bwark

You’re probably about to see a lot of crap going round about this because what the hell?? It’s advertised on the playstore as an unofficial AO3 app with free fanfic to read and it’s pretty popular

I downloaded it and yeah… when they say unofficial AO3 app they really mean they’ve ripped a bunch of content off AO3 and it’s just on there to read. Searching my AO3 handle gets me this:

What the hell. That’s my stuff. 144 fics to read. The stats you can see for the ones there are ripped from AO3 too. Beyond obviously, I was never contacted about having my work put up on an app I’ve never heard of. And what makes this better?

There’s an option to go Premium and even to leave a tip. They’re purportedly keeping the app alive with this cash but to call a spade a spade, they’re profiting off fanfic by ripping it from AO3 and asking users to pay for a premium service.

I’m furious. The reviews on this app are all talking about how useful the users did or didn’t find it; no one seems concerned that the app should not exist in the first place. What the hell

This is the text of one of my fics, just ripped and posted on the app.

If you tap on one of the fics from the list I posted a pic of in my first post, you see this

(Notice the ad at the bottom. This is being monetised. I also got a full-screen ad that I had to wait for while taking screenshots. I was getting this person paid for MY OWN FIC but I really want to document this.) Now if I tap that three-dot menu you can see up there, I get this:

“Open in browser” is the link that does take you to the AO3 page of my fic. It’s very unobtrusive. Clearly the app developer doesn’t want you leaving the app to read, and taking away your time viewing their monetised ads. I imagine it’s only there for plausible deniability down the line.

If I try to leave a comment, I get this:

My comment was not successfully added. Maybe the ability to communicate with a robbed AO3 writer is a ~Premium feature? Snark aside, I imagine it’s because I’m not logged in on the app, and so I have no username to post the comment under. But the app tells me my comment’s been posted. It’s broken, it’s lying, it’s one crappy part of this crapshow app that I hope is gone from the playstore before I finish typing this all out.

For the curious, trying to leave kudos gets me this:

And the kudos counter did actually go up, so. Yay for that? Hidden away from where the stolen fic is actually posted, is a way to leave kudos. While another ad scrolls along the bottom of the screen obviously.

the app is not hosting the fics itself

(which is unsurprising because it costs to host data and I’m sure they want to keep as much of their profits as they can)

it’s more like an AO3 reader, with text hosted on AO3 being displayed on the app

for this reason the app does not violate the letter of copyright law

the monetisation is supposedly for the coding of the app, not the fic itself

What this doesn’t change:

Writers have no control/consent over their full works, which they own the copyrights to, being displayed on the app. Legally there’s nothing to be done but ethically it’s unacceptable to display the entire untransformed product of someone else’s effort and creativity, without asking them, for your own financial gain.

The app is glitchy at best and shady at worst in its practices. People using the app have been signed up to premium without wanting to be, and can’t get out of it. People have used their AO3 credentials to log in to this third-party app, the security of which is unknown. Worryingly, warnings on fics are being left off, author’s notes (with additional warnings) are nowhere to be found, and writers who have orphaned works to make them anonymous have those works showing up under their usernames on the app. (Read the notes on this post for details of all this).

The app is built on shoulders of the work of unpaid AO3 volunteers and writers. It is profoundly unfair to monetise an app that relies on their work. Firstly the hosting of the fic is something that donators to AO3 gladly pay for. Secondly the code for producing stats, bookmarks, kudos and the rest of AO3 is created by hours of volunteer work. Thirdly, needless to say the fanfic itself is being written through hours of unpaid work. What I’m saying is, none of this content belongs to the app’s creator, but they’re the only one being paid for it. If the developer truly feels they deserve payment for their app’s coding I encourage them to keep trying to monetise the app’s code while removing everything they didn’t create or find consent to use. I would like to see it.

To the people saying, “it’s fanfic, it’s all pretty much theft anyway, you’ve got no leg to stand on!”

No.

Fanfic on AO3 is transformative. It’s posted to be read for free without ads, and it transforms the original work. Legally and ethically this is its leg to stand on. If this app developer transformed AO3 writers’ work in the same way that AO3 writers transform canon (i.e. same characters, sometimes same universe, sometimes plot parallels, occasional references to canon lines), at that point we wouldn’t have a leg to stand on. As it is, this is a wholly different scenario. There is no parallel here that provides an excuse for this app.

To the people saying “it’s like pirating a movie, most people on here are all for that!”

No.

It’s taking something that was already completely free and unpaid, and running ads under it/offering premium ways to consume it. Entirely different question to that of movie piracy.

To the people saying, “what does it matter? It’s all still there on AO3. The app is just providing a service that people must want if they’re paying for it. And apps like this have been around for a while and things are only just kicking off about them. So what?”

I think this matters because volunteers’ and writers’ gifts to fandom shouldn’t be monetised for someone else’s gain. I think this matters because writers are being treated by this app, and apps like it, as a money-making industry rather than individuals devoting unpaid time and passion to writing with freedom. I think it matters because fandom created an award-winning space to share work for free, and that space is being garnished with glitches and ads before being essentially sold back to the people who already owned it. I think it matters because in a society like ours, things don’t stay free easily. It’s something you can’t take for granted, something you have to fight for.

Going forward, it’s possible for writers to:

Set your fics to only be seen by AO3 users who are logged in, which stops them from being able to be viewed on the app, but also stops any guests to AO3 from being able to see them too.

Put a notice at the top of your fic - not in the author’s notes, in the fic itself - saying you don’t consent to your work being shared on monetised fanfic apps. This won’t stop them being shared, but it may give users of the app a sense of the shadiness and exploitation of the app they’re using.

It’s like… Imagine a community gets together to build a road. Everyone chipped in time, energy, and (yes) money. We all graded the ground, laid the asphalt, and landscaped the sides of the road. (Many of us do support OTW financially… this is how they’re able to keep AO3 running in the first place…)

But then some jerk decides, hey, this is an incredible scenic road! I could make money here! All these idiots just let people walk and drive on this road for free! And he sets up a toll booth at the side of the road, and collects a fee from people who want to see the sights for themselves, not realizing they could just… drive around the toll booth and see it all for free.

This person doesn’t use the proceeds to support the content they’re profiting from, nor the platform whose accessibility even made their crappy toll booth possible. They’re just shoving all that cash in their pockets.

I did not consent to be used this way, to have my labor exploited this way. I did not consent for anyone to profit off my works. (And I have to admit I’m a little bit concerned that fanfic authors could feel blowback if this app or apps like it do become the targets of powerful copyright holders to the original franchises and characters we all write about… even though *we* clearly did not consent to this use of our works, or anyone profiting off the distribution of our works through third-party apps.)