natalunasans reblogged
If you’ve been concerned about the OTW’s responses - both past and present - to concerns raised about racism and, in particular (although not limited to) AO3, please have a look at this letter and consider signing.
natalunasans reblogged
Preserve our history: edit Fanlore!
Over the last few days, we’ve seen a lot of fans worrying about the impact of Tumblr’s new Terms of Service on fandom (and non-fandom) communities on this site. We’re concerned, too.
While we don’t know exactly what that impact will look like, we know that we can learn from our history by reading about similar occurrences, such as Strikethrough and Boldthrough and FanFiction.Net’s NC-17 Purges. As this current situation unfolds, editors are documenting the Tumblr NSFW Content Purge so that we’ll have a collaborative record of these events as well.
We’d love for you to add your perspectives, histories, and knowledge to Fanlore. As a project of the Organization for Transformative Works, we’re working to preserve the history of fanworks and fan cultures by creating a living archive of fandom history that’s by and for fans – but we can’t do it without you.
Creating your account
It’s easy to get started on Fanlore! Check out our tutorial for new users and then create your account. We’ve seen a lot of fans suggest creating a user profile page on Fanlore as one way to help other fans find you across platforms, and we think that’s a great idea. Make sure to use the user profile template and check out this help page for more information on setting up your user page.
Resources for new editors
We know that wiki editing can be a little daunting at first, especially if you’re new to it – that’s why we have lots of resources for new editors! Stop by our New Visitor Portal, and read more about our mission and policies. We’ve also got answers to lots of frequently asked questions.
Once you’re ready to start editing, check out the recent changes to see what other editors are working on. We’ve also got our FanloreProjects, where groups of editors work together as a team to improve a specific part of Fanlore – like our Youtube Fandom pages, or our Meta articles. If you’re not sure where to start, check out our stubs. These are short articles that need to be expanded, and you might be just the right person to do that!
Contact us
If you’ve got questions, or if you want to know more about Fanlore, please get in touch!
natalunasans reblogged
AO3 (and other projects) will keep running as usual. Learn more in this update from the OTW Board members-elect: http://bit.ly/1T2to24
I’ve put a lot of the last three years of my life into the OTW, and AO3 in particular. If it were in any danger, I’d be the first person to panic! We’re fine, everyone has been wonderfully supportive, the bills are being and will be paid, and we’ll sort things out as soon as we can.
There have been a lot of changes in the OTW in the past few days. The current Board of Directors has resigned, effective December 15. We know there has been some confusion, and we wanted to share with you the situation as it currently stands:
- The OTW and its projects, including the Archive of Our Own, Fanlore, and Transformative Works and Cultures, are operating normally. Our volunteers are still carrying out their work and will continue to do so throughout this process. Rest assured that everyone’s first priority is to keep the projects and the organization running smoothly.
- We, Matty Bowers and Atiya Hakeem, new Board members elected earlier this month, will take office on December 1st. We should have access to all the tools and information available well before the 15th.
- We have a long list of things we know need to be worked on, compiled from internal and external feedback, and our own plans for the Org. We will rely on this to prioritize and start taking action.
- We are committed to publishing a budget for 2016 as soon as possible. An essential part of this process will be to make a draft and then seek OTW teams’ feedback on the chosen items. This may not end up happening until early 2016, depending on the status of the current draft. We’ll know more come December 1st, when we receive access to the draft.
- We hear everyone’s questions about the next election cycle and what happens to the vacant seats on the Board. We will do our best to have information about that out as soon as we can; we can’t officially make decisions or announcements until December.
Please remember that this is a work in progress! There is a lot of information to be gathered, and a lot of work ahead. There has been a great deal of internal and external support for this fresh start and we are grateful to everyone who has reached out and offered to help. We’re currently working to organize our information and resources so we can move ahead as soon as possible.
Thanks for your support, and for the vote of confidence.
—Matty and Atiya (Lady Oscar) Board members-elect
I know this is a dull, don’t-panic kind of post, but please do consider sharing this to counter the unnecessary alarm if you’ve seen people on your dash worrying about how they have to “save all their stuff” off the AO3 and that it’s going to all collapse.
(If you DO want copies of your stories for any reason at any time, though, I do mention that you can download them easily as nice clean HTML whenever you want, using the download link on each work.)