btw this isn't a vague/subtweet (post?) or anything but just so y'all know, there's a way to mark things as "inspired by" on ao3

you don't have to just put it in the notes!! very cool under-utilized feature

This is an underutilized feature of AO3, and a great way to credit the work you might be taking inspiration from.

It's also useful because it will link your work on the work it's inspired by! A little section pops up to say "Works inspired by this one:" and a hyperlink at the bottom of the original fic.*

And then anyone who finds the fic that inspired you will have the option to read your fic too and anyone reading your fic has the chance to go read the fic you loved so much you had to write about it! Everyone wins!

*The author does have to approve that link, it doesn't just pop up on it's own, but in my experience as someone who enjoys gifting fic it's usually well received.

as a reminder to literally anyone and everyone who even so much as considers this: AO3 has NO autosave ability when you're making drafts, so PLEASE do not use it instead of a writing program.

If their server goes down, if you hit a wrong button and refresh the page or go back to the previous page, if you accidentally close the browser, if your browser or device crashes, etc etc etc you are shit out of luck. Your work is gone forever, it didn't backup to anywhere and there is NO recovery option. Even TUMBLR's drafting ability is supposed to autosave and often does.

If you want to avoid gdocs that's fine- there's other text editors with simple autosave options, like Online Notepad or Digital Scholar's notepad, or there's still local-drive writing programs that are free and open source, like LibreOffice. PLEASE do not use AO3 to write your stories into directly. It has NOTHING.

Every November during NaNoWriMo, Scrivener goes on sale at a steep discount. It is the best writing program I have ever used AND it has a super reliable autosave.

LibreOfficr is also a great alternative as mentioned above. I have it, too, just in case.

Definitely don't use AO3 for a writing program. Also, save your work in multiple places. I have my works on my D: drive with a copy on my C: drive and ANOTHER copy on an external drive and I have emailed them to myself so they are on a couple of clouds. My most prized short story is also printed.

Just mentioning that because being paranoid about preserving your work as a writer is essential. Even if you never post or publish it. You will hate yourself otherwise.

Reblogging to add that Campfire is an excellent writing app as well. It has outstanding local autosave and cloud saving features. You can write from your phone, tablet, PC, or browser and it all syncs up.

In addition to writing, you can also add your own languages, maps, magic/legendary items, wiki articles, character sheets, and so much more. They're all integrated really well and it's a great way to keep track of all the shit you come up with.

The app is free for limited use (you can write up to 25k words in manuscript, have a set number of timeline events and character sheets, etc). Unlike some apps, you can do everything for free, including customize the appearance and theme.

Upgrading is done per feature, so you only pay for what you actually need. For example, it costs $1.50/month for unlimited writing. That's nothing. You can also pay for annual or lifetime upgrades, for folks who prefer not to have monthly subscriptions.

And the icing on the cake, you can easily add collaborators or readers to your projects. I cannot recommend it enough.

I wrote this post initially to address folks who prefer not downloading complicated apps, since if they're using AO3 they are probably doing it because it is a very simple rich text editor, but these are good additions for anyone looking for something a bit more complex, with more features. Personally I can't use either, I have to have as simple of a program as possible.

I also forgot to mention Write or Die and Written? Kitten! The latter is mostly as bad as AO3 in terms of autosave (it will keep your text if you refresh but not if you navigate away or crash), but you at least get a visual reminder every 100 words if you want to move your writing off the site so you can write in a simple box and save elsewhere. The former is a less a program and more a threat, but in the writing stage it's just a text box with a timer and a word counter, so I use it sometimes when even LibreOffice's simple toolbars are a distraction, or if I need a focused time period to write in. If you have the WOD program on desktop at least, it will also create a backup text file as you write, to whatever folder you want, in case of crashes.

Look, write however you want I guess, but writing directly into AO3 is a gamble at best. At some point something out of your control will happen, and you'll lose something you loved, and it's going to really fucking SUCK. I don't want that for you. Your writing is precious enough to at least try to protect up front by creating it someplace even marginally safer.

Also, relatedly, please please please do not publish mostly empty works with a bunch of tags that say stuff like "AO3 draft because of time limit please ignore" and a work text that says something like "erm sorry this is just a placeholder so my draft doesn't get deleted because of the stupid time limit lol". NO! STOP THAT! Those mostly empty works are considered spam, and they make the search function more annoying to use for literally everyone else on the site. They're also reportable, and people will absolutely 100% report your account over them (and frankly, they should!). AO3 isn't a writing program. The AO3 drafts aren't meant for actually writing in, they're just meant to be a place so you've got like a month or so to play around with the html formatting before you post a work. The draft time limit is specifically there so that people don't use it to draft works over an indefinite time span. It's meant to prevent people from doing literally exactly this.

If you're just looking for a writing program that isn't Word or Google Docs, any of the options listed above are great – I myself use LibreOffice, and it's what I usually recommend to people. If, on the other hand, you're writing in the AO3 drafts because you're having trouble transferring the formatting of your drafts over from Word or Google Docs and don't really know html, here is a great guides to help make the process easy:

Here's an additional thing that you can set up on Google Docs specifically that basically allows you to toggle between rich text and html, just like in the AO3 drafts, so that if you want to do funky things with formatting you can still just copy/paste:

Also, if all else fails, here's a guide for fixing your formatting in Word if it's gotten screwed up and AO3 isn't recognizing where the paragraph breaks should be and stuff:

The easiest way I've found to get your fic from Word to AO3 without all the Word garbage formatting is to use this tutorial here, which involves copying-and-pasting the html tags you want into the document (you can do a mass find-and-replace that wraps html tags around existing text), then saving it as .txt to strip out all of the native Microsoft formatting. It's pretty simple, and there's a tutorial here: https://beatrice-otter.dreamwidth.org/318344.html

Also, you absolutely should not write your fic in AO3's posting interface, holy shit, but there are browser extensions that will save whatever text you have entered into a form. Go to your browser's app store and search for "form history" or "text cache" or some similar keywords, and you will find add-ons that will save text you enter into any text box on a website, so that IF you hit the wrong button or your browser crashes or something, you will be able to recover the text you typed.

I never got formatting garbage in all the years I spent copying text from Word into the AO3 richtext editor. Possibly my version of Word was just too old for that.

Dear writers on AO3: "No archive warnings apply" is for your fluff, soft character, chill smut or story fics. It's for when there's nothing big/triggering and none of the major archive warnings show up in your story.

"Creator chose not to use archive warnings" is THE EXACT OPPOSITE. It is a Massive "enter at your own risk" sign indicating one or more of the major archive warnings or other nasty/gnarly/triggering tags may apply but would be a major spoiler to tag (e.g. horror/thriller fics where one of the major characters is killed). PLEASE don't use this tag if you mean "no archive warnings apply," they're not the same thing.

Sincerely, someone who just saw four T-rated fluff fics in a row tagged "creator chose not to use archive warnings" and had a minor heart attack.

Okay, I get what you're trying to do here, but this is not actually true.

"No Archive Warnings Apply" is used when none of the required archive warnings are present in the fic, correct. This is for fics which do not contain Graphic Depictions of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, or Underage content.

HOWEVER. This emphatically does not mean the NAWA tag is only for "fluff, soft character, chill smut or story fics." A NAWA fic may contain balls to the wall raunchy smut, Blorbo's terrible horrible no good very bad day, massive violence not graphically depicted, relationships that are deeply unsettling to every outside observer within and without the story, whump, heartbreak, tragedy, and much much more. A fic being marked "No Archive Warnings Apply" is not a guarantee that anyone involved is going to have a good time — only that there is no Graphic Depictions of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, or Underage. There is a reason AO3 also has ratings and other tags available to authors.

"Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings" is, as you say, the "Enter at Your Own Risk" flag, but NOT because it means one of the Archive Warnings or other heavy content is necessarily present.

CNTW means precisely what it says — the creator elected not to use the Archive Warnings. It may contain all of them. It may contain none of them. It may contain weird edge cases where the author was unsure if an Archive Warning would apply. It might be a fic with dark, heavy, or disturbing themes despite the absence of those big four. It might be a perfectly pleasant T-rated fic posted by someone who simply does not philosophically vibe with mandatory warnings. (Those writers exist!) It may even be nothing but fluff imported through the open doors program from an older archive that didn't use any kind of warning system. CNTW offers no guarantees as to content; it simply stands as a signal to the reader that this work's metadata cannot tell them what lies ahead.

Now will many authors, out of preference, courtesy, or habit, choose NAWA for "softer" fics and CNTW for "darker" fics? Certainly. But this is neither universal nor required by the Archive. The warning tags mean what they say, no more, no less.

Yeah, I am CNTW for everything I write, as I am indeed philosophically opposed to mandatory warnings (I think CNTW was originally aimed at writers like me, but that was a long time ago, and my recollections might be hazy). Most of my output since 2016 has been romcom fluffy. Still CNTW! A few things that have come in through Open Doors might still have No Archive Warnings Apply accidentally set from the migration, but I fix those as I see them.

I tag as well as I can, for the most part, but I make no guarantees. Thus, CNTW.

(Would I ever use archive warnings? Only if I wrote something that hit Warnings Bingo.)

"Creator chose not to use archive warnings" means "NO SPOILERS"

It does not imply anything about the content of the story. All it tells you is that the author doesn't want to give the reader any hints about that facet of the storytelling, for whatever reason.

.

Personally, I'm the kind of person who likes to know what I'm about to read before I read it so I don't waste time reading stories I don't like.

This applies especially to fanfiction.

If I'm reading original fiction, it's because I'm more open to experiencing something new and unexpected.

If I'm reading fanfiction, it's because I want a specific type of storytelling experience that the canon failed to give me, so I am looking for that specific thing in fanfiction.

If I am in the mood to read something with a happy ending, and the author doesn't disclose whether or not their story has a happy ending, I will skip to the end to check, because if I know that the ending is not the ending I want, it will ruin the entire story for me, and I will regret the time I wasted reading it.

If I am in the mood to read something fucked up and twisted, I want to be able to find what I'm looking for. I don't want to go hunting through a bunch mystery fic that might be innocuous fluff. That is also a waste of my time.

But that's just me.

Some people love fanfiction that surprises them. They have a surprise kink. More power to them. YKINMKATOK.

since I've seen it talked about in several places recently:

if you are going to do a whump- or kink- or ANY-tober or other similar challenges please please please don't post them as one fic with 31 chapters unless it actually is one coherent fic. if they're 31 completely separate fics or ficlets then please just make a collection for them or just post them as separate fics. it doesn't matter if they're only 100 words or if you think they're too small or insignificant to post alone, they're not.

and why this?

because if you post all 31 of them in one fic the tagging is absolutely useless. if I look for things to read on ao3 I'm gonna look at the tags, and if the tags include something that's a dealbreaker for me, i won't even click on the fic. I might not even SEE the fic because I've filtered out the nope-tag! so I'm gonna lose out on reading 30 perfectly nice fics because of one fic that my nope-tag applied to.

ao3 is about archiving. it's about clear tagging and being informative. there is nothing informative about it if the tags in the fic apply to random chapters while others have nothing to do with it. it makes so much more sense to have each work as an individual fic with its own individual tags and warnings, so readers can make informed choices.

of course, you do you. I can't police what other people decide to do. but personally, I find it incredibly frustrating to weed through 31 chapters to find the ones I actually want to read. so I don't. I automatically scroll past all works posted like that. and I know some others do, too.

there is absolutely no shame in posting short things on ao3. there is no minimum word count. no one is going to look at you funny if you post a small ficlet on its own, I promise. it's just going to make some readers very happy when they can actually find the things they want to read.

so, please. at least consider the upsides of posting each work as their own fic.

signed, one very frustrated fandom grandma.

This is what the Series connector is for! Let your fics breathe, even if they are only drabbles

It also wrecks the ability to sort/filter by word count. If someone is looking for a story that is at least 10,000 words, that means they want a story that's at least 10,000 words, not 20 stories that are each 500 words. And me, as someone who likes short stories and often particularly seeks them out, won't see yours if I'm filtering for works that are 5k or less, for example. I am your target audience, and you're making it harder for me to find you!

I was thinking about writing a new user guide for AO3, and then I remembered that AO3 already has one and nobody ever reads it because when people see a banner message they just dismiss it.

You can get this banner back by going into your Preferences, scrolling down to the bottom section called Misc. and checking the box next to "Turn the new user help banner back on," and then hitting the Update button.

Or, if you just want to read the tips and tricks, you can find them here. (If you click the link in the banner, it'll give you a popup instead).

There's a lot of useful stuff in there, including things that people ask about pretty often.

GUYS. DID YOU KNOW YOU CAN WRITE CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE FICS ON AO3

Other things you can do:

Its fucking amazing. Ao3 is fucking amazing. Can I legally marry a website?

WHAT

Attn authors on AO3! Just learned about this on a writing discord I’m in and thought I’d share.

A new website, https://rivd.net/, has cropped up and has been shown to have stolen/scraped works from Ao3, which are being scraped and uploaded at a rather impressive speed.

At this time, it isn't clear if site owners have wised up and have started taking the fics down, as the site requires an account and also the current *justified outrage* at this has led to an apparent overload on the site's servers, meaning they've basically shut down the search and privatized their fanfiction category.

The best way to protect your work if it has not already been scraped is by locking it to all logged out users. It’s unfortunate as guest comments and kudos are so precious to us authors, but it will protect your works from being scraped.

Further information can be found in this Reddit thread and the below screenshots: https://www.reddit.com/r/AO3/comments/1dvyvqm/ao3_fics_being_uploaded_to_rivd_by_a_bot/

NOTE: DO NOT USE RIVD's DMCA TAKEDOWN FORM. You SHOULD NOT be required to provide your *government ID* to protect your intellectual property. This is borderline a phishing scam. RIVD is hosted by Cloudflare, who have a system for reporting abuse on sites which use their services which can be found at the following site: https://www.cloudflare.com/trust-hub/reporting-abuse/.

Thank you @punemy-spotted for compiling all this info and helping get the word out.

@Fanfic writers:

My friend send me this link, is a series on a profile on Ao3 (tumblr) that has different tutorials to insert things to fanfics via html code, I thought I would share bc it’s really cool

Lists of tutorials:

This is a tutorial/live example on how to make large images fit on mobile browsers but remain normal size on desktop browsers.

This is a tutorial/live example on how to mimic the look of letters, fliers, and stationery (as well as other forms of written media) without using images. For all your epistolary fic needs.

This is a tutorial/live example on how to create a "Choose Your Own Adventure" fic. While this has been explained before (see here), this particular tutorial shows you how to use a work skin to hide the next parts from the reader until they click through to get to them.

This is a live example of how an author can create linked footnotes in their work with only a little bit of HTML and no workskins required. This is best viewed by clicking "Entire Work". While I've included the actual coding in bold and italic once you click "Hide Creator's Style", there's a more detailed explanation here.

This a tutorial/live example on how to have text change or appear once a cursor is hovering over it. Helpful for pop-up spoilers, language translations, quick author's notes, etc.

Anonymous on tumblr: do you have a skin that would mimic the author’s notes and review/kudos buttons section from the end of a fic? the desired effect being that the fic could go on after the “end” of the fic, so after the author’s notes and review/kudos buttons

Here's a tutorial/live example to do just that, with some of the buttons actually functioning. I'll explain more inside!

This is a tutorial/live example on how to align images to the left or right of the screen and have text wrap around them.

This is a tutorial/live example on how to mimic email windows on AO3 without the need to use images.

This is a tutorial/live example on how to mimic iOS text messages on AO3 without the need to use images. There's also a chapter on how to have emojis displayed on AO3 as well.

Bored with the default page dividers? This is a tutorial/live example on how customize your page dividers with no images needed (though I do show you how you could use images if you wanted to do such a thing).

This is a live example how to make invisible text that can only be seen by highlighting the text. Tutorial is included in text, and you can always leave comments about questions you may have.

MOBILE USERS: Sadly, this probably won't work for you, since highlighting in a mobile browser is different than web. I've tried correcting this, but have yet to find a solution.

Original coding and design is from layouttest. I make no claims for it, just tweaked it so it will work on AO3.

This is a live example of my AO3 skin that allows the author to recreate the look of lined notebook paper in their work. To learn more about it, you can find the tutorial here.

This is a live example of my AO3 skin that allows the author to recreate the look of sticky notes (aka Post-Its) in their fic. To learn more about it, you can find the tutorial here.

This is a live example of my AO3 skin that allows the author to recreate the look of Deadpool's thinking boxes in their fic. To learn more about it, you can find the tutorial here.

This is a live example of my AO3 skin that allows the author to recreate the look of a newspaper article in their work. To learn more about it, you can find the tutorial here.

This is really useful and I'll always reblog it.

AO3 Etiquette -UPDATED

Based on both decent and not so decent replies, I have made some changes to my original post below.

It would seem a whole new kind of AO3 reader/writer is emerging and it is becoming clear not everyone quite understands how the website community works. Here is some basic guidance on how most people expect you to go about using AO3 to keep this a fun community archive that funtions correctly:

I KNOW there's plenty more I missed but I'm trying to cover most of the basics that people seem to be struggling with.

I invite anyone to add to this, but please explain, don't berate.

Yet another AO3 bot situation - please spread the word!

Hi, it's me again, the person who wrote that viral post about fanfiction plagiarism! Today I'm here to warn you about abuse perpetrated by bots who have stolen AO3 usernames.

There's currently an epidemic of bots going around leaving (apparently random) horrible, hateful comments on people's fics. This isn't the first time bots have invaded AO3, but the big problem with this wave is that they're using real AO3 usernames to do it.

I learned about this when another writer contacted me after receiving the following comment on their story:

Now, while that is my username, I DEFINITELY did not leave this comment (and anyone who would leave something like that on a fic should be slapped! What an awful thing to post). This fic is in a completely unrelated fandom that I have never participated in, nor has that author participated in any of my fandoms, so the probability of it being some intentional fandom drama thing to make me look bad is also low.

The writer whose fic the comment was left on enlisted the aid of some friends and tracked down other guest comments with unrelated usernames attached, which is pretty strong evidence that they are being left by bots at random.

The TL;DR: If you receive a cruel comment from a (Guest) with an actual AO3 username attached, it's most likely from a bot. Please do not lash out at or dogpile the AO3 user who owns that name, and who in all likelihood has no idea that their name has been hijacked for evil.

If finding this kind of comment on a fic, even left by a bot, is likely to upset you, I would recommend changing your comment settings so that only users who are logged in can leave comments. To do this, edit your story settings, and under "Privacy," select the radio button that says "Only registered users can comment," as shown below.

Please spread the word to other AO3 users! And if you see mean guest comments on other fics, maybe let the author know that it's probably from a bot and not a real person who thinks their writing is bad.

I promise you I (and the majority of the authors I know) would NEVER leave a mean or hateful comment on a fic! We all understand how to back-arrow or close out of something that is not working for us. Please note this new bot issue!

I desperately wish people would start actually reading the AO3's TOS before confidently making 'user guides' to the AO3 that are just blatantly, flatly wrong.

Yes the AO3 has banned content. They do not allow anything that's illegal under US law - though US law, importantly, does not ban fictional depictions of things - and they do not allow any commercial content. That includes your ko-fi link, or mentions that you do fic commissions. If you do post fic commissions to AO3 and want to mention the commissioner, the fic is a 'request' from the commissioner. This protects the AO3 and you from copyright law.

No the AO3 is not 'a creative fanfiction archive'. It is a fandom archive. Your meta, insights, and theories are absolutely welcome and encouraged there. AO3 also encourages you to post other types of fanworks, like fan videos, podfics, and art, but unfortunately isn't able to natively host those like it does text, so fic has kind of become what it's known for. That absolutely does not mean that other types of fanwork aren't allowed, or are discouraged by the site culture! Anybody who tells you otherwise is just plain wrong!

AO3 Tagging Inspiration.

Mainly a reference for me bc I always blank when it comes to tags. Sharing in case it helps anyone else, but not intended to be prescriptive. Further references:

so conditioned by this format that for a hot second there I literally thought there was a show out there called "No Fandom" featuring characters named "A" and "B"

About the AO3 "No Guest Comments for a while" warning

If you're not following any of AO3's social media accounts you might be in the dark as to what kind of "spam comments" have engendered this banner at the top of the site:

These spam comments have been posted about a great deal on the AO3 subreddit for the past couple of days. Initially they comprised a bunch of guest (logged out users) bot comments that insulted authors by suggesting they were using AI and not writing their own fics. Some examples, from the subreddit:

But it then escalated to outright graphic porn images and gifs being posted in comments, again by logged out 'Guest' accounts. Obviously, I'm not going to give examples of those, but between these two bot infestations, AO3 has clearly decided to act and has temporarily closed the ability to post comments for users who are not logged in with an AO3 account.

Unfortunately, this means that genuine readers who don't have an AO3 account won't be able to leave comments on fics that they enjoy.

If you are a genuine reader who doesn't yet have an AO3 account, I strongly suggest getting yourself on the waiting list for one. More and more AO3 authors are now locking their fics down to registered users only - either due to these bot comments or concerns about AI scraping their work - which means you're probably missing out on a lot of great stuff.

Hopefully guest commenting will be enabled again at some point soon, but I suggest not waiting until then. Get yourself on that list.

Wait times are going to be longer than usual at the moment, due to the current Wattpad purge [info on Fanlore | Wattpad subreddit thread], but if you're in line, then your invite will come through eventually.

Update: There's now a Megathread about this on the AO3 subreddit.

Listen to your elders

So last week I posted abut the importance of downloading your fic. And then three days later AO3 went down for 24 hours. No one was more weirded out by this than I was. But while y’all were acting like the library at Alexandria was on fire I was reading my download fic and editing chapter eight of Buck, Rogers, and the 21st Century. And also thinking about what I could do to be helpful when the crisis was actually over.

So first off, I’m going to repeat that if you’re going to bookmark a fic, you really need to also download the fic and back it up in a safe place. I just do it automatically now and it’s a good habit to get into.

But let’s talk about some other scenarios. Last October I lost power for over a week after hurricane Ian. Apart from not having internet or A/C I did find plenty to do, I collect books so I had plenty to read, but maybe, unlike me, your favorite comfort reads aren’t sitting on a bookshelf. So let’s do something about that, shall we?

In olden times many long years ago around 1995 we printed off a lot of fic. It was mostly SOP to print a fic you planned to reread and stick it in a three ring binder. And that’s totally valid today too, but you can also make a very nice paperback with a minimum amount of skill and materials.

Let’s start with the download; Go to Ao3 and select your fic, we’ll be working with one of mine. This method works best with one shots, long fic tends to need a more complicated approach. Get yourself an HTML download

Open up the HTML download and select all then copy paste into any word processor. Set the page to landscape and two columns, then change the font to something you find easy to read, this is your book, no judgement. This is all you have to do for layout but I like to play a little bit. I move all the meta, summary, notes to the end and pick out a fun font for the title: 

No time like the present to do a quick proofread. Congratulations, you’ve just created your first typeset. On to the fun part.

Now you’re going to need some materials:  8.5x11in paper ruler one sheet of 12x12 medium card stock (60-80lb) scissors pencil pen or fine tip marker sheet of wax paper white glue two binder clips 2 heavy books or 1 brick butter knife

You’ll also need a printer, if you’re in the US there is almost a 100% chance your local library has a printer you can use if you don’t have your own. None of these materials are expensive and you can literally use cheap copy paper and Elmers glue.

Print your text block, one page per side. Fold the first page in half so that the blank side is inside and the printed side out:

use the butter knife to crease the edge. Repeat on all the sheets. When you’ve finished, stack them up with the raw edge on the left and the folded edge on the right. I used standard copy paper, because you’re only printing on one side there’s no bleed to worry about. Take the text block and line everything up. Use the binder clips to hold the raw edge in place.

Wrap the text block in the wax paper so that the raw edge and binder clips are facing out. I’m going to use my home built book press but you don’t need one, a brick or a couple of books or anything else heavy will work fine.

Once the text block is anchored down, take off he binder clips and get out the glue.

You can use a brush but you don’t need one, smear some glue on that raw edge.

Go make a margarita, watch The Mandalorian, call your mother. Don’t come back for at least an hour

In an hour smear some more glue on there and shift your brick forward so that the whole book is covered. This keeps the paper from warping. While glue part 2 is drying we’ll do the cover. Get out your 12x12 cardstock

Mark the cardstock off at 8.5 inches and cut it. Measure in 5.5 inches from the left and put in a score line with the butter knife (the back edge not the sharp edge)

Carefully fold the score line, this is your front cover. You have some options for the cover title, you can use a cutting machine like a cricut if you have one, you can print out a title on the computer and use carbon paper to transfer the text to the cardstock. I was in a mood so I just freehanded that beoch. Pencil first then in pen.

Take your text block out from under your brick. Line it up against the score mark and mark the second score on the other side of the spine

Fold the score and glue the textblock into the cover at the spine. Once the glue dries up mark the back cover with the pencil and then trim the back cover to fit with your scissors.

Voila:

I’m going to put this baby on the shelf next to the Silmarillion.

The whole process, not counting drying time, took less than an hour.

If you want to make a book of a longer fic, I recommend Renegade Publishing, they have a ton of resources for fan-binders. 

I know @prismatic-bell has posted a few times about what you can add to your printout to make it last longer and it make it helpful to future archivists, but it’s literally this easy to make your own little library of your favorite fics.

Disclaimer: none of these answers are official, and may not work for your particular use case. If there is a specific feature that an unofficial app had that you don't know how to replicate on the AO3, let me know in the notes and we might can crowdsource a solution.

A lot of people used the Archive Reader app to access stories on Archive of Our Own, and have been upset that the app is now charging to read longer than an hour a day. AO3 (and its parent organization, the OTW) has made it extremely clear in recent days that this app is unofficial and that there *is* no official app. They encourage people to use the website.

However, there are MANY reasons you might want an app, and in a bunch of those cases, there are ways to do those things without having to provide your login information to a random person running an app. Here is a round-up of solutions to the most common reasons I've seen people give for wanting an app instead of the plain AO3 website.

These solutions are based on the following assumptions:

WARNING // AO3 COLLECTIONS

It's happening again, guys. More fics are 'disappearing' because someone changes a collection to private.

All the fics in that collection also change to 'unrevealed' and no one can find them or read them anymore. Only the owner of the collection can.

This is what you will see if the fic is part of a private/unrevealed collection⬇️

Only the author can remove their fic from an unrevealed collection. Ao3 sends you an email warning you that a collection your fic is part of has changed the status to unrevealed.

(This is the email you receive⬇️)

The BIG problem here is that if the author is no longer active on Ao3 and don't check the mails, the fic will be lost forever!

Please make sure you have this option unchecked in your preferences if you don't want your works added to collections without your consent⬇️

Be careful with allowing people to add your fics to collections, guys. I have deleted all the collections from my fics and I won't allow any collection requests anymore.

SHARE THIS to make more people aware of this problem!