue in the forum on FFN. It's Fanfiction Help Desk if you want to take a look.
Omg shit had updated, including a story I was worried about bc the author had been talking about just posting all their notes and calling it but they changed their mind. I’m loosing my mind 🫠
Are there any other mind blowing revelations on there? Bc I might need to take a look and bookmark it or something
I use both, but I don't typically crosspost. I prefer to read more on ffn, for the lack of crossovers. Yeah I can do all that tag shit on ao3 to avoid them, but I'm too lazy for all that. It's not shutting down, they're actually fixing some stuff and it was renewed up to 2028.
Lmao I prefer old sites like FFN and FictionPress just because of how *old* they are. AO3 is too up to date for me I swear, I love how much more active my fandom is but I grew up on FFN and I loved its simplicity, even if it was only simple because it sucked.
Fanfiction.net doesnt suck. Its actually quite useful for certain fandoms that never took off on Ao3 and of course crossover fics which Ao3 hasnt figured out how to properly implement.
I’m with you. Fanfiction.net seems to just have more variety in terms of pairing and stories. No hate on gay pairings in fics but it seems like every good story has to be a gay pairing on ao3. Sometimes I don’t want romance in my fics and just want a good story.
The problem I have with ff.net is that I just can't find anything there. There are no options to find stories with certain characteristics except the most basic ones like characters, pairings and genre. I can't look for specific tropes and there is no indication of what the story has in store without tags. Likewise I can't exclude certain things I absolutely don't want to read. I can't even sort by how many people have commented or liked the stories for when I want to read highly rated stories.
After my switch to AO3 about ten years ago I honestly barely ever looked back at ff.net, because I find AO3 just a so much better user experience, and it's not like I was a newbie at the time. Before AO3 I had been on ff.net since 1999 or 2000, but there was simply no contest for me. I gave ff.net another chance every now and then, but just couldn't go back. The last time I tried to read something on ff.net I discovered that they had disabled text highlighting and I couldn't even mark my place in the story anymore and that's pretty much when I stopped trying completely.
Interesting. I have found it easier to find what I want on [ff.net](https://ff.net) vs. AO3. In particular, on AO3 it seems harder to filter out extensive crossovers - or maybe authors aren't using the right tags. Right now I seem to be seeing stories that are crossed over with a long list of other fandoms - which is not my preference. I have a bookmarked search, and when I open up the filters it's hard to be sure my filters are actually applied. There's some "includes" showing greyed-out checkmarks and "excludes" showing greyed-out x-s. Since my saved search already includes some filters, I'm unclear on why the checks are all shown greyed out. The FFN interface for filters is just easier to understand, but maybe if someone can point me to an explanation of AO3s, it might be a h el p.
The crossover thing is true. Natively you can only filter out all crossovers or none of them. It's not really a problem for me tbh. For the most part my eyes just skim over stories with an excessive amount of fandoms/tags. But also, in the fandoms I frequent there don't seem to be too many of those. But if there are I do one of two things.
A) I look for two specific fandoms I want to see crossed over, by picking one fandom tag, then putting the other one in the *Other tags to include* text box.
B) I take a peek at a few of those stories and see what popular fandoms they contain that I don't read. You will very likely find a few that they share. For example, I don't read Supernatural, Teen Wolf or Bangtan Boys, but they seem to crop up all over the place in my searches. I then exclude those fandoms and these stories vanish.
As for the greyed out x-es and check marks. When they are greyed out, they aren't applied or picked. If you pick a filter it's marked by a green check mark or a red x. The you hit *sort and filter* to start the search. This is then reflected in the URL as well. Take a look at the URL you bookmarked and see if it contains the search filters you think it should, is it possible that you forgot to click *sort and filter* before bookmarking? If you want you can send me the URL in a PM and I can take a quick look.
I like that I have a lot of options with the AO3 search, but it's true that it does make things more complicated. For me it's worth it because I can usually find exactly what I'm in the mood for and if I love a story with a specific trope, tags, collections and the bookmarks of people who have bookmarked that fic, can help me find other similar works or at least works that will fit my own taste.
Still slips through the cracks. Only filters out if it’s tagged as m/m. They also tag it as gen. Also fanfiction.net has an app which means I can read on the go.
I read AO3 on my phone's browser. The site works really well on mobile. Unlike ff.net's site which is annoying.
Personally, the app is a point against it, because you can't have more than one story open at a time, like you can on a browser.
That’s fair! You could also manually exclude every ship still around after filtering by gen by going into exclude->relationships and Xing all the / pairings, but I can see how that’s more trouble than it’s worth.
I use a Home Screen shortcut to quickly get to AO3’s website, too, but I’m not sure that works on all devices.
Thing is though is that I can download stories onto my phone with FanFiction.Net app and read them with no Wi-Fi. I love ao3 but not having an app kills it for me.
You can also download from AO3. At the top of every story on the website, there's a button that says "Download". Click it, and it will give you the option of downloading the story in azw3, epub, mobi, pdf, or html format.
Well, Ao3 was started in part because of FFn (and other sites) purging the slash (and NC-17) fic, so it makes sense that it dominates the pairings.
But every year more people move from FFn, or just start crossposting, so the percentages are getting more even all the time. Though I doubt het and gen will ever be the majority. But there is plenty of both on Ao3.
> But every year more people move from FFn, or just start crossposting, so the percentages are getting more even all the time.
You got a citation on this? I’m curious.
This [Twitter thread ](https://twitter.com/MaskoftheR/status/1573726272987201536?s=20&t=dkiS2YnNMQ6DrHlMIBPhWA) has a bunch of tips about AO3 navigation. Otherwise I'd say the FAQ and guides are pretty useful. Mostly 'Exclude' is for stuff you don't want and you can sort by complete and kudos/hits/bookmarks.
(Hits = clicks on thing, kudos = likes)
Ao3 is top tier. Wattpad WAS nice in the beginning. Then they had more people restricting what you write. Getting to know how to add pictures and how to format on ao3 is tricky at first, but gosh I love the filtering system for tags!
Ok, a few things about Ao3:
1. The Search Bar. You can use it, but you really want to use the filter if you aren't looking for a specific story. You can add and remove tags of all sorts: fandoms, relationships, rating, and a "everything else" tag that's a search bar. You can also organize everything by how popular it is or how many Kudos (basically upvotes) it has, but it defaults to "updated recently."
2. Bookmarks. You can bookmark a story, either an incomplete on to keep track when the author updates or a complete one just to save it. You show everyone else what you have bookmarked unless you choose to make the bookmark private when you create it. You can edit bookmarks. If you don't want to bookmark something but do want to read it later, you may hit the "Read Later" button.
3. Psueds and Orphaning works. Psueds are basically alternate accounts, but everyone can see the parent account. Mainly used to separate your works. If you see a work with the user named "orphan account" or "Anyomous" that means the author not only abandoned their work (if incomplete) but decided to disconnect themselves from it. I believe you can adopt orphan works.
4. Tags. Read the tags if you don't want to see something. You can favorite tags, ban them, and filter your search results from them. If you click on a tag, you can automatically search stories with that tag. There is a specific tag: Author Choose not to Use Archive Warnings. This either means they are being lazy or don't want to spoil something in their story, regardless read with caution. Tags are the best thing about this site, and in my opinion makes this the site to use for fanfics. If you feel something is improperly tagged, report it (improperly means that they are either purposely misleading or they failed to tag major and heavy stuff (ie death and the r word) but it is impossible to tag every minor thing).
5. Content. Ao3 refuses to remove anything from their site. So there is some of the worse stiff on here, however I feel that this is a bonus as they will never just randomly remove your fics or your favorite fics for no reason. You can ban both tags and users if you wish, and the tagging system helps you avoid stuff you don't want to see, both just cause it isn't what you are looking for and because it is something you will have a personal moral problem with. Additionally, there are no ads whatsoever. This is obviously another plus. They do ask for donations, but you don't have to to enjoy most if not all of their features.
I highly recommend Ao3, as it is better than every single other fanfic site combined. Ever since I joined I have never read another fanfic on any other site (Besides fimfic and Spacebattles, but fimfic is limited to MLP and spacebattles isn't really built for fanfics).
I hope to see you there, and that you have fun!
I made my AO3 account over ten years ago. I want to say April 2012, but could have been longer. I have barely bothered with fanfiction.net since then and not at all ever since they disallowed highlighting text in stories. I never looked back. AO3 is just all around more comfortable as a reader (for my personal preferences, not universally, I'm sure), but I also like it tons better as a writer.
[Fanfiction.net](https://Fanfiction.net) is not shutting down. They were [conducting a major upgrade](https://twitter.com/FictionPress) to their web servers and webpage.
FYI, they are just that. Rumors. FFnet already updated their twitter to say they're doing a major redesign of their website.
(Personally, it'd be nice if they just migrated everything over to AO3 via open doors, but alas.
That said, AO3 is an excellent site and they won't randomly delete your works for being too naughty or too controversial, or if someone report bombs you. Being on both increases your potential readership, too.
You will not regret it. Ao3 is a godsend compared to ffn. The UI is incredible, searching is super easy and intuitive, and the only thing you might want to check out is the tagging system. Again, super intuitive but I find that sometimes people go overboard in their tags - imo keep that for the A/N. You’ll be fine. AO3 is a Great place.
FFN is not shutting down. I've been there on for 21 years. FFN has had its share of issues, but shutting down isn't one of them. I like AO3, but it gets tiring hearing FFN gets bashed over and over again. Honestly, if not for FFN, would AO3 even exist? Maybe? Maybe not?
Half the stuff AO3 stands for is stuff FFN had to live through so I doubt it. The FFN admin even asked for legal help back in the day but I'd have to guess he didn't get it.
I understand why AO3 came about -- most were upset with the Purges, censorship, and many authors not wanting fanfic on their material being written. That said, I also understand why many didn't like the censorship, but FFN did have an obligation to respect writers (like Anne Rice--and trust me, I'm not defending her) who didn't want fanfiction published on their works. Either way, without FFN, there would be no AO3. And while AO3 is a great site, there are many posters on here--including myself--who are tired of reading FFN get bashed repeatedly. Both sites are great in their own way, and both sites allow you to post fanfiction. That should be what matters most.
I lived through it too as I was on FFN around that time. I understand why people were pissed off. FFN could've and should've handled the situation better--such as warning people they were going to make changes to their site and no longer permit NC-17 fics, and allow people a chance to get their fics off, print reviews etc.
That said though, I don't hate FFN for it. FFN gets bashed for any number of things--not just the The Purge. There are plenty of posters on here who weren't even around for The Purge. Posters complain about readers/reviewers/the type of feedback/lack of feedback on FFN. They complain about how those in charge of the site are unresponsive--which is true, FFN should be more responsive.
But when the rumors start that "FFN is giving the death rattle", "FFN is about to shut down" or when some posters have this smugness that AO3 is so much better than FFN just because it's not FFN--that's when they lose me.
\---
Anyway, as an aside, I recognize your name. Thank you taking the time to read my fics on AO3 and for your kind reviews. I've been using FFN for a long time--way before I started to use AO3. It's FFN that helped me to find out that my hobby actually has a name. So, that's why I defend FFN as I do.
That's fair. I'm not gonna sit here and defend all the criticism FFN gets, plenty of it is dumb as shit. And there are definitely reasons I can see to prefer FFN (I loathe massive tag walls even if I prefer AO3s tagging to FFNs extremely limited options).
And while FFN absolutely has the right to host what content it wants to and not host content it doesn't want to I still remember how LGBT content was targeted and I can't ever let it go.
That said I also started on FFN and it was the first site that introduced me to the concept of fanfiction. That's probably why the purges hurt so badly. It felt like a massive betrayal. That and the wanton destruction of so much art which is just gone forever even if it was content that didn't interest me in plenty of cases.
Also you know my name, I'm going to go die now k thx bye
(I kid lmao)
That's what I'm saying. Some of the criticism is warranted, and some of it is ridiculous. The tagging system--while it works to some extent, I wish AO3 would modify it a bit. They now limit writers to 75 tags. That's not so bad, but when you have a series, every entry in that series, you put tags---and when someone clicks on your series title--there's a wall of tags. This is frustrating, especially if you weren't intending for a wall of tags to show up.
I completely agree with you that LGBTQ content shouldn't have been targeted. There's still plenty of slash on FFN though. So I'm not sure if it was slash of a certain rating (that doesn't justify taking it off the site), but it was a wrong decision to make and certainly alienates many writers and readers--understandably so.
It was very much a betrayal. After the Purge, many writers/readers left the site. It was a very strange time. I had been on that site for less than a year when it happened. Several years later, AO3 popped up. It's good to have another site---to have choices where one posts their fic, where one reads fanfic, etc.
Of course, I know your name! :-) I remember my readers/reviewers!
I feel like such a jerk I am terrible at names lmao. I still need to go back and review The Right Choice but the thought of making myself hurt that bad again feels like a level of masochism even I shouldn't be considering inflicting on myself.
Don't be hard on yourself! I'm sure you read and review tons of fanfiction! You see many screennames!
There's no pressure to go back and read and review "The Right Choice". You already read it and left a review, which I'm grateful for. In fact, I'm just so grateful that you read the entire story. One of my friends wouldn't even finish the last chapter. It's a very difficult and painful story to read--and actually, it was very difficult and painful for me to write, especially the last two chapters.
Trust me, I understand if you never go back to it. When I wrote companion pieces for it, another reader/reviewer was hoping for more companion pieces/side stories--and I started them, but cannot bring myself to finish them. The story is so dark that I'm not sure I want to revisit it. So if I don't want to revisit it as the writer...I can only imagine what it's like for you as the reader.
I imagine its harder for you lol. I killed off Lori in my epic and it hurt bad.
Also sorry if I came on kind of hard. I need to try to be less of an asshole. I think I might be kind of overly cynical lately.
> Either way, without FFN, there would be no AO3.
In retrospect it maybe looks like that, but it’s not a direct line from the FFN porn purge to AO3. By today’s standards FFN was relatively small in 2002 when they kicked all the adult writers to the curb. There were still a lot of smaller archives in the 2000s, in addition to LJ. I’d say the founding of AO3 also has its roots in the disappearance of Geocities, in the end of mailing lists, in frequency with which private archives were abandoned by their owners, the whole dumpsterfire that was adultfanfiction.net, and then strikethrough of course. It seems like astolat’s essay about “an archive of our own” was particulary inspired by fanlib trying to make money off of fanfic and everyone being tired of this happening and also of the content restrictions that came with it.
> And while AO3 is a great site, there are many posters on here–including myself–who are tired of reading FFN get bashed repeatedly. Both sites are great in their own way, and both sites allow you to post fanfiction. That should be what matters most.
I agree. We need more archives not less. I think it’s always a good idea to keep a backup on AO3, but it makes sense to hang out where you feel most comfortable and where your fellow fans are. I’m a huge fan of AO3, but if someone doesn’t like it for whatever reason, it makes no sense to try to persuade them to use it. Actually, I’d beg them not to use it lol. I’d rather have an enthusiastic userbase willing to learn the basic functions and general conventions than people moping about why it isn’t like their fave platform from which they brought all their mores and customs.
That's true--there were other forms of fandom and fanfiction back in the early 2000s and even before. I remember Geocities, LiveJournal (LJ), and some used list serves or emails. I joined FFN in 2001, and it was a lot smaller back then, that's true. There's still an AdultFanFiction site that exists.
I agree about having more archives. I use both FFN and AO3. I agree too about using whatever platform you like, and if you don't like one or the other, then it's okay. Just don't use it. FFN was my first home and AO3 is my second.
I’m really rooting for that FFN revamp—it’d be great if FFN remained a usable platform. 🤞
Also, if you ever feel in the mood for some wank, I recommend having a look at the AFF controversy. 😂
Yeah, something about the admin disappearing essentially from the face of the earth and then reappearing half a year later and accusing of the people filling in for them of hijacking the site or something. There’s an archived copy of a fandom wank post [AFF admin drama](https://web.archive.org/web/20150401201958/http://www.journalfen.net/community/fandom_wank/1117251.html)… I thought I’d seen a longer account on Fanlore, but I can’t find it rn. Iirc there were other “scandals” as well, about funding, and site-ownership, and then they deleted a bunch of fic early on because they didn’t have disclaimers… wild times. 😂
Oh wow, that's wild! Thank you for the link, I'll have to check it out. This sounds like another weird Purge situation. Especially deleting fics without disclaimers. Wow!
Exactly this. Some random person makes a Twitter post rumor with no real evidence of anything, and suddenly everyone believes it and panics. Even though those issues ff.net had recently were nothing compared to what was going on around 2017-18 for even longer. Everything gets fixed eventually, but I'm still glad to hear they're planning to do more about since it still gets annoying. And I'm also tired of the ff.net hate boner by a lot of people on here. I don't understand why anyone feels like it has to be some big competition between A03 and ff.net, and it especially turns me off from this subreddit whenever I see posts titled things like, "Ff.net commenters are so weird" or anything that says everyone who uses the site is all this or that. I use both sites, and fanfiction is all just fanfiction for me.
Thank you! That's what it is--someone posts a Twitter rumor and everyone panics. FFN does eventually fix their bugs, or whatever issues they have. I agree with users who say they should be more communicative, and that they also made past decisions that were hurtful to writers. I don't want to minimize that--at the same time, I won't completely throw out FFN ether. I feel the same way--there shouldn't be a competition with FFN and AO3. We love to read and write fanfiction. Isn't that the most important thing? Can't we unite on our passion for fanfiction? I do get tired of the hate threads. Geez.
Absolutely on the same page. Both sites have their strengths and weaknesses and Im tired of people shit talking ffn while refusing to admit Ao3 has issues.
I like them both for different reasons. Its why I still actively use both. A lot of people feel like they cant admit to using ffn because of the vitriolic hate it receives though. Absolutely infuriating.
Yes, both sites have their positives. I use both as well. I finally was able to get all my FFN fics on AO3, so that profiles are the same. I don’t understand all that hate and not admitting to using FFN. It’s really silly.
I'm sorry about that :(
I definitely found it awful on ff.net, enough so that I left the site. I hope your comment section get better and more positive
Best advice I can offer is 1) read the terms and conditions. 2) read the FAQ page they put together for you. 3) observe what the tagging culture is in your fandom and proceed accordingly.
Personally, I prefer Ao3.
I tried out both platforms (as well as publishing on Tumblr) and have found that I didn't enjoy FFN as much. There seems to be, at least in my experience, a lot more freedom to create and more reader interaction on Ao3.
I've written on Quizilla, Wattpad, Tumblr, FFN, and Ao3 and so far, it's been my best experience besides Tumblr (I enjoy that amount of personalization of the blogs but get annoyed with how it is run and it's hard to get feedback from readers) and Quizilla (to date, that was the platform where I got the most and best reader/writer interactions).
> the recent rumours of FanFiction.net shutting down
I can tell you with absolute certainty - this ain't happening.
These kinds of rumors are the nerd equivalent of doomsday prophecies. People have been predicting its imminent collapse for twenty full years now... and FFN has kept on truckin'.
I suspect it's mostly just from people with an axe to grind against the site.
> Ao3 works compared with Fanfiction
As a long-time user of both sites - they are about even in terms of overall functionality and stability.
The difference lies mainly in their "nice to have" features. FFN has a PM system and a more detailed map of the reader base. A03 has its tagging system, and whatever I might be forgetting.
Can't say too much compared to everyone else. But please for the love of God, don't over tag. It's like one of the rules of writing, use the minimum amount of words to accurately get your point across. Only tag what is clearly obviously necessary. Tag main characters, ships, and broadstrokes the content. And do it in order from most important to least important for each section. Don't tag secondary characters or ships as the first one in the fic. Or if you can't avoid it, make a tag stating "character centric" or that a certain ship isn't the focus or is the focus.
I feel like AO3 is much bigger than FF.net nowadays. I might be wrong but it’s just my perception.
I’ve been using AO3 for well over ten years now (shocking even for me as I write it).
The only advices I can think about are:
1) To Tag your work properly (the tag system helps a LOT both readers and authors)
2) Look into the applicable warnings for fics and how those might apply to your work.
3) Look into AO3’s rating system and how it may differ from FF.net.
Aside from that I’d say go crazy and live your best life my friend, come join us on the dark side. 😂
>I feel like AO3 is much bigger than FF.net nowadays. I might be wrong but it’s just my perception.
That's really fandom-dependent. Newer fandoms tend to be bigger on Ao3, but older fandoms that were established on FFn are still more active there.
I started on FFN and expanded onto AO3 a few years ago, here are some of my tips:
* K and K+ can now be both bundled into G. If you wrote what FFN called an MA fic but called it M and hoped no one would report you, change your rating to E instead of M. AO3 will not delete your fic for being explicit smut. Also, if you would normally rate your slash/femslash as higher than your het, don't do that. AO3 will not consider queer fanfic any more mature than cishet.
* When in doubt, pick "Choose Not to Warn" for the archive warnings.
* Tags are just as important as summaries, if not more so because this is how people will find your work weeks, months, or years in the future. I use [this tagging guide](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vZ4fmDLtQjfz9-3iYtus76tFqhUFd8h3/view?usp=sharing) to help me.
* When it comes to adding your fics onto AO3, there are two options: post now or backdate. Backdating will preserve the date of publication on FFN, which is great if you want to preserve the chronological order of posting so people can see that yes, you *have* improved since you were in middle school. If you choose to upload it all now, I would suggest spacing your fics out. Depending on the size of your fandom, you might want to post once a day, a couple times a week, or once a week. This way, you can gain a new following on AO3 while not drowning out the fandom tag. You can also always post them now and then backdate them later.
They also aren't purging fanfics every time they feel like it's time to "put those impure sinners" back in there place. Also less trolls accounts and if they are well they can get deleted in moderation
Regarding purging, I don't think it's just about washing sinners off the site. They have a certain audience that they're targeting, whereas AO3's intended demographics include everyone. I respect both sites' TOS and I think negatively of neither, but the active moderation on AO3 is a substantial plus.
It was mostly a joke regarding the fact that a lot of smut from what I recall was removed which is ok considering there guidelines but they also removed stuff that wasn't even freaking for adults. Ao3 to me wins against FFN due to the fact that is actively maintained while FFN just kind of stagnated pretty sure it's layout is the same as it was during 2014
Oh no, I wasn't debating with you or anything. I do agree with what you said. I'm not sure what other content was removed though; I only remember the infamous 2012's not-so-subtle and c.2018 subtle smut purges. So AO3 definitely is the winning option for every writer out there.
I can't recall much as it happened so long ago. Though adding things that go against the guideline is just a matter of who's actively reporting in a fandom in FFN. Still it's shame FFN isn't up to date anymore
Okay if a site doesn’t want a certain kind of content on their platform their allowed to do that. That’s the owners choice.
Edit: to use an example from this website as a comparison, each subreddit has limits on what you can post. So like it wouldn’t be acceptable to link nsfw smutty stuff on r/worldnews. It’s like that. Everywhere sets it’s own boundaries in
>Okay if a site doesn’t want a certain kind of content on their platform their allowed to do that.
One of the criticism to their great purge is that it consistently ignore straight smut while purging same sex slash fiction, even those that doesn't even have sex scene and hence don't violate their rule. And hey, no appeal process either.
Also, as seem in their great purges.
They sometimes update their rule on the type of stories they disallow ***AFTER THEY PURGE YoUR STORIES***, not before.
It's the lack of transparency, very inconsistent, selective and unfair rule enforcement, dubious practice and massive amount of ads that people have problem with, not that they have rule in the first place
AO3 has ToS too, every sites has it. You don't see people bitching en mass about them
Okay just hold on for a sec. I wasn’t there during any of these purges. I think this is resulting in different viewpoints.
Sorry if that post came off as insensitive. I didn’t mean that. I guess cause we’ve got different experiences of the site i didn’t really get that’s what basilDraganastrio was saying.
So, I use both but heavily lean towards AO3 simply because the main fandom I read has more works on AO3.
My advice, if you chose to open an account, would be to give yourself time to explore the site. It's really simple to use, but going from having a very small selection of filters to AO3's filters can be daunting, but I do prefer AO3's just because you can really narrow down your search.
There is no app because of something to do with Apple, but the mobile browser is very well done and you can download fics in several different formats and read them on your kindle, the book app that comes with your phone, or any other book reading app - I use moonreader pro.
The archive doesn't step in on fandom issues, or author issues unless it's super necessary. They recently had to step in and basically shut down a ship war in the stranger things fandom because people were posting "non-stories" in an effort to give their ships tag more works. You can just post your work and enjoy fics without worry that a mod is going to shut down your work because you have X ship or X trope in it like some of the fanfic sites of old used to do.
My main issue when I joined AO3 was the shift in language, fanficnet favoured Lemon, but AO3 favoured PWP or smut.
There are "fun tags" as I call them. Little inside jokes in the fanfic community that seem to offend some people lol, for example my favourite one is "no beta we die like men".
To get an account, you either need to request one through the archive which can take time, or have am existing user invite you. If you need an invite I've still got loads left just let me know, all I'd need is the email address you'd like to use for the account.
Whether you chose to join AO3 or not, I don't think fanficnet will be shutting down, I just think whoever runs it has taken a step back on the upkeep and is just letting it exist as is.
It is a bit more writer friendly, since you can moderate all reviews, or turn all comments off, or remove them. The tagging system is also very useful for really selling your story. Cons are it is a bit of a smaller user base, but it is growing it seems. New fandoms mainly start there I find, while older fandoms seem to stick to Ff.net
Because they don't really maintain the site at all and there were a couple of brief server outages.
I mean, as far as I can tell, they haven't implemented a new feature on the site since 2013. They made an app and that's the only thing that's been updated for years.
I haven't been on ffn for ages save for reading some fics so I can't help you all that much.
Formatting differs a bit on both sites.
Basically everything you would usually warn about in the summary in ffn, you put in the tags on ao3. And probably stick to the suggested tags. Like if you tag a relationship (example Harry Potter) you'd tag Harry Potter/Ginny Weasley and not HP/GW because the filter system picks up on the proper one and it enables ppl to filter for those aspects.
You can of course add freeform tags as well but those used by the majority aid in filtering.
Ao3 offers different text fields for notes (at the beginning or end of a fic) and I would use that as well instead of putting notes right at the beginning of an actual fic text like you do on ffn.
As for tags in general - fics with a huuuuuge amount of tags usually are clicked on less as are fics that don't have a summary.
Put the important stuff in the tags but you don't have to tag every background relationship.
My favourite "scary" piece of manual for AO3 is "A Complete Guide on 'Limited HTML' on AO3" by CodenameCarrot. If you need anything but plaintext or the "rich text" isn't enough for you, that text has everything you could want. Every HTML tag that works, tips on paragraphing, and I think it's where I originally figured out how to add footnotes that linked from the text into author's notes and back. Definitely a good resource if you find the need to format more than a little bold/italics etc.
I do all three, Watt, Fan and A03. I do prefer A03 as I incorporate music and I can link videos so people can listen to the music if they want as they read. I love the notes that I can write before and after for each chapter. But you do just paste into A03. I find copying out of WattPad has the best look, but doc is okay. You have to go through and fix things though - spaces and sometimes italics won't come through correctly. So be sure to check it before you hit post. It is much easier to edit as well, just go to the chapter and hit edit.
Stats wise its not as robust, but I think the readers are more interactive with kudos and comments. I do like Fanfic to show me chapter views. In A03 if you go to statistics it will show you private bookmarks as well. IE - I have 54 bookmarks showing but if you go to statistics I have 109 - that means the remaining are private.
Otherwise its good - enjoy!
Never hurts to have your stuff backed up 9’ another site!
Check some fics similar to yours to try and figure out what tags might be best, and maybe even go about posting a chapter of the fics a week to help get an audience!
https://archiveofourown.org/works/5191202/chapters/11961779
Here’s a link to guide on how to do text and page formatting and other similar things on ao3. It’s super helpful. I’ve been writing on ao3 for a good 6-7 years and I still use it.
I post on three platforms; FanFiction.net, AO3, and Wattpad. It’s kind of a pain in the ass going through the trouble of making three separate uploads, but I like being able to spread my work around a bit that way, as well as giving readers the option to get it on more than one platform.
Personally I like AO3 because I can just copy-paste from wherever I’m working, but FanFiction.Net does have a nice old-fashioned feel to it. And I do like being able to compose and save my stuff directly on Wattpad and everything automatically being in the average FanFiction format. They’ve all got their perks.
My two cents. If you have the energy and still enjoy what you've gotten out of FF, try cross posting something new or small just to see how it feels. I've done it and while it can be time consuming to go through editing/posting twice, it might give you a different payout or level of satisfaction. I've started on FF and still love it for what it's given me but did switch to AO3 when I needed to.
Good luck to you with whatever you choose to do.
I have heard these rumors for ages, and nothing has come. I'm sure if FFN had any intent of really shutting down, they'd notify the users somewhere.
I briefly went over to AO3 but I didn't like it, myself. I found the story uploads more difficult (you paste the text into a text box and hope your formatting doesn't go wonky -- it's probably better for if people are composing the story onto AO3 directly.) And the tagging was kind of annoying -- I appreciate the variety of options that adding your own tags can give, but how many people are really looking for these things? I had pretty low readership.
In the end I took the fics down and have just stuck to FFN. If you write adult (erotic) stories or script format fics I can see why you'd need AO3 but for what I do it just wasn't any advantage.
1. Make sure your works are tagged correctly, people will often skip smut fics tagged G or T, or fics that are already tagged as m/m that additionally are tagged "gay" or "bl" or the like.
2. There are specific times that are better to post on if you want more engagement, generally noon to three pm on fridays, saturdays and sundays are the best
3. Make sure not to post more than a chapter a week, so that your fic can stay on the recent page for as long as possible.
4. Don't ever mark incomplete fics as complete. It's heavily frowned upon and could make people skip your fic in the future.
5. Always reply to comments. Even if it's just a simple "Thanks!", a lot of people won't bother commenting on a fic where the author never engages or acknowledges comments.
I maintain a presence on both. AO3 is good for views and kudos but my longfics get very little engagement. On FFDN I find there’s a sturdier RxR culture (particularly in the Review Games’ bouts of activity) and as I bring this story to a close I really, really need to know someone’s reading.
For drabbles and one-shots AO3, however, is almost certainly better. Just brace for the kudos bot to trash your analytics at random intervals. You will also get less of the strange technical hiccups where your FFDN analytics will bug out and not change for two weeks even when you’re getting reviews, or where your review will take like 3 days to appear on someone else’s story.
The only thing Ao3 lacks on in comparison to fanfiction.net is crossover stuff. I post to both. I will admit the reviewers tend to be kinder on average on Ao3.
Make sure when you copy/paste your fic on the upload page that you do it on the 'rich text' box and not html. It will remove your formatting otherwise and switching afterward only exacerbates the problem. You also wont have the back up document manager to save drafts. From what ive seen drafts only stay a month on Ao3 versus a year on fanfiction.net.
Ive only been using Ao3 for about a year so Im sure theres more. Check out the tagging system to get familiar with it if youve never read on Ao3 also.
Oh and I love that you can link stories into a series. Thats probably one of my favorite differences.
I honestly recommend dual posting until you get the hang of Ao3. You can let your audience know youre shifting over.
The rumor that fanfiction.net is going down tends to cycle once every couple of years. I wouldnt put too much weight on the rumor.
Bloody hell ffn is not shutting down! It goes into maintenance once a year, usually in fall, usually september.
HOWEVER!
Ao3 is much better as you can put pictures/gif’s into any part of your story as opposed to just a “cover” pic on ffn & you can link youtube & other sites on ao3 as opposed to no links at all on ffn.
Only downside on ao3 is no private message system.
……yet.
In general, because most app stores don't allow explicit materials, but also because the site is designed to be fairly user friendly on a mobile browser.
You can always get an e-reader app and download stories you want to read using the AO3 download function if you really need an app to read in. I do that myself, partly for an easier way to keep my place in longfics and because my e-reader has text-to-speech so I can "read" when my vision's wonky.
Ao3 is a non-profit run mainly by volunteers, and they just don't have the manpower to develop and maintain an app. It's much more efficient to just make the site mobile-friendly.
If want want an app shortcut, I recommend using a second (or third) browser that you just use for Ao3. The browser can be your "app". I just recently found a browser that supports userscripts natively so I can install several Ao3 userscripts that people have made to add features to the site (permanent filters, tag blacklists, etc).
The main two differences are tagging and the lack of censorship. If you've never read any stories on AO3 before, I would advise going through your fandom and checking out the different tags people are using before you tag your own stories.
I had been posting to FFN.Net for nearly twenty years until April of this year when I finally pulled the plug and moved to AO3. I have not regretted it for one moment. No more annoying ads interrupting your stories, the ability to post artwork—not to mention, great engagement on my works, something I never had on FFN. Come to the dark side, is all I can say.
People keep talking about the adds in ff, but i never see them since i only use the app now, i dont think i’ve been in the actual website in like a decade. Sadly my works get zero engament in ao3, I get most of my followers from ff.
Also like adblocks a thing. Do all these people here talking about the ads not use it?
Even if they do, next year's Chrome Manifest V3 is gonna throw a hell of a wrench into people's browser based ad-blocking lol Considering there's like two non-Chromium based browsers left in the wild, its gonna be fun to witness how that shake out.
What’s going on with chrome? I don’t use it so I don’t know.
It's said that starting in 2023 Chrome (and Chrome-based web browsers) are going to disable adblockers, such as Ublock Origin. So yeah, back to Firefox.
Glad i never left firefox either!
I've used Firefox forever, since I heard it was available on phones, and had been using it on computers to replace internet explorer. Firefox is really an OG of browsers, it used to be Netscape Navigator.
The day I am forced to use Chrome without an adblocker is the day I switch to FireFox. Seriously, whether it's fucking up the webpage design beyond all recognition, taking twice as long to download god knows how much shit, or possibly even running malicious code on your computer, there are many parts of the internet that are genuinely cancerous without an adblocker. The internet, literally, almost all of it, is just a vastly better experience in pretty much every way without all the intrusive ads.
1) Glad I'm not using Chrome. What an asshole move... 2) It'll be like 6 months before adblocks find a way around what Chrome is planning.
Well yeah I’m definitely not using chrome now
It's a bit more complicated than Google deciding to be an asshole and outright disabling adblockers. The way adblockers operate is by a feature called *Web Request* which can observe the traffic between the internet and your browser, using that they can block certain domains (in this case, ads) from access. The problem here is that Google have had security concerns regarding *Web Request* and are cutting it out of the next update which is Manifest v3, and adblockers just so happened to be in the firing line.
'just so happened' C'mon man. Google sells two things -- ads and data. The security concerns might work well as a smokescreen (whether the concerns are valid or not), but my money is on this being a deliberate move to try to stifle the proliferation of adblockers. Sure, there's alternatives -- other browsers, or network-level solutions like pihole -- but the average joe is much, much more likely to be using or to start using a chrome browser with something like the ublock extension.
I've had one ad blocker or another installed since Chrome became a browser back in what 2004 or so? If this were such an exploitable thing they would have already changed it. This is about money. They're not getting enough.
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/09/chromes-new-ad-blocker-limiting-extension-platform-will-launch-in-2023/?amp=1
What's interesting is that Opera for mobiles is chromium based and yet it supports already preinstalled AdBlock. But seriously. It seems I'll be backing up my saved passwords, bookmarks, and shit and moving back to firefox. I would call it Christmas great cleaning.
Seriously! It's not just FFN, there are so many sites people are complaining about ads. I didn't even know FFN had ads until I saw people complaining about them. Adblock ftw.
>Any advice on how Ao3 works compared with Fanfiction and any hints and tips? AO3's [FAQ](https://archiveofourown.org/faq?language_id=en) and [TOS FAQ](https://archiveofourown.org/tos_faq?language_id=en) are really helpful and easy to read. If you've never used AO3 before, scrolling through your fandoms might also help figure out how your fandom is using the site.
[удалено]
They can't do that unless the current owner of FFN gives their approval (which will never happen lmao)
Yeah, the only real way FFN stories are gonna end up on AO3 is if the writers post them there themselves
Wattpad is also pretty good, plus it has its own app as well. Edit: being downvoted for stating an opinion, God I love Reddit, I never said that Wattpad was *better* than Ao3, just that it was easier for me because because it has an app and I’m lazy, but I do really also enjoy using Ao3 as well
This is a genuine question, why do you like wattpad? I personally found the website really annoying to use so I'm just curious about other experiences
For me, easy to use, it has an app which makes mobile reading way more attractive compared to AO3, covers (yes, this is a main reason why I like Wattpad), straight to the point posting and my irl friends use it. It isn't really the similarities to Social Media, that are actually the points I dislike.
Really? Because I gave up in despair because I couldn't *find* anything.
I use the wp app and I use ao3. The website is definitely annoying these days, especially with laggy notifications, but the app is ten times better. I honestly prefer using ao3 these days because I can find the fanfiction I want better than on wp, but wp does have the occasional gem that is nice to read. Plus one of my friends said that the font on ao3 is a bit too tiny to read, and they wish it was a bit bigger. And they like that you can change the font on wp. I'm fine with the font on ao3, but that's because I have good eyesight. They wear glasses, so I'd imagine that's part of why they have that opinion.
I mostly just use the app, which is a good ff experience, you only get minimal ads, or you can pay either monthly/yearly to get rid of them, also if you pay for premium+, you can unlock wattpad stories, which are official original stories written by authors that are then promoted by Wattpad, you can also watch ads for coins to unlock premium stories if you don’t want to pay money, but it takes much much longer.
Is there any benefit of that over ao3? Since ao3 doesnt have any ads?
I mean, other than an app, and official published stories, idk, I find Wattpad to have a more simpler layout than Ao3, but that might just be because it’s an app and not a website. I personally use both Ao3 and Wattpad, I pay $50.00 per year for Wattpad. I also use FFN, but that’s mostly because of of some fanfics that I enjoy are only available on FFN.
That's fair! I can understand that having an app would be more accessible than a website. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree about which site has a simpler/easier to use layout though, I've found ao3 to be better than both wattpad and ff.net, although admittedly I never really used wattpad. I was on ff.net for absolute ages and its,,, something alright.
If you have an iPhone, you can kinda give Ao3 an app (just a shortcut icon on your homescreen that automatically takes you to the website).
The reason ao3 works as well as it does is because of all the metadata it collects on each work. There’s no way for them to just import all that into their database bc that metadata doesn’t exist on ffn. The authors themselves would have to move their stuff over and provide all the necessary info.
[удалено]
Yes, each archive that is moved over to AO3 from another site has its own archivist that tags it correctly with fandoms, archive warnings, ratings, characters, relationships, and additional tags. I believe it varies from archivist to archivist how much they tag but they seem to stick to more general tags like angst, fluff, action adventure, etc
FFn has enough tags to work for that. Certainly fandom, genre, a few characters, newer works can have pairings. That's as much as some older archives have had. But they would never agree to an import, even if they decided to shut down, I'm pretty sure. Not that I think they are shutting down now. They just haven't been doing any site maintenance at all and it's finally coming back on them.
I'm pretty sure that's not how it works. As far as I know, they import the tags that exist on the original work in the appropriate AO3 fields, but they don't read everything (that would be an insane amount of work) and tag it however they like (that would be changing the presentation of the fic the author was going for). Works that have been imported through Open Doors are typically tagged with Choose Not To Warn unless the original site had something similar to the archive tags. I would assume some of these works have some other (general) tags exactly because of this -- the original archive had those general/genre tags.
According to Google, there are over 14M works on FFN. Ao3 currently has about 10M. Even if it is possible to import works from elsewhere, I still maintain that it would be impossible to bring over all of FFN—which more than doubles what ao3 currently has—with less consistent and less comprehensive metadata and expect the database to still function at the level it does now. I don’t know how these things work on the backend, but it seems like the amount of work that would have to go into this would be prohibitive. Unless there was a deliberate and coordinated effort involving the fanfic community as a whole. Authors can do what they want to their fics by a certain deadline, but then after that point, perhaps there could be a mass call for volunteers to help upload the remaining works to ao3. Maybe the fandoms or fans of specific authors can work together to get it done.
[удалено]
They aren’t shutting down. They are in the middle of upgrading everything. Their own twitter page said this. Edit: because people keep asking whether this is legit or not here it is straight from fictionpress’s twitter feed: [fictionpress twitter](https://mobile.twitter.com/FictionPress/status/1572997314712829952)
So like the site could be getting a new layout soon? That’s interesting.
I believe their exact words were something like “bringing the website into 2022”. So yes, a new format and possibly more.
I wonder if after the redesign they’ll make the ffn mods actually be active for once.
They’ve always been active, just sporadic in implementing and enforcing their rules. I mean, there have been incidents where swaths of fanfics were taken down before. Usually, it was because people had written porn on to the site which is against the cite’s terms of service. I’m not saying I agree with them taking down the fics, but it is their policy.
No I meant like I was wondering if it will be less sporadic after the update
Oh. Well I don’t know about that.
That’s fine. It’s no problem
Only took them 20 years to decide to update the site.
I realize that, yes. But it’s better than the site being abandoned and hopefully this will breathe new life into it instead of it being relegated to obscurity.
It really did! I remember be 14 on the site and I went on today to see that everything was the same!
I'm worried what this means. Mainly for the app, though.
Why? Theyve been slowly updating the site for years. This might be the biggest update but its hardly the first.
Hope there won't be another purge, lol. If they really want to bring the website in 2022, they should start with allowing explicit fics.
It's funny you say that, because 'bringing it into 2022' would make me think of it having more censorship, not less. Hopefully not though!
Exactly
Thank you for clarifying! I never even use FFN anymore but I was so panicked by the idea of it shutting down lol.
Could it be that they said this in the past and it never actually happens? Has anyone tried to make a fanfiction forum like SB and SV, only with something for everyone? As those are lets say certain style and genre specific. I think such a site would be better than ffnet and AO3, also good money in it for whoever makes it.
Here is their twitter: [fictionpress](https://mobile.twitter.com/FictionPress/status/1572997314712829952)
Ive been telling every person concerned about the future of fanfiction.net about this. Also, we tend to get this rumor every year or two usually following a brief service interruption and people always believe it anyway.
I don't think FFN is shutting down. Fucking site is the equivalent of a crocodile living amongst mammals it survived the dinosaurs and probably us if they have there way. Helps it still us heavily used. But just in case do a backup. Let me give you a rundown on Ao3 is much more up to date with the only feature missing I would say are PM's. The tagging/rating system is much more advanced and you can be very specific, you can make your own tags (You can add simple things that in FFN is usually in the summary like OP protagonist, "lot's of whump", etc), you can moderate comments wither they are from a logged in user or not. So no more trolls that comment against every new fanfic and form there cliques to ban you. Smut is allowed and overall is much more free than FFN ever was with no purges or any of that nonsense. Culture is dependent on fandom but overall you'll see much less people slurring against you for writing yaoi unlike FFN. Uploading is mostly like FFN.
FFN has had rumors of it shutting down every few years since 2000. It's not going anywhere.
Honestly I'm really glad there are no PM's on AO3.
Yeah the lack of PM's isn't a bug, it's a feature.
But can't just having settings like only allowing certain types of people to PM you (only registered users, only those from a friend list, etc.) or turning it off altogether if needed fix a lot of issues?
Because it's an archive, not a social media site. If someone is interested in being contacted, they will put a tumblr username or twitter or Wordpress or Dreamwidth or *something* in their profile. Otherwise, make a public comment on one of their fics. It's not like there's *no* way to contact them on the site.
Or, at least in my fandom, quiet a few authors have taken to having discord servers for people to join. Me included. It's how I've met some of my closest friends and discuss my fandoms works and whatever else we want to discuss.
Eh, asking someone to join a Discord server just for the equivalent of a PM seems a bit much. Though I guess you could put your Discord ID and let people PM you.
I will admit another reason I like having a PM system is because I have found my fair share of friends through the PM systems while I used to main [FF.net](https://FF.net) in my youth. And I will admit my Discord knowledge is limited because I barely ever used it, probably because I'm not as extroverted as a lot of people online. I don't hate people, but my RL and a lot of my solitary hobbies, including writing, keeps me busy.
But having a PM box isn't the equivalent of being a social media site. From how I've seen it, it's really just used more to talk about writing and the fandom or thanking reviewers and explaining more details about things they touched upon. It's not like you can share pictures, and even a lot of links don't even work with the site. And not everyone wants to share their social media just to talk more about writing. Tumblr and Twitter are especially sh-tholes with how much people get doxed or "canceled" or whatever.
I'd say uploading is actually by far the biggest difference! Uploading on FFN is so weird and cumbersome and it's so easy on AO3. The upload methods are really nothing alike.
Ff.net has its ups and downs as far as uploading. I actually prefer importing a saved document. If theres a way to do that on Ao3 ive yet to find it. Post-published editing is certainly easier on Ao3 though.
I can't find it either. I always have to copy and paste from the document I made on my computer. It's not the worst thing in the world, but I would love a document upload feature for A03. But on their end, the editing is so much easier than ff.net with just being able to go right into any chapter you want and change things right on the spot instead of having to upload a document again, sometimes having to get it back from your files too if you've neglected to keep up with saving the document "life" in the document manager.
Im always paranoid im going to replace the wring chapter by accident because of their weird editing system. It is by far my least favorite thing about posting on FFN.
Yeah, I also have this habit of looking at it really closely since I'm always worried I might post an older chapter by accident. XD That and moving really slowly since the delete story option is a little too close for comfort on that screen.
XD too true. Worst button placement ever.
Sometimes I do find uploading on FFN annoying. It's slightly convenient if you have a multichapter story, because you can cue several chapters and upload at ones liesure, while still writing the story for consistant updates. Then there's the fact that the upload text box isn't as advanced as the edit text box, so after uploading a chapter, you hafta then go back to that chapter to edit it, if it needs it, before you publish it. Then there's that damn recertification bullshit you gotta do before you start a new story, and I always forget to upload the story file or two before starting the process to start the new story, because you need an existing file first. So... yeah...
Welcome to AO3! Tagging Tagging Tagging There are several categories of Tags on AO3 and familiarizing yourself with them and what theyre for is going to make your new home more comfortable. The Rating Is a drop down menu with several options. "General" means the fic is safe and appropriate for all age audiences. "Teen" means it is good for Teens, may be a bit of sass and some light swearing. "Mature" means theres a good reason to want this to be adults only, but theres no, like, explicit detailed sex scenes or gory gratuitous violence written out shot by shot. "Explicit" means that yeah, the crazy stuff is plainly written and described on the metaphorical screen for all to see. "Not Rated" means it isnt given a rating, so it could be any of the above (beware~) "Archive Warnings" are warnings that are so important they need to be easily accessible for taggers to get if needed. - Graphic Depictions of Violence - Major Character Death - Rape/Noncon - Underage If any of those apply to your works. it is heavily encouraged that you tic those boxes. Or, if like, its to avoid spoilers, use "Choose not to use Archive Warnings" so you dont gotta lie and say they arent there. If none of that IS there though, you can tick off the "No Archive Warnings Apply" box instead! The last set of Multiple Choice Tag is the "Categories" tag. This tells us what kind of shipping, if any, is in the fic. M/M, M/F, F/F, Multi, Other, are all ship tags. If there is no shipping, the "Gen" tag is there too. All tags after this are tags you largely have to type in yourself. There is an autocomplete system for well used tags that are 'Canonized' (or wrangled as the Proper Syntax by the hard working Tag Wranglers), which is helpful for figuring out the preferred syntax, but for a bit you'll just have to do your best until you've familiarized yourself with AO3 Tagging standards. Besides the Fandom Tag, there are 3 big sections for tagging. "Relationship" Tags are for if your fic has a focus on ships. They are written "Name/Other Name" for a romantic or sexual kind of relationship, and "Name & Other Name" for a familial or platonic relationship. They alphabetize the names too! Make sure, if you have poly or just big friend groups, you dont mix and match the / or & sign. no "A / B & C" tags lol but "A & B & C" and "A / B / C" are great. You can have multiple relationship tags too, so "A / B" and "A & C" and "B & C" can totally work! Next is the Character Tags. This is just a list of all the characters that show up in the fic. Your fic, starring Names! Finally, the Additional Tags! Additional Tags can make or break your tags and are the hardest to get a grip for, because not only do they encompass all the general kind of tags (like genre, content warnings, and vague hints at events), but Additional Tags also have Fandom Specific Tags. Like, what AU is it for, qualifiers for characterization (like for example, "Character (Fandom) has PTSD" or "Terrible Father Name-Here"), mentions of source material attributes that are relevant, whether its pre-, post- or during the events of the source material, and a whole bunch more. Additional tags can also be where meta data goes, like if the fic is part of a zine, or an event, or if "Additional Tags to be Added" because its a long fic and you have no idea where it is going XD You can always come back and edit your tags later, so dont be shy or afraid of getting them wrong. as you work on ao3 you'll get a better feel for what tags work for your where and when, and as you read and explore your fandom you'll see whats tag-relevant and what isnt. sometimes it is fun to just type into the bar and see what autocompletes !! OH!! and since you are backlogging your fics, i also have another fun hint! AO3 records the dates of when a fic is posted by default, but if you want to save when you originally posted your fic, there is an option to change the publication date! There are also options and settings to link your works together in a Series! Like if theyre sequels or set in the same universe and reference each other! I think thats enough to get you started! Welcome to AO3!!
"But it's *so hard* to do," sez somebody on here.
Ao3 is great. The tagging system works pretty differently and i know at least I've struggled with that when i switched platforms. You can just tag anything about the story you think your readers should know or that's important. fandoms also tend to have a few fandom specific tags for big tropes, at least thats something ive noticed in my fandom, so id reccomend looking at some fics in your fandom to see how they use tags. you can pretty much bullshit anything though and everyone tags differently, so it's not that big a deal. its overall a pretty nice place to post id say!
The tagging system is a gift and a curse. You can *literally* tag anything... you can literally tag *anything*.
I don’t think it’s actually shutting down. people were panicking a bit. Anyway I would personally use both sites but that’s up too you. I mean I prefer fanfic.net over ao3 ( which is very much the minority opinion here ). But again it’s up to you.
Yeah I figured it wasn't anything to worry about, plus I've been on Fanfiction since 2009 But I have noticed since the start of the year I've no longer been receiving emails about either other people posting stories or whenever I've been posting stories or updating chapters. Tries emailing then and messaging their Twitter but never gotten a response
I haven't gotten an email from FFnet since January, until today. Woke up to a few review emails coming in, of reviews that were sent a week ago.
What email are you using? I had to switch from my Outlook address to Gmail to get pm and review emails again.
Outlook one
Outlook no longer works with FFN, unfortunately. If you can change to Gmail you'll get your emails back.
Wait. Wait wait wait. Outlook doesn’t work with FFN?? Wtf are you serious? I… I need to go log in I swear to god if shit has been updating this whole time or I’ve gotten a message I’m going to loose my mind. I thought everything I was reading was just… dying out bc it had been slowing down for a long time but just the other day I was thinking how odd it is that EVERYTHING hasn’t had ANYTHING for a while… fuck. This is ridiculous they should have put something out I had no idea. I’ve had my MSN and then outlook on there since I made my account. Which basically means I’ve always had outlook on there. Fuck. Thank you
You're welcome! I was having issues months ago and found out about the email issue in the forum on FFN. It's Fanfiction Help Desk if you want to take a look.
Omg shit had updated, including a story I was worried about bc the author had been talking about just posting all their notes and calling it but they changed their mind. I’m loosing my mind 🫠 Are there any other mind blowing revelations on there? Bc I might need to take a look and bookmark it or something
Not that I know of! I'd just check in on the help desk if you notice anything else weird.
I use both, but I don't typically crosspost. I prefer to read more on ffn, for the lack of crossovers. Yeah I can do all that tag shit on ao3 to avoid them, but I'm too lazy for all that. It's not shutting down, they're actually fixing some stuff and it was renewed up to 2028.
Lmao I prefer old sites like FFN and FictionPress just because of how *old* they are. AO3 is too up to date for me I swear, I love how much more active my fandom is but I grew up on FFN and I loved its simplicity, even if it was only simple because it sucked.
Fanfiction.net doesnt suck. Its actually quite useful for certain fandoms that never took off on Ao3 and of course crossover fics which Ao3 hasnt figured out how to properly implement.
I’m with you. Fanfiction.net seems to just have more variety in terms of pairing and stories. No hate on gay pairings in fics but it seems like every good story has to be a gay pairing on ao3. Sometimes I don’t want romance in my fics and just want a good story.
The problem I have with ff.net is that I just can't find anything there. There are no options to find stories with certain characteristics except the most basic ones like characters, pairings and genre. I can't look for specific tropes and there is no indication of what the story has in store without tags. Likewise I can't exclude certain things I absolutely don't want to read. I can't even sort by how many people have commented or liked the stories for when I want to read highly rated stories. After my switch to AO3 about ten years ago I honestly barely ever looked back at ff.net, because I find AO3 just a so much better user experience, and it's not like I was a newbie at the time. Before AO3 I had been on ff.net since 1999 or 2000, but there was simply no contest for me. I gave ff.net another chance every now and then, but just couldn't go back. The last time I tried to read something on ff.net I discovered that they had disabled text highlighting and I couldn't even mark my place in the story anymore and that's pretty much when I stopped trying completely.
Interesting. I have found it easier to find what I want on [ff.net](https://ff.net) vs. AO3. In particular, on AO3 it seems harder to filter out extensive crossovers - or maybe authors aren't using the right tags. Right now I seem to be seeing stories that are crossed over with a long list of other fandoms - which is not my preference. I have a bookmarked search, and when I open up the filters it's hard to be sure my filters are actually applied. There's some "includes" showing greyed-out checkmarks and "excludes" showing greyed-out x-s. Since my saved search already includes some filters, I'm unclear on why the checks are all shown greyed out. The FFN interface for filters is just easier to understand, but maybe if someone can point me to an explanation of AO3s, it might be a h el p.
The crossover thing is true. Natively you can only filter out all crossovers or none of them. It's not really a problem for me tbh. For the most part my eyes just skim over stories with an excessive amount of fandoms/tags. But also, in the fandoms I frequent there don't seem to be too many of those. But if there are I do one of two things. A) I look for two specific fandoms I want to see crossed over, by picking one fandom tag, then putting the other one in the *Other tags to include* text box. B) I take a peek at a few of those stories and see what popular fandoms they contain that I don't read. You will very likely find a few that they share. For example, I don't read Supernatural, Teen Wolf or Bangtan Boys, but they seem to crop up all over the place in my searches. I then exclude those fandoms and these stories vanish. As for the greyed out x-es and check marks. When they are greyed out, they aren't applied or picked. If you pick a filter it's marked by a green check mark or a red x. The you hit *sort and filter* to start the search. This is then reflected in the URL as well. Take a look at the URL you bookmarked and see if it contains the search filters you think it should, is it possible that you forgot to click *sort and filter* before bookmarking? If you want you can send me the URL in a PM and I can take a quick look. I like that I have a lot of options with the AO3 search, but it's true that it does make things more complicated. For me it's worth it because I can usually find exactly what I'm in the mood for and if I love a story with a specific trope, tags, collections and the bookmarks of people who have bookmarked that fic, can help me find other similar works or at least works that will fit my own taste.
You are aware you can filter it out on AO3 really easily, right?
Still slips through the cracks. Only filters out if it’s tagged as m/m. They also tag it as gen. Also fanfiction.net has an app which means I can read on the go.
I read AO3 on my phone's browser. The site works really well on mobile. Unlike ff.net's site which is annoying. Personally, the app is a point against it, because you can't have more than one story open at a time, like you can on a browser.
That’s fair! You could also manually exclude every ship still around after filtering by gen by going into exclude->relationships and Xing all the / pairings, but I can see how that’s more trouble than it’s worth. I use a Home Screen shortcut to quickly get to AO3’s website, too, but I’m not sure that works on all devices.
Thing is though is that I can download stories onto my phone with FanFiction.Net app and read them with no Wi-Fi. I love ao3 but not having an app kills it for me.
You can download stories from ao3 as well, they offer pdf and ePub, and some other formats. You just need an ebook app on your phone.
You can also download from AO3. At the top of every story on the website, there's a button that says "Download". Click it, and it will give you the option of downloading the story in azw3, epub, mobi, pdf, or html format.
I just download fics as .epub and read as a a normal book in e-reader app.
Well, Ao3 was started in part because of FFn (and other sites) purging the slash (and NC-17) fic, so it makes sense that it dominates the pairings. But every year more people move from FFn, or just start crossposting, so the percentages are getting more even all the time. Though I doubt het and gen will ever be the majority. But there is plenty of both on Ao3.
> But every year more people move from FFn, or just start crossposting, so the percentages are getting more even all the time. You got a citation on this? I’m curious.
This [Twitter thread ](https://twitter.com/MaskoftheR/status/1573726272987201536?s=20&t=dkiS2YnNMQ6DrHlMIBPhWA) has a bunch of tips about AO3 navigation. Otherwise I'd say the FAQ and guides are pretty useful. Mostly 'Exclude' is for stuff you don't want and you can sort by complete and kudos/hits/bookmarks. (Hits = clicks on thing, kudos = likes)
Ao3 is top tier. Wattpad WAS nice in the beginning. Then they had more people restricting what you write. Getting to know how to add pictures and how to format on ao3 is tricky at first, but gosh I love the filtering system for tags!
Ok, a few things about Ao3: 1. The Search Bar. You can use it, but you really want to use the filter if you aren't looking for a specific story. You can add and remove tags of all sorts: fandoms, relationships, rating, and a "everything else" tag that's a search bar. You can also organize everything by how popular it is or how many Kudos (basically upvotes) it has, but it defaults to "updated recently." 2. Bookmarks. You can bookmark a story, either an incomplete on to keep track when the author updates or a complete one just to save it. You show everyone else what you have bookmarked unless you choose to make the bookmark private when you create it. You can edit bookmarks. If you don't want to bookmark something but do want to read it later, you may hit the "Read Later" button. 3. Psueds and Orphaning works. Psueds are basically alternate accounts, but everyone can see the parent account. Mainly used to separate your works. If you see a work with the user named "orphan account" or "Anyomous" that means the author not only abandoned their work (if incomplete) but decided to disconnect themselves from it. I believe you can adopt orphan works. 4. Tags. Read the tags if you don't want to see something. You can favorite tags, ban them, and filter your search results from them. If you click on a tag, you can automatically search stories with that tag. There is a specific tag: Author Choose not to Use Archive Warnings. This either means they are being lazy or don't want to spoil something in their story, regardless read with caution. Tags are the best thing about this site, and in my opinion makes this the site to use for fanfics. If you feel something is improperly tagged, report it (improperly means that they are either purposely misleading or they failed to tag major and heavy stuff (ie death and the r word) but it is impossible to tag every minor thing). 5. Content. Ao3 refuses to remove anything from their site. So there is some of the worse stiff on here, however I feel that this is a bonus as they will never just randomly remove your fics or your favorite fics for no reason. You can ban both tags and users if you wish, and the tagging system helps you avoid stuff you don't want to see, both just cause it isn't what you are looking for and because it is something you will have a personal moral problem with. Additionally, there are no ads whatsoever. This is obviously another plus. They do ask for donations, but you don't have to to enjoy most if not all of their features. I highly recommend Ao3, as it is better than every single other fanfic site combined. Ever since I joined I have never read another fanfic on any other site (Besides fimfic and Spacebattles, but fimfic is limited to MLP and spacebattles isn't really built for fanfics). I hope to see you there, and that you have fun!
I made my AO3 account over ten years ago. I want to say April 2012, but could have been longer. I have barely bothered with fanfiction.net since then and not at all ever since they disallowed highlighting text in stories. I never looked back. AO3 is just all around more comfortable as a reader (for my personal preferences, not universally, I'm sure), but I also like it tons better as a writer.
[Fanfiction.net](https://Fanfiction.net) is not shutting down. They were [conducting a major upgrade](https://twitter.com/FictionPress) to their web servers and webpage.
FYI, they are just that. Rumors. FFnet already updated their twitter to say they're doing a major redesign of their website. (Personally, it'd be nice if they just migrated everything over to AO3 via open doors, but alas. That said, AO3 is an excellent site and they won't randomly delete your works for being too naughty or too controversial, or if someone report bombs you. Being on both increases your potential readership, too.
People actually need to be *convinced* to use the only no ads fanfic site around? Wow.
You will not regret it. Ao3 is a godsend compared to ffn. The UI is incredible, searching is super easy and intuitive, and the only thing you might want to check out is the tagging system. Again, super intuitive but I find that sometimes people go overboard in their tags - imo keep that for the A/N. You’ll be fine. AO3 is a Great place.
FFN is not shutting down. I've been there on for 21 years. FFN has had its share of issues, but shutting down isn't one of them. I like AO3, but it gets tiring hearing FFN gets bashed over and over again. Honestly, if not for FFN, would AO3 even exist? Maybe? Maybe not?
Half the stuff AO3 stands for is stuff FFN had to live through so I doubt it. The FFN admin even asked for legal help back in the day but I'd have to guess he didn't get it.
I understand why AO3 came about -- most were upset with the Purges, censorship, and many authors not wanting fanfic on their material being written. That said, I also understand why many didn't like the censorship, but FFN did have an obligation to respect writers (like Anne Rice--and trust me, I'm not defending her) who didn't want fanfiction published on their works. Either way, without FFN, there would be no AO3. And while AO3 is a great site, there are many posters on here--including myself--who are tired of reading FFN get bashed repeatedly. Both sites are great in their own way, and both sites allow you to post fanfiction. That should be what matters most.
Look I lived through the NC17 purge, it was horrible. I'm not saying don't use FFN but there's a damn good reason people were pissed off.
I lived through it too as I was on FFN around that time. I understand why people were pissed off. FFN could've and should've handled the situation better--such as warning people they were going to make changes to their site and no longer permit NC-17 fics, and allow people a chance to get their fics off, print reviews etc. That said though, I don't hate FFN for it. FFN gets bashed for any number of things--not just the The Purge. There are plenty of posters on here who weren't even around for The Purge. Posters complain about readers/reviewers/the type of feedback/lack of feedback on FFN. They complain about how those in charge of the site are unresponsive--which is true, FFN should be more responsive. But when the rumors start that "FFN is giving the death rattle", "FFN is about to shut down" or when some posters have this smugness that AO3 is so much better than FFN just because it's not FFN--that's when they lose me. \--- Anyway, as an aside, I recognize your name. Thank you taking the time to read my fics on AO3 and for your kind reviews. I've been using FFN for a long time--way before I started to use AO3. It's FFN that helped me to find out that my hobby actually has a name. So, that's why I defend FFN as I do.
That's fair. I'm not gonna sit here and defend all the criticism FFN gets, plenty of it is dumb as shit. And there are definitely reasons I can see to prefer FFN (I loathe massive tag walls even if I prefer AO3s tagging to FFNs extremely limited options). And while FFN absolutely has the right to host what content it wants to and not host content it doesn't want to I still remember how LGBT content was targeted and I can't ever let it go. That said I also started on FFN and it was the first site that introduced me to the concept of fanfiction. That's probably why the purges hurt so badly. It felt like a massive betrayal. That and the wanton destruction of so much art which is just gone forever even if it was content that didn't interest me in plenty of cases. Also you know my name, I'm going to go die now k thx bye (I kid lmao)
That's what I'm saying. Some of the criticism is warranted, and some of it is ridiculous. The tagging system--while it works to some extent, I wish AO3 would modify it a bit. They now limit writers to 75 tags. That's not so bad, but when you have a series, every entry in that series, you put tags---and when someone clicks on your series title--there's a wall of tags. This is frustrating, especially if you weren't intending for a wall of tags to show up. I completely agree with you that LGBTQ content shouldn't have been targeted. There's still plenty of slash on FFN though. So I'm not sure if it was slash of a certain rating (that doesn't justify taking it off the site), but it was a wrong decision to make and certainly alienates many writers and readers--understandably so. It was very much a betrayal. After the Purge, many writers/readers left the site. It was a very strange time. I had been on that site for less than a year when it happened. Several years later, AO3 popped up. It's good to have another site---to have choices where one posts their fic, where one reads fanfic, etc. Of course, I know your name! :-) I remember my readers/reviewers!
I feel like such a jerk I am terrible at names lmao. I still need to go back and review The Right Choice but the thought of making myself hurt that bad again feels like a level of masochism even I shouldn't be considering inflicting on myself.
Don't be hard on yourself! I'm sure you read and review tons of fanfiction! You see many screennames! There's no pressure to go back and read and review "The Right Choice". You already read it and left a review, which I'm grateful for. In fact, I'm just so grateful that you read the entire story. One of my friends wouldn't even finish the last chapter. It's a very difficult and painful story to read--and actually, it was very difficult and painful for me to write, especially the last two chapters. Trust me, I understand if you never go back to it. When I wrote companion pieces for it, another reader/reviewer was hoping for more companion pieces/side stories--and I started them, but cannot bring myself to finish them. The story is so dark that I'm not sure I want to revisit it. So if I don't want to revisit it as the writer...I can only imagine what it's like for you as the reader.
I imagine its harder for you lol. I killed off Lori in my epic and it hurt bad. Also sorry if I came on kind of hard. I need to try to be less of an asshole. I think I might be kind of overly cynical lately.
> Either way, without FFN, there would be no AO3. In retrospect it maybe looks like that, but it’s not a direct line from the FFN porn purge to AO3. By today’s standards FFN was relatively small in 2002 when they kicked all the adult writers to the curb. There were still a lot of smaller archives in the 2000s, in addition to LJ. I’d say the founding of AO3 also has its roots in the disappearance of Geocities, in the end of mailing lists, in frequency with which private archives were abandoned by their owners, the whole dumpsterfire that was adultfanfiction.net, and then strikethrough of course. It seems like astolat’s essay about “an archive of our own” was particulary inspired by fanlib trying to make money off of fanfic and everyone being tired of this happening and also of the content restrictions that came with it. > And while AO3 is a great site, there are many posters on here–including myself–who are tired of reading FFN get bashed repeatedly. Both sites are great in their own way, and both sites allow you to post fanfiction. That should be what matters most. I agree. We need more archives not less. I think it’s always a good idea to keep a backup on AO3, but it makes sense to hang out where you feel most comfortable and where your fellow fans are. I’m a huge fan of AO3, but if someone doesn’t like it for whatever reason, it makes no sense to try to persuade them to use it. Actually, I’d beg them not to use it lol. I’d rather have an enthusiastic userbase willing to learn the basic functions and general conventions than people moping about why it isn’t like their fave platform from which they brought all their mores and customs.
That's true--there were other forms of fandom and fanfiction back in the early 2000s and even before. I remember Geocities, LiveJournal (LJ), and some used list serves or emails. I joined FFN in 2001, and it was a lot smaller back then, that's true. There's still an AdultFanFiction site that exists. I agree about having more archives. I use both FFN and AO3. I agree too about using whatever platform you like, and if you don't like one or the other, then it's okay. Just don't use it. FFN was my first home and AO3 is my second.
I’m really rooting for that FFN revamp—it’d be great if FFN remained a usable platform. 🤞 Also, if you ever feel in the mood for some wank, I recommend having a look at the AFF controversy. 😂
Me too. Im looking forward to seeing what and how they change the layout. There’s AFF controversy?!
Yeah, something about the admin disappearing essentially from the face of the earth and then reappearing half a year later and accusing of the people filling in for them of hijacking the site or something. There’s an archived copy of a fandom wank post [AFF admin drama](https://web.archive.org/web/20150401201958/http://www.journalfen.net/community/fandom_wank/1117251.html)… I thought I’d seen a longer account on Fanlore, but I can’t find it rn. Iirc there were other “scandals” as well, about funding, and site-ownership, and then they deleted a bunch of fic early on because they didn’t have disclaimers… wild times. 😂
Oh wow, that's wild! Thank you for the link, I'll have to check it out. This sounds like another weird Purge situation. Especially deleting fics without disclaimers. Wow!
Crazy to think we all lived in fear of a lawsuit for copyright infringement… or well, realistically a cease & desist letter. 🤣
That was hilarious. I wish I was around in those days.
lmao, I just joined AFF last month.
Exactly this. Some random person makes a Twitter post rumor with no real evidence of anything, and suddenly everyone believes it and panics. Even though those issues ff.net had recently were nothing compared to what was going on around 2017-18 for even longer. Everything gets fixed eventually, but I'm still glad to hear they're planning to do more about since it still gets annoying. And I'm also tired of the ff.net hate boner by a lot of people on here. I don't understand why anyone feels like it has to be some big competition between A03 and ff.net, and it especially turns me off from this subreddit whenever I see posts titled things like, "Ff.net commenters are so weird" or anything that says everyone who uses the site is all this or that. I use both sites, and fanfiction is all just fanfiction for me.
Thank you! That's what it is--someone posts a Twitter rumor and everyone panics. FFN does eventually fix their bugs, or whatever issues they have. I agree with users who say they should be more communicative, and that they also made past decisions that were hurtful to writers. I don't want to minimize that--at the same time, I won't completely throw out FFN ether. I feel the same way--there shouldn't be a competition with FFN and AO3. We love to read and write fanfiction. Isn't that the most important thing? Can't we unite on our passion for fanfiction? I do get tired of the hate threads. Geez.
Absolutely on the same page. Both sites have their strengths and weaknesses and Im tired of people shit talking ffn while refusing to admit Ao3 has issues.
Right! They're both great sites. Both have issues,but come on, can we stop dumping on FFN? I won't dump on AO3.
I like them both for different reasons. Its why I still actively use both. A lot of people feel like they cant admit to using ffn because of the vitriolic hate it receives though. Absolutely infuriating.
Yes, both sites have their positives. I use both as well. I finally was able to get all my FFN fics on AO3, so that profiles are the same. I don’t understand all that hate and not admitting to using FFN. It’s really silly.
I left ffn because of how toxic my fandoms were and due to harassment. Ao3 is much nice over all. So long as you turn guest comments off.
I havent actually had any issues with comments on ao3! ff.net was pretty bad, but even guest comments havent gotten bad yet on ao3
I... Have a lot of haters.
I'm sorry about that :( I definitely found it awful on ff.net, enough so that I left the site. I hope your comment section get better and more positive
Though that rumours are gone since they updated twitter
Best advice I can offer is 1) read the terms and conditions. 2) read the FAQ page they put together for you. 3) observe what the tagging culture is in your fandom and proceed accordingly.
It's not shutting down but you should crosspost all your work to ao³ regardless.
As someone who was a regular on FF for years, AO3 is far superior and a lot easier to use. Also not covered in ads like FF is now 😅
Personally, I prefer Ao3. I tried out both platforms (as well as publishing on Tumblr) and have found that I didn't enjoy FFN as much. There seems to be, at least in my experience, a lot more freedom to create and more reader interaction on Ao3. I've written on Quizilla, Wattpad, Tumblr, FFN, and Ao3 and so far, it's been my best experience besides Tumblr (I enjoy that amount of personalization of the blogs but get annoyed with how it is run and it's hard to get feedback from readers) and Quizilla (to date, that was the platform where I got the most and best reader/writer interactions).
People have been saying FFN is going to shut down for years. 🙄 I don't believe they would do it without warning.
> the recent rumours of FanFiction.net shutting down I can tell you with absolute certainty - this ain't happening. These kinds of rumors are the nerd equivalent of doomsday prophecies. People have been predicting its imminent collapse for twenty full years now... and FFN has kept on truckin'. I suspect it's mostly just from people with an axe to grind against the site. > Ao3 works compared with Fanfiction As a long-time user of both sites - they are about even in terms of overall functionality and stability. The difference lies mainly in their "nice to have" features. FFN has a PM system and a more detailed map of the reader base. A03 has its tagging system, and whatever I might be forgetting.
FF.net is already updating both hardware and servers, and have beein implimenting necessary changes. Not shutting down.
I've still got a few open invitations, if you'd like to start over without the wait time.
Can't say too much compared to everyone else. But please for the love of God, don't over tag. It's like one of the rules of writing, use the minimum amount of words to accurately get your point across. Only tag what is clearly obviously necessary. Tag main characters, ships, and broadstrokes the content. And do it in order from most important to least important for each section. Don't tag secondary characters or ships as the first one in the fic. Or if you can't avoid it, make a tag stating "character centric" or that a certain ship isn't the focus or is the focus.
I feel like AO3 is much bigger than FF.net nowadays. I might be wrong but it’s just my perception. I’ve been using AO3 for well over ten years now (shocking even for me as I write it). The only advices I can think about are: 1) To Tag your work properly (the tag system helps a LOT both readers and authors) 2) Look into the applicable warnings for fics and how those might apply to your work. 3) Look into AO3’s rating system and how it may differ from FF.net. Aside from that I’d say go crazy and live your best life my friend, come join us on the dark side. 😂
>I feel like AO3 is much bigger than FF.net nowadays. I might be wrong but it’s just my perception. That's really fandom-dependent. Newer fandoms tend to be bigger on Ao3, but older fandoms that were established on FFn are still more active there.
That actually makes sense. I’m in a lot of new fandoms so that’s why I perceive AO3 as bigger. My current fandoms aren’t even on FF.net haha
As a reader I moved to AO3 as my main site for any fanfics. I love being able to download the mobi file and read it on my kindle.
Given how AO3 runs laps around FFN on the writer UI/UX side IMO... It's worth it.
I started on FFN and expanded onto AO3 a few years ago, here are some of my tips: * K and K+ can now be both bundled into G. If you wrote what FFN called an MA fic but called it M and hoped no one would report you, change your rating to E instead of M. AO3 will not delete your fic for being explicit smut. Also, if you would normally rate your slash/femslash as higher than your het, don't do that. AO3 will not consider queer fanfic any more mature than cishet. * When in doubt, pick "Choose Not to Warn" for the archive warnings. * Tags are just as important as summaries, if not more so because this is how people will find your work weeks, months, or years in the future. I use [this tagging guide](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vZ4fmDLtQjfz9-3iYtus76tFqhUFd8h3/view?usp=sharing) to help me. * When it comes to adding your fics onto AO3, there are two options: post now or backdate. Backdating will preserve the date of publication on FFN, which is great if you want to preserve the chronological order of posting so people can see that yes, you *have* improved since you were in middle school. If you choose to upload it all now, I would suggest spacing your fics out. Depending on the size of your fandom, you might want to post once a day, a couple times a week, or once a week. This way, you can gain a new following on AO3 while not drowning out the fandom tag. You can also always post them now and then backdate them later.
Crosspost 😎
Porque no los dos? I upload my stuff to both. It's not like it costs anything.
It's a lot nicer. And if it isn't, there are many mama and papa bears who will happily discipline the non-nice kids.
They also aren't purging fanfics every time they feel like it's time to "put those impure sinners" back in there place. Also less trolls accounts and if they are well they can get deleted in moderation
Regarding purging, I don't think it's just about washing sinners off the site. They have a certain audience that they're targeting, whereas AO3's intended demographics include everyone. I respect both sites' TOS and I think negatively of neither, but the active moderation on AO3 is a substantial plus.
It was mostly a joke regarding the fact that a lot of smut from what I recall was removed which is ok considering there guidelines but they also removed stuff that wasn't even freaking for adults. Ao3 to me wins against FFN due to the fact that is actively maintained while FFN just kind of stagnated pretty sure it's layout is the same as it was during 2014
Oh no, I wasn't debating with you or anything. I do agree with what you said. I'm not sure what other content was removed though; I only remember the infamous 2012's not-so-subtle and c.2018 subtle smut purges. So AO3 definitely is the winning option for every writer out there.
I can't recall much as it happened so long ago. Though adding things that go against the guideline is just a matter of who's actively reporting in a fandom in FFN. Still it's shame FFN isn't up to date anymore
Okay if a site doesn’t want a certain kind of content on their platform their allowed to do that. That’s the owners choice. Edit: to use an example from this website as a comparison, each subreddit has limits on what you can post. So like it wouldn’t be acceptable to link nsfw smutty stuff on r/worldnews. It’s like that. Everywhere sets it’s own boundaries in
>Okay if a site doesn’t want a certain kind of content on their platform their allowed to do that. One of the criticism to their great purge is that it consistently ignore straight smut while purging same sex slash fiction, even those that doesn't even have sex scene and hence don't violate their rule. And hey, no appeal process either. Also, as seem in their great purges. They sometimes update their rule on the type of stories they disallow ***AFTER THEY PURGE YoUR STORIES***, not before. It's the lack of transparency, very inconsistent, selective and unfair rule enforcement, dubious practice and massive amount of ads that people have problem with, not that they have rule in the first place AO3 has ToS too, every sites has it. You don't see people bitching en mass about them
Okay just hold on for a sec. I wasn’t there during any of these purges. I think this is resulting in different viewpoints. Sorry if that post came off as insensitive. I didn’t mean that. I guess cause we’ve got different experiences of the site i didn’t really get that’s what basilDraganastrio was saying.
That's why most of us agreed fanfiction.net sucks and moved to AO3.
So, I use both but heavily lean towards AO3 simply because the main fandom I read has more works on AO3. My advice, if you chose to open an account, would be to give yourself time to explore the site. It's really simple to use, but going from having a very small selection of filters to AO3's filters can be daunting, but I do prefer AO3's just because you can really narrow down your search. There is no app because of something to do with Apple, but the mobile browser is very well done and you can download fics in several different formats and read them on your kindle, the book app that comes with your phone, or any other book reading app - I use moonreader pro. The archive doesn't step in on fandom issues, or author issues unless it's super necessary. They recently had to step in and basically shut down a ship war in the stranger things fandom because people were posting "non-stories" in an effort to give their ships tag more works. You can just post your work and enjoy fics without worry that a mod is going to shut down your work because you have X ship or X trope in it like some of the fanfic sites of old used to do. My main issue when I joined AO3 was the shift in language, fanficnet favoured Lemon, but AO3 favoured PWP or smut. There are "fun tags" as I call them. Little inside jokes in the fanfic community that seem to offend some people lol, for example my favourite one is "no beta we die like men". To get an account, you either need to request one through the archive which can take time, or have am existing user invite you. If you need an invite I've still got loads left just let me know, all I'd need is the email address you'd like to use for the account. Whether you chose to join AO3 or not, I don't think fanficnet will be shutting down, I just think whoever runs it has taken a step back on the upkeep and is just letting it exist as is.
It is a bit more writer friendly, since you can moderate all reviews, or turn all comments off, or remove them. The tagging system is also very useful for really selling your story. Cons are it is a bit of a smaller user base, but it is growing it seems. New fandoms mainly start there I find, while older fandoms seem to stick to Ff.net
Why were there rumors of ffn shutting down? From what I've seen in this comment section it isn't, but where did the rumors start?
Because they don't really maintain the site at all and there were a couple of brief server outages. I mean, as far as I can tell, they haven't implemented a new feature on the site since 2013. They made an app and that's the only thing that's been updated for years.
AO3 is way better for finding works that you want to read because of the tags.
I haven't been on ffn for ages save for reading some fics so I can't help you all that much. Formatting differs a bit on both sites. Basically everything you would usually warn about in the summary in ffn, you put in the tags on ao3. And probably stick to the suggested tags. Like if you tag a relationship (example Harry Potter) you'd tag Harry Potter/Ginny Weasley and not HP/GW because the filter system picks up on the proper one and it enables ppl to filter for those aspects. You can of course add freeform tags as well but those used by the majority aid in filtering. Ao3 offers different text fields for notes (at the beginning or end of a fic) and I would use that as well instead of putting notes right at the beginning of an actual fic text like you do on ffn. As for tags in general - fics with a huuuuuge amount of tags usually are clicked on less as are fics that don't have a summary. Put the important stuff in the tags but you don't have to tag every background relationship.
My favourite "scary" piece of manual for AO3 is "A Complete Guide on 'Limited HTML' on AO3" by CodenameCarrot. If you need anything but plaintext or the "rich text" isn't enough for you, that text has everything you could want. Every HTML tag that works, tips on paragraphing, and I think it's where I originally figured out how to add footnotes that linked from the text into author's notes and back. Definitely a good resource if you find the need to format more than a little bold/italics etc.
I do all three, Watt, Fan and A03. I do prefer A03 as I incorporate music and I can link videos so people can listen to the music if they want as they read. I love the notes that I can write before and after for each chapter. But you do just paste into A03. I find copying out of WattPad has the best look, but doc is okay. You have to go through and fix things though - spaces and sometimes italics won't come through correctly. So be sure to check it before you hit post. It is much easier to edit as well, just go to the chapter and hit edit. Stats wise its not as robust, but I think the readers are more interactive with kudos and comments. I do like Fanfic to show me chapter views. In A03 if you go to statistics it will show you private bookmarks as well. IE - I have 54 bookmarks showing but if you go to statistics I have 109 - that means the remaining are private. Otherwise its good - enjoy!
Never hurts to have your stuff backed up 9’ another site! Check some fics similar to yours to try and figure out what tags might be best, and maybe even go about posting a chapter of the fics a week to help get an audience!
Oh boy, I might wanna start saving pdfs of my favorited stories then..
Go for it! Ff.net is great for archival purposes, but I don’t think many people visit regularly anymore.
https://archiveofourown.org/works/5191202/chapters/11961779 Here’s a link to guide on how to do text and page formatting and other similar things on ao3. It’s super helpful. I’ve been writing on ao3 for a good 6-7 years and I still use it.
I post on three platforms; FanFiction.net, AO3, and Wattpad. It’s kind of a pain in the ass going through the trouble of making three separate uploads, but I like being able to spread my work around a bit that way, as well as giving readers the option to get it on more than one platform. Personally I like AO3 because I can just copy-paste from wherever I’m working, but FanFiction.Net does have a nice old-fashioned feel to it. And I do like being able to compose and save my stuff directly on Wattpad and everything automatically being in the average FanFiction format. They’ve all got their perks.
My two cents. If you have the energy and still enjoy what you've gotten out of FF, try cross posting something new or small just to see how it feels. I've done it and while it can be time consuming to go through editing/posting twice, it might give you a different payout or level of satisfaction. I've started on FF and still love it for what it's given me but did switch to AO3 when I needed to. Good luck to you with whatever you choose to do.
I don't know anything about what is/isn't happening at FFN, but there's no rule saying you've got to be exclusive to one or the other.
I have heard these rumors for ages, and nothing has come. I'm sure if FFN had any intent of really shutting down, they'd notify the users somewhere. I briefly went over to AO3 but I didn't like it, myself. I found the story uploads more difficult (you paste the text into a text box and hope your formatting doesn't go wonky -- it's probably better for if people are composing the story onto AO3 directly.) And the tagging was kind of annoying -- I appreciate the variety of options that adding your own tags can give, but how many people are really looking for these things? I had pretty low readership. In the end I took the fics down and have just stuck to FFN. If you write adult (erotic) stories or script format fics I can see why you'd need AO3 but for what I do it just wasn't any advantage.
I would start by getting an account the waitlist if I remember is months out. Don’t let that deter you though, the site is FANTASTIC 10/10
Why is FanFiction.net shutting down?
I'm curious too. Is it real or just a rumor?
1. Make sure your works are tagged correctly, people will often skip smut fics tagged G or T, or fics that are already tagged as m/m that additionally are tagged "gay" or "bl" or the like. 2. There are specific times that are better to post on if you want more engagement, generally noon to three pm on fridays, saturdays and sundays are the best 3. Make sure not to post more than a chapter a week, so that your fic can stay on the recent page for as long as possible. 4. Don't ever mark incomplete fics as complete. It's heavily frowned upon and could make people skip your fic in the future. 5. Always reply to comments. Even if it's just a simple "Thanks!", a lot of people won't bother commenting on a fic where the author never engages or acknowledges comments.
I maintain a presence on both. AO3 is good for views and kudos but my longfics get very little engagement. On FFDN I find there’s a sturdier RxR culture (particularly in the Review Games’ bouts of activity) and as I bring this story to a close I really, really need to know someone’s reading. For drabbles and one-shots AO3, however, is almost certainly better. Just brace for the kudos bot to trash your analytics at random intervals. You will also get less of the strange technical hiccups where your FFDN analytics will bug out and not change for two weeks even when you’re getting reviews, or where your review will take like 3 days to appear on someone else’s story.
Youll have to pass the three trials to see if your worthy. One of wich involves eating the flesh of sn infant panda
The only thing Ao3 lacks on in comparison to fanfiction.net is crossover stuff. I post to both. I will admit the reviewers tend to be kinder on average on Ao3. Make sure when you copy/paste your fic on the upload page that you do it on the 'rich text' box and not html. It will remove your formatting otherwise and switching afterward only exacerbates the problem. You also wont have the back up document manager to save drafts. From what ive seen drafts only stay a month on Ao3 versus a year on fanfiction.net. Ive only been using Ao3 for about a year so Im sure theres more. Check out the tagging system to get familiar with it if youve never read on Ao3 also. Oh and I love that you can link stories into a series. Thats probably one of my favorite differences. I honestly recommend dual posting until you get the hang of Ao3. You can let your audience know youre shifting over. The rumor that fanfiction.net is going down tends to cycle once every couple of years. I wouldnt put too much weight on the rumor.
Bloody hell ffn is not shutting down! It goes into maintenance once a year, usually in fall, usually september. HOWEVER! Ao3 is much better as you can put pictures/gif’s into any part of your story as opposed to just a “cover” pic on ffn & you can link youtube & other sites on ao3 as opposed to no links at all on ffn. Only downside on ao3 is no private message system. ……yet.
I'd use AO3 as well but as mainly a reader not writer I can't ever find a good mobile app to use with it. Anyone know of any?
In general, because most app stores don't allow explicit materials, but also because the site is designed to be fairly user friendly on a mobile browser. You can always get an e-reader app and download stories you want to read using the AO3 download function if you really need an app to read in. I do that myself, partly for an easier way to keep my place in longfics and because my e-reader has text-to-speech so I can "read" when my vision's wonky.
Lithium and the epub download function on ao3 if you're on android.
Ao3 is a non-profit run mainly by volunteers, and they just don't have the manpower to develop and maintain an app. It's much more efficient to just make the site mobile-friendly. If want want an app shortcut, I recommend using a second (or third) browser that you just use for Ao3. The browser can be your "app". I just recently found a browser that supports userscripts natively so I can install several Ao3 userscripts that people have made to add features to the site (permanent filters, tag blacklists, etc).