westiec:
wrecklwj:
“AO3 bookmarks are a reader’s space and a place for them to be honest about the fics they read, which is why authors can’t respond to them and don’t get notified when someone creates a bookmark. If authors don’t want to see a negative bookmark that someone has created of their fic, they shouldn’t click into the bookmarks section.” do you agree with this
Neither writer nor reader, and I agree with this statement
Neither writer nor reader, and I disagree with this statement
Neither writer nor reader, and I feel it’s complicated
I read but don’t write, and I agree with this statement
I read but don’t write, and I disagree with this statement
I read but don’t write, and I feel it’s complicated
I both read and write, and I agree with this statement
I both read and write, and I disagree with this statement
I both read and write, and I feel it’s complicated
Not in fandom/don’t use AO3/bald/results
Context: this is a very common viewpoint on the ao3 subreddit which I very recently stumbled upon, but most people i’m friends with in danmei fandom (twt, discord etc) don’t agree and think negative bookmarks are rude.
Here’s the thing: objectively, bookmarks are designed for readers’ personal notes AND they are designed to be seen. That’s why there are separate tickboxes for “Private Bookmark” and “Rec” when you create one.
The FAQ describes their purpose as:
An AO3 bookmark is a record of a work you want to remember, find more easily, or record a note about. Bookmarks created on the Archive can also serve as recommendations to other users.
and says that:
You can also add your own personal notes or tags for the work. The notes can be anything, such as brief reviews or reminders to yourself. Tags can be used to make your bookmarks easier to sort and filter.
So like. Yes. Bookmarks are for readers’ notes, and they need not be exclusively recommendations. Authors should be aware that bookmark notes may contain unfiltered thoughts or negative commentary that readers did not intend for you to read.
(Unfortunately for everyone, as I found out on twitter one time, a shocking percentage of ao3 users do not realize their bookmarks are visible by default, much less easily accessible to the author.)
Now, does this mean I think readers should use the bookmark function to flame works they didn’t like for all and sundry to see? No, this isn’t fucking Yelp. I’ve never stumbled across someone with a bunch of negative bookmarks and thought, “whew, glad they warned me about all these fics!” but I’ve frequently thought, “wow this person sure spends a lot of energy on stuff they dislike.”
It is one click to make a bookmark private, and that function ALSO exists for a reason.
@/gaypiratebrainrot has a great post on here that describes ao3 interactions as:
comparable to doing a live reading in an intimate little bookstore, like kudos are everybody who stayed til the end and applauded, comments are everybody who waited to come up to talk to you afterwards, and bookmark comments are the little snatches of conversation you overhear outside
I think that’s a good way to think about it from all sides — bookmark comments aren’t for the author, no, but there’s a good chance they’ll be overheard. And if you’re out front of the store trashing the writing, whoever does hear you might think you’re kind of a jerk.
As an author, I 100% agree with the original statement, and I want to add that the bookmarks ARE designed for personal notes AND designed to be seen but they’re designed to be seen by other readers. Like the OP says, they don’t get emailed to an author, and authors can’t respond to them, because they are not for authors.
I also want to clarify the above:
That’s why there are separate tickboxes for “Private Bookmark” and “Rec” when you create one.
A bookmark, by default, with neither of these ticked, is a public bookmark. If you tick “private bookmark” it makes the bookmark invisible to everyone except for you, which is the place where - were I a reader wanting to say things to myself - I would put notes to myself (including crit I wanted to remember, in case I did want to reread the story but needed to NOT reread the story under certain circumstances), rather than doing it publicly BUT… if a reader WANTS others to find your work but still needs that note for themselves, I feel like it’s kind of a dick move to say they can’t because the author might see it. Flames are kind of a dick move no matter what, but honest feelings/warnings/crit a reader is making a note of in a place where authors aren’t really supposed to be and aren’t given tools to interact with because the space isn’t for them…
HOWEVER, if you tick “rec” that IS NOT the same thing as plain “public bookmark.” It actually serves a third purpose, to change the “bookmark” to a “recommended story,” which changes the ‘bookmark’ icon from a dogeared page to a heart symbol, and allows for extra sorting:
Here’s the thing, and you can disagree if you want, but as a writer and a reader, I wholly believe that the readers at an archive ALSO should have options for a) controlling their experience of the archive and b) signalling/helping other readers find fiction (and be warned, if there’s stuff an author didn’t warn for). If a reader wants to talk to an author, they have the comment section. If the reader wants to speak to other readers, that is what the bookmark/rec section is for.
We talk a LOT about how people in fandom should curate their own experience, and this sentiment is usually directed at readers not reading stuff they don’t want to read, but this NEEDS to include authors as well. Part of curating your online experience is understanding which spaces are for you and which spaces are not for you (they may be ACCESSIBLE to you, they may RELATE to you, they may be places you CAN go), so that you can choose to go to them or not.
But when you know that these places are not for you (they’re for the reader), and that they may contain things you don’t like (stuff about your story you don’t want to see from strangers), and you go there anyway (regardless of reason)… it’s not really on the reader. It might suck to see something as the author of the piece (and I have been there!), but ultimately you made the conscious choice to go into that section instead of curating your experience and staying out if it could negatively affect you. It’s NOT the same as a comment section, it’s not INTENDED to be the same as a comment section, and shouldn’t be treated as one by authors.
What WOULD be nice is a “hide bookmarks” option for authors, so they can’t see bookmarks on their own fics. In fact “hide bookmarks” and “hide kudos” and “hide hits” would all be nice options for the author UI.
You can hide any of these things with a skin, if viewing them is not something you want to do.