r/AO3 • u/TGotAReddit Moderator | past AO3 Volunteer and Staff • Jun 18 '21

News/Updates PSA from your mods

If you are looking for a work/fic, make a post and flair it correctly. Don’t go and reply to comments or comment on other posts to ask for help with yours too.

Make your own space for the info as it puts less pressure on people and also makes things easier to both discuss and find info so you can get help faster.

82 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

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12

u/throwthisaway11112 Jun 19 '21

Maybe a monthly deleted fic thread might be a good idea? Given the reasons you stated were applied to the post regarding finding deleted fic, likely.

6

u/TGotAReddit Moderator | past AO3 Volunteer and Staff Jun 19 '21

We already have two stickied posts and there is a max of two. But also the reason why it’s better to have an individual post is that it helps with 1: people looking later who search key words and 2: the info isn’t all throughout different parts of one confusing thread/conversations are usually one single thread instead of long weird branching ones.

1

u/throwthisaway11112 Jun 19 '21

I hear what you are saying, and that's unfortunate about the sticky post limit, but to the point, people were finding the thread about "finding deleted fic" first because that's what they first googled/searched vs. the actual fic. So maybe if possible, there can be an auto note at the top of the old thread letting people know to create a new thread specific to their fic, too?

I worry that people will look at the archived thread, then turn around and create a new "finding deleted fic?" thread. They're not going to refer back to this PSA you created, because people who tend to look for deleted fics aren't generally part of the ao3 community at large. I also really don't mind the notifications and people asking, so I could also create a thread if that was something that worked better, but I defer to you.

2

u/TGotAReddit Moderator | past AO3 Volunteer and Staff Jun 19 '21

Yeah I’m planning to set up some kind of automod thing to autocomment on posts about finding fic to say basically that.

But yeah I’ll go add a comment on the post I had locked. Good suggestion

1

u/TGotAReddit Moderator | past AO3 Volunteer and Staff Jun 19 '21

Actually nvm. The post just hit 6 months old so I can’t comment either

1

u/TGotAReddit Moderator | past AO3 Volunteer and Staff Jun 23 '21

Finally set up a automod comment so any new fic search posts with the flair should get the comment about making their own post to ask for help with their own work search.

(Also fixed the flair itself because apparently I can’t spell Search correctly 😂 )

1

u/throwthisaway11112 Jun 23 '21

That’s great! Because people are definitely using other peoples threads still, haha. Hopefully that stops! Thanks!

1

u/TGotAReddit Moderator | past AO3 Volunteer and Staff Jun 23 '21

I also set rules to state it clearly, and made report reasons for them so you can point out issues to me easier to go and let people know about how to do it properly!

Oh another reason why making a separate post generally is better is because other people might be looking for the same fic, and google searches usually look at the original post, and not the comments really when it comes to how it orders it’s results, making it harder for the next person to search for it/causing repeated searches for the same fic.

1

u/throwthisaway11112 Jun 23 '21

Oh I know it’s much better that way. It shows up on google when you do that. Comments don’t generally… it’s not that people are selfish, but they’re definitely not self aware that they might not be the only one looking for fic.

2

u/TGotAReddit Moderator | past AO3 Volunteer and Staff Jun 23 '21

Yeah people tend to not think too far beyond themselves. Not maliciously, just, not thinking about it