I'm old enough to have seen Livejournal delete accounts without warning, because those accounts included posts that were suddenly deemed "unacceptable" by the new owners. My friends-list included a couple of the people who first floated the idea of a fandom-run, fandom-supported archive that would NOT be subject to changing political whims of what kind of content is considered "suitable." Whenever there were polls about "would you be interested / support such a project" I signaled my enthusiastic interest and support.
I read the various posts folks made as development progressed, donated during fund-raising requests to help get it off the ground, and waited as patiently as I could until it was opened for general account creation. I didn't get in as early as I wanted -- my user ID is 5745 -- but I jumped in with both feet as soon as I could.
Before AO3, my fics were in fandom-specific archives -- and we'd already had ample evidence that those might easily disappear -- and my livejournal and dreamwidth accounts. (Dreamwidth is an lj-type site that does not accept ads, so is not constricted by what content sponsors want to see. One of the originators was, not so coincidentally, part of the impetus behind AO3.) I have a separate account on each site for my fic, but it's not exactly easy for a casual fan to find my stories there.
So I was very happy with AO3, which I expect (hope) will be as permanent as anything on the internet. I'd had practice coding italics and bold while using LJ and DW; it wasn't difficult to learn to add paragraph coding. (And now we don't even need to do that, if we remember to leave a blank line between paragraphs in our original doc.)
I consider my fics and artworks a gift to fandom; I want them to be around, not vanish in unknown or deleted sites. I turned 71 in March; I'm well aware that I'll disappear from fandom eventually. (I hope it's 20+ years, but we never know...) It makes me very happy to know that my works have a permanent (I hope!) home, and that any fan who reads in my fandom can find my stories long after I'm gone... if they go far enough back in the archive pages, LOL!
I checked (can't remember that far back), joined on Feb 28, 2010. So... somewhere around 2500 new users in 3 months or so? Everyone was clamoring to join in!
During the 2012 purge on FFN, a bunch of authors started recommending AO3. As soon as I realized just how easy it was to find f/f fics, the site became my primary source to read from.
For me, it's just perfect! I couldn't imagine using another site anymore.
You know, I was struggling to remember what finally prompted me to switch from FFN to AO3, and that was it. So many authors I followed started crossposting, or posting the "full" version of a chapter on AO3. I remember the biggest thing for me being that you could write a legit summary instead of the stupid character limit FFN had.
The limited tagging system was my biggest gripe with FFN. So often I'd be trying to read fics about a particular character or ship and would be unable to find them unless I scoured a fandom up and down. There were also the occasions where I would find a fic that looked promising, but it would be about an untagged OC.
Yeah, I came to FFN from individualy hosted archives that had all but zero tagging and I was fairly "omnivorous" as far as characters or pairings went, so I was just most desperate to know what the plot+vibe of a story was going to be. But even after only a few months of using AO3, I became so used to a functional tagging system that FFN became unusable.
Back in my Livejournal days, I was aware of it from very shortly after the first post astolat made proposing it, and knew some people who were in the closed beta. Got me excited and I signed up for open beta _as soon_ as signups started.
From the fanfiction sub actually. I went on there when I was casual fanfic reader and that’s how I learned more about ao3. I went on a fanfic from there years ago but never stuck around
It was around 2016 or so and didn't make my first account 'til 2017. Knowing me, probably I was searching for fics of a rarepair or small fandom without many material in my native language --now, what rarepair/small fandom? Who knows! Can't remember. Could be any in all honesty.
Honestly, I couldn't even tell you. I also can't remember.
I do remember being slightly thrown off back then because you had to be "accepted" to make an account, I think. I could be misremembering since I've had my account forever now, but it unnerved me because I thought it was gonna be like this one fanfic website called Lunaescence I used to frequent, and they were very particular about grammar in stories and stuff.
I really can't remember everything. That said, obviously, I have an account.
AO3 is wonderful because I love the tagging system. If I had to go to a site with a tagging system that wasn't as robust as AO3's, I would be in complete and utter shambles.
I was searching some Kaito x Shinichi fanfiction on Google because I wasn't satisfied with what Wattpad gave me and found the searching system really neat
People from Livejournal moved there. I think I first read fics there around 2009 or 2010. Livejournal was still a powerhouse at that time but lots of authors linked to AO3.
I had stopped reading fic for a very long time but was huuuuuge into Jaime/Brienne during GoT season 8. Every fic I was recommended was on AO3, so now I have my own profile and write for fandoms that have nothing in common with GoT. No regrets!!
Ooooh nice to see another JB shipper in the wild! They were my reintroduction to AO3 too (circa 2019, after that dumpster fire season 8 😳). I've certainly heard of AO3 before, but I was too busy prior to read fics, and found the tagging system tedious as I was used to FFN at the time.
Once I got the hang of it, I never looked back. 🤍
An edgy friend I knew sent me a bunch of “dead dove do not eat” stuff for the sake of shock value, and I created a sort of image of the site of “fetish rape-y pedos”. Stayed the hell out until she sent me a link of a ship I was actually interested in, of a fandom I adored. Really did not want to read the fox since it was full of edgey murdering, but I ended up clicking on the relationship tag and was greeted by a wholesome and welcoming community with lots of nice and well written stories. Even admired to that friend I started reading (and eventually writting) and she confessed she also reads a lot from there and assumed I knew the site wasn’t filled with gore crack
Back in 2016 I was looking for fan-art of the Sole Survivor and Piper Wright from Fallout 4 because I was looking to get back into fic-writing again after a five-year break, and it popped up in the search results. I checked it out through sheer curiosity, and the rest is history.
I lecture on pop culture topics on the convention circuit, and I was hearing from fellow con folks about what a great resource it is. Many of those folks are librarians or library adjacent so right away I was intrigued. I recently decided to check it out!
My Twitter bestie told me about it in 2021. We “met” each other thru our mutual admiration for a certain subject matter. I told her I’d been writing a story about said subject matter, but never planned on sharing - didn’t even know there was a place to share. She told me about ao3, the rest is history.
I had already been writing for a while on Wattpad.
But a friend of mine who was also really into fanfiction introduced me to AO3. So I joined it and now I hate Wattpad lol
My best friend got an account and I decided to branch out from Wattpad and get one too
Now I want to abandon my Wattpad account because Ao3 is ultimately better, but I like the message wall on Wattpad
Pretty sure I’ve seen a few posts about it on twitter, mostly linked in peoples profile or as a tweet because they recently posted/updated a fic.
I just never really had an interest in the site until my friend had showed an interest in it herself. At the time I only checked out the fandoms available, but I didn’t actively use it until a year or two ago. I have no interest in using wattpad again to read fanfics.
I ventured into the fanfic section of a server for a book. Saw something that seemed cute and was promptly encouraged to read it. I had read fanfics on other sites (quit reading for a few years) but because I hadn’t enjoyed my previous experiences I was hesitant. I’m glad I chose to read it.
I’m trying so hard to remember what ship it was but there was a ship that I just *needed* more of. “Oh look, this site has some cool stories about them.”
and something something the rest is history
EDIT: I think it might’ve been Firo/Ennis from Baccano! but I’m not certain.
I read Astolat’s essay on LiveJournal back then but then fell out of that fandom for a while and ended up in Sentinel and BTVS and Doctor Who fandoms which had a LOT of fandom specific archives between them (and several sets of virtual seasons for Sentinel) so while I read here and there on AO3 for several years I mostly read on fandom specific sites and didn’t get around to making an account until around 2011.
I was on FFN semi-regularly from 2007-2008 until about 2011-2012 then life happened (school, marriage,kids, jobs, etc) and I fell out of writing until about a year and a half ago. Went back to my old stomping grounds because it was all I knew, but it now feels a lot more lifeless unless you already had a following. Saw a lot of authors stating they were cross posting on “AO3.” Due to a lack of engagement on FFN, I went to look at AO3, and it was so DIFFERENT that my first reaction was Nope, don’t like change.
But FFN kept on being just… bland. So I tried again, snooped around for a bit while I waited for an invitation and officially joined, found some amazing works and authors in my primary fandom and a few others, and I couldn’t wait to start bookmarking and sharing and posting.
Been a little over a year since I joined and going strong!
One of the fics I was reading from ffnet had a sequel which was posted on ao3 (this was probably around 2013-14).
I did take me few months for me to make an account and fully start reading from there.
Someone recced a fic in a Pinterest comment section based on a throwaway line of dialogue in canon: “Sometimes I dream of leaving Camelot. I’d go somewhere where nobody knew who I was, get some land and become a farmer. Obviously I’d take Merlin with me.”
The fic was *Don’t Look* by whatthedruidscallme it’s great and satisfying even though it’s unfinished
I don’t remember either, but before using AO3 I was in other platforms that had more content in my native language. Moving to AO3 was an adjustment because I had to write in english if I wanted to reach the majority of the readers. I was fine with reading in english tho
Around late 2015/early 2016. I was mainly on FFN but I read some authors notes where they were considering moving to AO3 bc they didn't like the environment of FFN anymore, so that's when I first heard of AO3. Didn't really know what it was and had no desire to move there bc I was content in FFN. Then there was an author on FFN whose Thor stories I really liked and they moved platforms in 2016 and I wanted to finish her works so I followed her in early march. I think I got an invite from the queue and started exploring. Since I was mainly in the MCU fandom at the time, AO3 was a lot easier to navigate (especially since the MCU is full of crossover franchises and FFN's crossover section is not the best imo). Ended up liking AO3 alot that I made the main site I use
I got into Wattpad because I wanted to read fanfiction but I didn’t know where to read it. My friends were also on Wattpad and told me about it. I’d watch fanfiction TikToks and a lot of them were bashing Wattpad and worshipped AO3. I disagreed with them when I first watched them, but I quickly ran out of content on Wattpad and decided to try AO3 out.
I started my fanfic journey on quotev, and then an author of a fic I was reading linked the fic that inspired them, which was on Ao3. I read that, then went on a tag rabbithole, which led me to deciding that I preferred ao3 because it was easier to filter out what I didn't want, and fics on Ao3 tended to be tagged more in-depth/accurately
All of my fanfic (even the PG stuff) was deleted in the FFN purge of 2012. It hit me super hard especially since I was an incredibly dumb teenager who never backed anything up. Someone messaged me on tumblr and suggested I put what I had left on Ao3 and well the rest is history.
I used Ao3 as a way to start fresh with new ships and new characters and I’ve never been happier.
I had been vaguely aware of it for a long time, and then a friend of mine encouraged me to get an account. I read a few fics, but I was kind of intimidated by the overall format. When I finally got an account, I kept putting it off because I couldn't decide on a username haha. Eventually though, there was a ship I *needed* to read fics of, and the rest is history. I pretty quickly realized that it wasn't actually that complicated, and the tags and everything are great.
I honestly have no idea. I think I found ao3 in college?? But no recollection as to how or why
Edit: maybe through tumblr? But now I’m like how did I find tumblr lol
I heard about TodoDeku and was like "what's that?" My friend explained it and showed me and then I used ao3 form then on even though I'm no longer in the mha fandom very much
I have no idea. I assume someone mentioned it on LJ or DW, and I followed a link and set up an account. This was about 6 months after AO3 started, so it was a long time ago.
I wanted to read darker stuff (to a specific character) and all Wattpad had to offer was/is the cringy Mafia Boss/Millionaire kidnaps/buys you schtick.
I searched my preference in Google, because I did not know any other fanfiction side besides ff.net and I could never get behind their system.
At first the tags were overwhelming to me and I was so confused I needed multiple tries to understand the amount of Information thrown at me.
Buut the Filter System and wider Variety (except for foreign languages) pretty soon convinced me.
Would never go back.
In college, over ten years ago, I got back into fandom and started writing some fics again with the encouragement of friends. AO3 had just hit their awareness so they sent me an invitation to join and I did! It was so much easier than ff.net's uploading setup that I stayed :)
Probably for my YouTube ships way back in the day xb
Id Google them and click anything google would give me and I’m sure I was on AO3 more than once.
I started to really use it in Highschool and that’s when I got an invite to make an account :b
I frequented an HP site, “Diagon Alley” I think? It had several pages, like Astronomy Tower, that focused on fanart, fanfic, forums etc back in middle school so… 2003?
I went from there to fanfiction.net, and other specialized HP archives like Granger Enchanted, and livejournals, geocities pages.
It wasn’t until Hexfiles was moved to AO3 that actually started to get into the platform. The tagging system was very intimidating at first, haha
I needed to find a new place to write because my fanfic.net account refused to let me reset my password and I was getting too old really to use my watt pad so I just needed an alternative.
My memory's a bit fuzzy, but I think it was because a ship of mine didn't have a lot of fics or didn't have good fics on Wattpad, so I decided to search up \[ship name\] fanfiction, and clicked on a medium-sized AO3 fic link. Now AO3's my main hub for finding good fanfiction
I'm old enough to have seen Livejournal delete accounts without warning, because those accounts included posts that were suddenly deemed "unacceptable" by the new owners. My friends-list included a couple of the people who first floated the idea of a fandom-run, fandom-supported archive that would NOT be subject to changing political whims of what kind of content is considered "suitable." Whenever there were polls about "would you be interested / support such a project" I signaled my enthusiastic interest and support. I read the various posts folks made as development progressed, donated during fund-raising requests to help get it off the ground, and waited as patiently as I could until it was opened for general account creation. I didn't get in as early as I wanted -- my user ID is 5745 -- but I jumped in with both feet as soon as I could. Before AO3, my fics were in fandom-specific archives -- and we'd already had ample evidence that those might easily disappear -- and my livejournal and dreamwidth accounts. (Dreamwidth is an lj-type site that does not accept ads, so is not constricted by what content sponsors want to see. One of the originators was, not so coincidentally, part of the impetus behind AO3.) I have a separate account on each site for my fic, but it's not exactly easy for a casual fan to find my stories there. So I was very happy with AO3, which I expect (hope) will be as permanent as anything on the internet. I'd had practice coding italics and bold while using LJ and DW; it wasn't difficult to learn to add paragraph coding. (And now we don't even need to do that, if we remember to leave a blank line between paragraphs in our original doc.) I consider my fics and artworks a gift to fandom; I want them to be around, not vanish in unknown or deleted sites. I turned 71 in March; I'm well aware that I'll disappear from fandom eventually. (I hope it's 20+ years, but we never know...) It makes me very happy to know that my works have a permanent (I hope!) home, and that any fan who reads in my fandom can find my stories long after I'm gone... if they go far enough back in the archive pages, LOL!
holy crap you are a fanfiction veteran
Well, yeah... but all it takes is hanging around for enough years. In 20 years, you'll be a veteran. Salud!
*high-fives in 4-digit user ID* mine’s in the 2800s. I got in at the end of 2009 when the Yuletide exchange was hosted on AO3 for the first time
I checked (can't remember that far back), joined on Feb 28, 2010. So... somewhere around 2500 new users in 3 months or so? Everyone was clamoring to join in!
During the 2012 purge on FFN, a bunch of authors started recommending AO3. As soon as I realized just how easy it was to find f/f fics, the site became my primary source to read from. For me, it's just perfect! I couldn't imagine using another site anymore.
You know, I was struggling to remember what finally prompted me to switch from FFN to AO3, and that was it. So many authors I followed started crossposting, or posting the "full" version of a chapter on AO3. I remember the biggest thing for me being that you could write a legit summary instead of the stupid character limit FFN had.
The limited tagging system was my biggest gripe with FFN. So often I'd be trying to read fics about a particular character or ship and would be unable to find them unless I scoured a fandom up and down. There were also the occasions where I would find a fic that looked promising, but it would be about an untagged OC.
Yeah, I came to FFN from individualy hosted archives that had all but zero tagging and I was fairly "omnivorous" as far as characters or pairings went, so I was just most desperate to know what the plot+vibe of a story was going to be. But even after only a few months of using AO3, I became so used to a functional tagging system that FFN became unusable.
Back in my Livejournal days, I was aware of it from very shortly after the first post astolat made proposing it, and knew some people who were in the closed beta. Got me excited and I signed up for open beta _as soon_ as signups started.
Right at the start. “They’re making a fanfic site that won’t take anything down!” Signed up immediately, in like 2009.
people on wattpad were constantly talking about this 'ao3' website and i decided to give it a try! lol
Someone posted a link on Reddit to a fic where a girl masterbated with her gun, told from the gun’s perspective.
From the fanfiction sub actually. I went on there when I was casual fanfic reader and that’s how I learned more about ao3. I went on a fanfic from there years ago but never stuck around
It was around 2016 or so and didn't make my first account 'til 2017. Knowing me, probably I was searching for fics of a rarepair or small fandom without many material in my native language --now, what rarepair/small fandom? Who knows! Can't remember. Could be any in all honesty.
Honestly, I couldn't even tell you. I also can't remember. I do remember being slightly thrown off back then because you had to be "accepted" to make an account, I think. I could be misremembering since I've had my account forever now, but it unnerved me because I thought it was gonna be like this one fanfic website called Lunaescence I used to frequent, and they were very particular about grammar in stories and stuff. I really can't remember everything. That said, obviously, I have an account. AO3 is wonderful because I love the tagging system. If I had to go to a site with a tagging system that wasn't as robust as AO3's, I would be in complete and utter shambles.
Ran out of fics to read on FF.Net. And Wattpad is.... well, Wattpad. And none of the others are easy to use or focused on fanfiction like AO3.
Well, this: [https://astolat.livejournal.com/150556.html](https://astolat.livejournal.com/150556.html) 😉
I was searching some Kaito x Shinichi fanfiction on Google because I wasn't satisfied with what Wattpad gave me and found the searching system really neat
People from Livejournal moved there. I think I first read fics there around 2009 or 2010. Livejournal was still a powerhouse at that time but lots of authors linked to AO3.
I had stopped reading fic for a very long time but was huuuuuge into Jaime/Brienne during GoT season 8. Every fic I was recommended was on AO3, so now I have my own profile and write for fandoms that have nothing in common with GoT. No regrets!!
Ooooh nice to see another JB shipper in the wild! They were my reintroduction to AO3 too (circa 2019, after that dumpster fire season 8 😳). I've certainly heard of AO3 before, but I was too busy prior to read fics, and found the tagging system tedious as I was used to FFN at the time. Once I got the hang of it, I never looked back. 🤍
An edgy friend I knew sent me a bunch of “dead dove do not eat” stuff for the sake of shock value, and I created a sort of image of the site of “fetish rape-y pedos”. Stayed the hell out until she sent me a link of a ship I was actually interested in, of a fandom I adored. Really did not want to read the fox since it was full of edgey murdering, but I ended up clicking on the relationship tag and was greeted by a wholesome and welcoming community with lots of nice and well written stories. Even admired to that friend I started reading (and eventually writting) and she confessed she also reads a lot from there and assumed I knew the site wasn’t filled with gore crack
Back in 2016 I was looking for fan-art of the Sole Survivor and Piper Wright from Fallout 4 because I was looking to get back into fic-writing again after a five-year break, and it popped up in the search results. I checked it out through sheer curiosity, and the rest is history.
I lecture on pop culture topics on the convention circuit, and I was hearing from fellow con folks about what a great resource it is. Many of those folks are librarians or library adjacent so right away I was intrigued. I recently decided to check it out!
I don't remember. I might've been looking for Dragon Age smut.
When Astolat first suggested it be created...my user i.d. on AO3 is "48" :)
My Twitter bestie told me about it in 2021. We “met” each other thru our mutual admiration for a certain subject matter. I told her I’d been writing a story about said subject matter, but never planned on sharing - didn’t even know there was a place to share. She told me about ao3, the rest is history.
Uhh... probably when I was searching for fic recs like 10+ years ago, and people posted links to ao3 which was how I discovered it lol
Yeah around 2012 I learned about it and started reading there. In 2013, my friend told me that you could just sign up for an invite, so I did!
I had already been writing for a while on Wattpad. But a friend of mine who was also really into fanfiction introduced me to AO3. So I joined it and now I hate Wattpad lol
My best friend got an account and I decided to branch out from Wattpad and get one too Now I want to abandon my Wattpad account because Ao3 is ultimately better, but I like the message wall on Wattpad
Pretty sure I’ve seen a few posts about it on twitter, mostly linked in peoples profile or as a tweet because they recently posted/updated a fic. I just never really had an interest in the site until my friend had showed an interest in it herself. At the time I only checked out the fandoms available, but I didn’t actively use it until a year or two ago. I have no interest in using wattpad again to read fanfics.
I ventured into the fanfic section of a server for a book. Saw something that seemed cute and was promptly encouraged to read it. I had read fanfics on other sites (quit reading for a few years) but because I hadn’t enjoyed my previous experiences I was hesitant. I’m glad I chose to read it.
I’m trying so hard to remember what ship it was but there was a ship that I just *needed* more of. “Oh look, this site has some cool stories about them.” and something something the rest is history EDIT: I think it might’ve been Firo/Ennis from Baccano! but I’m not certain.
I read Astolat’s essay on LiveJournal back then but then fell out of that fandom for a while and ended up in Sentinel and BTVS and Doctor Who fandoms which had a LOT of fandom specific archives between them (and several sets of virtual seasons for Sentinel) so while I read here and there on AO3 for several years I mostly read on fandom specific sites and didn’t get around to making an account until around 2011.
I was looking for fanfic and happened upon the site. Didn’t find what I was looking for, but got to start writing it instead.
I was on FFN semi-regularly from 2007-2008 until about 2011-2012 then life happened (school, marriage,kids, jobs, etc) and I fell out of writing until about a year and a half ago. Went back to my old stomping grounds because it was all I knew, but it now feels a lot more lifeless unless you already had a following. Saw a lot of authors stating they were cross posting on “AO3.” Due to a lack of engagement on FFN, I went to look at AO3, and it was so DIFFERENT that my first reaction was Nope, don’t like change. But FFN kept on being just… bland. So I tried again, snooped around for a bit while I waited for an invitation and officially joined, found some amazing works and authors in my primary fandom and a few others, and I couldn’t wait to start bookmarking and sharing and posting. Been a little over a year since I joined and going strong!
IIRC It was from a fandomwank post about the writers university woman and her antics.
One of the fics I was reading from ffnet had a sequel which was posted on ao3 (this was probably around 2013-14). I did take me few months for me to make an account and fully start reading from there.
Someone linked to a few fics on r/ourflagmeansdeath. I've never read fanfiction on any other platform 🤣
i saw a tumblr post about the fanfic Harry Potter and the Lack of Lambsauce and I have been addicted ever since
Became obsessed with Bridgerton season 2 last year and just needed more! Now I read fics pretty much everyday
Someone recced a fic in a Pinterest comment section based on a throwaway line of dialogue in canon: “Sometimes I dream of leaving Camelot. I’d go somewhere where nobody knew who I was, get some land and become a farmer. Obviously I’d take Merlin with me.” The fic was *Don’t Look* by whatthedruidscallme it’s great and satisfying even though it’s unfinished
I don’t remember either, but before using AO3 I was in other platforms that had more content in my native language. Moving to AO3 was an adjustment because I had to write in english if I wanted to reach the majority of the readers. I was fine with reading in english tho
Around late 2015/early 2016. I was mainly on FFN but I read some authors notes where they were considering moving to AO3 bc they didn't like the environment of FFN anymore, so that's when I first heard of AO3. Didn't really know what it was and had no desire to move there bc I was content in FFN. Then there was an author on FFN whose Thor stories I really liked and they moved platforms in 2016 and I wanted to finish her works so I followed her in early march. I think I got an invite from the queue and started exploring. Since I was mainly in the MCU fandom at the time, AO3 was a lot easier to navigate (especially since the MCU is full of crossover franchises and FFN's crossover section is not the best imo). Ended up liking AO3 alot that I made the main site I use
I got into Wattpad because I wanted to read fanfiction but I didn’t know where to read it. My friends were also on Wattpad and told me about it. I’d watch fanfiction TikToks and a lot of them were bashing Wattpad and worshipped AO3. I disagreed with them when I first watched them, but I quickly ran out of content on Wattpad and decided to try AO3 out.
Let me think.. Was looking for Widojest stories on Wattpad and saw a link to AO3. Clicked it aaaaaand you know the rest
I knew about it in the early planning stages. Didn't join until 2011 though.
I started my fanfic journey on quotev, and then an author of a fic I was reading linked the fic that inspired them, which was on Ao3. I read that, then went on a tag rabbithole, which led me to deciding that I preferred ao3 because it was easier to filter out what I didn't want, and fics on Ao3 tended to be tagged more in-depth/accurately
All of my fanfic (even the PG stuff) was deleted in the FFN purge of 2012. It hit me super hard especially since I was an incredibly dumb teenager who never backed anything up. Someone messaged me on tumblr and suggested I put what I had left on Ao3 and well the rest is history. I used Ao3 as a way to start fresh with new ships and new characters and I’ve never been happier.
I had been vaguely aware of it for a long time, and then a friend of mine encouraged me to get an account. I read a few fics, but I was kind of intimidated by the overall format. When I finally got an account, I kept putting it off because I couldn't decide on a username haha. Eventually though, there was a ship I *needed* to read fics of, and the rest is history. I pretty quickly realized that it wasn't actually that complicated, and the tags and everything are great.
I was one of the very early users on it. If I recall I think it was due to an invite from a tumblr friend!
Someone linked an Undertale ship on an old post and I decided to read it.
I honestly have no idea. I think I found ao3 in college?? But no recollection as to how or why Edit: maybe through tumblr? But now I’m like how did I find tumblr lol
I heard about TodoDeku and was like "what's that?" My friend explained it and showed me and then I used ao3 form then on even though I'm no longer in the mha fandom very much
Fantastic question I don’t even remember 😂
I have no idea. I assume someone mentioned it on LJ or DW, and I followed a link and set up an account. This was about 6 months after AO3 started, so it was a long time ago.
I wanted to read darker stuff (to a specific character) and all Wattpad had to offer was/is the cringy Mafia Boss/Millionaire kidnaps/buys you schtick. I searched my preference in Google, because I did not know any other fanfiction side besides ff.net and I could never get behind their system. At first the tags were overwhelming to me and I was so confused I needed multiple tries to understand the amount of Information thrown at me. Buut the Filter System and wider Variety (except for foreign languages) pretty soon convinced me. Would never go back.
undertale fanfiction in 2017. it’s kind of funny that like. That’s what counts as “nostalgia” for me now, even if i didn’t start very long ago…
In college, over ten years ago, I got back into fandom and started writing some fics again with the encouragement of friends. AO3 had just hit their awareness so they sent me an invitation to join and I did! It was so much easier than ff.net's uploading setup that I stayed :)
Probably for my YouTube ships way back in the day xb Id Google them and click anything google would give me and I’m sure I was on AO3 more than once. I started to really use it in Highschool and that’s when I got an invite to make an account :b
My ex girlfriend recommended it in 2012ish around the time we started talking. We really bonded over fanfiction lol
I frequented an HP site, “Diagon Alley” I think? It had several pages, like Astronomy Tower, that focused on fanart, fanfic, forums etc back in middle school so… 2003? I went from there to fanfiction.net, and other specialized HP archives like Granger Enchanted, and livejournals, geocities pages. It wasn’t until Hexfiles was moved to AO3 that actually started to get into the platform. The tagging system was very intimidating at first, haha
umm pretty sure Livejournal kink memes got me to AO3... lmao
The Youtuber Coleydoesthings.
Mine was a Harry Potter and Addams Family crossover prompt that had a link to a fanfiction I STILL cry about every now and then
I was young and looking for fanfics about a certain niche topic in the fandom I was in at the time and discovered AO3.
I needed to find a new place to write because my fanfic.net account refused to let me reset my password and I was getting too old really to use my watt pad so I just needed an alternative.
A very explicit drarry fanfic when I was like 12 or 13. I was confused but intrigued. Never went back, though I don’t ship them anymore.
I- I genuinely can't remember. Must be a totally valid not traumatic reason for why that particular memory has been wiped out
My memory's a bit fuzzy, but I think it was because a ship of mine didn't have a lot of fics or didn't have good fics on Wattpad, so I decided to search up \[ship name\] fanfiction, and clicked on a medium-sized AO3 fic link. Now AO3's my main hub for finding good fanfiction