To the people who pile hate on AO3 for hosting what they deem as “inappropriate” conduct:
Do you also spend your time boycotting libraries?
Public libraries across the country continue to carry thousands of books like Nabokov’s Lolita (pedophilia), VC Andrews’ Flowers in the Attic series (incest), and Emma Donoghue’s Room (rape). Those books are available for free to any number of underage people who happen to have a library card. They are often “untagged.”
Do you also spend your time boycotting pirate/torrent sites? Many movies with inappropriate content are available online to download for free.
How about TV? What about popular songs with inappropriate subject matter? Do you have a problem with radio? With Spotify? Do you know how many ways there are to expose someone to content that mentions pedophilia, rape, incest, murder, or basically any other evil thing in the world?
Why do you get to decide what content is okay to publish on an online platform designed for and by adults? Why do you take issue with a site that posts its budget online, refuses to run ads and provides an absolutely free publishing platform for writers to share their work with a wide audience? Why do you take issue with a site that requires an age check and provides ways to helpfully tag works for particular content, in a way that most other content distributors do not?
Let’s talk about the bottom line, here: writing about something is not the same as endorsing it.
Let’s say it louder for the people in the back: writing about something is not the same as endorsing it.
You all think Stephen King is a murderer? How about the people who write every disturbing episode of Law & Order: SVU? How about the creators of any of the zillions of teen dramas that show teenagers having sex? Why is that content any different than the content available on AO3?
There’s a standard in the United States for what does and does not constitute child pornography. It’s called the Miller Test. Read it and familiarize yourself with it before you hurl around damaging accusations.
But that’s kind of irrelevant, because: AO3′s policies specifically prohibit the hosting of actual child pornography. Their Terms of Service page outlines, in detail, the kind of work they will and will not host.
AO3 makes it possible for countless writers and artists to create transformative work. They have an endless supply of creative content and they choose to make no money from this venture. They also pledge to help legally defend anyone’s right to create fan works.They don’t require you to buy a book or a theater ticket or a monthly subscription fee to read all of this work to your heart’s content, without popup ads, without selling people’s information. AO3 has been hugely responsible for making fanfiction possible, period.
And if you censor some of it? You censor ALL of it. There is no fair or reasonable way to determine what content is okay and what is not okay, because fiction is not math, and there is no scientific formula for “appropriate.”
EVEN SO, refer again to the Terms of Service above, in which AO3 does set specific limits on the content it will host.
Do you know what isn’t appropriate? Censoring artists. Telling writers they can’t write about certain topics. Bullying fans who don’t write the pairings you personally deem “okay.” Policing people for writing fictional stories.
In short: Donate to AO3. They make fandom possible on a daily basis.
But that’s kind of irrelevant, because: AO3′s policies specifically prohibit the hosting of actual child pornography. Their Terms of Service page outlines, in detail, the kind of work they will and will not host.
So for anyone who actually believed the “this is literally about child porn!!!” version: this is about the AO3 using the legal definition of what child porn is, as opposed to the one antis prefer. (Which can include things like minors chastely kissing, or relationships between adults if the age difference is “too large”.)
sometimes when someone comments on your fanfic, it’s like those randomly-occurring emergency heal spells that bring you back up to full health when you’re about to die. like i was struggling to write today but someone out of nowhere left a comment and HELLO! THANK YOU! i am back and a writer again.
Every year, multiple times a year, they convince ppl to fork out thousands of dollars and….literally nothing changes. There’s no doubt in my mind they’re pocketing most of this money lol
Yep
They just emailed me about this today and I’m ???? Where is the 100k+ going every time they do this? There’s been one major update that fanfiction has had for at least five years and they don’t demand money like that
You people realize that, like, server space and shit costs money, right? You realize that they need money to pay graphic designers and coders and such BEFORE you get to see those updates on the website, right? You realize that ffnet runs ads on their site and that’s how they’re earning revenue while AO3 is completely ad-free, right? Lord help me I know very little about finances or how to run a website but Wikipedia does the exact same thing but they have a far more massive user base to pull from. Do you like AO3? Would you rather go back to only having ffnet? No? Then maybe don’t baselessly accuse them of scamming people. You don’t have to donate to them if you don’t want to, they’re not holding your account hostage if you don’t.
They also post a very handy breakdown of where that money is going.
IT’S NOT A SCAM. If you love ao3 and want it to exist, DONATE.
They literally keep a team of lawyers on staff in case someone like disney decides to pull shit and sue? Which costs money?
I work daily with content delivery and servers, let me tell you plain: that shit ain’t cheap.
“Nothing changes” is like a mom saying “The moment I clean up around here you guys mess it up again!” The servers are always being asked to do more than they can bear, and people always have to fix them. Basic rent for server space, and basic maintenance, actually do cost that much.
And people don’t understand just how much freedom the AO3 would lose if it ever accepted advertising money. The instant you let someone make money off you, you live under the threat of them taking that money away if you don’t play by their rules.
(Nor do they understand just how much social media companies are profiting off the free data and content their use provides. “Free” services aren’t free)
I can’t wait for AO3 to come out of beta so everyone who hates it runs away with the code to set up their own version of the website… and suddenly discovers HOW DIFFICULT AND EXPENSIVE it is!
Servers are expensive, dudes. Maintenance costs money. If you want a community controlled ad free space, then you can put up with seeing the occasional fundraiser post, especially since it’s COMPLETELY OPTIONAL.
Here’s a thing: when a website sells ad space, the thing that is actually for sale? Is the user. A company that sells ad space goes to advertisers and says “I have X amount of users and I will sell you their views for Y amount of dollars.” The person browsing the website is now the product.
This obviously goes doubly or even triply so when a website sells customer data to corporations.
Look, I don’t hate online ads – people who run websites gotta eat. But when it comes to something like AO3, which was built by and for the fan community, I’d rather be the consumer than the consumed.
That’s the maxim: if you’re not paying, you’re not there consumer. You’re the product.
Keep that in mind on the internet, kids.
The thing I love about Tumblr is all the new stuff I’ve gotten to learn about because other people have so much excitement about it. All these TV shows and movies and comics and books and games that I’ve never seen or read or played, but because the people I follow are excited about them, so am I. And then you get these people who actually apologize because their blog has changed focus, and I’m like “No, man, thanks to you I suddenly want to watch Avatar: The Last Airbender or play Detroit: Become Human or gush over Star Trek: Voyager.” What’s there to be sorry for? Your excitement makes me excited. Thank you so much for sharing. Maybe your thing isn’t my thing, but your passion makes me want to know more about it.
Crumpet's Bookshelf 