for the last one i donβt just mean oh the author inadvertently wrote in gay subtext or whatever iβm talking about media as a cultural artifact which can reveal a ton about societal norms, biases, ideals, etc. itβs all about positionality and an unexamined positionality is often the most revealing of all
With the rise of AI and the well known epidemic of AI companies scraping Ao3 for training data most authors on Ao3 have locked down their fics to logged in users only. This is unfortunate for authors and readers. As an author I've noticed a steep drop in readership on fics restricted to logged in users and when recommending fics to my friends I've noticed that the folks without an account can't find the fics. The logged in users only toggle, not only keeps people without an account from reading a fic, but also from seeing its listing at all. More than 50% of fics I come across have this setting turned on.
So, you should get an AO3 account. I know this seems daunting and unfair because it's an invite only system but, you can invite yourself through the homepage if you don't already have one, and in the past few years I've never heard of someone who requested an invitation through this method, not getting one.
And for those of you who are hesitant because you don't write, that's okay. It's not weird at all to click on a commenter username and find that they have 0 works and 10,000 bookmarks. It might take a week for the invitation to actually show up, but I can almost guarantee you will get one, just keep an eye on your email.
It's free to join and donations are optional. You'll have more to read if you have an account and maybe give your favorite author the chance to protect their work from AI without a loss of readership and feedback.
I'm so glad to see AO3 making it absolutely clear that none of these things are allowed to even be HINTED at.
Here's some of the language from the new post about AO3's police on commercial promotion:
-
There is a wide variety of things that are not allowed under AO3's non-commercialization rules.
Any other language which one might interpret as requesting or having requested financial contributions, whether for yourself or others. This covers indirect references, euphemisms, or other language intended to get around the TOS. Some examples of this include:
Thanks for the coffee!
My β username is the same as my username here
This chapter is brought to you by my patrons
You know where to find me if you want early or bonus chapters
Check out my Twitter to learn how you can donate to me since I'm not allowed to discuss it here
If you want to hear more about my ideas, talk about fandom, or find more of my stuff for a coin, visit my Tumblr
Solicitation is not allowed, whether it's for yourself or on behalf of someone else.
Here's the crazy thing, folks. You *can* day things like "My Tumblr is [username], come over and scream into the void about these blorbos with me!" And then plaster your kofi all over your Tumblr. You can say "Thanks to [someone] for suggesting this fic! I listen to people's suggestions all the time on Tumblr!" for literally any reason someone told you to write a fic.
It's not hard to filter out the things you shouldn't say based on environment. Back when I was in high school you'd hear about all the fun someone had that weekend, but they wouldn't say there was drinking and weed and throwing firecrackers into a campfire where a teacher or parent could hear them.
The reason we're not allowed to post monetary links or use any language alluding to it on AO3 is for our protection. If a copyright holder wants to sue a fan writer for making money or demand their work be taken down as "property" of the copyright holder, AO3's lawyers need to be able to defend us by saying money isn't being made and not perjuring themselves.
It's a LEGAL issue. AO3 has no issues with writers earning money. Just not directly via their platform. Not enough people seem to understand this. There's a very long history of copyright holders throwing their weight around and taking a hatchet to fandom spaces using legal backing, and we're trying to avoid that.
It's more than that though. It's not just about protecting their asses, legally. It's also about the principles and values upon which AO3 was built.
AO3 came out of an exlicitly anti-monetization fan culture. You will hear the founders of AO3 use the term "gift economy" a lot if you follow any of their socials, which is another way of saying "mutual aid economy."
AO3 is a non-profit organization built and coded and maintained by volunteer labor and charitable donations.
Understand that when you try to use the AO3 platform to monetize, you are not just monetizing your own labor as a fan creator. You are also monetizing the volunteer labor of everyone who built that platform.
And they will tell you that they are NOT OKAY with you exploiting THEIR LABOR, THEIR HOURS UPON HOURS OF CODING AND TAG WRANGLING AND ORGANIZING AND FUNDRAISING, for your personal gain.
Stop trying to sell books in the middle of a library.
idk if this is a young fan thing or new fandom culture but some of yall think fics are abandoned way too quickly. a few months or a year or two is not unusual to go without a fic update. sometimes fics take longer to write, other times writers have rl events, or maybe there's multiple fics and one gets more priority. there are tons of reasons for fics not to be updated every week or every month. it also isn't uncommon for people to come back and update fics after a number of yearsβive read updates that took five, or ten years. people's lives change, but they still want to tell their stories. personally, i never consider a fic abandoned unless the author has said so; though if it's been a few years i manage my expectations. but a last update being a year ago is... generally not a sign that a writer has abandoned their fic
Original fic usually goes through this same process before being commercially published. Readers just don't know that bc they aren't receiving it in bite-size chunks online. Large periods of stagnant writing are historically just another Monday for most writers.
some people think writers are so eloquent and good with words, but the reality is that we can sit there with our fingers on the keyboard going, βwhatβs the word for non-sunlight lighting? Like, fake lighting?β and for ten minutes, all our brain will supply is βunofficialβ, and we know thatβs not the right word, but itβs the only word we can come up withβ¦until finally itβs like our face got smashed into a brick wall and we remember the word we want is βartificialβ.
I saw this post from @class1akids that got me thinking of the symbolism of Shouto and Touya's birthdates.
πΉI hadn't thought about it before, but I realized that Touya's birthday is a way of playing with the phonetics of his name and the kanji for the number 18.
Normally, εε « (18) is read γγ γγ―γ‘ (juuhachi). However, most kanji have multiple readings and one phonetic reading for the kanji used for 10 and 8 is Toya*.
*note: this is not a standard reading of the combined kanji. There are also other possible readings for both kanji depending on context. Also, there is a difference between γ¨γγ (Touya), which is the actual spelling of his name, and γ¨γ (Toya) / γ¨γγ (Tooya) but for the purposes of wordplay, they are similar enough that I believe this was Horikoshi's intention.
For reference, here are the actual kanji used in Touya's name:
η (lamp/light) - onyomi reading: γ¨γ (tou)
η’ (arrow) - kunyomi reading: γ (ya)
Also, perhaps this was a clue about Touya's favorite food all along. Another reading for ε (10) is γ (so) and ε « (8) can also be read as γ° (ba). (It's why "soba day" is October 8)
π°For Shouto's birthday, there isn't a direct phonetic link, but I think January 11 could symbolically refer to a couple of things.
First, the number 11 is sometimes used to mean "good" in Japanese. The reasoning behind this is that 1 is read as γγ‘ (ichi), which can be shortened to γ (i). By this logic, 11 becomes γγ (ii), which translates to "good" or "excellent", which is very fitting for Shouto.
Also in Japan, January 11 is ι‘ιγ (kagami biraki) - the day you are supposed to break open and eat kagami mochi (the mochi displayed as an offering to the gods for good luck in the new year.)
This website has a detailed explanation of kagami biraki but here are some main points:
ι‘ (kagami) means mirror and ιγ (biraki) means to open, unfold, or unseal. Literally, kagami biraki means opening/unfolding a mirror.
There is a proper way to break the mochi. Cutting it with a knife is bad luck. Instead, it should be broken with a wooden mallet or by hand, then cooked into a dessert or soup.
The word ι - bira(ki), also read as hira(ku), has a connotation of opening doors / new opportunities. "Kagami biraki" is purposely written with this kanji instead εγ (kiru) to cut or ε²γ (waru) to break, which have connotations of bad fortune or mishap.
Attaching such a significant date to Shoutoβs birthday could be Horikoshiβs way of indicating that Shoutoβs birth was seen as auspicious - originally to Endeavor as the "good luck" of finally getting the masterpiece child he wanted, but later in a positive way for Shouto himself as he came to terms with the things that could have broken him but which he eventually accepted and used to create his own destiny.
Kagami (mirrors) also represent harmony, which is fitting for Shouto, whose journey involved introspection and finding harmony between the two halves of his quirk.
[ignore this next bit if you don't want heartbreaking symbolism]
πAs for both of them being born in January, I suspect that Horikoshi chose Shouto's birthday first and intentionally gave Touya the same birth month to reference the fact that he was almost the perfect creation that Endeavor wanted and that he was "replaced" when Shouto was born. There's also something about January and new beginnings that isn't really relevant to Touya π
Something else I learned while I was digging deeper into the symbolism of Japanese dates is that the old Japanese name for January was η¦ζ (mutsuki).
η¦ (mu) refers to a harmonious relationship, especially among family members, which is heartbreaking in the context of the Todoroki family but it ties in with Horikoshi's messy attempt to bring the family together to stop Touya before breaking it apart again.
Notes:
- These days, January is usually just called δΈζ (ichigatsu), literally 1st month.
- New Year's Day is the most significant holiday in January and is traditionally a time when families come together
- If anyone's super interested in how different kanji readings work, this site has a good explanation but it is quite long and may be confusing for folks who are brand new to kanji.
Our next writer is the brilliant bluem00nrabbit! If you thought her promo piece was fantastic, just wait until you read the full length fics sheβs written for the zine! (Yes, plural!) Needless to say, weβre lucky we got her! πΉ
There is nothing more precious to me as a writer than the comments left on AO3. Whenever I get that email notification, I wonder what kind of comment was left. To have a little fun, I'm going to sort the typical comments into a few different categories and share my reactions to them as a writer.
If you feel I missed a comment type, please let me know. I'm curious to learn what other classifications you think exist (positive comment types only please - let's not make this negative). Also, if you wanted to tag yourself, I'd love you know what type of commenter you think you are.
The Polite Conversationalist - Your comment confirms that you read and enjoyed the fic or chapter. You offer praise for the author's efforts and encouragement for them to continue. - If this is you, please know that I'm imagining us holding a book club together. I brought us snacks.
The All Caps Reaction - You left the most unhinged comment. - You were screaming as you read it? I was screaming as I wrote it. Let's be friends.
The How Dare You - The angst is real. And painful. And I'm sorry but the story needed it. - This is a compliment of the highest order and I'm so glad you left it.
The Conspiracy Theorist - You are so invested that you are trying to figure out what comes next. - I'm so excited to read your ideas. They let me know the story tracks for you. And I'm either smiling because you guessed right and I'm excited for you to read what comes next, or I'm grinning because I know the plot twist is going to blow your mind.
The Catch-Up - You haven't commented in a while and are letting me know you are catching up. - I'm so glad you are back! I missed you. I know life gets busy and it means a lot to me that you took the time to read my story.
The Giggle - You laughed at my jokes and let me know. - Did we just become best friends? I'm already making you a bracelet.
The Callout - You found my favorite line in the chapter or fic. - I love you so much. You just made my day, my week, my month. Seriously, all the love for the reader. xoxo
The Repeat Customer - could also be any of the above, but every fic, every chapter, there they are with something kind to say and a wish to see you again next week/month/whenever. The pfp/username combo you could pick out of a sea of people in an instant.
The Happy Insomniac - "I just wanted to let you know that it's 4 am and I stayed up all night bingeing your work" say no more fam, me and my keyboard are yours for life now
The Book Report - You identified a major theme/motif/metaphor/all of the above that I was trying to draw out, and even found some clever use of language/character/symbolism that even I didnβt realise was in there - I am proposing marriage on the spot.
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