An Incomplete and Highly Subjective List of Reasons Why I Love the AO3

[themadlurker]

Inspired by answering comments and getting happy-making kudos notifications in my inbox today...
Some reasons I am very, very, very pleased with the AO3:

• Posting! Backing up your fic on the AO3 is really, really really really easy! You just need the url of a fic, and a few minutes to tidy up the header info. The AO3 grabs your html coding from the original entry, and usually recognizes most of the header tags as well. Please back up your fic! It will not only protect it from the vagaries of fortune such as hacking, account deletion, and other assorted Acts of LJ, it will make your fic easier to find (for those of us who don't find browsing on LJ a particularly easy process - more on this later).
• Kudos! Okay, I could probably write an essay on how much I love this feature alone, from the perspective both of a reader and of a writer, but I will try to restrain myself. I think a lot of people look at kudos as a sort of second-best option, an "oh, well, if you're not going to leave a proper comment..." consolation prize, but aside from being easier sometimes, kudos tell you things you wouldn't get from a comment - like when someone finished reading, or whether they read more than one of your fics.
  
  Sure, a commenter could tell you that, but there's something wonderfully concrete about seeing someone's reading progress. A couple times I've been online when kudos came in and I just sat there beaming stupidly at my inbox thinking, SOMEONE OUT THERE RIGHT NOW IS READING STUFF I WROTE. Kudos = awesome, real-time feedback.
• The comment inbox. Much better than the LJ or DW ones (sorry, DW, I still <3 you, though) for answering comments and keeping track of what you've answered, because it automatically marks things as read when you reply, plus it shows you a checkmark so you know you've replied without going to look. Such a simple thing, but it makes so much sense, and means I'm less likely to ignore an unanswered comment because I assume I've just forgotten to mark it as read (when actually I haven't answered). Maybe you have to be living inside my disorganized brain to appreciate how helpful that is, but it makes me happy and that's enough. :)
• Browsing for fic! Even if the archive made nothing easier for me as a writer, I'd still love it for allowing multifandom, centralized browsing. Meaning, when I want to find fic for a given fandom, all I have to do is go to the AO3 and search for that fandom. As opposed to tracking down a fandom-specific archive, googling, searching delicious, searching LJ, or begging my flist for recs, or finding that one post about the fandom from five months ago, etc. etc.
  
  I know archives aren't everyone's favourite way to read, and even I've got into the habit of reading primarily off my friends list, but the sheer simplicity of going to a single, central site to search for fic will never get old for me.
  
  LJ is just not made for fic. Blogging platforms in general are not well adapted to organizing fic. Sure, we've found ways to work within the limitations: sticky posts, fic indexes, masterlists, taggings systems, recs lists, affiliated comms, flist reading filters, and so on. None of it matches the ease of doing a simple search and getting everything on the site that fits. And filtered searches! Searching by multiple tags! I defy anyone to tell me it's possible to find every Merlin/Arthur fic on LJ in five seconds by typing "Merlin/Arthur" into a search bar. Archives are just so. Much. Easier.
• Locking and "orphaning" content. I love that there's a way to lock works on the AO3 so that anyone logged in can see them, but they're invisible to the outside world. I also wish more people would take advantage of that and the option to leave a work up while removing your name from it to preserve things they aren't comfortable laying claim to anymore I know it probably won't work for everyone, but there's so much potential to preserve loved stories for people who still want to read them!
  
  Caveat: locking on the AO3 only really works well if readers - not only writers - have accounts, and I don't think we're there yet. I just recently unlocked a few of my fics (RPS mostly) that I'd have preferred to keep locked for my own peace of mind, but that I realized a lot of readers didn't have access to like that. So, for anyone who uses the AO3 to read and thinks that means you don't need an account, it's true that you can do most things without an account (including leaving kudos, yay! I love getting kudos from 'a guest', it reminds me of when I would read off archives and be intimidated because the only way to leave feedback was to e-mail the author - scary!) but there are some good fics there that you might be missing.
  
  Another reason you should consider getting an account to read on the archive:
• Reading history. It's like your browser's history, but it keeps track of fics you've read on the archive, complete with tags, summaries, and a "read later" option so you never lose track of that one interesting-looking fic you found but didn't have time to read then and there. And speaking of then and there...
• Downloading fic! So much easier on the archive! I first tried this during yuletide when the archive was so busy that I didn't trust a tab to reload if I closed it. Since then I've discovered that saving fics as a pdf means I can bookmark my spot in a long fic and get back to it later. (This works with pdf's printed from lj pages too, but the AO3 ones are easier to download and are actually formatted for reading, not browsing.) Between downloading and "Read it later," it's a lot easier to close tabs. And no more leaving a tab open indefinitely so I don't lose my place!
• Boomarks! Actually, this is one I'm still reserving judgment on. I like that bookmarking directly on the archive means the work is already tagged, and that there's the ability to add archive-standard tags to external works. I'm still very attached to the versatility of delicious, though, and I think there's actually something to be said for bookmarks, reviews, or any other format where readers' commentary is not directed at the author not showing up attached to the work.
  
  There's an option right now for authors to hide hit counts on their work, but nothing to hide the number of bookmarks (even from oneself). The bookmarks may be useful to readers who want more info before they decide what to read, but I've seen unpleasant critiques written up as well, and having that on the same site as the fic (with the link right there!) makes it harder for authors to avoid. It's just not the same as an external bookmarking site - or even the memories feature on LJ - where the links go on a page belonging to the reader, not the writer. So that make a one-site-fits-all approach less appealing.

I didn't mean to end that list on a negative note! Just take it as a counter-balance to my general ongoing squee about the archive that I do realize it can't do everything for everyone. Just the fact that it's fic-focussed, for example, means it'll never have the richness of fannish communities with art, fic, meta, vids, conversations, squee, and so many other things going on togehter. But for what it does - as a platform to post and read fic - the AO3 is wonderful and I loffs it. <3

In conclusion: Please back up your fic! And please get an AO3 account to read there. It will make the world a better place!

Crossposted from http://themadlurker.dreamwidth.org/60518.html at Dreamwidth.
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