#SPAM OTW

[savingsallow]

HAPPY B-DAY CASSIE! 🎂

— Cassie Luna belongs to my bestie @acslytherpuff !!! ❤️‍🔥✨

[shot by: @miss--soapy 🫶🏻✨]

[transformativeworks]

Are you getting that annoying "Buy Art from Me" spam on your AO3? Here is what to do

First - if you are a real non-spam person asking folks to commission art by commenting on their fics on AO3.. please do not do that. That is a violation of the TOS.

Second - We are working on filtering it out, and you can help! Below the cut is info on identifying the spam comments, and then how to report them in the most effective way!

So we can stop this flood of spam.

<3 Mod Remi

(Details from PAC are below the Read More)

How to identify it - 1. Comments are left by registered accounts 2. Usually, the comments are on works that have just been posted or updated 3. The comment may provide very specific compliments about the work, and if challenged, the commenter will firmly deny being a bot or scammer 4. The key identifier is that in the comment itself, or in a follow-up to any reply to the comment, the spammer will always do at least one of these two things: - Offer to create art for the work, or say that they are an artist interested in working with you - Ask if they can speak with you on another platform (they may provide their own contact details for other platforms, such as Discord, Artstation, or Instagram)

THE BEST WAY TO REPORT IT 1. Select the 'Thread' button on the comment so that you're viewing the comment's direct page 2. Scroll to the bottom and select the "Policy Questions & Abuse Reports" link 3. In the "Brief summary" field, put "spam comment" 4. In the "Description" field, put "This is a spambot" and then "The account name is [whatever account name]" – this will ensure it gets sorted correctly - Please only include 1 account in your report – if you see another, then please file a new report - Please don't re-report accounts you've already reported

What AO3 is doing about this - 1. We're implementing several measures to try and stop these spammers from making new accounts, but unfortunately, some are going to slip through our fingers 2. Fortunately, it is very easy for us to get rid of this type of spam and prevent the account from posting more – so long as it is reported to us in the correct fashion. If our auto-sorter detects the keywords in your report that will file it into our "suspected spam" folder, then it's easy for our volunteers to quickly check and handle it

[someonecradlemeintheirarms]

new ao3 spam bot, maybe

so, we have all seen the amazing work the AO3 policy and abuse team are doing and doing a weekly spotlight series on the most common TOS violations, yes?

first up this week was the posting of non-fanworks (you can find the spotlight here, recommend reading)

anyway, it would seem someone might be taking advantage of that and is personally being a jerk, or a bot has been made leaving comments like this: (image is from this reddit thread)

AO3 is an ARCHIVE. they don't just go around deleting fanworks "for space". what this comment is saying is utter crap, so if you get something like this, do not despair, do not freak out, do not believe it.

if you get a comment like this, mark as spam or delete. do not respond, don't feed the trolls

that is all, anyone who has more/better info, go ahead and add your knowledge or thoughts (nicely)

[yutamayo]

I'm gonna have to make a TON of stsg breakup parallels/posts BC I went on a deep dive into the world of heartbreak quotes and now I have so many painful words I have to make them say without speaking

[skellebonez]

Ya'll know that if AO3 really wanted to they could legitimately just make a stand alone app that you download from their website, right? That it doesn't NEED to be on any app store? There is literally no reason for them to not have their own 3rd party app.

If PillowFort can be working on their own standalone app that will not be downloaded through Google or Apple then AO3 could have done this years ago. They're just never going to.

[ao3org]

Comment Rate Limits for Logged-In AO3 Users

In the next few days, #AO3 will begin rate limiting comments from logged-in users to help combat a wave of spam comments: https://otw-news.org/4m69w8dr (We'll let you know when the change is live!)

English • Български • Català • Dansk • Deutsch • eesti keel • Ελληνικά • Español • Filipino • 한국어 • Italiano • עברית • Magyar • Nederlands • Norsk • Português brasileiro • Português europeu • Română • Русский • Slovenščina • Српски • suomi • Svenska • Tiếng Việt • Українська • 中文-普通话 國語

[lefemmerougewriter]

This is exactly why I make sure my fics ALL have comment moderation. I would never publish comments like that.

Yo, there's a new wave of spam comments being left on AO3! If you get a comment sounding like this...

"Dear Jenny_Vastra, your works are truly imaginative and demonstrate immense talent. Our writing community encompasses writers and readers from over 40 different regions of the world. If you'd like to connect with us, please join our discord group using the code 6VVWRBZX9W. Best, []"

Do NOT follow any instructions, mark them as spam. They are targeting non-archive locked fics exclusively right now. (This was left on one of the only fics I didn't archive lock...)

[baltameile]

some of my favourite katarsis facts that i've been collecting like little treasures:

lukas is really sweet and always wants everyone to feel comfortable

emilija does little rituals with incense and crystals before gigs

jokubas is always late (but he will deny it)

alanas and emilija work as music teachers and their students sent them gifts after esc

alanas is the one who spams the group chat with memes

acc to their manager lukas is an overthinker and needs someone to hug him (oh god)

when alanas picks up lukas otw to the studio lukas always connects to bluetooth and puts on some weird music

one time they listened to despacito - lithuanian remix

the boys say that emilija keeps them together (oh god pt 2)

the idea of going to eurovision first came up when they were drunk

alanas is the tidy one and lukas is the messy one

jokubas is the talkative one and emilija is the mysterious one

in conclusion your honor i love them to bits

[sl-walker]

Other Fandom Archives

At least, other ones running on the otw-archive software!

SquidgeWorld Archive

Open to all fandoms, SqWA is run under the nonprofit squidge.org! In addition to the archive there, Squidge also offers image hosting, podfic hosting and a bunch of other excellent services. Beyond that, it utilizes more extensive archive warnings than AO3 and also accommodates two additional relationship categories! SqWA has a no-AI policy that is both up front legally and implemented behind the scenes through various coding measures.

The TOS is here. The information about the additional warnings can be found here.

--

Ad Astra :: Star Trek Fanfiction Archive

A single-fandom Star Trek fanfiction archive, this one's home for any and all Trek fandom! Using the same warnings as AO3, but a much stricter (and therefore searchable) tagging scheme, Ad Astra's also connected to one of the friendliest and most supportive Trek communities on the internet! We run weekly challenges, monthly review/comment hunts and like the other archives, we take a very hardline stance against AI both in actual terms and in firewalling the site. AI 'bots can't even reach the server before getting sucked into a black hole of 4XX errors and bannination jail!

There's an additional QPR (Queer-platonic relationships) tag accepted in the form of Character A ~ Character B, as well. Two invitations go out once a day, unless you want to contact me directly, then I can send one immediately.

Find the site FAQs here, please pay special attention to the posting rules!!

--

superlove

Run off of a macbook by a very talented young person, superlove is for all fandoms and original fiction and pretty much whatever else melo wants to open the doors for! In addition to the same archive warnings and relationships available to people using AO3, superlove also has a few more warnings that users can use and both QPR and vs. tags for queer-platonic and adversarial relationships. Given this is largely a private project, please make sure you review the rules carefully.

--

Comic Fanfiction Authors Archive

The CFAArchive is an archive built specifically for comic book and comic animation adjacent fandoms, rather than live-action properties! It uses the same archive warnings as AO3 and Ad Astra, but has the two additional tags QPR and vs. for queer-platonic and adversarial relationships! Much like Ad Astra, the tagging scheme on the CFAA is very strict to maximize searchability and minimize tag-spamming. There's also an attached Discord, where we run a bi-weekly writing challenge, the occasional comment/review hunt and a monthly focus feature where everyone reads a book, discusses it and creates based on it! If you love comic books and comic animation properties, this is the place for you!

Much like Ad Astra, the filtering out of AI 'bots is extremely strict; they get 4XX'd into oblivion and so far, none have gotten through since the new firewall rules were implemented, so you actually can leave works unlocked if you like with minimal (though never nonexistent) concern about them being scraped.

Two invitations go out once a day, unless you want to contact me directly, then I can send one immediately.

The TOS is here; please read the rules carefully! The tagging FAQ is here; don't be intimidated, it's not hard once you get into the swing!

[archivezaria]

weed induced spam otw💋

[transformativeworks]

Five Things GenreCat Said

In Five Things, GenreCat discusses tips on how to get tickets processed quickly, going through emails labelled spam, and MXTX. Read more at: https://otw-news.org/2p86u2r3

[kurgy]

Shaming people for liking Harry Potter is self-soothing purity politics. It doesn’t help trans activism, it doesn’t harm TERFs or JKR It punches sideways to feel good.

HP has massive global cultural reach - if every JKR-aware+pro-trans person abandoned it profits would barely dip. Like, this shit doesn't reach China and Japan - both have their own theme parks otw

What does help is engaging with the text: criticizing and explaining it's flaws + offering more interesting ways to relate to it. This undermines the TERF rot - while pro-trans people withdrawing lets TERFs use HPs cultural impact for recruitment.

Thats what JKR wants, btw: for decent people to shame each other into silence so her people's bullshit looks welcoming and reasonable in comparison.

Shaming clueless nostalgics, casual fans or new kids for something they innocently like pushes them towards radicalization. If HPs used as a hate symbol, yet is too large to kill outright - then it needs to be de-fanged. That can't be done outside the mouth.

Many trans people first questioned their gender because of HP. Its always had a huge LGBTQ+ fanbase with it's themes of struggling with identity, abuse and trauma, hidden oppressed worlds, unjust systems, cruel social structures and found family. Beyond the 'magic' panic THAT was a big part of it being considered 'satanic': the queer kids liked it.

Calling LGBTQ (especially trans) fans 'anti-trans' for liking HP veers dangerously close to fascist logic: only certain kinds of joy or belonging are allowed.

It may be a mediocre childrens story with fundamentally conservative themes and many questionable oddities from a questionable author… so is My Hero Academia. Yet they are still loveable - and people are not wrong for that love. Mindful analysis is more effective a weapon than book burning.

im exhausted but will try do my best with this i guess. implying that i am using fascist logic bc i feel personally unsafe and distrustful around harry potter fans as a transgender person is kinda nuts while jk rowling is behaving like an actual fascist and is buying politicians while half the harry potter fans said "i stand with jk rowling" and went out of their way to dm trans ppl pictures of their hogwarts legacy receipts bc they just wanted to hurt and upset trans people, and show us how the profits would never dip and everything we ever did or said would be meaningless. being forced to see the same argument again, it seems.

feeling anxious, angry, and unsafe bc the rest of the hp fans i meet either prop themselves up as the good ones while still platforming and freely advertising the continued interest in her books and giving her more attention and more money and validation, while the rest of harry potter fans who feel oh so emboldened to "protect womens sex based rights" by directly harassing and stalking trans women and spamming their dms and replies with shit like this?? i refuse to even post the vile suicide wojacks

am im meant to tolerate and share a space with ppl who think trans people are mentally deranged and should be put down like dogs? share a space with ppl who swear they are the cool ones while also still sharing that space with those same bigots who want us dead?

no one is going to come and physically make you give up harry potter, you can do whatever you want, but shit is bad out here right now, for all trans people, but especially joannes primary targets: trans women

you just cannot blame any trans people for not feeling safe or being cool with you being a big harry potter fan now of all times as our rights are being stripped from us and our medical care is further and further criminalized

as for the dig at me about bnha as like some kind of gotcha i guess, that one is probably the worst example to use bc i am not nearly as invested in keeping the hero anime around as you seem to be for the wizard books. i cant even call myself an actual fan of that series because my criticisms outweigh any of the positives, which brings me to my next point:

while the author of that manga definitely did write from his own personal conservative points of view from an extremely odd but centrist lens, and is definitely misogynistic towards his female characters, the thing is, unlike joanne,

mangaka kohei horikoshi is not currently living in a scottish castle funneling millions and millions of dollars of vast wealth into anti-trans legislation and "research" on top of praising a white supremacist and rapist for "knowing what a woman is" while funding more and more rightwing politics

and if the day should come where kohei horikoshi has considerable sway over politics via obscene wealth i will, in fact, kick him and his series to the fucking curb. ive already done this before when i learned something and immediately did a deep dive on scott cawthon.

look, you do not seem like a bad person, and while i am not going to change your mind on harry potter, theres only so many times i can take hearing the most vile transphobic things said by those fans before i just want nothing to do with the property entirely. you feel very strongly about your point of view, and my own experiences make me feel very strongly about mine, but arguing back and forth over this will not do either of us any good, so i feel like this conversation should end here civilly, and we can both keep our peace and part ways on okay terms

[pixiecaps]

Okay 🥰 Yay 🥰

Ily Too . btw woukd you perchance want to hear about TRC .(book series im obsessed wiyh forever)

i would love that. (im currently otw to the doctor but if you want u can spam me with messages about it and i’ll get back to ya when im free :3) (also ur always free to talk to me about any of ur obsessions :33)

[olderthannetfic]

OTW elections

Just got my e-mail with the link to actually vote.

If you're eligible and don't see it soon, check your spam filters.

FWIW, while the vote doesn't make a huge difference this time, I put Anh first. Everyone who's left seems reasonable. I prioritized the Asian candidates.

[quartersety-of-a-holsety]

Okay, I've been keeping tabs on the shitfest with AO3 and I'm getting tired of repeating myself in reply sections

First and foremost, to the people panicking, please breathe. Panicking helps nobody

Next, please keep track of updates via their Tumblr and status Twitter. They're more reliable than some rando shouting "OMG IT'S BACK!"

To the people who apparently have no idea what to do with themselves due to AO3 being down, please either go to sleep, go outside, read a book, do literally anything to occupy yourself until this all comes to an end. This ain't site maintenance that's unexpectedly hit several hiccups, this is a malicious attack on the site's servers. This could very well take a considerably long time to resolve, ranging from several more hours to days or even weeks. Treat it like a power outage and just wait until service is restored -- ON A MORE LONGTERM STABLE BASIS!

Y'all, just cos the site comes up and stays up after a few minutes does not mean service has been fully restored. Please wait until the all clear is given before you start refreshing any pages -- the sysadmins having to directly deal with this would greatly appreciate it. Also I would personally recommend that when the site does come back up, please be easy with it and don't spam open a bunch of fics at once. The last thing the site needs is being severely strained after just coming back cos you're that desperate for your fic fix. Slow down and be easy

To the people spreading misinformation about the attackers and where the attacks are coming from, just stop. We know what the group is supposedly called and we know what their supposed reasons are. However, AO3 themselves have stated that this may not necessarily be true. For all we know, whatever group this is could be lying about their motives, hell they could be lying about being behind the attack entirely just to get their fifteen minutes of fame -- please follow the golden rule: don't feed the trolls. This also means that again, for all we know, the real culprit could be some asshat in his mama's basement with no real reason to do this beyond for shits and giggles -- remember that ancient phrase "I did it for teh lulz"?

Regardless of what this person/group is calling themselves and regardless of what they say their reasons are, please do not take anything they say at face value. Take their comments with a huge grain of salt

Furthermore, enough with the Islamophobia. Your bigotry is showing

To the shitposters making light of the situation, glad to know we can always count on y'all to add some levity to an otherwise stressful time. Just please remember to not take the jokes too far

And finally, to the people unnecessarily spouting hate for AO3 and OTW, please find something better to do with your time

[ao3org]

We've temporarily disabled the ability to request a new account invitation as a preventative measure due to a spam attack. If you already have an invitation, you can still use it! However, anyone currently in the queue will not receive an invitation until we turn it back on.

Additionally, we have temporarily disabled the form on the Technical Support & Feedback page and taken the Policy Questions & Abuse Reports page offline. Anyone attempting to access the Policy Questions & Abuse Reports will receive an error page about being blocked from archiveofourown.org, but don't panic -- this is not the case! It's just the default error displayed by Cloudflare. You can continue to access the rest of the site as normal.

Lastly, the Organization for Transformative Works' donation page -- which is hosted by a third party provider -- is currently offline due to a DDoS attack. This is the only donation form the OTW uses, so please be cautious of scammers impersonating AO3 or the OTW to solicit donations. We are unable to take them at this time.

July 11, 2023 - 23:50 UTC