#not a fic but my tag system sucks atm

[yifftwiceplz]

dave pesters rose about a favor

[aethylas]

Hey, I'm a huge fan of your fic A Gentle Silence Wrought With Music and I was just wondering if you had any plans to continue it at all?

You know how the Witcher 3 is an incredible game but sometimes you have to put the main quest on hold to collect a bunch of trading cards. Anyway in this metaphor CW Supernatural is gwent.

(To answer your question in a less cryptic fashion - first of all thank you so much for being a fan of the fic and I’m SO sorry it’s on hold atm because writing/editing it requires a lot of work and immersion in the world, which I don’t have time or mental space for right now - but it’s DEFINITELY not abandoned, most of the rest is drafted at minimum, it’s just on hold for various reasons including. Sigh. Supernatural hyperfixation. But have no fear, I am set on continuing it in the future. Thank you again for your interest!)

[lavenderek]

hi, A/3 volunteer back again! i hope i can answer your questions properly, but i’m on mobile so sorry if i get a bit confused. it’s also going to be quite long but i hope you can figure out which questions i’m replying to. let me know if you need any more clarification!

1 - as tag wranglers, we don’t moderate content via deletion, etc - we just move fics into the correct tags, and it’s typically on a fandom basis (for example, i might solely wrangle for something like the supernatural fandom only). i’ve never come across ‘problematic’ tags since most of the time, it’s just sorting tags into like... more general tags? so example - someone tags a fic with ‘kinda fluffy kinda angsty’. we would then kind of make it so that tag redirects to ‘fluff with angst’, even though it still appears as the original tag on the fic. does that make sense? i’m also a little unsure of the other questions you had here - which is totally my fault, i’m in the middle of writing an essay for uni that needs to be in in like... 12 hours and my brain is frazzled - but if you were asking about a situation where if i was concerned that a single user had a collection of fics that were all entirely based upon something illegal and reported their entire account to mods, would it be deleted - i’m not sure. tag wranglers are kind of like low-level moderators, and we’re not what would typically be thought of as moderators since we simply reorganise content versus actually removing it. since the reporting process is typically through the site itself and is handled by an entirely separate team, i cant speak for how they think or what their process is.

2 - it’s up to our judgement as to if we want to report it, but again, the tags we wrangle are VERY general. tags like ‘dead dove don’t eat’ and stuff that are typically full of polarising content arent something i’ve come across, because i think they make up a minority of most fandoms when put against tags like ‘fluff’ and ‘angst’ and even stuff like ‘chocolate’, lmao. i’m not certain what happens when a report is processed and the fic is found to be removable - what i do know though is that with fics that are seen as breaking specific laws (i.e depictions of CSA, slander, etc) mods are often a lot more hard-handed for several reasons (reputation both within the community and in terms of the fact they could very much get in legal trouble). again though, i’m a low-level moderator and don’t see that side of the process. however, if i report something and it’s not taken down, i’m not implicated in any way. it’s been a while since i’ve been on the site and reported anything so i’m not entirely certain if reporting is 100% anonymous or if you have to supply details like email, but i think if you DO supply things, it’s to ensure you aren’t mass-reporting someone (bc i think that counts as targeted harassment). email is also possible to fake, so i think you can make the process anonymous if you want to. as for how often i personally report fic - not often. i’m a CSA victim (which is why this topic is touchy for me tbh), and i don’t like to go through the process because i find it arduous - you have to give an explanation as to why you’re reporting the fic, and i find it triggering at times. i’ve also never been in a position where i have found a fic while actively volunteering that i feel has been necessary to report, so i can’t speak for that either. all of that being said - i’ve heard of and seen on one occasion fics and entire accounts be deleted for harassment/slander - in particular, i’ve heard multiple times that accounts dedicated to purposely like... making fun of? or like technically harassing? kpop boy group members have been taken down because even though their content is ‘technically’ fanfiction, it’s obviously just there to incite hatred against a specific person. so, imo, if mods are quick on taking down accounts obviously run by 14 year olds in fandom drama writing numerous fics where boyband member A calls boyband member B stupid and tells him nobody likes him, i think they’re very likely just as serious about taking down more serious content. that’s just my opinion and my personal experience though, and it’s distinct from my volunteering.

overall, on the whole topic of CSA on the website - it’s really tough even just as a basic content moderator. there’s lots of reasons as to why people post it, and though people are very obviously welcome and encouraged to think critically about everything, it’s a fact that the topic is really really difficult to manoeuvre (culture, who is posting it, when was it posted, why it’s being posted aka vent fics, etc). as i said, i’m a CSA victim myself, so i understand the frustration, but it’s too nuanced and difficult a topic to be able to say ‘ban it all’. however, i do think the site is doing their best to crack down on stuff that is very obviously on there for one specific reason, and i also think generally, they’re changing things so people are able and sometimes encouraged to anonymise themselves by not giving any profile info and to protect themselves by turning off comments completely, etc. i find that you can make it really easy to curate your posting experience so that essentially, you can post but nobody can really interact.

3 - i like tag wrangling! i got into it because i saw a position on the front page of the site and decided to go for it. it wasn’t very taxing to get into and you don’t have to put much work in - a couple of hours a week is enough, and they’re understanding about work/uni/etc. it’s easy to meet other people through volunteering, and they ensure everyone is over 18. i don’t read through fic myself - just through tags, and then i sort them into their proper places. if something is tagged wrong, we don’t get in touch with the author, we just do our best to reorganise the tag so it redirects into the correct place - again, for instance, if someone writes a fantasy AU that they tag with ‘high fantasy prince/princess AU’ and that tag doesn’t exist, we would sort it into the main tag for a royalty AU or something like that. re: monetisation of fics: technically, monetised content is not allowed on A/3 - if someone is advertising their patreon or kofi in their authors notes or profile, you’re supposed to report it just as a general user. i think it’s because it puts the site at risk of being sued or something? but as a low level mod, i don’t HAVE to report these things unless i see them while i’m tag wrangling (aka i see a tag like ‘my patreon is XYZ!!!!! send me money!!!!!!’) and i personally don’t report monetised fics because ... i don’t find it a prominent issue, lmao. people are also learning to avoid it by being like this is my tumblr or this is my twitter, and when you click on their social media they link their patreon or whatever There instead. also, idk who decided the colour scheme! i think it was just like a generally agreed upon thing with the site designers. i also think there’s been convo for a few years about dark modes and stuff on the site, but i’m pretty sure the site has to get a few more things out of the way before they’ll prioritise that (i know they’re trying to work on a better moderating system for things like spam and harassment atm bc the spam filter absolutely sucks dick lol). i’ll totally drop a mention like WOW, wouldnt it be AMAZING if we could have this SPECIFIC COLOUR SCHEME, tho <3

thank you so much for responding!!! this is really cool to know, i've never even seen a post by an a*3 worker before so you're a total unicorn right now

heh uni-corn because you're in uni. sorry i'm tired too

good luck on your paper!

[theoreticslut]

I am here to talk to you about writing :)

How many WIPs you have atm?

How many of them would remind me that I'll never be able to get a guy like Fred?

Here are some words/concepts:

sunshine/sunset

cuddles

best friends to lovers

Thank you Gabriella!! I love that you’re always asking me questions! 🥺🥰💗 it literally makes me so happy! Pls don’t ever stop.

+ I have about 20 current WIPS (I think I missed some bc my tagging/notes system I’m using SUCKS), but a TON MORE ideas!!

+ uhm, about half of them?? I think I’ve got maybe 6 that are Fred x reader & then others are George x reader but have a lot of Fred interaction in them. But I feel you!! When writing, I’m frequently going ‘pls? May I have you?’

+ sunshine / sunset;

I have some with these words but none of them are Fred ones! Here’s a little bit from a bill one I’m writing with the word sunshine -

He was a ray of sunshine and a breathe of fresh air all in one body. He easily captured the attention of any room he was in, not even trying to but doing so nonetheless.

+ cuddles;

Ooh here’s one!! This ones fully written, just needs a little editing 💗

“Freddie, what are you doing?” You giggle, a smile taking over your face.

“Cuddling you. It’s hard to feel left out when you’re being cuddled by your best friend, yeah?”

“Fred...” you smile, burying your head into his shoulder as your heart melts at his words.

You can feel as he chuckles, his arms tightening around you as he plays with the ends of your hair.

+ best friends to lovers;

I’m not completely sure if this is going to be best friend to lovers yet but there’s a good chance!!

“Fred, stop!” You laugh as he continues to make a mess of the tent. If you had known how clueless he was in setting up a tent you would have asked someone else to help.

“I don’t understand this. Why can’t we use magic? It’d make it so much easier.”

“Because Freddie, camping without magic is more fun.” You smile, gently pushing him out of the way.

Feel free to ask me any questions on fics / writing!! I just wanna talk about it so bad 💗