Archive of Our Own

In 2007, a website called FanLib was created with the goal of monetizing fanfiction. Fanfiction was written mostly by women, and FanLib, which was run entirely by men, drew criticism. Simultaneously, LiveJournal was making policy and design changes that its fanfiction-oriented user base disliked. This led to the creation of the nonprofit Organization for Transformative Works (OTW), which purported to record and archive fan cultures and works. a development phase that ended in April 2026. The site's name derives from a blog post by writer Naomi Novik, who, responding to FanLib's lack of interest in fostering a "fannish" community, called for the creation of "An Archive of One's Own." AO3 defines itself primarily as an archive, not an online community. In 2022, Ao3's expenses were $290,688, most of which was used for server hosting and maintenance, and revenue from fundraising efforts reached a reported $512,359. Funds for the platform are raised in various ways. Primary fundraising efforts such as the April and October drives as well as other non-drive donations raised $621,455 as of 30 September 2023. Some revenue is collected in the form of royalties from books by some of the initial OTW members. On 10 July 2023, the site was the target of a denial-of-service attack. Anonymous Sudan (likely Russian-backed according to cybersecurity company CyberCX) claimed responsibility in a Telegram post, saying it was motivated by the website's American registration as well as its sexual and LGBTQ content, and demanded $30,000 worth of Bitcoin within 24 hours to end the attack. The site came back online the next day with Cloudflare protection added. On 2 April 2026, following the April Fools prank of replacing the ‘beta’ next to the logo with ‘omega’, AO3 announced that it would be exiting open beta. == Features ==

Archive of Our Own runs on open source code programmed almost exclusively by volunteers in the Ruby on Rails web framework. The developers of the site allow users to submit requests for features on the site via a Jira dashboard. who help the organization by working on volunteer committees such as Policy & Abuse, and Tag Wrangling. Tags Archive of Our Own has a system for labeling and categorizing uploaded works, referred to as "tags". Uploaded works on AO3 are to use Rating Tags, which indicate the maturity level of the content in the fanfiction; Archive Warnings, which alert readers about potentially triggering content in the story; and Fandom Tags, which sort the work into the intended fanbase(s). The maximum number of tags was capped to 75 in September 2021, after an incident with a fanfiction that used too many tags. When browsing or searching for a tag, any work which has used the tag, or determined related tags, will appear in the search in a curated folksonomy. Accounts The site allows users to create unique usernames for their account. In addition, users may identify themselves by one or more pseudonyms, referred to as "pseuds", linked to their central account. Having an account allows access to features such as publishing works, following authors and stories to receive notifications of updates, saving and recommending favourite works through bookmarks, and creating a reading queue. An account is not required to view posted content as long as the author has not chosen to show their works only to registered users. Feedback Like many other online platforms, readers with AO3 accounts can leave comments on publications which have not had comments deactivated. Readers can give stories "kudos", which function similarly to likes on other sites. Kudos are permanent and cannot be taken back. Added in 2010, the kudos feature, however, has been negatively received by various AO3 authors who claim that the simple act of leaving a 'like' discourages the reader from interacting further with the author's work through leaving comments or reviews. In 2012, several authors created an 'opt out' feature that allows authors on AO3 to remove the kudos feature from their published works. == Content ==

fanfiction centering on Destiel The legal team working on behalf of Organization for Transformative Works believes that the publication of fan fiction on AO3 is legal under the Fair Use doctrine, meaning that they need to be "transformative", which they interpret as giving new meaning to the original work. AO3 hosts controversial content including works depicting rape, incest and pedophilia. The site is also open to certain original, non-fanfiction works, hosting over 250,000 such original works . AO3 reached one million works (including stories, art pieces, and podcast fic recordings, referred to as podfics) in February 2014. At that time, the site hosted works representing 14,353 fandoms, the largest of which were the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), Supernatural, Sherlock, and Harry Potter. Of the top 100 character pairings written about in fic on the site in 2014, 71 were male/male slash fiction and the majority of character pairings featured white characters. In 2016, about 14% of fics hosted on the site took place in an alternative universe (often shortened to AU) in which characters from a particular canon are transplanted into a different context. The length of a story on Archive of Our Own tends to correlate with its popularity. Stories of 1,000 words often received fewer than 150 hits on average while stories that were closer in length to a novel were viewed closer to 1,500 times apiece. AO3 does not allow social media posts, prompts or requests, and any works that AO3 moderators consider to be spam or non-transformative. Furthermore, fan fiction published on AO3 is expected to be "noncommercial" – the author cannot legally make any money off of their fan fiction because they are using another author's characters, setting, etc. AO3's nonprofit status prohibits it from commercializing works of fan fiction. == Reception ==

In 2012, in an article entitled "Where to find the good fanfiction porn", Aja Romano and Gavia Baker-Whitelaw of The Daily Dot described Archive of Our Own as "a cornerstone of the fanfic community", writing that it hosted content that other sites like FanFiction.Net and Wattpad did not allow and was more easily navigable than Tumblr. Time listed Archive of Our Own as one of the 50 best websites of 2013, describing it as "the most carefully curated, sanely organized, easily browsable and searchable nonprofit collection of fan fiction on the Web". Fiesler wrote positively of the nomination: "...its nomination signals a greater respect for both fan fiction as an art form and for the creators and users of this remarkable platform. It's a recognition of the power of these diverse spaces and voices that have, for so long, been marginalized—both in genre fiction and in computing." Impact Studies have shown the positive impact writing fanfiction can have on aspiring writers and young people. Sites such as Archive of Our Own or Fanfiction.net give authors the space to accept feedback on their works in a supportive and non toxic environment which differs from social media. The majority of AO3's writers are based in the Northern Hemisphere and speak primarily English which has allowed for many to practise their English while writing fanfiction. Women make up the majority of AO3's users with the next largest category being non-binary. One of the most popular forms of fanfictions re-interpretate the cisgender/heteronormative elements found in the real world and most media. == Censorship ==

China On 29 February 2020, Archive of Our Own was blocked in China, after fans of Chinese actor Xiao Zhan reported the website for hosting an explicit fan fiction novel starring him. The banning of the site led to several incidents and controversies online, in the Chinese entertainment industry, as well as to professional enterprises, due to heavy backlash from mainland Chinese users of Archive of Our Own. Users called for a boycott against Xiao Zhan, his fans, endorsed products, luxury brands, and other Chinese celebrities involved with the actor. Germany On 13 December 2022, the site was indexed by the German Federal Department for Media Harmful to Young Persons due to "child pornography content", temporarily removing it from Google search results. In January 2023, the restrictions were lifted since the agency had committed administrative errors in the indexing process. Russia In March 2023, Roskomnadzor requested Archive of Our Own to delete 16 fan fiction works, claiming they contained "child pornography". The site was subsequently blocked in Russia on 14 April 2023, after failing to comply with the request. == See also ==