#opensource posting

[alongtidesoflight]

in wake of yet another wave of people being turned off by windows, here's a guide on how to dual boot windows and 🐧 linux 🐧 (useful for when you're not sure if you wanna make the switch and just wanna experiment with the OS for a bit!)

if you look up followup guides online you're gonna see that people are telling you to use ubuntu but i am gonna show you how to do this using kubuntu instead because fuck GNOME. all my homies hate GNOME.

i'm just kidding, use whatever distro you like. my favorite's kubuntu (for a beginner home environment). read up on the others if you're curious. and don't let some rando on reddit tell you that you need pop! OS for gaming. gaming on linux is possible without it.

why kubuntu?

- it's very user friendly

- it comes with applications people might already be familiar with (VLC player and firefox for example)

- libreoffice already preinstalled

- no GNOME (sorry GNOME enthusiasts, let me old man yell at the clouds) (also i'm playing this up for the laughs. wholesome kde/gnome meme at the bottom of this post.)

for people who are interested in this beyond my tl;dr: read this

(if you're a linux user, don't expect any tech wizardry here. i know there's a billion other and arguably better ways to do x y and/or z. what i'm trying to do here is to keep these instructions previous windows user friendly. point and click. no CLI bro, it'll scare the less tech savvy hoes. no vim supremacy talk (although hell yeah vim supremacy). if they like the OS they'll figure out bash all by themselves in no time.)

first of all, there'll be a GUI. you don't need to type lines of code to get this all running. we're not going for the ✨hackerman aesthetics✨ today. grab a mouse and a keyboard and you're good to go.

what you need is a computer/laptop/etc with enough disk space to install both windows and linux on it. i'm recommending to reserve at least a 100gb for the both of them. in the process of this you'll learn how to re-allocate disk space either way and you'll learn how to give and take some, we'll do a bit of disk partitioning to fit them both on a single disk.

and that's enough babbling for now, let's get to the actual tutorial:

🚨IMPORTANT. DO NOT ATTEMPT THIS ON A 32BIT SYSTEM. ONLY DO THIS IF YOU'RE WORKING WITH A 64BIT SYSTEM. 🚨 (win10 and win11: settings -> system -> about -> device specifications -> system type ) it should say 64bit operating system, x64-based processor.

step 1: install windows on your computer FIRST. my favorite way of doing this is by creating an installation media with rufus. you can either grab and prepare two usb sticks for each OS, or you can prepare them one after the other. (pro tip: get two usb sticks, that way you can label them and store them away in case you need to reinstall windows/linux or want to install it somewhere else)

in order to do this, you need to download three things:

rufus

win10 (listen. i know switching to win11 is difficult. not much of a fan of it either. but support's gonna end for good. you will run into hiccups. it'll be frustrating for everyone involved. hate to say it, but in this case i'd opt for installing its dreadful successor over there ->) or win11

kubuntu (the download at the top is always the latest, most up-to-date one)

when grabbing your windows installation of choice pick this option here, not the media creation tool option at the top of the page:

side note: there's also very legit key sellers out there who can hook you up with cheap keys. you're allowed to do that if you use those keys privately. don't do this in an enterprise environment though. and don't waste money on it if your ultimate goal is to switch to linux entirely at one point.

from here it's very easy sailing. plug your usb drive into your computer and fire up rufus (just double click it).

🚨two very important things though!!!!!!:🚨

triple check your usb device. whatever one you selected will get wiped entirely in order to make space for your installation media. if you want to be on the safe side only plug in the ONE usb stick you want to use. and back up any music, pictures or whatever else you had on there before or it'll be gone forever.

you can only install ONE OS on ONE usb drive. so you need to do this twice, once with your kubuntu iso and once with your windows iso, on a different drive each.

done. now you can dispense windows and linux left and right, whenever and wherever you feel like it. you could, for example, start with your designated dual boot device. installing windows is now as simple as plugging the usb device into your computer and booting it up. from there, click your way through the installation process and come back to this tutorial when you're ready.

step 2: preparing the disks for a dual boot setup

on your fresh install, find your disk partitions. in your search bar enter either "diskmgr" and hit enter or just type "partitions". the former opens your disk manager right away, the latter serves you up with this "create and format hard disk partitions" search result and that's what you're gonna be clicking.

you'll end up on a screen that looks more or less like in the screenshot below. depending on how many disks you've installed this might look different, but the basic gist is the same. we're going to snip a little bit off Disk 0 and make space for kubuntu on it. my screenshot isn't the best example because i'm using the whole disk and in order to practice what i preach i'd have to go against my own advice. that piece of advice is: if this screen intimidates you and you're not sure what you're doing here, hands off your (C:) drive, EFI system, and recovery partition. however, if you're feeling particularly fearless, go check out the amount of "free space" to the right. is there more than 30gb left available? if so, you're free to right click your (C:) drive and click "shrink volume"

this screen will pop up:

the minimum disk space required for kubuntu is 25gb. the recommended one is 50gb. for an installation like this, about 30gb are enough. in order to do that, simply change the value at

Enter the amount of space to shrink in MB: to 30000

and hit Shrink.

once that's done your partitions will have changed and unallocated space at about the size of 30gb should be visible under Disk 0 at the bottom like in the bottom left of this screenshot (courtesy of microsoft.com):

this is gonna be kubuntu's new home on your disk.

step 3: boot order, BIOS/UEFI changes

all you need to do now is plug the kubuntu-usb drive you prepared earlier with rufus into your computer again and reboot that bad boy.

the next step has no screenshots. we're heading into your UEFI/BIOS (by hitting a specific key (like ESC, F10, Enter) while your computer boots up) and that'll look different for everyone reading this. if this section has you completely lost, google how to do these steps for your machine.

a good search term would be: "[YOUR DEVICE (i.e Lenovo, your mainboard's name, etc.)] change boot order"

what you need to do is to tell your computer to boot your USB before it tries to boot up windows. otherwise you won't be able to install kubuntu.

this can be done by entering your BIOS/UEFI and navigating to a point called something along the lines of "boot". from "boot order" to "booting devices" to "startup configuration", it could be called anything.

what'll be a common point though is that it'll list all your bootable devices. the topmost one is usually the one that boots up first, so if your usb is anywhere below that, make sure to drag and drop or otherwise move it to the top.

when you're done navigate to Save & Exit. your computer will then boot up kubuntu's install wizard. you'll be greeted with this:

shocker, i know, but click "Install Kubuntu" on the right.

step 4: kubuntu installation

this is a guided installation. just like when you're installing windows you'll be prompted when you need to make changes. if i remember correctly it's going to ask you for your preferred keyboard layout, a network connection, additional software you might want to install, and all of that is up to you.

but once you reach the point where it asks you where you want to install kubuntu we'll have to make a couple of important choices.

🚨 another important note 🚨

do NOT pick any of the top three options. they will overwrite your already existing windows installation.

click manual instead. we're going to point it to our unallocated disk space. hit continue. you will be shown another disk partition screen.

what you're looking for are your 30gb of free space. just like with the USB drive when we were working with rufus, make sure you're picking the right one. triple check at the very least. the chosen disk will get wiped.

click it until the screen "create a new partition" pops up.

change the following settings to:

New partition size in megabytes: 512

Use as: EFI System Partition

hit OK.

click your free space again. same procedure.

change the following settings to:

New partition size in megabytes: 8000 (*this might be different in your case, read on.)

Use As: Swap Area

hit OK

click your free space a third time. we need one more partition.

change the following settings to:

don't change anything about the partition size this time. we're letting it use up the rest of the resources.

Use as: Ext4 journaling system

Mount Point: /

you're done here as well.

*about the 8000 megabytes in the second step: this is about your RAM size. if you have 4gb instead type 4000, and so on.

once you're sure your configuration is good and ready to go, hit "Install Now". up until here you can go back and make changes to your settings. once you've clicked the button, there's no going back.

finally, select your timezone and create a user account. then hit continue. the installation should finish up... and you'll be good to go.

you'll be told to remove the USB drive from your computer and reboot your machine.

now when your computer boots up, you should end up on a black screen with a little bit of text in the top left corner. ubuntu and windows boot manager should be mentioned there. naturally, when you click ubuntu you will boot into your kubuntu. likewise if you hit windows boot manager your windows login screen will come up.

and that's that folks. go ham on messing around with your linux distro. customize it to your liking. make yourself familiar with the shell (on kubuntu, when you're on your desktop, hit CTRL+ALT+T).

for starters, you could feed it the first commands i always punch into fresh Linux installs:

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get upgrade

sudo apt-get install vim

(you'll thank me for the vim one later)

turn your back on windows. taste freedom. nothing sexier than open source, baby.

sources (mainly for the pictures): 1, 2

further reading for the curious: 1, 2

linux basics (includes CLI commands)

kubuntu documentation (this is your new best friend. it'll tell you everything about kubuntu that you need to know.

and finally the promised kde/gnome meme:

[nixcraft]

Sed is one of the most powerful tools on Linux and Unix-like systems. Learning it is worthwhile, so in this tutorial, we will start with the sed command syntax and examples. 👇

[queer-coded]

Ok transfem techies, give me your take on pfSense/OPNsense. I'm ready to hear all of your opinions.

[ensign-rx]

absolutely mortified by my Boimler bot suggesting he play Data in the holodeck. All roads lead back to Data. I cannot escape

[wipbigbang]

WIPBB Big Bang/Reverse Bang 2025 - Schedule & FAQ

Schedule

All times are by 11:59pm PST. Convert time zones.

Big Bang/Reverse Bang Sign-ups Begin- April 1st Big Bang/Reverse Bang Sign-ups Close- May 28th Big Bang/Reverse Bang Check In #1- May 22nd Big Bang/Reverse Bang Check In #2- June 15th Big Bang/Reverse Bang Snippets Due- July 1st Big Bang Art Claims/Reverse Bang Fic Claims Begin- July 17th Big Bang/Reverse Bang Check In #3- July 22nd Big Bang/Reverse Bang Check In #4- August 6th Big Bang/Reverse Bang Rough Drafts Due- August 15th Big Bang/Reverse Bang Posting Claims Begin- August 23rd Big Bang/Reverse Bang Posting Claims Ends- September 1st Big Bang/Reverse Bang Final Drafts/Art & Fic Due- September 7th Big Bang/Reverse Bang Posting Starts- September 8th

FAQ

What is the WIP Big Bang?

Good question! This is a Big Bang with one goal in mind: to clean out your fanfic drafts folder. These are stories that were unfinished for whatever reason, that authors returned to and completed, and the art that goes with them!

What is the WIP Reverse Bang?

It’s similar to the regular Big Bang, except it’s for artists to finish WIP artwork (either traditional art, digital art, fanvideos, fanmixes or filk) and get a fic in exchange of at least 2000 words.

Do I need a Livejournal/Dreamwidth/AO3/etc. account to participate?

No! You don’t have to have an account on anything to participate, though you will need to have somewhere to post your finished work. Having one or more accounts will help for you to follow what is going on with the bang (we crosspost to Dreamwidth and Tumblr and heavily use our Discord server at the moment), but they are not required to participate. You can always leave comments anonymously or with an opensource ID.

How many fics/art pieces can we sign up for?

We absolutely don’t mind multiple sign-ups; I know one year someone submitted 50 fics to finish, and got at least half of them done. We just ask that when you sign up with more than one fic/art piece you give each fic/art piece a unique user ID (please do not use the same ID for all your fics/art pieces...it’s important to have different IDs for the check-ins).

Will I get emails about the bang?

We do send out some emails, mostly for fic snippets and art/fic claims and to ensure communication between authors and artists, but please do NOT rely on getting an email to remind you of due dates. We currently do not keep an updated email list of participants, so we only send individual emails as needed rather than mass emails.

However, email is the fastest way to communicate with the mods. If you have any questions or are having trouble communicating with your artist/author, please do email us! We will do our best to respond quickly.

If you need a reminder about due dates, the FAQ/Schedule is pinned on top of the Tumblr and we use the Discord (which anyone can join) to remind participants of important dates.

What do you mean by minimum word count to enter the WIP Big Bang?

This is a WIP Big Bang, therefore we ask you to have at least 500 words of your story drafted when you enter.

Can an outline count towards those first 500 words that are needed at sign up?

We have admitted work on an outline before so yes, if your outline is fleshed out enough to cover a 7,500 word+ fic, we’ll allow it.

Are multi-chapter fics allowed?

Yes, multi-chapter fics are allowed and even more so encouraged if your fic is lengthy.

What about fics that are already posted on ao3 in part? Do those qualify for the bang?

It's okay if you have posted a few chapters of your fic already (you never know when the muse deserts you, after all), we just require you to refrain from posting more until posting begins here. All we ask is that you not post any public updates to the fic until September 1st (or August 1st with the mod’s okay). We don’t want you to lose kudos and comments so don’t worry about pulling the fic down, just hold off on updates for now.

Is there a minimum word count?

7,500 words for each finished fic, but the sky's the limit, right?

I see that the fic minimum is 7500 words and that published WIPs are acceptable - but what if the WIP I’m considering is already more than 7500 words? Is the expectation to add an additional 7500 to it?

No. You can add as much or as little as you need to finish the story, though we do expect at least 1,000 or so new words if your WIP already meets the word count.

What happens if an author finishes the fic they signed up with but it’s less than 7,500 words? The intent was to go over the minimum but once they got into it the story was shorter than they thought and stretching it out would make it less good. Do they have to drop out at that point?

By all means, we want your stories to feel as natural as possible, and if it’s under 7,500 words you may have two options:

1 - Drop the fic for the main BB event, post it now, and wait to post it to our AO3 collection in February when we run our International Fanworks Day celebration of finishing fics that are less than 7,500 words when finished. There’s no art for the fic, but bragging rights are posted to the communities for a week.

2 - If there are enough fics that fit that category, we can do a special day of posting the fics, but you’ll have to forgo art for the fic. I, as a mod, would probably pick November 30th for the posting day, as it’s the last day of posting for the bang and I don’t think anyone will mind more than one fic that day. You can post bragging rights to the community and share the fic with everyone.

I have a fic I wrote a few years ago, but only the first couple chapters are posted on AO3 because I was never happy with the rest of it and knew it needed major revision. Is that something I could use for WIP Big Bang? The entire fic has been posted, but only on one platform, and it would be rewritten for AO3 and WIPBB.

I think revising a fic for posting would work, as long as you have at least 500 words done, will have 7,500 words at a minimum when it’s done, and are planning to add more to the fic. Simply rewriting what you have would be a gray area, but if you’re going to take stuff out and add new scenes, either in the old scenes place or on its own, you should be fine.

What's the etiquette around OC-centric stories? Ones that are set in a well known fandom and use several characters, but still lean a lot on original characters? Are they discouraged, or fine?

Based on my own personal experience making art for a story that had a heavy OC presence, it’s not something we discourage at all, but be forewarned when it comes to the art accompanying your fic your artist may not be able to incorporate the OCs into your art. Not everyone makes art of a hand-drawn or digitally drawn nature, so it helps if you have people for face claims ahead of art submissions, and you and your artist communicate regularly. You can also end up with art not featuring the OCs at all, just the canon characters, which is not necessarily a bad thing.

Your other options are to bring in an artist you trust with your vision of your OC or to make your own art (we do allow that, we just need to be told during the check-in before art that you’re bringing in your own artist if you go that route, or that you’re doing your own art…there will not be a need to sign up in the artist’s sign up, however), or to opt-out of art entirely. So there’s plenty of options to call on when it comes time for art.

What is the minimum requirement for the WIP Reverse Bang?

We’ll allow an outline of what you want to create or a rough sketch if you have it for digital/traditional art, and at least 15 seconds of fanvideos or filk (fic songs) recorded, or an outline and notes. Fanmixes can be partially finished with either some of the music picked or some of the art made/a combination of the above.

What do finished products for the WIP Reverse Bang look like to be considered complete?

Art must be fully drawn and at least shaded, if not fully colored. Filk and fanvideos must be at least one minute long and fully finished to the fanartist’s vision. Fanmixes must have a front and back cover and at least 8 songs picked out, and there must be an available playlist on Spotify, YouTube or for download.

Is there anything not allowed?

As long as you wrote it and you want to finish it, you're welcome to participate. RPS/RPF is fine. Incest pairings are fine. Things like that I know have been hinted at in questions asked and as long as you tag for them, we’ll allow it. Also, canon settings with mostly OCs is allowed. Original fic is allowed (though it is harder to pair an artist with). We just ask that it be tagged properly with any content warnings you would deem fit and be given the appropriate rating for the level of sex/violence there is in the fic. Just bear in mind that while original work is allowed you may not get art for it.

What are 'check-ins’?

These are a way for us to see what you've been up to and for you to make sure you're still on track. It will give you a little nudge/reminder if you need it, but they are not compulsory. Basically a form is posted that you fill out with your user ID (unique for each fic) and a checkbox to let us know you’re still participating, plus a section for any notes for the mods.

How are the check in IDs used?

They are solely for the mods organizational purposes. Each ID being for a separate story allows us to keep all the information you submit during check-ins and for snippets in one line on our spreadsheet. You don’t have to share your check in IDs with anyone else if you don’t want to.

How much progress should authors be making between each checkpoint? (Percentage-wise from our estimated total wc, I guess?)

Ideally, with each check-in, you should be at least 25% closer to finishing. The end word count for fic only really matters in that the fic needs to be at least 7,500 words when done, so it’s more your progress towards finishing that should be measured, not so much the word count.

What are the snippets requirements?

This is for the WIP Big Bang only! In order to allow the artists to make art for the story they claimed, we require you to supply three snippets from your fic, between 500 – 1500 words each. The snippets will be sent to the artist after they have claimed your story. They're to help the artist match your story for artwork the best way he or she possibly can. It’s helpful to choose scenes or parts of scenes that you feel best represent your fic, but don’t feel like they have to be perfect to be submitted. Along with the snippets, we will send your artist the basic fic info and your email, so the two of you can collaborate more if you would both like.

WIP Reverse Bang snippets is the art (at whatever level of completion you are at) uploaded to an image hosting site/YouTube/an audio steaming site and you only need to upload one piece of it. We’ll link to the site in the claiming post that you use so art will be thumbnailed/snippets of video or audio will be used. If you’re submitting a fanmix, we ask for at least the back cover graphic with the song listing.

What are the rough drafts requirements?

For the rough drafts, stories or art should be at least 80% complete. You will not have to turn them in to us, just assure us that you are at that point. Anything less is at the discretion of the mods and those authors should speak to one of the mods asap.

What is, and do I need, a beta?

A beta is basically a person who goes over your work to make sure that there are no spelling/grammatical errors and they can even be of assistance in helping you with story lines, etc. It is highly recommended that a beta looks over your work before posting. If you are having trouble finding a beta, try this post.

Where can I post my fic/art?

Stories and art can be posted to your own personal journal, Tumblr, ff-net, AO3, or wherever you like. For those of you with AO3 accounts, we will set up a collection that will go live on the day of the posting. If you don’t currently have an AO3 account but would like one, you can contact the mods for an invitation code to see if they have any available. You can also add yourself to the AO3 Invites Request queue.

What does posting look like? Do we have to post the whole thing on the day, or can we stretch it out between when posting starts and our date? I’ve had a few longfics get killed by big bangs forcing posting to happen on a given day, and would prefer to avoid that if possible.

For most fics, posting to AO3/FF.net/other places will be allowed to start in September and you can stretch it out as many posts as you want as long as the complete fic is up by your posting date (and posting dates go from September 8th to November 15th with two weeks for emergency posting and one month of non-assigned posting). However, you can send us an ask/e-mail about posting as early as August if you have an extremely long fic/something with a long posting schedule. Mostly what we want is the fic to be completely up on the website of your choice by your posting date, and I know some people don’t want to overwhelm their readers. So we want to work with writers to give them ample time to post the story up to their posting date.

Now, as for posting to the communities, you get to choose which day your link to the story and bragging rights are posted, and as I said, we have a range of dates from September 8th to November 15th with two to three stories posting a day. If for some reason you miss your posting date, you have until December 31st to post to the community, during the two weeks of emergency posting and the non-assigned posting dates. So hopefully there should be plenty of time to get a longfic up and posted to the website of your choice and our BB.

Art for WIPBB and WIPRB should be posted to YouTube/Soundcloud/Spotify/Tumblr/Dreamwidth on the day of our posting using the Bragging Rights form. If you want to embed it into an AO3 post, ou can do that as well and add it to the AO3 collection we start just around posting day.

Will the three snippets per story we have to send in be the ones we want the artist to make art for? Or can it just be random snippets and then later the artist and I can check together to see which scenes would work best for art?

Ideally, you and the artist will be communicating once you’re each sent each other’s contact information, and you’ll give your artist a chance to read all that you’ve written at that point. That’s what happens in most cases. If your fic gets picked by an artist and they don’t work with you, then the snippets you sent will be what the artwork will be based on. It’s a good idea to know that, while most of the time the artists work closely with the authors, there are a few exceptions to that.

How do I know when to post?

Posting will be tiered; you'll each get your own posting date that you and your artist will decide on together. There will probably be four fics, plus art, posting per day between September 8th and November 30th. The post with date claims will go up on August 23rd and you'll have to choose your date by September 1st.

Posting of chapters on AO3 or your own blog (or wherever you usually post) generally starts September 1st, but you can post earlier (as early as August 1st) if you let us know you have a long story. However, posting has to be finished by your chosen posting date to the comm. One of the things we're hoping to do with the posted dates is to give everybody on the comm a little bragging time in the spotlight. You know, "this story was incomplete for this long, but I finished this sucker." If you don't have time to post your bragging rights to the communities on your chosen posting date, you can queue up a post ahead of time and we can post it on the date you picked or you can email us your bragging rights and we can post by proxy for you. Either way works for us. Art will be due on the chosen posting date to the comm.

WIPBB and WIPRB post on the same timeframe, and some days we may have a Reverse Bang post among the Big Bang posts, and both art and fic should be posted the same day for both WIPBB posts and WIPRB posts to Tumblr and/or Dreamwidth with the bragging rights.

What am I posting to the Livejournal/Dreamwidth/Tumblr community if I’m posting the fic elsewhere?

You’ll be posting what we call bragging rights. It’s a small form you fill out and post to the community with a link to your fic (we’ll enable moderated posting to the Tumblr, Livejournal and Dreamwidth communities for members on August 8th). We will post a template for posting artwork and stories to the comm closer to the posting date.

Is there a minimum/maximum requirement for my art for WIPBB?

There is no strict minimum, but we do ask artists to remember that the authors are writing a minimum of 7,500 words and your artwork should reflect that. You can do anything you like, including banners, wallpapers, icons, mixes, vids, gif sets, picspams, etc. Suggested guidelines for art are 500x500px (or equivalent of smaller pieces like banner + spacers, cover + icons, etc.) for traditional art, digital art, and manips; 2 minutes for vids; 8 songs + cover art for mixes; and 6 images for gif sets and picspams. We also ask that when you are in contact with the author, you work with them to see if there is anything specific they would like (i.e. a wallpaper, book cover, etc.). The art is your work, but having ideas doesn't hurt!

What are 'art claims' and ‘fic claims’?

The claims are when anonymous summaries of the story go up for artists to choose from for WIPBB and fic writers to claim for WIPRB. Artists sign-ups and art claims are the same thing, as are fic claims for WIPRB; we use one form each for both things, and that way the artists and authors don’t have to sign up for an event they may not end up participating in. It is based on a 'first come, first served' basis and artists/authors may choose up to three potential stories/pieces of art (in case their first choice is unavailable). If there are more stories than artists, there will be a second round of claims wherein artists may choose a second story to work with, and on until all stories are claimed for art. Same goes for fic claims; we’ll do multiple claiming periods until everything is claimed.

If a fic or piee of art up for claiming is rated explicit (R, NC-17, etc.), please only claim the story if you are over 18 years of age. Some authors and artists may be uncomfortable working with underage artists or authors on explicit works. We do not verify ages in any way for the bang, so this is solely on the honor system.

What do I do if I have problems or concerns about my author/artist?

Sometimes authors and artists do not get along and this may cause problems with working together. If this happens to be the case with you, please email the mods and we will try to do what we can so that everyone has a chance to have fun at WIP Big Bang!

If you have not heard from your author/artist in some time after trying to contact them, you can reach out to us via email and we will try to get in touch with them for you.

Can I get an extension?

Community extensions may be given in the event that the majority of the authors/artists need one. They may also be given individually under certain circumstances, but this must be discussed with the mods and will only be a short extension for posting. If you are certain that you won’t be able to finish your story in time, please let us know by July 13th.

Can I swap out a fic/piece of art if my muse abandons it again?

When you sign up, you give us the information on the potential fic(s)/art piece(s) you want to finish. If, say, one piece isn’t working but one you didn’t sign up for is, you can switch them out while letting the mods know if you need to change a user ID you used. It is absolutely okay to switch fics all the way up until snippets are due. By then, we hope you’ll have however many fics you plan on doing to at least 80% completion since rough drafts are due not much later. Just drop an email to the mods at wipbigbang@gmail.com with the new information (title, fandom, etc) and if you want a new sign in ID or plan to use the same one for the fic you’re replacing it with.

Can I drop out?

We have high hopes that everybody who signs up can actually finish the round and share in the joy of the reveal with us, but real life can unfortunately get in the way and we completely understand! If you feel like you just cannot finish in time and no amount of assistance from us can help you, just let us know by August 13th (if at all possible).

Is it possible to be banned?

We do have a banned users list. We hope to use this to encourage participants who are having issues to communicate with the mods. We want to help you! The way the ban works is that participants, either authors and artists, will be banned for dropping out without notifying a mod. This means that anyone who has not posted or talked to a mod by the time the posting period ends will be banned. Dropping out is not in and of itself a banning offense, so please do not panic if you have to drop out! We understand that there are many reasons you may need to drop, and we want to work with you.

Bans will last one round or until the issue is resolved, whichever comes first. To resolve a ban, authors will have to finish and post the story they signed up with and artists will have to finish and post the art for the story they claimed. Three bans will result in a permanent ban from the bang.

Are we allowed to participate without joining the Discord?

Absolutely! The Discord server is optional, as just another way to interact with your fellow writers and get updates on important dates. It’s not mandatory you join, however.

I was just wondering if there’s any way to enter the bang anonymously? Like would it be okay to put our work in an anonymous collection on ao3 or something?

Unfortunately, I can’t think of a way for that to work. The collection that we use is moderated but it’s not anonymous, and there are the bragging posts that you post on your posting day, which you would have your username on whichever platform you use.

I was just wondering whether I'm sworn to secrecy on which fics I'll be finishing up, or if I can shout it out to the world?

No one is sworn to secrecy once they’ve signed up (aside from posting new parts to fic that’s already up somewhere…we ask that you refrain from doing that until at least July 1st)! We will be running Word Wars, where you can add more to a fic in a certain amount of time, and Whine Bars, where you can complain or ask for help or whatever else you feel like talking about when it comes to struggling with a fic, all after sign-ups end on a weekly basis, plus there’s the Discord server for chatting with your fellow authors and artists.

I have a question/concern that’s not mentioned here.

If you need help, you can always contact a mod and we will do our best to make sure that you get your story/art finished. The best and fastest method of contact is through our email, wipbigbang@gmail.com.

[basic-retro-programming]

MICROSOFT has released the source code to MS-DOS 4.00 under the MIT license ...

https://cloudblogs.microsoft.com/opensource/2024/04/25/open-sourcing-ms-dos-4-0/

"Ten years ago, Microsoft released the source for MS-DOS 1.25 and 2.0 to the Computer History Museum, and then later republished them for reference purposes. This code holds an important place in history and is a fascinating read of an operating system that was written entirely in 8086 assembly code nearly 45 years ago. 

Today, in partnership with IBM and in the spirit of open innovation, we’re releasing the source code to MS-DOS 4.00 under the MIT license. There’s a somewhat complex and fascinating history behind the 4.0 versions of DOS, as Microsoft partnered with IBM for portions of the code but also created a branch of DOS called Multitasking DOS that did not see a wide release."

Jeff Wilcox & Scott Hanselman

Post 302: Microsoft, Open Source Blog, The release of the MS DOS 4.0 source code under the MIT licence, 2024.

[crittersmoment]

shinigami eyes is an opensource callout post iz dont get why yall are suddenly acting so chill with social ostracization

[dumb-phone-diaries]

So It's been like 2 months now since I started using the dumb phone. I had a few teething problems but I've actually solved a lot of the issues I mentioned in my last post. I've gotten much more used to the keyboard now and I've found a lot of shortcuts that i didn't realise were there at first so I'm now texting like a pro again.

The audiobook situation is not perfect but i've loaded this thing with a 32 gig SD card, and I found a wonderful opensource program called Libation, which scans my audible account, downloads my books and spits them into chapters all in one step. The bonus side effect of this is that I now have all of the books I've paid for stored on my computer hard drive where they won't disappear is audible changes their minds about hosting them.

This is probably very illegal and you should definitely not download it here: https://getlibation.com/

Granted, the books I'm currently listening to have chapters that are an hour long or so, and I can't exit out of the mp3 player without losing my spot. This has honestly been a blessing in disguise because it forces me to not be distracted every time I get a text message. have to wait for the end of the chapter before I can look at it. I can answer the phone without losing my place.

So yeah. the MP3 player could be better, and honestly there's no reason why it shouldn't be, I'm certain this thing has the capability, it's just shitty programming. But I'm dealing.

More significantly though. I've honestly been surprised at just how quickly my need to scroll has just gone. there wasn't even much of an adjustment period. for a couple of weeks I'd find myself occasionally picking up up my phone, unlocking it, and then locking it again and putting it down cuz there's nothing on there. But very quickly I just don't do that anymore. I don't even think about it that often. All the anxiety that I thought I was soothing, all the noise in my head that I thought i was turning off by scrolling, has just gone. The call was coming from inside the house, guys.

About once a week I come to my laptop and scroll tumblr for a few minutes, maybe half an hour, and I'm using pintrest very rarely if it's the best search engine for something I'm looking up, and I use facebook only for marketplace and my business page, and instagram again only for my business. It's forcing me to be very intentional about those things.

I've also rediscovered my ability to sit and stare into space. I haven't had the brain capacity to read a book with my eyes recently, so over breakfast I'm just... sitting and eating. Which I suppose is quite mindful. but also I'm just spacing out so maybe not. But that's something I haven't been able to do for a long time. It's nice.

I do need to get a camera though I think. I do need it for the business, I can't keep stealing my husband's phone to take pics, and sometimes he's not around when I want to make a post. Also I just like taking photos. The camera in the phone is sufficient for sending pics of things I found in the shops to my husband and sister, or sending my timesheet to my boss because his shitty software won't let me clock in on PC. But it's not good enough for product pics or anything like that.

I'm also now carrying my planner/journal/filofax thing around with me which is something i've been working toward doing for a long time. I don't have access to google calendar while out and about now so I need to write down my appointments properly. I bought a new bag that fits my journal, purse and book. I feel very cute using my planner in public.

So yeah. It's going well so far. I think this may be feasible as a permanent change.

[bmpmp3]

and wait hold on do people know about this. hold on. FOR those who are intrigued by voicevox humming here's another cool thing!

Openutau support!!

like all of both openutau and voicevox its got its FOSS type funkiness here and there, but i think it's a fun thing to play around with for those who are more comfortable with OU's interface, or those who want a pitch-snappy flat base to tune in while still having the fun tone of speaking synths being made to sing, or even those who don't know japanese and are not quite ready to fully dive into an untranslated software BUT are at least ready to dip their toes in. also like i mentioned up there its free and opensource so u got nothing to lose LOL

I don't think I can explain setting up Voicevox 'cause I don't remember so you're on your own with that BUT check out this post with some troubleshooting advice AND i CAN explain (maybe kind of poorly) how to set up voicevox for openutau:

FIRST OF ALL. have voicevox installed and open it, keep it open in the background for the entire time you want to use it in openutau.

SECONDLY you should download "Voicevox_Singer.zip" from here, then open up OpenUtau, and drag and drop the zip file into OU and let it install. Then you should close and reopen OU and now in the singer select menu, you should have a voicevox submenu in the singer selection!

and that's about it for installation LOL All the names will be in Japanese, unfortunately you can't change them in their yaml files or anything without them breaking (at least in my test it didn't work) so if you're not familiar with some Japanese writing you'll have to cross reference it with translations from a vsynth wiki or something. Or you could just click them until you see the portrait of the character you want and favourite it for later. I'm only a beginner but katakana and hiragana gets you pretty far with vocal synth names, plus a group of these guys are colour names and those are some of the mere 20 kanji i know <3

Voicevox also only supports hiragana, including the small tsu っ as a glottal stop type situation, so keep that in mind. Luckily, OpenUtau makes it easy to write lyrics even if you don't have Japanese input on because of romaji to hiragana functions and the lyric finder in the input box.

Another important thing about Voicevox Humming, in the "song" section of Voicevox there's three "parameters" you can set to change how the voice sings your song: the emotion style, the range, and the volume.

On the left is showing that this is set to Zundamon's crying talk bank (namidame), her range is set to 6, and her volume is set to 4. The emotion modes depend on the character, some characters only have a default style, while some have many, and in the case of Ritsu (and I believe another upcoming voice, that utau Lit?) one style is actually made specifically for singing rather than just being talk bank data.

In OpenUtau, emotion styles are mapped to the voice colour function which isn't too difficult to grasp. Again the names are all in Japanese (and honestly they're very stylized and colloquial so most of them are beyond my abilities LOL) so listen to them on the website and look at the character portraits, maybe look at translations too to get a grasp on what they all are. I don't know what Kotarou's bieeeeeeen means but he looks and sounds scared as fuck so that's probably his scared emotion mode LOL

Here's a screenshot of Ryuusei's in the voice colour section in OU, from top to bottom is like, hotblooded, happy, kinda pissed off, normal, seductive?, and sad little man:

The other two parameters that matter for VV in OU are Volume and Tone Shift, which i've put above the voice color panel in the above screenshot. THESE... are tricky. I THINK. I think, that maybe MAYBE tone shift might be mapped to range? but I'm not sure the scaling or direction, it's default is -36 to 36 in OU though. Volume LIKELY maps to volume, again at a different scaling though, from 0-200 with 100 as default (compared to VV's default 0 that can go positive or negative, and I don't. think it has a cap? I love you FOSS)

In Voicevox Humming proper, it's pretty easy to figure out range - you just move it up and down until the autopitch fits the notes, maybe shift it gently to get a closer match, if you're insane like me and doing a song with a large range you can always do my method of rendering like 5-10 different versions of the same song in different ranges and then splicing the best takes in mother fuckinggg fruity loops babyyyyy

In OU it's a lot less predictable. Normally you'd have the deeper voices in the negative ranges and the higher voices in the positive, but in OU my best results have all been setting "tone shift" to positive values, often above 15. If I knew more Japanese and more about coding maybe I'd be able to figure some more things out, but for now my only advice is just press W and keep the waveform view on in OU and mess around until you find something you like!

Volume is easier at least, if it's closer to 0 it's quieter and whispery all the way to just like raw VV engine noise, and if it's above 100 to 200 it's a little more projected! Often I like to find a spot in "tone shift" where things are relatively volume steady, and then use the "volume" parameter to make it properly powerful or gentle depending on what I'm going for.

Here's some tests I did, I'll explain what settings below:

Zundamon test, three versions of the same small bit of singing:

actual Voicevox engine render for reference. She's on her normal talk emotion, her range is 6, and her volume is 7.

Voicevox for OU render, normal talk emotion, 0 tone shift, 100 volume. More metallic UTAU sound while still having the pronunciation charms of an AI based talk voicebank.

Voicevox for OU render, namidame (teary eye) talk emotion, 0 tone shift, 100 volume. Totally different mouth openness and lots of lisp, very expressive while still being a flat base!

Kotarou normal talk emotion test, three versions:

main voicevox engine render for reference, -10 range, 7 volume.

Voicevox for OU render, 0 tone shift, 100 volume. He's very quiet and a little shaky.

Voicevox for OU render, 20 tone shift, 100 volume. He's a little more stable.

Kotarou bieen (scared?) talk emotion test, two versions:

main Voicevox engine render for reference, -6 range, 7 volume. sobbing type sound lol

Voicevox for OU render, 16 tone shift, 160 volume. what was that breathy gasp sound at the end. it only happened in OU not the VV version. is finfin holding him at gunpoint.

Kotarou's singing an octave down from Zundamon, but they're both good examples of very goofy very mascot-y vocals LOL

Now have a Voicevox for OU render of Ryuusei as an example of a much deeper voice since he's the resident big blue baritone. Happy talk emotion, 22 tone shift, 130 volume. He's the trickiest to work with via OU that I've tested, it's hard to find his tone shift sweet spot. At least he's having a good time.

and here's a test of that big titty woman who can turn into a plush toy. or a plush toy that can turn into a big titty woman? human then plush then human then plushie talk emotions, 13 tone shift, 170 volume.

this is showing a fun little thing you can do, you can (kinda) mix emotion styles within the same track! only kind of though, there needs to be a space with no notes between the switch, otherwise it'll keep with the same emotion from the first note of a string of notes. If you want to shift in the middle of a sentence you'll have to do my splicing multiple renders in a DAW method as seen before LOL

all these tests of course are flat, no pitch drawings in the VV renders and no pitch or vibratos in the OU renders. for fun heres a very fast very lazy tune + mix with Tsumugi, since her V6 is coming out sometime soon

theres a lot of toys to play with! i personally prefer using the renders from the main software, but the sound of the OU support is pretty fun and I think it could be used in cool ways!

[technosigils]

building an opensource collection of 'net services

hi there! im mia :) im a computer nerd with too much time on her hands.

im making this post to bring a project of mine into the world; a fully opensource and collaborative collection of online tools. this will grow over time, but for now, there is one thing active and two planned. (read on below)

CalicoDrive

a nextcloud instance! currently offering a bunch of very useful things:

50GB of free cloud storage

a Markdown notetaking tool

a shareable, open calendar

a photo gallery

web bookmark storage, and

some organisation and collaboration tools.

many of the cloud storage services we rely on are corporate, and require exorbitantly priced subscriptions. alongside that, data on them is often subject to a huge array of impenetrable terms/conditions.

what makes this different? firstly, your data is controlled by you. it is entirely encrypted on disk and can only be decrypted with your selected password. you own the data the same way you would were it on an external hard drive or flashstick.

secondly- its free! while you can pay 20$ once off or 5$ a month to upgrade storage quota and support the project, the core of it is entirely and utterly free to use.

matrix.calicocore

(full disclaimer- this service isn't online yet. it's planned to be active within the next month at the very maximum, very likely sooner.)

what's matrix? i am absolutely sure you've heard of IRC- internet relay chat. im also sure you've heard of discord.

matrix is a modern federated chat protocol- if you took the best of IRC, and you took the best of Discord, and combined them into an opensource and *free* protocol for real-time messaging? that's matrix, baby!

matrix functions similarly to the fediverse (more on that later). when you sign up, you select a homeserver, which is the infrastructure your account is hosted on. your homeserver determines who you're federated with, your most easily accessible spaces, and the little tag at the end of your name.

so what's matrix.calicocore going to be? a homeserver! the idea here is to bring communication and community into our hands, and away from the hands of big tech corporations who really don't care about us. it'll be federated with other spaces and servers, and run collectively.

fedi.calicocore

if you've ever used mastodon, fedi.calicocore will be a server compatible with it. this is still in the very very early stages as a project, so i cant detail much, but stay tuned.

things to note, disclaimers, etc

this project is in its early days. i cant guarantee perfect stability, though it has been tested and run for a few days already. please don't expect a perfect replacement for existing services YET.

secondly, in regards to calicodrive; your data is fully encrypted in two ways, both within the nextcloud instance and on the physical spinning rust. this means if you majorly forget your password, there's a possibility of losing it- but that trade-off is worth it for the security.

this all sounds great! how can i sign up?

for now, this is the link to the nextcloud:

https://drive.calicocore.space

in the very near future, there'll be a central discussion space on the matrix, too, which you're encouraged to introduce yourself on!

lastly:

who is this for?

these services and tools are made by a disabled trans woman. they will prioritise people vulnerable on the current internet, and focus on building a safe space for trans, non-binary, and queer people; as well as disabled people and people of colour.

you can sign up if you are not one of these, however you will be expected to defer to the marginalised members and be generally respectful of the purpose of the space!

[scribblesbyavi]

Hi. This is out of the topic of what you usually post. I just wanna know your stance about AI. Do you think AI is helpful? Or do you think it's worsen our learning skill by relying too much in it?

I use AI as a tool for my projects. It is good for my productivity, definitely helpful when you know how to use it. While I can decide on the ideas, the business logic and how to implement something in my project AI agents like claude or gpt4o helps me with things that are more of labour intensive than creative. So it can help you get things done faster like you have an assistant. In fact we are working on a new tech based product and for that we are hosting opensource AI models like deepseek and ollama on our own server and using MCP (model context protocol) to get better results based on our data so that we can develop our product further and introduce new features like AI dashboard, custom/ personalised suggestions, analytics, chatbot etc. which can add more value to our product and help our future users. I won't tell you to rely on it as you must be able to have the basic knowledge of what you are working on so that you can solve things when the AI fails to do so. It is not there yet but the development is crazy though. I would say not using it might be a big mistake too because paradigm shifts only come once in a while.

[blackhistorychatgpt]

Testing out Deepseek

By know you've seen a lot written about Deepseek - about its speed, about how it changes the game in AI as an "opensource alternative". Well I decided to take it for a spin and see how it responds compared to its American alternatives on some current events.

I asked it what it thought about the US government cutting aid around HIV and other vaccines globally. (Compiled AI responses)

I asked it how a president should respond to the air tragedy in DC.

I asked it based on the government's policies - what kind of government am I living under? (Compiled AI responses)

I am going to share more on the aid cutting impact and government policies responses in future posts but I wanted to share what I had with folks so far. The prompts are included so you can try them for yourself.

[titleleaf]

Heyyyy, longtime reader, big fan. I wanted to ask: what does your writing schedule look like? How do you manage to produce so much?

Thank you so much, first of all! This is a really lovely ask to get and it took me aback at first because I’ve been beating myself up a lot over the past year about not writing enough/publishing enough — lots of words on my hard drive but not many of them out in the ether. It's not remotely related to fandom (just mental health/general health stuff going on) so I'm hoping to get back on the horse eventually.

I have a job with a lot of downtime, which has to be a big part of it -- at home I have my writing app open on my personal laptop basically 24/7 (with lots of documents that are just titled stuff like “[fandom name] scratch”, for getting ideas scribbled down and seeing what happens) and I use a note-taking app (for a long time Evernote, but now the opensource app Joplin) to keep track of stuff when I’m away from my desk.

But the real secret is just that I’ve been posting fic on AO3 for, oh god, 15 years now. There’s some real duds on there but writing mostly short fic over that period of time has stacked up. I also owe a lot of those stories to fic exchanges and kink memes — it’s really a treat writing something knowing it has a built in audience of at least one person, and it gives a fun chance to explore something from a fresh angle, but seeing a ton of possibilities/prompts/pairings I might never have considered before really gets my mental wheels spinning.

[wipbigbang]

2024 WIP Big Bang Schedule & FAQ!

Schedule

All times are by 11:59pm PST. Convert time zones.

Sign-ups Begin- April 15th Sign-ups Close- May 21st Check In #1- May 22nd Check In #2- June 15th Snippets Due- July 1st Art Claims Begin- July 17th Check In #3- July 22nd Check In #4- August 6th Rough Drafts Due- August 15th Posting Claims Begin- August 23rd Posting Claims Ends- September 1st Final Drafts/Art Due- September 7th Posting Starts- September 8th

FAQ

What is the WIP Big Bang? Good question! This is a Big Bang with one goal in mind: to clean out your fanfic drafts folder. These are stories that were unfinished for whatever reason, that authors returned to and completed, and the art that goes with them!

Do I need a Livejournal/Dreamwidth/AO3/etc. account to participate? No! You don’t have to have an account on anything to participate, though you will need to have somewhere to post your finished work. Having one or more accounts will help for you to follow what is going on with the bang (we crosspost to Dreamwidth and Tumblr and heavily use our Discord server at the moment), but they are not required to participate. You can always leave comments anonymously or with an opensource ID.

How many fics can we sign up for? We absolutely don’t mind multiple sign-ups. I know one year someone submitted 50 fics to finish, and got at least half of them done. We just ask that when you sign up with more than one fic you give each fic a unique user ID (please do not use the same ID for all your fics...it’s important to have different IDs for the check-ins).

Will I get emails about the bang? We do send out some emails, mostly for snippets and art claims and to ensure communication between authors and artists, but please do NOT rely on getting an email to remind you of due dates. We currently do not keep an updated email list of participants, so we only send individual emails as needed rather than mass emails.

However, email is the fastest way to communicate with the mods. If you have any questions or are having trouble communicating with your artist/author, please do email us! We will do our best to respond quickly.

What do you mean by minimum word count to enter? This is a WIP Big Bang, therefore we ask you to have at least 500 words of your story drafted when you enter.

Can an outline count towards those first 500 words that are needed at sign up? We have admitted work on an outline before so yes, if your outline is fleshed out enough to cover a 7,500 word+ fic, we’ll allow it.

Are multi-chapter fics allowed? Yes, multi-chapter fics are allowed and even more so encouraged if your fic is lengthy.

What about fics that are already posted on ao3 in part? Do those qualify for the bang? It's okay if you have posted a few chapters of your fic already (you never know when the muse deserts you, after all), we just require you to refrain from posting more until posting begins here. All we ask is that you not post any public updates to the fic until September 1st (or August 1st with the mod’s okay). We don’t want you to lose kudos and comments so don’t worry about pulling the fic down, just hold off on updates for now.

Is there a minimum word count? 7,500 words for each finished fic, but the sky's the limit, right?

I see that the fic minimum is 7500 words and that published WIPs are acceptable - but what if the WIP I’m considering is already more than 7500 words? Is the expectation to add an additional 7500 to it? No. You can add as much or as little as you need to finish the story, though we do expect at least 1,000 or so new words if your WIP already meets the word count.

What happens if an author finishes the fic they signed up with but it’s less than 7,500 words? The intent was to go over the minimum but once they got into it the story was shorter than they thought and stretching it out would make it less good. Do they have to drop out at that point? By all means, we want your stories to feel as natural as possible, and if it’s under 7,500 words you may have two options:

1 - Drop the fic for the main BB event, post it now, and wait to post it to our AO3 collection in February when we run our International Fanworks Day celebration of finishing fics that are less than 7,500 words when finished. There’s no art for the fic, but bragging rights are posted to the communities for a week.

2 - If there are enough fics that fit that category, we can do a special day of posting the fics, but you’ll have to forgo art for the fic. I, as a mod, would probably pick November 30th for the posting day, as it’s the last day of posting for the bang and I don’t think anyone will mind more than one fic that day. You can post bragging rights to the community and share the fic with everyone.

Is there anything not allowed? As long as you wrote it and you want to finish it, you're welcome to participate. RPS/RPF is fine. Incest pairings are fine. Things like that I know have been hinted at in questions asked and as long as you tag for them, we’ll allow it. Also, canon settings with mostly OCs is allowed. We just ask that it be tagged properly with any content warnings you would deem fit and be given the appropriate rating for the level of sex/violence there is in the fic. Just bear in mind that while original work is allowed you may not get art for it.

I have a fic I wrote a few years ago, but only the first couple chapters are posted on AO3 because I was never happy with the rest of it and knew it needed major revision. Is that something I could use for WIP Big Bang? The entire fic has been posted, but only on one platform, and it would be rewritten for AO3 and WIPBB. I think revising a fic for posting would work, as long as you have at least 500 words done, will have 7,500 words at a minimum when it’s done, and are planning to add more to the fic. Simply rewriting what you have would be a gray area, but if you’re going to take stuff out and add new scenes, either in the old scenes place or on its own, you should be fine.

What's the etiquette around OC-centric stories? Ones that are set in a well known fandom and use several characters, but still lean a lot on original characters? Are they discouraged, or fine? Based on my own personal experience making art for a story that had a heavy OC presence, it’s not something we discourage at all, but be forewarned when it comes to the art accompanying your fic your artist may not be able to incorporate the OCs into your art. Not everyone makes art of a hand-drawn or digitally drawn nature, so it helps if you have people for face claims ahead of art submissions, and you and your artist communicate regularly. You can also end up with art not featuring the OCs at all, just the canon characters, which is not necessarily a bad thing. Your other options are to bring in an artist you trust with your vision of your OC or to make your own art (we do allow that, we just need to be told during the check-in before art that you’re bringing in your own artist if you go that route, or that you’re doing your own art…there will not be a need to sign up in the artist’s sign up, however), or to opt-out of art entirely. So there’s plenty of options to call on when it comes time for art.

What are 'check-ins’? These are a way for us to see what you've been up to and for you to make sure you're still on track. It will give you a little nudge/reminder if you need it, but they are not compulsory. Basically a form is posted that you fill out with your user ID (unique for each fic) and a checkbox to let us know you’re still participating, plus a section for any notes for the mods.

How are the check in IDs used? They are solely for the mods organizational purposes. Each ID being for a separate story allows us to keep all the information you submit during check-ins and for snippets in one line on our spreadsheet. You don’t have to share your check in IDs with anyone else if you don’t want to.

How much progress should authors be making between each checkpoint? (Percentage-wise from our estimated total wc, I guess?) Ideally, with each check-in, you should be at least 25% closer to finishing. The end word count only really matters in that the fic needs to be at least 7,500 words when done, so it’s more your progress towards finishing that should be measured, not so much the word count.

What are the snippets requirements? In order to allow the artists to make art for the story they claimed, we require you to supply three snippets from your fic, between 500 – 1500 words each. The snippets will be sent to the artist after they have claimed your story. They're to help the artist match your story for artwork the best way he or she possibly can. It’s helpful to choose scenes or parts of scenes that you feel best represent your fic, but don’t feel like they have to be perfect to be submitted. Along with the snippets, we will send your artist the basic fic info and your email, so the two of you can collaborate more if you would both like.

What are the rough drafts requirements? For the rough drafts, stories should be at least 80% complete. You will not have to turn them in to us, just assure us that you are at that point. Anything less is at the discretion of the mods and those authors should speak to one of the mods asap.

What is, and do I need, a beta? A beta is basically a person who goes over your work to make sure that there are no spelling/grammatical errors and they can even be of assistance in helping you with story lines, etc. It is highly recommended that a beta looks over your work before posting. If you are having trouble finding a beta, try this post.

Where can I post my fic/art? Stories and art can be posted to your own personal journal, Tumblr, ff-net, AO3, or wherever you like. For those of you with AO3 accounts, we will set up a collection that will go live on the day of the posting. If you don’t currently have an AO3 account but would like one, you can contact the mods for an invitation code to see if they have any available. You can also add yourself to the AO3 Invites Request queue.

What does posting look like? Do we have to post the whole thing on the day, or can we stretch it out between when posting starts and our date? I’ve had a few longfics get killed by big bangs forcing posting to happen on a given day, and would prefer to avoid that if possible. For most fics, posting to AO3/FF.net/other places will be allowed to start in September and you can stretch it out as many posts as you want as long as the complete fic is up by your posting date (and posting dates go from September 8th to November 15th with two weeks for emergency posting). However, you can send us an ask/e-mail about posting as early as August if you have an extremely long fic/something with a long posting schedule. Mostly what we want is the fic to be completely up on the website of your choice by your posting date, and I know some people don’t want to overwhelm their readers. So we want to work with writers to give them ample time to post the story up to their posting date.

Now, as for posting to the communities, you get to choose which day your link to the story and bragging rights are posted, and as I said, we have a range of dates from September 8th to November 15th with two to three stories posting a day. If for some reason you miss your posting date, you have until November 30th to post to the community, during the two weeks of emergency posting, with a possible extension after that due to the amount of participants needing to post later. So hopefully there should be plenty of time to get a longfic up and posted to the website of your choice and our BB.

Will the three snippets per story we have to send in be the ones we want the artist to make art for? Or can it just be random snippets and then later the artist and I can check together to see which scenes would work best for art? So ideally, you and the artist will be communicating once you’re each sent each other’s contact information, and you’ll give your artist a chance to read all that you’ve written at that point. That’s what happens in most cases. If your fic gets picked by an artist and they don’t work with you, then the snippets you sent will be what the artwork will be based on. It’s a good idea to know that, while most of the time the artists work closely with the authors, there are a few exceptions to that.

How do I know when to post? Posting will be tiered; you'll each get your own posting date that you and your artist will decide on together. There will probably be four fics, plus art, posting per day between September 8th and November 30th. The post with date claims will go up on August 23rd and you'll have to choose your date by September 1st.

Posting of chapters on AO3 or your own blog (or wherever you usually post) generally starts September 1st, but you can post earlier (as early as August 1st) if you let us know you have a long story. However, posting has to be finished by your chosen posting date to the comm. One of the things we're hoping to do with the posted dates is to give everybody on the comm a little bragging time in the spotlight. You know, "this story was incomplete for this long, but I finished this sucker." If you don't have time to post your bragging rights to the communities on your chosen posting date, you can queue up a post ahead of time and we can post it on the date you picked or you can email us your bragging rights and we can post by proxy for you. Either way works for us. Art will be due on the chosen posting date to the comm.

What am I posting to the Livejournal/Dreamwidth/Tumblr community if I’m posting the fic elsewhere? You’ll be posting what we call bragging rights. It’s a small form you fill out and post to the community with a link to your fic (we’ll enable moderated posting to the Tumblr, Livejournal and Dreamwidth communities for members on August 8th). We will post a template for posting artwork and stories to the comm closer to the posting date.

Is there a minimum/maximum requirement for my art? There is no strict minimum, but we do ask artists to remember that the authors are writing a minimum of 7,500 words and your artwork should reflect that. You can do anything you like, including banners, wallpapers, icons, mixes, vids, gif sets, picspams, etc. Suggested guidelines for art are 500x500px (or equivalent of smaller pieces like banner + spacers, cover + icons, etc.) for traditional art, digital art, and manips; 2 minutes for vids; 10 songs + cover art for mixes; and 6 images for gif sets and picspams. We also ask that when you are in contact with the author, you work with them to see if there is anything specific they would like (i.e. a wallpaper, book cover, etc.). The art is your work, but having ideas doesn't hurt!

What are 'art claims'? The claims are when anonymous summaries of the story go up for artists to choose from. Artists sign-ups and art claims are the same thing; we use one form for both things, and that way the authors don’t have to sign up for an event they may not end up participating in. It is based on a 'first come, first served' basis and artists may choose up to three potential stories (in case their first choice is unavailable). If there are more stories than artists, there will be a second round of claims wherein artists may choose a second story to work with. And on until all stories are claimed for art.

If a fic up for claiming is rated explicit (R, NC-17, etc.), please only claim the story if you are over 18 years of age. Some authors may be uncomfortable working with underage artists on explicit works. We do not verify ages in any way for the bang, so this is solely on the honor system.

What do I do if I have problems or concerns about my author/artist? Sometimes authors and artists do not get along and this may cause problems with working together. If this happens to be the case with you, please email the mods and we will try to do what we can so that everyone has a chance to have fun at WIP Big Bang!

If you have not heard from your author/artist in some time after trying to contact them, you can reach out to us via email and we will try to get in touch with them for you.

Can I get an extension? Community extensions may be given in the event that the majority of the authors/artists need one. They may also be given individually under certain circumstances, but this must be discussed with the mods and will only be a short extension for posting. If you are certain that you won’t be able to finish your story in time, please let us know by July 13th.

Can I swap out a fic if my muse abandons it again? When you sign up, you give us the information on the potential fic(s) you want to write. If, say, one fic isn’t working but one you didn’t sign up for is, you can switch them out while letting the mods know if you need to change a user ID you used. It is absolutely okay to switch fics all the way up until snippets are due. By then, we hope you’ll have however many fics you plan on doing to at least 80% completion since rough drafts are due not much later. Just drop an email to the mods at wipbigbang@gmail.com with the new information (title, fandom, etc) and if you want a new sign in ID or plan to use the same one for the fic you’re replacing it with.

Can I drop out? We have high hopes that everybody who signs up can actually finish the round and share in the joy of the reveal with us, but real life can unfortunately get in the way and we completely understand! If you feel like you just cannot finish in time and no amount of assistance from us can help you, just let us know by August 13th (if at all possible).

Is it possible to be banned? We do have a banned users list. We hope to use this to encourage participants who are having issues to communicate with the mods. We want to help you! The way the ban works is that participants, either authors and artists, will be banned for dropping out without notifying a mod. This means that anyone who has not posted or talked to a mod by the time the posting period ends will be banned. Dropping out is not in and of itself a banning offense, so please do not panic if you have to drop out! We understand that there are many reasons you may need to drop, and we want to work with you.

Bans will last one round or until the issue is resolved, whichever comes first. To resolve a ban, authors will have to finish and post the story they signed up with and artists will have to finish and post the art for the story they claimed. Three bans will result in a permanent ban from the bang.

Are we allowed to participate without joining the Discord? Absolutely! The Discord server is optional, as just another way to interact with your fellow writers and get updates on important dates. It’s not mandatory you join, however.

I was just wondering if there’s any way to enter the bang anonymously? Like would it be okay to put our work in an anonymous collection on ao3 or something? Unfortunately, I can’t think of a way for that to work. The collection that we use is moderated but it’s not anonymous, and there are the bragging posts that you post on your posting day, which you would have your username on whichever platform you use.

I was just wondering whether I'm sworn to secrecy on which fics I'll be finishing up, or if I can shout it out to the world? No one is sworn to secrecy once they’ve signed up (aside from posting new parts to fic that’s already up somewhere…we ask that you refrain from doing that until at least July 1st)! We will be running Word Wars, where you can add more to a fic in a certain amount of time, and Whine Bars, where you can complain or ask for help or whatever else you feel like talking about when it comes to struggling with a fic, all after sign-ups end on a weekly basis, plus there’s the Discord server for chatting with your fellow authors and artists.

I have a question/concern that’s not mentioned here. If you need help, you can always contact a mod and we will do our best to make sure that you get your story/art finished. The best and fastest method of contact is through our email, wipbigbang@gmail.com.

[saku0115]

Blog Rules

Who am i?

Hi im Saku an artist, im from chile🇨🇱 (spa/eng) and i do art as a hobbie

What type of art you make?

Reminder this is a hobbie, but i do a little of all, but mostly i love to do animation or audiovisual if you want a more formal aproach

If I like a post, I'll draw it(I will always credit the original in the same post)

Resources?

I mostly use opensource apps; i use krita, blender, audicity, lmms(Music), libreoffice

Request?

Yes, feel free to ask, i love drawing for others. but it may take me time to post it

Repost?

Nop, ONLY REBLOG, if you wanna promote do it, I can't stop you (but, it's difficult to make people follow you from others social's, so there's this big posibility that only YOU win not me)

Commision?

OPEN !!!!

||Others Socials||

Youtube/Tiktok/instagram

[medewerkers]

StreamBuilder: ons opensource framework dat je dashboard mogelijk maakt.

We kunnen vol trots aankondigen dat ons eigen framework dat je dashboard op Tumblr mogelijk maakt, sinds 6 juli opensource is. We noemen dit framework StreamBuilder en we gebruiken het al jaren.

Eerst de basics. Wat betekent 'opensource'? Opensource is een model voor decentrale softwareontwikkeling die de samenwerking stimuleert. In begrijpelijke taal is het beschikbaar stellen van de broncode van softwareprogramma's zodat gebruikers of andere ontwikkelaars hem kunnen gebruiken of aanpassen. Wat is Streambuilder? Nou, elke keer dat je je feed Volgend of Voor Jou bezoekt, of een zoekopdracht invoert, een blogbericht of lijst met getagde posts bekijkt of zelfs als je naar de blogaanbevelingen kijkt, gebruik je dit framework. Als je de code zelf wilt bekijken, kijk dan hier op GitHub!

StreamBuilder doet een hoop. De primaire architectuur is gericht op contentstromen ('streams'): berichten van een blog, een lijst van blogs die je volgt, berichten met specifieke tags, of berichten aangaande een zoekopdracht. Dit zijn verschillende soorten streams die kunnen worden gecombineerd, gefilterd op basis van bepaalde criteria, gerangschikt op relevantie en kans op engagement, en meer. Op je Tumblr-dashboard zie je berichten van blogs en met tags die je volgt gecombineerd met blogaanbevelingen. Elk van deze types is een aparte stroom met een eigen logica, maar ze delen wel allemaal hetzelfde framework. We injecteren de aanbevelingen op bepaalde intervallen, filteren berichten op basis van je blokkeringslijst en rangschikken berichten op relevantie als je "Het beste eerst" hebt ingeschakeld. Dit zijn voorbeelden van de functionaliteit die StreamBuilder ons biedt. Wat zit er in de doos?

De volledige codebibliotheek voor het framework dat we gebruiken om zo goed als elke contentfeed op het platform weer te geven.

Een YAML-syntax voor het opstellen van contentstromen en het filteren, injecteren en rangschikken ervan.

Abstracties voor het programmatisch opstellen, filteren, rangschikken, injecteren en debuggen van stromen.

Abstracties voor stromen samen op te stellen, bijvoorbeeld in carroussels, voor stromen-in-stromen.

Een abstractie voor paginering op basis van de cursorpositie voor complexe stroomsjablonen.

Unittests voor de openbare interface voor de bibliotheek en het grootste deel van de onderliggende code.

Wat we nog in petto hebben

Documentatie. We moeten nog veel van onze eigen interne tools migreren!

Meer voorbeelden van stroomsjablonen en voorbeeldimplementaties voor verschillende veel voorkomende stromen.

Als je vragen hebt, kun je de code zelf bekijken en daar een ticket indienen.