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Today's Agenda:

Decisions made since the last public board meeting
Diversity update
2024 Board roadmap
Any other business (Questions & Answers)

Decisions taken since last meeting:

Approved new chairs for Webs, Communications
Approved Board Confidentiality Policy
Approved Board Break Policy
Granted new threshold for Finance's expense approval

This meeting ran as smoothly as the last, again due to the fact that the only people allowed to post to the meeting room are Board members and there's no way to ask questions about the business at hand. The first roll call showed 99 guests. The second had 75, and the last 67. So around 100 people were there at one point or another, maintaining the trend of increased attendence since End OTW Racism began encouraging fans to show up for the meetings.

The diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) update, was, in its entirety:

We're pleased to announce that our contracted organizational culture firm finished conducting interviews in December, and will be sharing their final report with the Board very soon.

This was so inadequate my eyes nearly rolled out of my head. Their DEI efforts cannot begin and end with this firm's audit, but as long as we're on the subject, what did they learn from the preliminary report? Did it trigger any changes in the organization? And, as I asked in my one alloted question: If the OTW doesn't release the consultant firm's findings to the public, either in full or in summary, what other kind of transparency and accountability mechanisms will be employed?

To that, Anh Pham responded: We don't have the report yet, so we cannot give a specific answer at this time. We know that people are eager to hear the findings and will share what we can when we can.

But back to the agenda. After that DEI "update," Kathryn S shared the Board's roadmap for 2024:

The following is a list of tasks that the OTW Board hopes to accomplish by the end of the current Board year on September 30, 2024. Completing this list is our goal, but it will depend on numerous factors outside of our control. We will continue to post updates on our progress on these and other tasks in the OTW Signal and in Public Board Meetings.

Trust, Safety, and Accountability:

Enable Elections Committee to pay for elections without requiring Board approval - DONE

Board Confidentiality Policy - DONE

Policy for Making a Formal Complaint Against a Board Member - IN PROGRESS

Improve Board transparency - STARTED

Improve Board responsiveness and turnaround time for communications - STARTED

OTW Whistleblower Policy

Review and revise OTW policies for volunteer discipline

Soliciting Expertise:

Procurement Policy (Outlines steps to find new consultants, contractors, tools, etc. in a fair and fiscally responsible manner) - IN PROGRESS

Create Requests for Proposal for various consultants/contractors

Following Existing Plans:

Stay up to date with Board's goals in the OTW Strategic Plan

Assist other committees to reach their goals in the OTW Strategic Plan

Support Strategic Planning Committee through the implementation of the Strategic Plan

Lead the review, approval, and implementation of recommendations from organizational culture survey

Board Sustainability:

Board Break Policy (Requires Board Members to take a reasonable break from Board work every year to prevent burnout) - DONE

Board Hiatus Policy (Outlines procedure for going on and coming off hiatus, as well as establishing limits for how many Board Members can be on hiatus at once and how long a hiatus can be) - IN PROGRESS

Board Annual Self-Assessment and Still Willing to Serve survey

Board Assistants Team (BAT) Committee:

Approve creation of new committee - DONE

Approve committee chairs - DONE

Approve first committee members - DONE

Work with BATs to create systems to better manage Board tasks - STARTED

After all that copying and pasting we had 45 minutes left for questions.

The first question was:

Q: Have there been any meetings or other progress regarding updating the AO3 Terms of Service since this summer? Given the timezone difficulties involved in coordinating real-time meetings, is asynchronous meeting being considered (and if it is not, why not)? When do you expect TOS revisions to be complete?

kcdayton: We are getting ready to begin asynchronous meetings about this; we hope to either make significant progress or complete the work by the end of this Board term. We will provide updates at our next meeting.

Someone astutely asked:

Q: I see that the Board has "started" working on transparency in the update. Could you clarify what steps are involved in this process, please?

Kathryn S: For one, better Board meetings! We're making an effort to answer more questions during these quarterly meetings. We are also sharing updates through the monthly OTW Newsletter, which you can find on the OTW website.

We have also made internal changes, such as giving a way for volunteers to request public responses to questions asked in our Volunteer Anonymous Feedback Form, answering volunteer questions in an internal public space, and having a policy for making volunteers and chairs aware when individual Board members are unavailable (e.g. when they are on vacation).

There were two questions about ensuring disciplinary measures are applied fairly.

Q: What internal policy changes is the Board pursuing to ensure that volunteers of color aren't held to an unfair double standard when being corrected/disciplined?

Kathryn S: We cannot currently speak to specific policy changes, but we are committed to reforming our disciplinary procedures in line with best practices, including considerations for holding volunteers of color to an unfair double standard. We will continue to provide updates.

The second, purely based on its wording, got more of an answer:

Q: What standards are in place for dealing with racism and hate speech within the org without being subject to the personal biases of the board and chairs?

Kathryn S: We are in the process of revising our formal disciplinary processes and procedures, and we're also working on a volunteer complaint process that will ensure fairness for all volunteers. We also expect the organizational culture consultant to have recommendations related to this.

Got a bit of clarification on what "soon" means:

Q: What is the Board's time estimate on when the results of the organizational culture firm's report will be shared with the Board? Will it happen before the next public Board meeting?

Michelle Schroeder: We do expect to see it soon, so definitely before the next public Board meeting, which will be next quarter (so in about three months).

Then there were two questions about the Board meetings themselves.

Q: Some questions here can only be answered in real-time with "more information to come". Could such questions be noted in after-meeting reports to help track issues due for follow-up? (Or is there another plan for reporting on them?)

kcdayton: We can look into ways to indicate fuller responses when we add the post-meeting replies, sure! On that note, Board shared the updated responses to 2 questions we answered live in November 2023 meeting in the #questions-answers channel. You can check them here #questions-answers November 2023 post-meeting Q&A.

We are also paying attention to what people want to know so that we can do better next time!

Q: Will we have more frequent meetings?

Kathryn S: These public meetings take a lot of time to prepare for, so it is very unlikely that there will be more than 4 per year for the foreseeable future.

Questions were also asked about improving communications between committees, hiring additional consultants/contractors, committees holding open meetings, what's being done to prevent volunteer burnout, and AO3's policy on AI-generated works. If you'd like to read more on these subjects, I recommend joining the OTW Discord and reading back through the #public-board-meetings channel, which is pretty straightforward now that Board members are the only ones allowed to post there. If you've already joined, you can use this link to jump to the top of the Jan 28 meeting.

The Board took fourteen questions all told, though some were not blessed with what I would call answers. The questions that did not get answered at all will be replied to in #questions-answers starting in two weeks on February 10, 2024.

Meanwhile, at the top of the hour, in the #open-chat channel where people socialize and post their questions for the Board, Kathryn S shared a statement from the Board, with this introduction from dazyndara: "Before we get started, we are aware of the ongoing discussions around the OTW and Israel-Palestine. The Board has prepared a statement on the topic which they will share now. Follow-up questions can be sent in via the contact form but will not be addressed during this meeting."

Dear Meeting Attendees:

We understand that many attending are planning to ask for the Board to make an official statement on the Israel-Palestine conflict. It is the policy of the OTW to not make official statements on anything that falls outside of the purview of the OTW as a nonprofit organization: fans, fandom, and Internet policy.

This is primarily for the following reasons:

Engaging in advocacy beyond the organization's purview could risk revocation of our 501(c)(3) status.

The OTW community is enormous and diverse, and is impacted by a huge variety of political issues. Making a statement on some issues would make our silence on others more significant – and more hurtful to those impacted.

Researching and crafting official statements on complex political issues takes a significant amount of time and effort, and the Board has limited time and needs to focus on the elected mandate of running and improving the OTW.

The OTW is respected as an advocate for fans and fandom, and our statements in this regard are therefore taken seriously and have an impact. Public stances made by the OTW regarding topics outside of the organization's scope are far less likely to be taken seriously, and could even reduce the impact of future statements made within our purview.

We know that this is disappointing to many of you, and we are sorry. However, as the people responsible for the current and future wellbeing of the OTW, we are not going to break or change this policy.

Respectfully,
The OTW Board

But as satsuma points out in So the OTW Board is still being terrible, but this time about Gaza, the OTW has already taken a political stance when they decided to treat the phrase "from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free" as threatening rather than liberatory, and now they are refusing to comment on that choice.

For this, and other reasons, I found this meeting very frustrating. I am not feeling any kind of increased transparency from the OTW or the Board, and that DEI update was a joke. Also they were back to banging on the drum of the Contact Us Form. I once again took them at their word and threw this series of questions into their mailbox: What is the structure of your agreement with the consultant firm? What are they contractually obligated to deliver? Is it just a report or will they be assisting in or assessing your implementation of their recommendations?

But I still haven't gotten any response to the last ten letters I sent, so at this point I'd have just as much luck chucking them down a wishing well, with about the same results.

{also posted to Tumblr}

Today's Agenda:

Decisions made since the last public board meeting
Welcome new Board members
Announce officer roles
Diversity update
Any other business

Decisions taken since last meeting:

Approved Finance requests
Approved new chairs for Fanlore, Support, and Strategic Planning
Granted preliminary approval for complaint management system
Created Twitter report for impersonation account
Approved new committee formation - Board Assistants Team
Approved new chairs for Board Assistants Team
Signed onto a letter opposing the Stop CSAM Act introduced in the US Senate

This meeting ran much more smoothly than the last due to the new rules and the way questions were handled. The first roll call showed 91 guests, and the last showed 88. Anh, as president, ran the meeting and got through the cut and paste business quickly, leaving 40 minutes for questions.

The diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) update was very brief but contained long awaited news:

We're delighted to announce that we've signed a contract with a consulting firm, who will be working with us on an organizational culture audit. (If you were wondering about the unlabeled $96,000 line item in the budget, this was it!)

The consulting firm has already completed an initial survey and begun interviewing volunteers, and will continue this process over the next few weeks.

DEI subject matter experts will be involved and consulted throughout the process. We are incredibly excited to work with them and make the OTW a better, more inclusive place!

Later, in response to my question asking for more details, Zixin said they would not be sharing information about the firm in order to protect them from possible harassment and that they don't have a sense of how many people at the firm will be working on this or for how long. They expect a preliminary report by the end of January 2024 and will give updates at the next public meeting.

Considering how long we've been waiting for progress on the DEI consultant, getting a report from them by January feels lightning fast, but history suggests the next Board meeting won't be until March, so it'll probably be a while before that information reaches us.

Also of note was the question of paid staff: Has the board been looking into hiring a volunteer to look into hiring paid staff? Is there a timeline for hiring paid staff?

Kathryn S responded:

We do have a timeline for Paid Staff Transition in our Strategic Planning 2023-2026:

The Volunteers & Recruiting Committee has been working on finding an external HR firm for the organization for several months. There are two main goals behind for the OTW behind this initiative:
To help the OTW create a better environment for its volunteers by reviewing our current org-wide policies and procedures and creating new ones when needed;
To help the OTW transition from a fully volunteer-based organization to hiring our first employee.
The committee has interviewed several firms, but the size and global scope of the OTW's volunteer and user bases make it a complicated project. They are still meeting with candidate firms and exploring potential alternatives.

I asked a follow up to this, a request for an update on the search for a Paid Staff Transition Officer, but it did not make it before the Board during the relevant conversation, or in the meeting at all. I used the double arm (o//) to indicate it was a follow up question, but it still depended on votes to get in front of them, which feels like a flaw in the system, but I'll get an answer eventually, see below.

People asked a lot of good questions, and we got answers for the promised ten, even though it made the meeting run about twenty minutes longer than its scheduled hour. Some of the topics covered: confidentiality policy for Board and the emergency procedures promised to volunteers; Finance investing OTW's money to avoid being solely dependent on donors; evaluation and improvement of the Constructive Corrective Action Procedure (CCAP procedure); progress on the ToS review; proposed subcommittee to handle complaints and conflicts within the OTW; complaint management system for volunteers.

If you'd like to learn more, I recommend joining the OTW Discord and reading back through the #public-board-meetings channel, which is pretty straightforward now that Board members are the only ones allowed to post there. If you've already joined, you can use this link to jump to the top of the Nov 12 meeting.

The meeting closed with the news that the Board is planning to release a high-level overview of their timeline that includes their goals for the 2023-2024 Board Year at the next public meeting.

The questions that didn't get answered during this meeting will be answered in the #questions-answers channel starting in two weeks. So expect those around November 26, when the Board will begin posting weekly Q&A threads.

{also posted to Tumblr}

Someone on Tumblr asked me for tips on how to search the Wayback Machine for AO3 works that are rated Mature or Explicit. My original post on using the Wayback Machine touches on it, but I went into a little more detail in a new post which I'm reproducing here.

There is a way to search the Wayback Machine for works that are rated Mature or Explicit, but it takes some extra steps.

If you're not logged in to the AO3, and the Wayback Machine (WBM) isn't, the archive requires you to click through an extra screen in order to access works with adult content. Unrated stories will also trigger this behavior. The archive then takes you to a work page that has some extra stuff added to the end of the work's URL, and this is what you need to look for when searching the WBM.

( Read more... )

It's October and the new OTW Board has been seated, and after that dumpster fire of a Board meeting on July 2, I want to know what they're going to do to prevent a repeat and I want them to come out here and tell us, so I've shoved yet another letter into the OTW Contact Form, and I encourage you to do the same.

Here's what I wrote:

Hello, and welcome to the new Board members!

Following the astoundingly mismanaged July 2 public Board meeting, what changes do you plan to make to the way future meetings are run to make them more efficient, accessible, and organized?

I ask that you announce these improvements now and allow for feedback from the public as it's important we know what to expect from these meetings, as well as what will be expected of us, and it's crucial they're moderated in such a way that provides guests sufficient time to ask questions about the agenda during the business at hand, as well as time to ask general questions regarding OTW projects, progress on the strategic plan, and the organization's work fulfilling its pledge to make the OTW and its platforms a safer, more inclusive space for fans of color.

If you haven't yet decided on any changes, please commit to announcing them at least two weeks ahead of the next meeting.

Thank you,
Punk

Join me in calling on the OTW Board to explain how they're going to make future meetings functional and accessible to the public! You're welcome to borrow or adapt my letter. If you write your own letter, considering sharing it to encourage others, and please, spread the word.

Reblog on Tumblr | Retweet on what we used to call Twitter | Boost on Mastodon | Reskizzle on Bluesky

As you know, Bob, I will not shut up about OTW Board Meetings.

My origin story: September 5, 2021, the OTW was celebrating its 14th anniversary, and as I read their cheerful announcement I thought of the fans of color I know and their frustration, disappointment, and anger with both the OTW's historically shitty response to racist harassment and its current lack of action on the promises it made in that June 2020 statement following the murder of George Floyd, and so I sent the OTW a letter requesting a public update on what it was doing to make the organization and its platforms more welcoming to fans of color. I did not get that update. I got a series of replies that didn't actually address my request and after I was sent to comb through old board meeting minutes (board meetings? what board meetings??) for a few crumbs of information, I thought fuck that and showed up at the next board meeting myself, armed with a pointed question about what they were doing to hire a diversity consultant. That was December 2021. I'm still asking that question in board meetings to this day.

So I'm very excited that

end-otw-racism has chosen to amplify my work and that this second action focuses, in part, on getting more people to board meetings and requesting the OTW actually TELL people when and where those meetings will be. I mean, it's not too much to ask???? So let's keep asking until we get it.

Here's what I wrote in my letter:

I've been attending OTW Board meetings for several years and while there's been some progress in how the meetings are announced (mainly the addition of the @ here message in the Discord channel), there's still a lot of room for improvement. Many fans don't even know there ARE board meetings! The OTW has an incredible reach across its social media accounts and the platforms it operates. Please take advantage of this reach:

* add a banner to AO3 pages, like those used for membership drives
* post announcements on all news platforms, not just Twitter, and pin them to the top of the page across social media
* email notices to all OTW members
* maintain an opt-in mailing list for non-members

And, most importantly, do all these things consistently! This includes proper upkeep of the Board calendar and making announcements as soon as possible, as widely as possible. There's no reason why these meetings should be so difficult to access.

Thank you for considering these suggestions,
Punk

Please send your own letter! It only takes a minute. You can use the template provided and/or offer your own suggestions! But the main thing here is to get the OTW to step up and treat these meetings like the important public resource they are and send out notices for them on blast.

In the meantime, I will continue to not shut up about board meetings. The next one is July 2 at 20:00 UTC. Find out what time that is for you. It'll be on Discord. Here's an invite to the OTW server, and you can also read how to find and attend board meetings.

{also posted to Tumblr}

I'm really enjoying the festival atmosphere the End OTW Racism organizers are fostering. It's like an anti-racist carnival. People are having fun, building community, and speaking out against racism on AO3 and in fandom as a whole. There's still a week left in the protest and the End OTW Racism: Call to Action has many ways you can get involved.

Here are a few:

follow the campaign on end-otw-racism, endotwracism, and endotwracism

change your pfp on social media

boost posts and share links in the hashtag

promote the campaign in your communities

talk with friends and followers about the OTW's lack of action in meeting the goals it set for itself in addressing racism on its platforms

add "End Racism in the OTW" to the title of your 5-10 most recent or most popular works on AO3 with an explanatory creator's note linking to end-otw-racism's Call to Action

add those works to the EndOTWRacism Collection on AO3

create a new fanwork with "End Racism in the OTW" in the title add it to the collection

leave feedback on works in the collection!

send the OTW Board of Directors a letter voicing your support for the protest and its demands

{also posted to Tumblr}

If you're interested in attending OTW Board meetings, here's what you need to know:

All Board meetings are open to the public. They're held quarterly and are announced on

OTW_News about a week before and again an hour before.

You can also find meetings on the Board's Google Calendar. If you add it to your own calendar, you can set up notifications for new meetings as well as event reminders. In recent months the agenda for the next meeting has also been added to the bottom of that page.

Meetings are held on Discord. Between meetings the room is set to read only so you can't post, but you can read back through past meetings, and if you join the server now, you should get a notification when they post the date for the next one. If it's your first time on the server, you'll have to agree to the rules of conduct in #01-some-rules and then you'll be allowed into the #public-board-meetings channel. Here's an invite link if you want to get a feel for the place.

Board meetings last an hour. During the meeting the Board takes relevant questions about the business at hand. If there's time, there's an open question period at the end, but you have to get your question in before the end of the hour. If you'd like to ask the Board a question but need help putting one together,

fiercynonym has a Twitter thread of excellent questions for the OTW regarding its anti-racist work (or lack thereof), or you can read the same thread on my journal, which I compiled with permission.

And, finally, you can also follow me here where I post board meeting times and dates and SEVERAL reminders along with links to the server. Or you can just follow my OTW tag what are they building in there, a hat tip to Tom Waits.

There isn't a date for the next meeting yet, but if you have any other questions, I'll do my best to answer them!

{also posted to Tumblr}

Another OTW Newsletter and still no update on their work making their platforms more welcoming to BIPOC fans. Why not write them a note requesting they add such a section to future newsletters? You can send it to Communications or the OTW Board.

Here's what I wrote:

Hi,

Just a note to say I think it'd be really great if you added a dedicated section to your monthly OTW newsletters to provide updates on the progress the organization is making with its anti-racist work. It doesn't have to be just for big announcements! New features are great and exciting, but I'm also very interested in any discussions, decisions, or advancements being made on this front, and I know I'm not alone. Making this a regular part of your newsletters will show that the org considers this work a priority and that there is progress being made, even if it's incremental.

Thank you!
Punk

You're welcome to borrow or adapt my letter. If you write your own, considering sharing it to encourage others, and please, spread the word.

Reblog on Tumblr | Retweet on Twitter | Boost on Mastodon

In response to my request for an immediate progress report on its anti-racist work and a commitment to regular reports in the future, the OTW sent me a form letter:

Hi there,

Thank you for reaching out to us and for your continued support as we work towards the goal of making the OTW a more inclusive organisation.

We would like to reassure you that we remain committed to implementing anti-racist measures on our organisation and projects. Our Strategic Planning team is currently reviewing feedback from the entire organisation in order to fine-tune our goals for the coming years, and our Diversity Consultant Research Officer has started their work towards finding an external diversity consultant to help us find further opportunities for improvement. Additionally, OTW committees continue to work to review internal processes and evaluate strategies to be inclusive on their day-to-day activities

Meanwhile, we are adding a permanent topic to our quarterly open meetings to share regular updates on this work. These updates will also be transcribed into our meeting minutes available on the OTW website for anyone who cannot attend for any reason, or who wishes to consult them after the meeting.

While these are just a beginning, some meaningful features have been added to the Archive of Our Own in order to make the website more welcoming and protect users against harassment, such as the option of turning off comments on your works, blocking people from interacting with you on comments, and opting out of gifts.

Progress on these goals is necessarily gradual due to the volunteer nature of our workforce. We would like to thank you for sticking with us as we continue to try and find ways to become more inclusive to users and donors. If you have any further comments or feedback, please don't hesitate to get in touch with us again.

Sincerely,

Natalia Gruber

OTW Board of Directors

As it happened, I did have further comments and feedback:

Hello Natalia,

I'm glad to hear you'll be adding this as a permanent topic to the quarterly board meetings. However, the meetings are sparsely attended, and the minutes aren't exactly the first place fans go to get news. In fact, the minutes tend to be brief and do not always accurately reflect the extent of the discussion. I believe a regular, scheduled post dedicated to this subject and promoted across your social media platforms is not an unreasonable thing to request. Perhaps you could develop such a report in conjunction with the updates given in the meetings and publish it separately from the minutes, or even ahead of the meeting. You could also add a similar dedicated section to the OTW Newsletter.

In the meantime, the next board meeting is three months away. Assuming you don't post a public update on your DEI work in that time, that means the first progress report will come almost ten months after your pledge to increase transparency. That's too long to wait. We deserve an update now. Not only on the changes that have been committed to the archive, but also any changes currently in development, including proposed policy changes specifically meant to combat racism in the organization and on its platforms. The tools you list give users more control over their experience on AO3, but they also put the burden on the individual. Structural change is needed in order to improve the way racist abuse is handled on AO3 and Fanlore, and this, too, needs to be part of the public conversation.

This work is very important to me, and I want to believe it's important to the OTW, but, from the outside, this does not appear to be the case. Despite the OTW's repeated statements that it's committed to anti-racist work, its inaction and long silences send a different message. I recognize that this is a volunteer run organization and can't move as quickly as an organization with a paid staff, but sharing information about your progress and process—and making that information highly visible and widely available—is something the OTW can do. It has just, so far, largely chosen not to. This has to change.

Thank you,
Punk

Please continue to write to the OTW Board and advocate for greater transparency, stronger policies against racist harassment, and a public progress report now.

If you receive a form letter in response, see if it addresses your specific concerns and questions, and if it doesn't, write back until you get something other than a form letter in reply.

It's been more than two and a half years since the OTW Board of Directors, Chairs, & Leads apologized to anyone who's suffered from their "inaction in making the OTW and AO3 a better environment for Black fans and fans of color" and vowed to "do better in the future." Let them know we're still waiting.

Reblog on Tumblr

It's FEBRUARY and you know what that means! That's right, it's been six months since the OTW published its Vision Statement 2022-2025. During that time there's been little communication of the progress being made on those goals despite one of those goals being increased transparency. Let's hold the OTW to its word.

I've asked the Board to commit to publishing regular progress reports on the organization's work making its platforms a more welcoming space for BIPOC fans, and you can too. Just cruise on over to the OTW's Contact Us page, select OTW Board of Directors from the drop down menu, and let them know how you feel about their extended silence on this matter.

Here's what I wrote:

It's been six months since the OTW pledged to "work on the implementation of processes to increase diversity and inclusion," create a "more welcoming environment" for BIPOC fans and volunteers, and "improve public relations by increasing transparency," and yet during this time there hasn't been a single public update dedicated to your progress on this work. This silence sends the message that the OTW doesn't consider anti-racist work a priority and can't be trusted to keep its word.

I'm calling on the OTW to publish a progress report detailing the actions being taken to achieve these goals and to issue such a report regularly, at least four times a year. Your extended silence on this matter is not the way to build trust with the fans you've hurt through your inaction. We need to see that the OTW is working on this. Let us know what you're doing to protect BIPOC fans from racist harassment on your platforms. Publish an update within the month.

Feel free to copy or adapt this letter. If you need further inspiration, check out

fiercynonym's excellent Twitter thread of questions for the OTW. I've also compiled the thread here on Dreamwidth with fiercynonym's permission.

If you write your own letter, considering sharing it to encourage others, and please, spread the word.

Reblog on Tumblr | Retweet on Twitter | Boost on Mastodon

I finally got tired of squinting at my phone whenever I tried to read something on AO3 and so yesterday I decided to do something about it. I would INCREASE THE THING.

Now, I already had a site skin optimized for desktop and it's my preferred way of viewing the archive, so I needed a way to preserve that while somehow putting in a thingy that would taste when I was on my phone and make the font bigger on that end. So I googled, found some instructions that weren't entirely correct, abandoned them, and did it by feel.

Here's what I did.

Over at the AO3, I created a new site skin, which I gave a unique title—and that's unique to the archive, not to you, so probably put your username in there.

You can describe what the skin does in the description field. That's just for you later when you're like, what the.

Then you're faced with the CSS box. You got two options here.

1) You can make all the fonts bigger with hashtag outer:

#outer {
  font-size: 16px;
}

2) Or you can just make the story text bigger:

#chapters {
  font-size: 16px;
}

For either of these options, you can also define font size as a percentage of the base font size, so "font-size: 105%" would make everything just a bit bigger than it currently is.

3) And of course any other CSS you want to slam in there. I also shrunk the line-height, the size of the title, and the margins for the summary and notes.

Now here's where the magic comes in. Scroll down to the "Advanced" section and expand it if necessary, then scroll to the "Media" section, then scroll inside the little box until you encounter "only screen and (max-width: 42em)." Select that. The next option "only screen and (max-width: 62em)" is for things with wider screens, like tablets.

NOW. Below that is the parent area. I wanted to use my desktop skin as the base (parent) for this, so I clicked on "Add parent skin," started typing in its name and AO3 was like, "Oh yeah, I know her," and I selected it from the drop down menu. If you're using a public site skin instead of a private skin (ew), you could add it as the parent. If you don't already have a skin you're using for desktop and don't want to use one for mobile, you can skip this step.

Then I hit SUBMIT and selected my new skin to USE and started the endless process of refreshing a work page on my phone, incrementally changing the CSS, then refreshing the page again until I was satisfied I had fiddled with it the proper amount.

And so now, my desktop experience with AO3 is unchanged and everything looks the same on my phone, except now the font is actually readable by my human eyes. Zictory!

{also posted to Tumblr}

If you're registered to vote in Oregon and want to see some meaningful gun legislation on the ballot this November, there's a petition that needs your signature.

Initiative Petition 17 seeks to ban large capacity magazines over 10 rounds in Oregon and require permits and thorough background checks to buy firearms. You can visit Lift Every Voice Oregon to read the full text of the petition and print out a signature sheet to sign and return to them by mail.

The petition requires 112,000 signatures to get on the ballot and last I heard they need about 60,000 more. Your signature needs to reach them by July 8, 2022.

If you're not registered to vote in Oregon, you can still spread the word. They're on Twitter at

LiftEveryVoiceO or you can reblog this post on Tumblr.

I just found James T. Kirk winking at me from between the lines of a text written more than three hundred years ago. I was reading about Bashō, a Japanese poet who lived during the Edo Period, when I came across this, from the opening paragraph of his travel journal Oku no hosomichi:

Months and days are eternal travelers, as are the years that come and go. For those who drift through their lives on a boat, or reach old age leading a horse over the earth, every day is a journey, and the journey itself is their home. Many people in the past have died on the road, but for many years, like a fragment of a cloud, I have been lured by the wind into the desire for a life of wandering.
—Bashō (1644-1694)
translated by Stephen Addiss

Jim must have read that and recognized himself in it because, as we learn in this unfilmed scene from the 2009 Star Trek movie, he makes a reference to it in a message to Spock, a message Spock will carry with him in a locket, long after Jim is gone:

Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you...I know I know, it's illogical to celebrate something you had nothing to do with, but I haven't had the chance to congratulate you on your appointment to the ambassadorship so I thought I'd seize the occasion... Bravo, Spock — they tell me your first mission may take you away for awhile, so I'll be the first to wish you luck...and to say...I miss you, old friend.

I suppose I'd always imagined us…outgrowing Starfleet together. Watching life swing us into our Emeritus years...I look around at the new cadets now and can't help thinking...has it really been so long? Wasn't it only yesterday we stepped onto the Enterprise as boys? That I had to prove to the crew I deserved command...and their respect?

I know what you'd say — 'It's their turn now, Jim…' And of course you're right... but it got me thinking: Who's to say we can't go one more round? By the last tally, only twenty five percent of the galaxy's been chartered…I'd call that negligent, criminal even — an invitation. You once said being a starship captain was my first, best destiny...if that's true, then yours is to be by my side. If there's any true logic to the universe...we'll end up on that bridge again someday. Admit it, Spock. For people like us, the journey itself...is home.

Perhaps Jim was setting off on that final journey as he recorded this, just as Bashō, getting older and already in poor health, was beginning a two and a half year journey from which he might not return. Bashō made it back; Jim didn't.

I don't know if Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman, the writers of that scene, were familiar with Bashō's work, but it seems an almost impossible coincidence that Jim, the captain of a boat, always pushing out into the stars, an eternal traveler, wasn't echoing the words of Bashō, a man similarly lured into a life of wandering.

{also posted to Tumblr}

The CROWN Act is a movement to prohibit race-based hair discrimination, which is the denial of employment and educational opportunities because of hair texture or protective hairstyles including braids, locs, twists or bantu knots. CROWN stands for "Creating a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair."

It's already a law in California and Washington State, and it recently passed the Oregon state House unanimously. I just wrote my state senator (a Republican!!) and asked them to vote in favor of the bill. It's also passed in New York, New Jersey, Virginia, Colorado, Washington, Maryland and Connecticut. Twenty-one municipalities have also signed it into law, and an additional bill was signed in New Mexico that was inspired by The CROWN Act. You can see the status of the act in your state on this map, which is not image described, or in plain text at Byrdie.

If you live in a state that hasn't passed the CROWN Act, you can help! Contact your state legislators and tell them it's important to you that people of color are able to wear and style their natural hair without facing discrimination in the classroom and workplace, and you're writing to ask that they introduce or sponsor the CROWN Act in your state legislature.

If you just want to copy and paste, you can borrow my wording or use a letter template (in pdf) from Dove, a member of the CROWN Coalition.

If you live in a state that has passed the CROWN Act or you've contacted your state legislators and still have some juice left, contact your US Senators and US Representative and ask them the same thing. The CROWN Act passed in the House, September 21, 2020, as H.R. 5309 in the 116th Congress, but never made it to the Senate, so it will need to be reintroduced for this current session of Congress.

You can also sign the Crown Act petition to show your support, even if you don't live in the US. They currently have 258,094 of 300,000 signatures.

The goal is to make the CROWN Act the law across the country and on a federal level.

{also posted to Tumblr}

I love this meme and

esteefee tagged me (on Tumblr) so here we go.

Rules: Name your favorite female characters from 10 different fandoms, then tag 10 people.

In alphabetical order:

Amy Santiago (Brooklyn-99)
Britta Perry (Community)
C.J. Cregg (The West Wing)
Dana Scully (The X-Files)
Diana (Wonder Woman)
Hermione Granger (Harry Potter)
Leslie Knope (Parks and Recreation)
Natasha Romanoff (MCU)
Nyota Uhura (Star Trek)
Starbuck (Battlestar Galactica)

Just look at that crew, even the two or three anxiety prone ladies in there will end you—though it'll probably involve a binder or an interpretive dance with some shouting. That...actually describes Amy, Britta, and Leslie. Weird.

Knowledge is also Hermione's weapon of choice, but she isn't as anxiety prone and will also punch you in the face if necessary. Same goes for Scully, Uhura, and probably C.J. Starbuck and Natasha will just punch you in the face. Diana will also punch you in the face, but in a corrective way, hoping you'll amend your behavior so that she will no longer have to punch you in the face quite so much.

{also posted to Tumblr}

It's possible to look at your AO3 bookmarks—or any user's bookmarks—and filter them by "only bookmarks with notes." Yet it's not possible to do this while looking at a work's bookmarks. I sent AO3 an email requesting this feature be added.

In the meantime, JR at AO3 support gave me these instructions:

As for seeing only bookmarks with notes, there is currently a work-around way to do this. It takes a few extra steps, but it is possible. Here are the instructions:

1. Open the Bookmark Search page by going to "Search" in the menu bar, then clicking "Bookmarks". This should take you to https://archiveofourown.org/bookmarks/search

2. On this page, you have to enter enough information to identify the exact work you're looking for. The easiest way to do this is probably to go into the "Any field on work" box and enter the work title (in quotation marks), the word AND, and then the author's username. So, for example:

"an upbeat kind of dirge" AND screamlet

3. Check the checkbox next to "With notes"

4. Click the "Search Bookmarks" button at the bottom of the page

This should return bookmarks for that particular work that have notes.

And in fact it does exactly that. Here are the results of that particular search.

{also posted to Tumblr}

I recently finished Alan Dean Foster's novelization of the 2009 Star Trek movie. It's almost universally terrible, but I wanted to see if it added anything to canon. Here are the results of my experiment.

Things the 2009 Star Trek novelization adds to—or subtracts from—movie canon:

( Form of a bulleted list! )

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The Most Human, by Amatara
Fandom: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: James T. Kirk/Leonard "Bones" McCoy/Spock, James T. Kirk/Spock, James T. Kirk/Leonard "Bones" McCoy, Leonard "Bones" McCoy & Spock
Additional Tags: Threesome, First time James T. Kirk/Spock, Established James T. Kirk/Leonard McCoy, Past Spock/Nyota Uhura, Porn with Feelings, Non-Graphic Smut, Voyeurism, Mind Meld, Love Confessions, Asexual Character, Asexual Spock, Pansexual Polyamorous James T. Kirk, OT3, Star Trek Beyond
Words: 4,381 words

Summary: After Kirk and McCoy extend an unexpected invitation, Spock struggles to communicate his desires, only to find that he has underestimated both his friends and himself.

Or: These days, Spock rarely thinks of himself as an alien, but fitting in can still be a challenge. Especially when the needs of the many sometimes seem so incompatible with his own.

Rec:

I really feel for Spock here; he wants something he doesn't know how to ask for, but Jim and Bones are kind and patient, and keep asking questions until they find one Spock can answer. Really lovely and sweet, and it pays a gratifying amount of attention to consent and making sure everybody is enjoying themselves.

{also posted to Tumblr}

"The Count Censored (ORIGINAL)" (Watch on YouTube)

Yes, that's the Count from Sesame Street, but what we didn't know about him is that he f*cks. I wasn't exactly sure what was going on here, in this—a video on YouTube—and I needed to, so I did some poking around. I mean, I knew what was going on, but I needed technical information.

Here's what I found: The original video and song were in episode 507, which first aired April 3, 1973. The Song of the Count was written by Emily Perl Kingsley and Jeffrey A. Moss and performed by Jerry Nelson, the voice of Count Von Count. It's a real thing.

Thirty years later, Neil Cicierega transformed it to create this censored version. He not only added bleeps but took the extra time to add the F and CK noises. Which, as he says, makes all the difference, and it does. It's a bleeping work of art.

(This could almost count as a shitpost, except I did research which I have to assume runs contrary to the shitpost philosophy. Sorry.)

{also posted to Tumblr}

Are you in the market for stories where Kirk and Spock meet as children and grow up together, becoming friends, brothers, and lovers over a period of many years? Then you're in luck. Here are some of my favorites in the genre. Arranged by bigness of size. Some may contain sexual activity between minors.

Adventure Is Out There, by Straight_Outta_Hobbiton and notfreyja | AOS | Teen | 12,922 words | Part 1 of Doubt The Stars | Jim is just the average, everyday, Starfleet-brat boy genius. His time is split between the mostly-Vulcan engineering crew and raising hell on the rest of the ship. If anybody (including Jim) knew the details of what occurred during his first trip to Vulcan, they wouldn't be surprised.

I Will Have This, by orphan_account | TOS | G | 15,541 words | Part 1 of T'hy'La | Just as she finished adding a small box of sweets to her items, she felt a tug on the sleeve of her robe. Turning, she had a smile prepared, and a praise on the tip of her tongue for whatever item her son had chosen. That turned into a sharp gasp when she realized that carefully ensconced in her son's arms was not any item for sale in the shop, but a very human baby. "Mother, I will have this."

Gift, by littlebirdtold | AU | Explicit | 30,886 words | Spock gets a small golden-haired, blue-eyed creature as a gift from his father (except he doesn't). The creature speaks in his nurse's Secret Language, appears to be convinced that Spock is an "elf" and calls itself "Jim." Utterly fascinated, Spock decides to keep it.

Foundations, by notboldly | AOS | Mature | 44,819 words | Amanda only wanted what was best for her son, and after Sarek's death, she was certain that Vulcan was not it. However, she had never expected it to be Iowa either, or rather, a poor little boy from Riverside.

Magpie, by waldorph | AOS | Explicit | 57,648 words | Spock met Jim when he was 7 and Jim was 6. It has since been generally agreed that this was a mistake (or: the one where they grow up together and things are simultaneously better and worse for it).

In Time, by yeaka | AOS | Explicit | 58,732 words | Winona Kirk is leaving, and Spock makes the 'perfect' caretaker. (Until Jim grows up, and everything changes.)

Refuge, by ThereBeWhalesHere | TOS | Teen | 70,138 words | In a less powerful, less united Federation, Romulus takes an opportunity to attack Vulcan and Federation planets begin taking in Vulcan refugees. One of these refugees, a young Spock, stays with the Kirk family on their farm in Iowa. Everyone thinks it's temporary, but after a few years Earth becomes as much a home to Spock as Vulcan ever was, and the Kirks—especially Jim—become family.

The Sum of Both of Us, by spicyshimmy | AOS | Mature | 207,623 words | Jim Kirk is nine when a massacre on Tarsus IV leaves him without a family and without a home. Spock is twelve when a strange boy in the desert saves his sehlat. Families aren't born; they're made.

The Promise, by coffee666 | AOS | Explicit | 207,872 words | As children, Jim and Spock promised they would get married when they grew up. Jim thought it was just a silly joke between kids. When they meet again upon the Enterprise, Spock still expects Jim to fulfill that promise.

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you will see what it is to be overcome, by

magneticwave

Fandom: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: James T. Kirk/Spock
Characters: James T. Kirk, Spock (Star Trek), T'Pau (Star Trek)
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Harry Potter
Word Count: 10,103

Summary: What kind of an idiot would try to explain magic to a Vulcan.

I loved this. The mix of magic and technology and Vulcan mind-stuff really works. The style is breezy, but like, secretly dire at the same time? Did someone say James T. Kirk? The prose is delightful, deft and athletic, and I was continually in awe of all the things it was doing. And then there's Jim, of course, charming and reckless, just cruising through life, avoiding all his problems until they flip his brains inside out at which point he still doesn't want to deal with them. Spock, meanwhile, has turned the Spock up to eleven, and is deliciously tense and distant right up until he explodes into a forest fire of feelings.

Very much recommended.

{also posted to Tumblr}

You & Me & The Pegasus Galaxy, by

CartWrite

Fandom: Stargate Atlantis
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: Rodney McKay/John Sheppard
Characters: Rodney McKay, John Sheppard, Teyla Emmagan, Ronon Dex, Radek Zelenka
Additional Tags: First Time, Angst, Humor

Summary: When John Sheppard finds Rodney McKay's very explicit ads on the Atlantis hook-up board, he feels pretty weird and kind of loses his mind.

This fic is so much fun to read, but it's also really responsible about the choices it makes, and I love it so much. John's voice is on point, and he and Rodney are perfect together. The sex is super hot. The emotions are fulfilling. All that plus a Porn Library and an interesting take on ZPMs.

{also posted to Tumblr}

Yellow Light, by

the_deep_magic

Fandom: Star Trek RPF
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Chris Pine/Zachary Quinto
Additional Tags: Romance, First Time, Slow Build
Words: 18,744

Summary: "Alright, Quinto, but don't expect me to just hop into bed. I'm not going to put out until at least – at least – the third date. And you're gonna have to earn it, too. I mean it. You're gonna court me if you want this fine ass."

That's right, beans, cram on your tinfoil hats and join me for some solid 2009 friends-to-lovers Pinto. Chris and Zach decide to date and things get weird but in the good way where they're learning sexy new things about each other. Chris is newly not-straight and kind of nervous about it, which is adorable, and the dialogue is on point. It's an older fic, and there's a lot of older man/younger man epithet stuff, but it just…adds to the retro feel?

{also posted to Tumblr}

I Will Have This, by ashayam_spirk

Fandom: Star Trek: The Original Series
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Amanda Grayson/Sarek, James T. Kirk/Spock
Characters: Amanda Grayson, Sarek (Star Trek), Spock (Star Trek), James T. Kirk, Winona Kirk
Additional Tags: Pre-Series, Kid Spock, Baby Jim, T'hy'la bond, Kid Fic, Fluff, Possessive Spock, time stamps, outsider pov, Amanda POV
Series: Part 1 of T'hy'La
Words: 15,541 words

Summary: Just as she finished adding a small box of sweets to her items, she felt a tug on the sleeve of her robe. Turning, she had a smile prepared, and a praise on the tip of her tongue for whatever item her son had chosen. That turned into a sharp gasp when she realized that carefully ensconced in her son’s arms was not any item for sale in the shop, but a very human baby.

"Mother, I will have this."

Sweet, angsty, and hopeful, with some great parenting (Winona, Amanda) and some not great parenting (Sarek, Sarek, and Sarek). If you saw this floating around before as a single chapter or a wip, it's now eight chapters and complete, and there's a sequel in the works.

{also posted to Tumblr}

In the Lost Epilogue of The Hot Phlebotomist, which I wrote and decided not to use, Rodney's waiting for John at the coffee shop:

Twenty minutes sounded ideal twelve minutes ago—enough time for him to prepare, but not so much that he overprepares and comes out the other side all crazy—but now that he's sitting across from an empty chair and still has eight minutes to go he's starting to think this was a terrible idea. Every time the bell above the door jingles, he looks up; there's hospital staff coming in alone or in groups, but no John, and Rodney drinks an entire cup of coffee and shreds most of his napkin while running through all the ways this could go wrong. What if John changes his mind? What if he never meant to come at all? What if he's hit by a bus crossing the street and Rodney's so upset by the accident he unthinkingly orders the blackberry and lemon pancakes and has to be rushed to the emergency room where they're put in adjacent beds and get sick of each other's company? This is a terrible date, and if John ever gets here, Rodney's going to tell him so.

esteefee expressed interest in an AU where they meet by ending up in adjacent hospital beds, which would be so good and also so terrible.

All you hear out of Rodney's curtain is a steady stream of complaints interspersed with him begging to use his laptop for "just, like, fifteen minutes, I swear." And from behind John's curtain, some gentle snores and the occasional Beep! Bloop! Boing! Rodney discovers John has a Nintendo DS over there and "Why does he get an electronic device and I don't? It's not like we're on an airplane and checking my email will send us crashing into a mountain! In fact, if you don't let me check my email there's a good chance we all might die!"

That gets him in trouble with the nurses, of course, and he can hear the other guy snickering behind his curtain, followed by a flourish of digital trumpets.

"Hey, psst, can you get the internet on that thing?"

"Did you just 'psst' me?"

"Answer the question! Wifi—do you have it?"

"Well, sure. How else am I gonna upgrade Cooking Mama's rice maker?"

And then Rodney has to take another little break because the spike in his blood pressure makes all his machines beep and the doctor comes in to frown at him.

{also posted to Tumblr}

#fic i wrote #fic i'm not writing #you want this au #it's yours #rodney's probably there for an allergic reaction #john skateboarded into a parked car

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Notes from the Jan 28 OTW Public Board Meeting +14 comments
Notes from the Nov 12 OTW Public Board Meeting +12 comments
Using the Wayback Machine with AO3 +13 comments
Improved OTW Board Meetings When? +1 comment
#EndOTWRacism turns its attention to the OTW Board of Directors +16 comments
#EndOTWRacism
How to Find and Attend OTW Board Meetings +20 comments
OTW Newsletter +2 comments
you have reached the OTW, please hold for greater transparency +17 comments
Hold the OTW to its word +8 comments
How To: AO3 Mobile Site Skin +11 comments
Gun Reform in Oregon +2 comments
the journey itself is home +30 comments
CROWN Act +4 comments
ten favorite female characters +6 comments
Filter AO3 Bookmarks by Notes +2 comments
Alan Dean Foster vs. Star Trek +11 comments
Star Trek fic rec: The Most Human, by Amatara
i could [bleep] forever, [bleep] until I drop +20 comments
the slowest of slow burns +7 comments
Star Trek fic rec: you will see what it is to be overcome, by magneticwave +2 comments
SGA fic rec: You & Me & The Pegasus Galaxy, by CartWrite +2 comments
Pinto fic rec: Yellow Light, by the_deep_magic
Star Trek fic rec: I Will Have This, by ashayam_spirk +4 comments
The Hot Phlebotomist, cont. +2 comments

see punk run

unsafe at any speed

Entries tagged with tumblrd

Notes from the Jan 28 OTW Public Board Meeting

Notes from the Nov 12 OTW Public Board Meeting

Using the Wayback Machine with AO3

Improved OTW Board Meetings When?

#EndOTWRacism turns its attention to the OTW Board of Directors

#EndOTWRacism

How to Find and Attend OTW Board Meetings

OTW Newsletter

you have reached the OTW, please hold for greater transparency

Hold the OTW to its word

How To: AO3 Mobile Site Skin

Gun Reform in Oregon

the journey itself is home

CROWN Act

ten favorite female characters

Filter AO3 Bookmarks by Notes

Alan Dean Foster vs. Star Trek

Star Trek fic rec: The Most Human, by Amatara

i could [bleep] forever, [bleep] until I drop

the slowest of slow burns

Star Trek fic rec: you will see what it is to be overcome, by magneticwave

SGA fic rec: You & Me & The Pegasus Galaxy, by CartWrite

Pinto fic rec: Yellow Light, by the_deep_magic

Star Trek fic rec: I Will Have This, by ashayam_spirk

The Hot Phlebotomist, cont.

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