The Zone Universe

As Google has worked to overtake the internet, its search algorithm has not just gotten worse.  It has been designed to prioritize advertisers and popular pages often times excluding pages and content that better matches your search terms 

As a writer in need of information for my stories, I find this unacceptable.  As a proponent of availability of information so the populace can actually educate itself, it is unforgivable.

Below is a concise list of useful research sites compiled by Edward Clark over on Facebook. I was familiar with some, but not all of these.

⁂

Google is so powerful that it “hides” other search systems from us. We just don’t know the existence of most of them. Meanwhile, there are still a huge number of excellent searchers in the world who specialize in books, science, other smart information. Keep a list of sites you never heard of.

www.refseek.com - Academic Resource Search. More than a billion sources: encyclopedia, monographies, magazines.

www.worldcat.org - a search for the contents of 20 thousand worldwide libraries. Find out where lies the nearest rare book you need.

https://link.springer.com - access to more than 10 million scientific documents: books, articles, research protocols.

www.bioline.org.br is a library of scientific bioscience journals published in developing countries.

http://repec.org - volunteers from 102 countries have collected almost 4 million publications on economics and related science.

www.science.gov is an American state search engine on 2200+ scientific sites. More than 200 million articles are indexed.

www.pdfdrive.com is the largest website for free download of books in PDF format. Claiming over 225 million names.

You've got a lot going on in this ask, anon, and it's obviously not asked in good faith. If I were a smarter human being, I'd delete it and move on with my life, but it's 9am on a Saturday morning and I'm still on my first cup of coffee so I'm just dumb enough to take the bait and respond.

Ship and let ship doesn't mean you need to approve of what other people are shipping. It doesn't mean you need to like what other people are shipping. It means that what other people ship is their business and what I ship is my business.

If I don't like a ship, I don't read it. I don't search out the tag. I don't try to find creators for it. I don't watch youtube compilations or stare at gifs or read meta analysis about how the ship is supported by canon.

If I don't like a ship, I just... don't think about it. It really is that easy. And when I do think about it, I might be annoyed for a moment, but then I move on with my life because guess what? Shipping is a meaningless hobby that I engage in during my free time and I don't want to waste my free time feeling pissed off.

I've seen a lot of bizarre definitions of "minor/adult" shipping, but even if we use the definition of an adult sexually abusing a child, it's still very easy for me not to read that story on AO3. I'm assuming this is all about AO3? It always seems to be in this kind of ask.

AO3 requires people to use one of two warnings in those cases. Either Underage or Creator Chose Not to Use Archive Warnings - or both. I use the filter system to remove works with those warnings from my search results and guess what? Those works might as well not exist for me because I've never seen one. And I've been on AO3 since about 2013.

The thing about these kinds of opinions is that they only ever come up in relation to shipping. I never see these opinions related to violence or drugs or swearing or whatever else you might find morally repugnant. But the handy thing about "don't like, don't read" is that it applies across the board.

I don't think I'm going to like the new Jurassic Park movie, so I'm not going to go to a movie theatre, spend $15, and sit in a dark room with strangers for two hours to watch it. I'm not going to read reviews of it. I'm not going to watch the trailer. If a friend of mine invites me to go see it, I'll pass. I won't stop my friend from going to see it, though. If they're going to enjoy it then they should - and they're not going to fetishize dinosaurs or paleontologists or the tourism industry when they do.

Hello friends!

If you have a few minutes, please take this survey for my dissertation research:

AO3 Participation { surveymonkey.com/r/esuao3 }

If you read *at all* on AO3, I’d love to have you included. (details below the cut)

Also, I’m not too proud to beg: PLEASE reblog this post and share with your friends (or enemies)!

[ID: A laptop with a wireless mouse and a hardback book sat on top, and a smartphone resting on top of the book. Chains are wrapped around the pile. Next to them text reads, Decolonising Fan Studies: A Bibliography-In-Progress /end ID]

Today we’re discussing Decolonising Fan Studies: A Bibliography-In-Progress. This crowd-sourced Google doc, uploaded and maintained by fan scholar Rukmini Pande, documents the effects of racism and colonialism both in fan studies and more generally in academia. It contains authors who do not have institutional support in academia as well as works published in traditional academic publications.

Find the document link, and learn more about the important work scholars of color are doing, over on Fanlore.

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[this ask was sent in months ago - the ask box is not currently open]

The most universal tags that I know of for meta are #meta and #metafiction, and of course there's also #headcanon if it's more in that vein.

I think combining those with whatever other relevant tags there might be is useful, but so is how you title and summarize. Different people pay attention to different things so make use of all of the tools you have available to you in order to get your message across.

If you're posting meta about fanfic in general and not about one particular fandom or character, you could also tag something like #panfandom. I've personally also used #Fanwork Research and Reference Guides - again, that will depend on what kind of meta it is that you're posting.

If you're creating a panfandom sort of meta, the Fandom tag to use would be No Fandom. Otherwise, just tag the fandom(s) that you're writing about. Also remember that Categories, Relationships, Characters, and Additional Tags are all optional - you don't have to tag anything there if you don't want to.

Nonfiction: 19/20

Essays: 17/19

Analysis: 7/20

Meta: 7/20

Character Analysis: 5/20

Metafiction: 2/20

This might be a little inaccurate, since I've only read each work's metatext (or took a quick peek at the work if necessary). But I think it's mostly correct; it's pretty easy to tell at a glance whether something is fic.

Nonfiction is, as you might expect, a catch-all for a bunch of different types of work. A sizeable minority of them are memoirs or personal diaries.

Essays looks like the best, most focused tag (of the ones I examined) for anyone actively seeking fannish nonfiction. Now that I know this, I'm definitely going to use this tag for all of my own meta that's in essay format.

The Meta tag itself seems to contain a lot of fanfic that breaks the fourth wall, which is why it's surprisingly low on actual nonfictional content. Essays, Metafiction, and Fanwork Research & Reference Guides are all subtags of Meta—so if a work contains any of those three tags, it will also appear in search results for Meta, but the reverse isn't true.

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Whenever I post meta to AO3, my first additional tag is always Nonfiction (and now I plan to tag works as Essays when applicable). Most people who use AO3 are looking for fanfic to read, so when I post something that isn't fic, I want to loudly advertise that fact.

I also tag the specific type of meta I'm writing. For me, that's usually Character Analysis. I've also tagged for Headcanons, Speculation, Analysis (of which Character Analysis is a subtag), Criticism of canon, and—because of my extremely niche hobby of assigning hero titles to non-Homestuck characters—Classpects (Homestuck).

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For character and relationship tags, I follow the same rule as I do with fanfic. Is this work about a character or ship, or does it just mention them in passing? I tag for the former, but not the latter.

Here are some (non-exhaustive) examples of meta works that I would probably add character and/or relationship tags to:

An analysis of two characters' canon interactions and relationship dynamic

A comparison of one character's canon vs. fanon characterization

A gushing essay about why your favorite rarepair is a really good ship that everyone should consider shipping

A list of headcanons about a specific character or specific ship

*hugs* You’re completely welcome at any party I throw, anon!

Fandom is a community made of a lot of different kinds of people. Some people write. Others make art. Still others run events or organize fans during social media campaigns. But all of those people you see doing all kinds of stuff? They’re the visible minority. There are many, many more fans who read or watch or vote or kudos or like or scroll without actually reaching out and talking to anyone else. Those people are just as important.

If everyone wrote fic, who would be left to read it? If everyone made art, we’d never have time to see it all. If everyone made gifs or vids of playlists, there’d be so many people making things that only a few people would actually enjoy them. 

I love to bake, but I don’t make cakes just for me. I make them to share. And I don’t expect someone to pay me for it or make me one in return or write up a Yelp review of my party. I just want you to come over and have fun and leave with a smile on your face. Even if you just wave on your way out the door, I’ll know I did a good job. 

Scorching take: I love AO3, but the interface is not as easy as you think it is for a newcomer who is very used to the sites they're already using.

In summary: let people read the fic they want to read on the sites where they want to read it, and if they decide for themselves that AO3 seems like a site they want to learn how to use, point them to resources that will help them learn how to use it.

I have absolutely no idea why. They just existed.

I think one of the reasons has to do with the fact that some people expected Milo and Melissa to end up together. But literally early in the first season, Milo shows interest for Amanda, so I don't know why they would think that.

AND I LOVE MILO AND MELISSA AS FRIENDS. It's nice to see the main character and his girl best friend just he FRIENDS.

I think that milolissa is the main reason why its controversial.

- Shades of white in Europe range from ‘freshly fallen snow’ to ‘I am frequently mistaken as being from the Middle East’

- White European is a thing. When you fill out a form, under ethnicity, there are several options for white; white British, white European, white other. Because people make that distinction

- There are Europeans who don’t class their ethnicity as their skin colour, but as their nationality. I have family who don’t think of themselves as white, they just think of themselves as Italian and don’t really give much thought to their skin colour

- People here in Britain always question if darker skinned white Europeans are ‘actually white’. I get it a lot myself. My response is always ‘well I’m not anything else, so obviously I must be’

- Despite being white, a lot of Europeans from Italy, Greece, Spain etc, don’t feel white in the traditional sense. We’re not white like white British people. We’re not white like white Americans. We’re our own white. White British is one thing. White Italian is another thing. White Greek is another, etc

- Which is why we have this notion here in Europe of ‘nationality over race’. Being white isn’t as important as where you’re from

- So this really only becomes an issue if you’re an immigrant

- So being white in Europe doesn’t save you from racial discrimination, because sure, you’re technically white, but you’re not white white. Not the right white

- Here in England, Europeans with really blatantly foreign names, such as myself, find it more difficult to get job interviews, because they take one look at our name and don’t bother reading the rest of the CV. A guy I know was actually told by his boss to reduce the pile of CVs he had by ‘chucking away any with a name you can’t fucking pronounce’

- And then even when you do get an interview, half the time you walk into the joint several shades darker than everyone else and feel like you’ve walked into the ‘Swedish supermodel’ clubhouse and you just know you’re not getting hired

(That’s Mila Kunis. She was born in the Ukraine.)

(Sebastian Stan. From Constanta, Romania.)

(Mia Wasikowska, from Poland)

(Nina Dobrev, who was born in Bulgaria.)

They are white! Just because they are white, it doesn’t mean people from their countries cannot face horrible discrimination, and it doesn’t mean that they can’t be constantly told that they don’t work as hard as people from Western Europe, and that they don’t deserve basic human rights.

But as somebody who has lived in England and the US, I can vouch for all of this. The race issues in Europe and the race issues in the US are not the same.

For the last few years, there has been an awful backlash against immigrants from Poland, with some of the same language used that Americans use about “Mexicans” (By which, half the time, they mean anyone from south of the US/Mexico border).

It’s worth understanding that

1. Racism and discrimination are everywhere.

I was yelled at in the street because a lady thought I was Polish. People have pushed their chairs into my parents and insulted them in a restaurant because they were recognised as Germans.

Less than 100 years ago we were considered mongoloid (and while it’s not entirely wrong, though Uralic or North-West Asian and Caucasian mix would be lot more accurate), and were oppressed by another nation (Russia) that tried to enforce cultural and linguistic genocide on us, and before that we were oppressed and practically enslaved by Sweden, not all that differently as in any other colonized nation–which we were for 800 years.

I’d like to point out that also italian people have faced discrimination from other european countries. We were, and sadly often still are, always seen as part of the mafia and therefore dangerous, or inferior and poor (y’all can find signs saying pretty nasty stuff online, and i’m leaving this here even tho it’s in Italian), i’ve heard a lady telling his son to stay away from me and my family because we were speaking italian and so we could do “bad things” to him and there were times when in shops we were made feel not welcome because we are italian…..and guess what my family is white.

“What are you talking about?” say my sister and I. ‘There are two Italian guys RIGHT THERE.” 

“OMG you cannot say Italian people are not white,” he says.

“Yes we fucking can,” says the Italian friend watching the show with us, deeply offended. 

And then we had to pause it and a lot of complex explanations ensued. (Including the fact that Greek and Italian people generally aren’t considered White in Australia and in fact many a Nonna will smack you if you suggest otherwise.)

Basically, ‘white’ is a category upon which no two cultures/countries can agree on the definition, they all think they have the only possible definition, and it usually boils down to Preferred Flavours of Bigotry.

The kicker is that our royal family has been allochtoon for generations. Our reigning queen is from Argentina, so our princesses are all allochtoon.

Except the government now changed the terminology, because ‘allochtoon had negative connotations’ (go figure). It’s now ‘people with a migration background’, but the term still functions the same. The government is still profiling these people more heavily for tax and social benefits fraud, especially the ‘people with a non-western migration background’, which is a whole different can of worms.

‘Non-western migration background’ is not as straight forward as you’d think. Indonesia, for example, is considered western, because it used to be a Dutch colony. But Curacao is not considered a western country, even though it’s still part of the Dutch kingdom. The government’s categories of western and non-western have more to do with how close you are to the equator than whether you are West or East on the map.

- Shades of white in Europe range from ‘freshly fallen snow’ to ‘I am frequently mistaken as being from the Middle East’

- White European is a thing. When you fill out a form, under ethnicity, there are several options for white; white British, white European, white other. Because people make that distinction

- There are Europeans who don’t class their ethnicity as their skin colour, but as their nationality. I have family who don’t think of themselves as white, they just think of themselves as Italian and don’t really give much thought to their skin colour

- People here in Britain always question if darker skinned white Europeans are ‘actually white’. I get it a lot myself. My response is always ‘well I’m not anything else, so obviously I must be’

- Despite being white, a lot of Europeans from Italy, Greece, Spain etc, don’t feel white in the traditional sense. We’re not white like white British people. We’re not white like white Americans. We’re our own white. White British is one thing. White Italian is another thing. White Greek is another, etc

- Which is why we have this notion here in Europe of ‘nationality over race’. Being white isn’t as important as where you’re from

- So this really only becomes an issue if you’re an immigrant

- So being white in Europe doesn’t save you from racial discrimination, because sure, you’re technically white, but you’re not white white. Not the right white

- Here in England, Europeans with really blatantly foreign names, such as myself, find it more difficult to get job interviews, because they take one look at our name and don’t bother reading the rest of the CV. A guy I know was actually told by his boss to reduce the pile of CVs he had by ‘chucking away any with a name you can’t fucking pronounce’

- And then even when you do get an interview, half the time you walk into the joint several shades darker than everyone else and feel like you’ve walked into the ‘Swedish supermodel’ clubhouse and you just know you’re not getting hired

Race itself is a fluid concept that varies from society to society, and isn’t always about colour. Because Europeans do not all see themselves as uniformly ‘white’, just as in Asia I don’t see myself as the ‘same race’ as a Japanese or Korean even though the US would consider as all the same ‘race’- Asian-American. The Japanese mistreated my family during WW2 because they believed they were superior and destined to rule Asia.

In Europe, ethnicity within what the US usually just sees as ‘white’ matters a lot, and is very much a criteria for racial exclusion. I doubt people in the US care if somebody is German-American or Polish-American but in the UK…boy they do care whether you’re German or Polish. Or how else do we explain Nazi Germany then? I’ve seen a lot of people call the Holocaust a ‘white people’s genocide’ when that makes no sense at all given that the Nazis considered Jewish, Rromani and Slavic people racially inferior and specifically said they belonged to ‘subhuman races’ outside the ‘Germanic/Aryan’ ideal. There’s also the Bosnian genocide- between two European ethnic groups.  Not to mention, racism in the US used to be like it is in Europe today. Consider how various European ethnic groups in the US like the Irish weren’t really considered properly white when they were often poor, working-class immigrants who couldn’t speak English. But they are today seen as white- which underscores exactly how race is a fluid concept. That’s why the UN definition of racism itself considers ethnicity and nationality.

To be sure, non-white people face racism in Europe. But the racial hierarchy isn’t about just being ‘white’ by US standards. It’s how much we are in line with the specific majority European ethnic group in the country. Not just white, but whether you are English or German or Italian enough. This is why in the UK there is racism against say, South Asians…but there was also a centuries old conflict with the Irish right up to the 21st century- the Troubles. And imo xenophobia and racism can work hand in hand- such as regarding say, Mexican immigrants to the US. This is what is happening in Western Europe vis a vis Eastern Europeans. 

[image: a banner for AO3 ReKudos Converter. between the Kudos button and the Comments button is an Uno Reverse type symbol; an arrow leads from the “You have already left kudos here :)” banner to a comment by “You” reading “This is an extra kudos, since I’ve already left one. :)”]

I made a userscript that will automatically turn a pointless click of the kudos button into a customisable automatic comment on the fic!

>> Get the script here <<

The script was made to work with Tampermonkey, so you may need to change the formatting to work with other JS userscript managers.

You can install Tampermokey for Firefox from here.

[EDIT 6/6/2021] As of 2.53 the script should work on every fic regardless of the amount of kudos or when you’ve kudosed it originally. It now has to wait for reply from OTW’s servers, so if it’s failing constantly, you’ll want to go set “lat” to a higher value (default is 500). Keep in mind that setting the delay higher will make the script take longer to run.