#hopefully this is helpful im having a fireworks-induced migraine rn so coherency is questionable

[n7punk]

Hey there! Good evenin!

I wanted to ask for advice on posting AI3 stories on here? I’ve noticed you and other artists I favorite doing it for some time but I’ve never really gotten the hang of figuring it out for myself.

(well, tumblr gave me two notifications but only showed me one anon so... hope you're the only one LOL). I assume that's a typo for AO3 and not the crime of AI generating 3 stories XD

okay, so I'm guessing you're looking for tips on how to effectively share fics in a useful/concise way? i don't know what a lot of other people do since the fanfic authors i follow on tumblr dont usually make share posts, but i can talk about my thought process i guess.

i share the way i do because i used to write my fics direct on tumblr (which was fine when they were like 1k one shots and doesn't work for pretty much anything else). i had to include all the information someone might want at the start of a post by necessity. when i started sharing fics from ao3, i continued providing the same information with some changes/additions because like, if that's what they wanted to know to read it on tumblr, they probably want it in order to click through to another site too. i know a lot of people who post direct on tumblr will just include like two lines like [- ship name - prompt/summary (some people skip even this & just. pls. include it) - read more] but that's really not enough for me to read something new unless i already like the author.

(side bar: for long projects, i generally do one share post at the beginning and one at the end, occasionally with another halfway through if it's especially long. i used to do them every chapter but that's just Annoying (for me, people in the tags, and my followers probably) but i update really frequently, so if it's been 2 months since the last chapter, go for a new share post, why not.)

anyway this is my general formatting notes that led to how i do my posts:

either start with or end with the link. you can type a regular title/"Read here on AO3!" and make it a hyperlink, or include one of the embedded links tumblr has.

IF YOU USE AN EMBED LINK: for multichapter fics, it will title it only as "Show Chapter" which is totally unhelpful. ao3 links are roughly formatted as "ao3.org/works/[workID]/chapters/[chapterID]". you need to delete the "/chapters/[chapterID]" part to have it display the embed link the same as it does with one shots, with the fic title, author pseud, and "AO3" stuff. This will make the link title actually helpful!

think of what information you would need if you were browsing ao3 instead of tumblr. you would usually be in a fandom, character, or ship's tag, so that's going to be the most important information you want to be sure you include and get out first, since it's often the first qualifying/disqualifying factor for people looking at fics. personally, i include fandom and ship because those two characters will be the obvious focus and all the others can be found on the actual ao3 post. if it's not a ship fic, then you can list major character(s) instead (also, you can list ship as "Gen" for general, non-shippy fic).

obviously you need a summary (seriously, you need a summary. even if it's bad, or one sentence, put something), but if there's other stats you want to include (like how i do the rating - which i think is important - and chapter/word count) you might want to put those ahead of the summary just to keep things visually neater. what you view as important will vary.

if you want to literally copy what i do i dont give 2 shits lmao. if you like some things about it but would change others, go for it. to me, your hitlist of information should be: fandom, ship/characters, work title, and fic summary. pseuds can be skipped, especially if its the same as your tumblr name, but i generally include it. i think rating is important, and i include something indicating length since thats a big decision factor in when/if i read what fics, but it's not so important in a share post because ideally, if they're interested in the summary, they'll at least open the fic and add it to their saved for later if its too long for that moment, and they'll see word count then