wafflelate

[wafflelate]

Fic In A Box 2024

Schedule

August 9-16: Nominations Pre-Gaming (participants can load tags from last year’s tagset into this tagset)

August 17: Tag Nominations Open

August 24: Tag Nominations Close

August 25-26: Nominations Cleanup

August 27: Signups Open

September 1: Swap requests open

September 7: Signups Close

September 10: Assignments Out By This Date

September 11: Swap requests close

October 20: Assignments Due

October 27: First Extension Due Date

November 3: Final Extension Due Date

November 10: Last Day To Submit Makeup Assignments

November 16: Work Reveals

November 30: Creator Reveals

All times 10pm Eastern

What is Fic In A Box

A gift exchange is an event where participants create fanworks to gift to each other. Fic In A Box is a fanwork exchange with a large minimum gifting requirement and several unique features. Gifts can include fic, art, audio, video— and much much more.

How It Works/The Nitty-Gritty:

All participants in Fic In A Box are requesting 10,000 words of fanfiction by default, but can opt in to other mediums to give their gifter options. Mediums can include writing structure things like "in-world rpf" for your gift, or include creative formats as far away from fic as different types of art, knitting patterns, logic puzzles, and so on. There were 288 mediums to choose from last year, and we add more every year.

For mediums other than the written word, pretty much any medium will be accepted, as long as it can be digitized for delivery and we can agree on a clear and easily checked equivalent to 1k of written fic. Participants who primarily work in non-writing mediums are very welcome and will get specially matched (as long as they give the mods a heads-up) so they'll have an assignment they can complete. If your art form is fannish cross-stitch? We'd love to have you join us.

Participants have the option to split the 10k words (or equivalent in an opted-into medium) that they owe between several separate works (say, one fic of 3k and a another of 7k) to reach 10k total. The minimum word count per work is 1k by default, but lower wordcount works will count if your recipient has opted into receiving them. (Drabble is a medium that can be opted into!) And initial assignments are 10k for one person, but at the start of the exchange the mods run Swaps which will give you the chance to split that 10k into multiple shorter assignments for multiple recipients!

So when it comes time to turn in gifts, you might turn in 3k worth of art, 4k in fic, and 3k in typesetting a fic (10k total), and then you receive 8k of fic and 2k of map design (10k total). Last year 265 people signed up, and we exchanged 993 gifts at the end of the creation period, everything from fic to reddit posts to logic puzzles to museum catalogues to CYOA stories to colouring pages!

If you cannot complete the full 10k (or other medium equivalent) but are still able to post one or more smaller, complete works, you can default on just the remaining wordcount. You will then be guaranteed (via finding a back up gifter-- "pinch hitting"-- if necessary) a gift equivalent to the amount you were able to submit (rounded down to the nearest 1k). There are also options to "earn back" guaranteed minimum amount by taking pinch hits or completing your original assignment.

Questions?

For more information about Medium rulesets, signing up, nominations of fandoms, relationships, or medium forms, swaps, or much more (questions about how pinch hits work? we have documentation about that), check out the dreamwidth blog!

If you have questions, feel free to ask them here, check the dreamwidth blog for much more documentation, email the mods, or join our discord server. The discord server has a lot of experienced participants happy to answer questions, and you are also welcome to join just to hang out!

Note: you must be 18 or older to join FIAB.

Links

Email: ficinaboxmod@gmail.com

Ao3 Collection (sign up here once signups open)

Tag Set

Dreamwidth Blog

Discord (includes question channel)

[wafflelate]

yesssss 100% also recommend it's wonderful. here's a link for the lazy.

hey there. do you like the arctic circle?

how about survival fic? some tasty, tasty forced collaboration in an unknown situation? then you should check out Ends of the Earth by Valiant_Effort on AO3, a naruto fic where Kakashi, Ino, and Sakura end up in the Elemental Nations equivalent of the arctic, where Itachi and Kisame have also found themselves stranded. ever seen caribou in a naruto fic? this is your chance!

when I tell you I sat down and read this, captivated, in one sitting, you should know I’m not kidding. and that my productivity suffered greatly. anyway, go read it

[wafflelate]

this was such a lovely thing to find in my notifications this morning, thank you!!

you might also be interested in these fics:

you cannot unlearn the feeling

Gaara & Uzumaki Naruto, ~1k, Soulbonds - Formed During Moment of Extreme Empathy, fits in with AoL-verse

He has the scroll. Mizuki is being worse than ever. Iruka is hurt and everything is terrible and Mizuki asks, "Don't you want to know why you could never bond with anyone? Why it's impossible for you?"

in your nature

Senju Tobirama/Uchiha Madara, 10k, Soulbonds - Formed During Moment of Extreme Empathy, uses the same worldbuilding as AoL

"Maybe a marriage would be the way to go," Madara says eventually, half out of exasperation but also half because it wasn't actually a bad idea. Except for all the ways in which it was terrible. "But not," Izuna says with a wrinkle of his nose, "with Hashirama." "No," Madara says, holding back a laugh at Izuna's expense out of politeness even though Izuna will feel the full brunt of how funny Madara thinks the idea is. "There are, however, other Senju."

What if I just read "The Art of Losing" by @wafflelate a million billion times because it's my favorite.

Anyway the rest of this post is just going to be me going !!!!! so, spoilers ahead

Things I think intensely about:

-how suna is going to react to Gaara deciding to become the kazekage

-how any detractors of his new position are going to be IMMEDIATELY shut down because the "first" thing he does is "contract with a seals mistress to get the dead wastes converted into arable land" (who is going to prove it WASNT a seal? Sunas sealing sucks lol. And technically it did originate from a seal. Gelels seal.)

-how devastated Gai is going to be upon learning literally everything Kakashi went through

-how pissed as fuck people are going to be upon discovering that root seals can apparently block soulmate bonds? I feel like sealing people without their informed consent is about to become very very illegal outside of emergency circumstances.

-how the fuck is cat feeling. Does he believe Kakashi is dead? Does he hope Kakashi is alive?

-nara shikakunand yoshino are about to fucking eviscerate the elder council. Either they were aware of this bullshit or they were criminally negligent. Oh, what's that inoichi and shibi? Some of your family got kidnapped too? Maybe we should bring torture back to t&i. Just this once.

-kakashi is going to be so fucking proud of shikimaru. In his super repressed way. Maybe in a he deserves that legacy more than I ever did if he's feeling self deprecating.

-do you think temari has to sit through a million drafts and revised versions of kankuros shikabane play the more information comes out. Soul mates who were cut off completely from their connection, one believing the other dead, and the other never even educated about soul bonds. Them still recognizing each other enough that Kakashi was kind to her and she freed him instead of killing him. Please kankuro why can't you make the fight scenes longer.

-shikaku seeing shikakos complete shadow transformation and being like "yeah that's insanely dangerous to so much as think about attempting, I don't want to consider how bad things had to be for her to create that. Forbidden jutsu on account of who the fuck knows how she didn't end up falling into the black"

-does Gai feel like he failed Kakashi. Does he swear never to do so again. Imagine him thanking shikako for saving his friend. Imagine Kakashi being shocked Gai still considers him a friend

-hi inoichi this is my soulmate Kakashi, he did not take thinking I was assassinated well at all, do you have any self help books because he hates talking about feelings

-obviously she knows about seals because danzo wanted his own nara level intelligent seal master. Obviously she hid as much of her skill as she could from him because she isn't stupid.

-anyway here's a book a better storage scroll some medical seals and the seal to get rid of roots evil tattoo of shittyness.

-actually now I'm thinking about what if she DOES join suna because Kakashi has trouble feeling safe in konoha or just because being around a shikamaru who never knew her and idolizes Kakashi is kind of awkward.

-if they share dreams do you think she explains her original world to Kakashi after he dreams of cities he's never seen.

-wondering who was the first person to remember the lookalike yoshino nara missing nin that got mentioned in that one report.

-if I think about how nervous Kakashi is going to be the first time he trolls shikako and how he'll feel when she grins or laughs or goes along with it I experience An Emotion™

-"I don't know if you'll like them, but here's other you's favorite books. They make a good social barrier, and you've been looking a little overwhelmed."

-yoshino is going to cry so so so much. Her baby needed her all this time and she never knew it.

-kakashi learning that he was absolutely invited to shikakos funeral and danzo is just a dick who lies

[wafflelate]

My favorite thing about getting a post massively reblogged is seeing how many people have negative tagging systems. I don't mean "negative" in the sense of "bad", I just mean that instead of tagging something as X, they tag it as not-Y.

Like you'll make a post about how spoons were invented in the 1720s in an ill-fated attempt to settle an argument between four of the five popes, and it gets reblogged and someone tags it "#not naruto".

And it's like, you're not wrong. That post has nothing to do with Naruto! But you can't help but feel proud your post got selected as one of the few non-naruto posts worthy of being included on their clearly heavily Naruto-themed blog.

[wafflelate]

Oh oh oh here it COME—

[wafflelate]

fannish next of kin?

I'm writing an article about digital lives after death, and I'm looking to speak to someone who has personal experience with the AO3's Fannish Next of Kin feature (specifically as the FNoK for someone who's passed away). If you'd be up for (briefly!) talking to me and potentially being quoted (anonymously/pseudonymously fine), please message me where I can get in touch/reply in the comments. I'd love to have an actual first-hand perspective on this feature rather than just talking about how it works.

[wafflelate]

Soup or soup

Oooof, that's a tough one! 🤔🤔 🤔 I know it's a little controversial but.... I'd have to go with soup.

[wafflelate]

Crows be like

[wafflelate]

[wafflelate]

the 'tried to kill you' to found family pipeline tho

[wafflelate]

Me watching tv: it’s what murderbot would have wanted

[wafflelate]

Rules for living in winter

From: 3rdritual

[wafflelate]

OP: [makes a post]

OP's mutual: #this looks like a 10k note post to me!

OP: No! You can't do this to me!

Me: OP says they don't want notes, so I can ruin them by giving them more notes!

Me: However, a clever poster would CLAIM they don't want more notes because they would know that only a great fool would take them at their word. I am not a great fool, so I can clearly not choose to add more notes to this post!

Me: But OP must have known I was not a great fool; they would have counted on it, so I can clearly not choose to scroll past this post!

OP: You've made your decision then?

Me:

[wafflelate]

[wafflelate]

It’s that time of year again so here is your yearly reminder that the world isn’t ending and people don’t hate you. The sun is just setting at 6 pm.

[wafflelate]

what's happening in the minecraft fandom?

You’re happier not knowing.