#tldr: fic writers aren't influencers

[rollercoasterwords]

the tiktokification of ao3

or: some of you fundamentally misunderstand ao3 and it really, really shows

i was talking about this with a friend a few days ago and since then i've seen multiple posts of various sorts that have just made me think about it more, so. here is me breaking down a disconnect i see particularly with younger members of the marauders fandom (i say marauders specifically just bc that's the only one i'm plugged into):

okay, so i've seen many (usually younger) marauders fans either talking online about how they wish ao3 was more like social media (specifically regarding algorithms) OR talking about ao3/fanfiction/fanfic writers as if they are operating under the same etiquette/guidelines/assumptions they would bring into social media platforms. this ranges from being mildly irritating to genuinely harmful, and i want to talk abt why.

first - you have to understand that social media, in this day and age, exists in a profit economy. and when i say social media here, i'm referring to platforms like tiktok, twitter, instagram, etc. all of these platforms exist in a profit economy where content is a product that can be monetized. this leads to a few important distinctions:

people posting on these social media platforms are generally posting with the intent to get their content seen by as many people as possible, as quickly as possible

they post with this intent because once their content is consumed by enough people, it becomes a product that they can monetize

therefore, if that content gets popular enough, these people can become influencers, where content creation is an actual job and their audience are, in a sort of vague and obscured way, similar to consumers purchasing a product

because of the profit economy surrounding social media, there are certain assumptions + forms of interaction that bleed across almost all social media platforms. the ones relevant to this little essay include:

operating under the assumption that anyone posting anything on the internet wants to go viral, ie. be seen by as many people as possible as quickly as possible in order to grow an "audience"

these influencers are creating content for us, their audience, so they should want to please us. they should also be trying to appeal to the broadest possible audience. therefore, if we dislike their content, we have a right to make that very, very clear.

in that same vein, we have a general right to critique content creators, as they are making a profit and we are the consumers purchasing their product--much like you might feel entitled to a certain standard of service in a restaurant where you are paying for the food.

when you carry these assumptions over to a platform like ao3, it creates problems. why? in a nutshell: because ao3 exists outside the profit economy

ao3 is a non-profit. it does not have an algorithm because it is not trying to sell you anything. this means that the writers posting their work on ao3 are not making a profit. we are not influencers. we are not creating monetized content to sell to a consumer-audience. where consuming content on other social media platforms might be comparable to eating at a restaurant, reading fanfiction on ao3 is more like coming over to someone's house and eating cookies that they made for free. you are in their house. the cookies are free, given as a gift. so what happens when those assumptions outlined above start to bleed over from other social media?

assuming that anyone posting fanfiction online wants their work to go viral -- i've seen this with popular fic writers getting questions like, "are you worried x isn't going to be as popular as y?" those questions are usually not ill-intended, but they demonstrate a fundamental lack of understanding about why writers post work on ao3. it's not to go viral. it's not to build any sort of online following. most of us who post on ao3 have jobs or schoolwork or other commitments, and writing fanfiction is something done for fun, out of a love for writing. those sharing their work online might be seeking community, but that is fundamentally different from seeking an audience, and in no way involves internet virality. if someone is posting fanfic on ao3 with the hope that it'll "go viral," then they likely either won't continue writing fanfic for long or will reach a point where they have to re-evalute their motivations, because seeking joy and validation by turning your art into a product for consumption just isn't very sustainable.

influencers are creating content for us, so we have a right to let them know if we don't like it -- nope!! fic writers are not influencers. yes, even the popular ones. no matter how much other people might blow their work up on social media, fic writers are still outside the profit economy. they are not creating content for an audience. they are not creating content for you. they are writing because they love it, and they are generously sharing it. if you don't like it, don't interact with it. you are never entitled to loudly and publicly proclaim how much you dislike a fic. i talk about this more here

we have a general right to critique fic writers, the same way we do with content creators/influencers -- again, no. you should not be treating fic writers the way you would treat an influencer on another social media platform, no matter how popular they may be. this is not to say fic writers are beyond all reproach; rather, it is a call-in to check your entitlement. fic writers are not little jesters entertaining in your court. they are not subject to your whims. they do not have to do things for you. they do not have to write things you like. in that post i linked on point 2, i talk about what etiquette might look like if you're really concerned that a fic writer is doing something harmful, but that is not what i'm talking about here. i am talking about the proliferation of negativity i have seen, especially on twitter and tiktok, where people essentially just talk shit about fics or fic writers as though they are entitled to have those fic writers working to please them. this is gross, and it needs to stop. you wouldn't go over to someone's house, eat the cookies they baked to share, and then spit those cookies back in their face and start shouting about what a shitty baker they are. or maybe you would--in which case, congratulations! you are Not A Good Person.

anyway, at the end of the day, a lot of this can be boiled down to: Because ao3 exists outside the profit economy, fic writers are not influencers, and you should never be treating them as though they are. i think i see this disconnect largely with younger people just because they've maybe only ever really understood social media within this sort of influencer-consumer-culture economy, and genuinely don't understand how to interact differently with the internet. so, consider this post a call-in to reevaluate the way you interact with fic writers and the etiquette you use when it comes to engaging with fanfic on ao3! i promise that ao3 being different from social media is a very, very good thing, and also a very, very rare thing, so let's treasure it and focus on fostering community rather than trying to morph it to fit the mould of influencer-audience dynamics that we see almost everywhere else <3

#tldr: fic writers aren't influencers #stop acting like they are #it only creates problems!!!! #anyway if you have engaged in some of these behaviors that doesn't make u a bad person #it just means u should maybe shift ur perspective moving forward #capitalism is a lifeless desert that grows every day and ao3 is a little oasis #let's all enjoy it while we can #instead of trying to place it within a consumer economy #ranting and raving #txt

[raayllum]

so i deleted my poll & here's why bc it is both. sad, strange, and a little hilarious. for TLDR, skip all the way to the end

this is what it was gearing towards as of this afternoon & this is why it got weird.

for clarification, the poll was meant to investigate, because i was curious, how many people i had potentially influenced in my writing(s) about callum analysis wise. i actually expected option 2 to be the most common (aka that people already saw him that way) since that's what i've found in my circles; most of the other rayllum writers and shippers i've spoken to reached those conclusions themselves after S2 or S3, if not earlier. so option 1 being the most popular was the first big surprise, as was as many people picking "want to see the results"

here's where things go from surprising to weird. earlier this afternoon, the poll was sitting around 120-ish people and had been in that vein for most of the week since it was published, climbing maybe a few votes every day after the initial boom in a variety of the categories the first like day and a half.

then, steadily, over the course of 5-10 minutes, anywhere from 5 to 15 fresh votes flooded in... all to the same category of "nah i don't see him that way." which wasn't That strange, except

the fandom troll, who is notoriously obnoxiously loud about Not liking this interpretation of callum, also has a tendency of making sock blogs and sending anonymous asks to bait you over and over again, no matter how many times you block them. for Years.

then the number continued to steadily climb solely in that singular category, doubling and then tripling. now, i'm not going to say there couldn't be *check statistics* 50 people who don't see callum as being willing to sacrifice the world for his loved ones/help aaravos if rayla or ezran's lines were quit literally being held at knifepoint, But

When the poll started, I acknowledged the bias the poll would likely be prone to, as my followers - by virtue of following me and seeing and presumably agreeing with what I post - would probably skew in favour of the interpretation, and this was reflected in 6/7 days of the poll's backing, with 60-78% (roughly 70-80 people) of participants leaning towards a shared interpretation. "Nah I don't see him that way" also rose steadily in terms of votes throughout the week day by day, but never cleared more than 8-10 individual people (you're troopers, I respect you, and I hope having the "snake boi Callum" tag makes it easier for you to blacklist accordingly so that you can enjoy your fandom experience)

The Snake Boi Callum interpretation is popular enough in fandom that we actually had a fandom event for it a few months back, plenty of people participated who I felt I wasn't familiar with as well as people I knew I would, and the pieces of art/fic/playlists regularly got 50-150 notes. If there are 50+ people who disagree with said interpretation, they are, generally speaking, not a group who's often actually making things for the fandom at large in terms of fic, fanart, other forms of creation, and not a ton of meta weekly or monthly about the topic and/or outside of that general wheelhouse, either. The 'pro' side is conversely a lot more active; most of the people who have written fic about said topic(s) aren't even me, but other cool lovely talented individuals over the past 3-ish years

The initial wave of votes happened when I posted the poll in the "snake boi Callum," "Rayllum," "tdp," and "the dragon prince" tags to reach a broader audience beyond my more immediate active follower range (as like, 90% of my followers are lurkers, which - respect). This is when it would've made sense if there was going to be an uptick in "nah I don't see him that way" to build

Instead, it happened 6 days into the poll when it was already decently buried by tags, I had recently self-reblogged it back into my accordingly biased circles, and rather than having a general variety, only a singular category went up by close to 40 people in like 3 hours. I tend to gain anywhere from 6-10 followers a week (for example, this week was 6) so that also does not account for the massive leap in a very short amount of time

Therefore, keeping to roughly 125 votes for posterity, and when removing the originally 30-ish or so people who voted for "see results" (significantly less than the first category, but more than the second by a decent margin) as well as the real 10 votes for "nah, I don't see him that way," approximately 85 people voted explicitly in favour of Snake Boi Callum / one of the first two options in general, with my meta being cited as the biggest influence. This is also with me rounding up the numbers of the other categories to likely more than they were, but I want to account for the potential error of my memory, as I wasn't keeping track of where things were super specifically before it started to smell like meddling.

Again, it's not that there couldn't be 50 people with that opinion, it's just that 40 of them, Realistically, did not suddenly come out of the woodwork in the span of 1-2 hours to consecutively vote in only one (1) category 6 days after that would've actually, marginally, made sense in terms of tagging / seeing it in the main tags.

If you're wondering why I presented all my ~ evidence ~ it's because if not, I'd probably be labelled as a liar and/or dismissed (it's happened before, unfortunately) and honestly, it ended up being a little funny to dig into how presumably nuts this got.

TLDR;

Anyway if you ever feel like you're deeply insecure and worried that you're idiotically clout chasing, remember you will never be as Embarrassing as the guy who made close to 39 sock blogs in one afternoon to try and 'one up' someone over an opinion they have regarding a children's tv show protagonist who's believed biggest flaw is that he Loves His Friends.

better poll that cannot be screwed with will follow

#blog-hordika-us #fandom nonsense #the way i don't mind math as much now bc i spent 3 hours today teaching it lmao #like imagine having the incentive to have that many fake emails and that much free time #i could never #i actually worked on my publishing revisions today and that was so nice #also so much mario kart #the irony of being So Mad that i'm like 'callum is gonna fly too close to the sun' #and then you icarus yourself. it's like titanic all over again

[ciceroprofacto]

Well I don't know if this may come as rude but. Honestly, I'd like a lot that in a certain moment, soa has more of that ofmd energy you mentioned: not giving a fuck of what actually happened, but staying somehow not out of reality.

I couldn't read soa in one week. I had to read it in four months for the huge emotional charge it is. And I had to re read previous chapters or some paragraphs before continuing because I had almost forgotten what was there before. I know you want this to be serious and you're putting a LOT of effort in it. It's noticeable, and I think I haven't ever seen a fic writer make that much effort in their writing.

But the plot, characters and themes (philosophical themes) sometimes are not simply a lot to handle. They're too much to handle, making it difficult for people with already busy lifes read it.

Sorry if I made any spelling or grammar mistake. English isn't my first language, and I practically learned it by myself. Thanks.

I'm vibing as much as I can with the meaning, but I do have a little confusion and I don't want to misunderstand, so correct me if I'm wrong. It seems like you're saying the tone of it doesn't take itself too seriously, but the themes and plot are really heavy. I think that's absolutely true!

But, I could do it better

The strength of comedy is that you're able to make heavy things lighter and it gives more people the ability to carry it. Which is exactly why ofmd has blown up where Black Sails didn't- despite BS being basically as-perfect as a show can be (Taika Waititi's name on ofmd definitely helps). It's the difference between having comedic relief and being a comedy. BS is an epic period drama that's with a touch, funny. Ofmd is really well-made comedy that's able to convey fairly-heavy themes because it nails the notes between things that are jokes and things that are not jokes. But, it also isn't quite as ambitious as Black Sails on what themes it's taking on- it skirts carefully around period-typical homophobia, racism, and sexism by creating a bubble in which those things have less influence, whereas Black Sails dunks you headfirst into that reality.

Since I'm trying to take on similar issues, I've been taking my tonal cues more from Black Sails. But, there's a lot that I can learn from ofmd's escapism, because it somehow manages to still be immersive despite not going into depth on some of those concepts, and because they don't go so far into those concepts they're able to focus on the more-accessible nuances of human emotion like found family, self-discovery, and falling in love. While it's important to take on issues and ensure the tone reflects the gravity of those issues- taking on some issues shouldn't be a commitment to take on all issues because then the tone becomes so burdensome no one can stomach the weight of the story anymore.

Basically- ofmd shows you don't have to delve into every little plot tangent to make an immersive period piece, and tangents are definitely my biggest weakness as a writer. What you're calling 'effort' is what I consider my little 'fascinations'. Half the time I'm writing plot around the research that I was doing for fun and half the time I'm researching to connect holes in the story. It's the plot vs story balance, and I think both SOA and BS try and keep those two on equal-footing while ofmd is character-focused with the story taking priority over plot. SOA and BS's style lets things get complicated and can be really intellectually-impressive, whereas ofmd's style is a lot more streamline and emotionally-impactful.

It's also nice that ofmd gives a lot of leeway to anachronisms. SOA and BS aren't exactly high-brow compared to the source material, but the language is still less-accessible than a show that just totally doesn't bother with 18th c. dialogue.

tldr; SOA is hard to read and I can do more to fix that.

Themes- people want to laugh, no one wants to laugh at injustice.

Tone- escapism is easier to stomach than realistic conflict.

Content- more people care about story than plot.

Delivery- more people understand what the fuck you're saying if characters talk like modern humans.

#y'all can say what you want about me #I am fully #and excruciatingly #self aware #soa #answered