To those unaware, in the deep dark hellscape of the internet there are archives made as places where creative works can live so that others may enjoy them. One such archive is known to many as Archive of Our Own (AO3), created in 2008 by the Organization for Transformative Works (OTW). AO3 is an noncommercial nonprofit site that hosts transformative fan works like fanfiction, fanart, fan videos and podfic. For more information on AO3, I would suggest heading to OTW’s page explaining AO3. With that intro into what AO3 is, let’s get started on taking a look at those tags ey!
So to the uninitiated, AO3’s tags can be both odd and at times confusing, so like many before me, I shall be taking the time to try and explain a few of them to you. I will preface this by saying that I will not go too in depth into any NSFW-esque tags, as I’m sure if you are truly that curious you would probably Google them. I am just covering some of the popular basic stuff you may come across, as many of the particular tags I will write about are common to see from fandom to fandom. So get ready, cause we’re about to jump right into this mess (can’t believe I’m writing another AO3 based piece for something).
Let me start off with content rating tags, these appear as square-shaped symbols by fic titles. These are the tags that tell you the general rating of a fanfic, and there are four of these tags in total. First is “G”, meaning that the fic is made for general audiences. Then there’s “T”, meaning it’s for audiences aged 13 and older. Next is “M” which is for mature audiences. Lastly, there’s “E”, which simply means explicit, take your guesses as to why I won’t elaborate further. The other tags in the square are also important, so I’ll explain those next.
The relationship/pairing/orientation tag uses the female and male symbols to distinguish the type of pairing in a fic, but if there’s no symbol present, the fic does not center around any romantic relationship. If you see both female and male symbols, the fic centers on a straight relationship. If you see either a male or a female symbol on their own, it’s an LGBTQ relationship. If it’s a multi-colored box, there’s multiple kinds of relationships and if there’s black box with a symbol I don’t know how to explain, AO3 just has that labeled as “other relationships”.
Then there are the content earrings. An orange box with “!?” means there may be some archive earrings that apply to the fic, but the other chose not to specify them. A red box with “!” means at least one of the major archive warnings apply. If you wish to know all of the major archive warnings, you can find them in the filters under include or exclude in the warnings drop down. If the box is blank, you’re going in blind with whatever the author says is in the fic in the tags as they did not mark their fic with any archive warnings. If you see a blue box with a globe, it’s an external work, so read all the tags carefully before reading.
Lastly, there is the finished or not tag. This tag is pretty straightforward—a red box with “🛇” means the work is not finished and a green checkmark means finished. If it’s blank, the status of the fic is unknown.
Now I won’t go into specific tags that authors write out, but I will mention two that I either see very often or feel like I need to warn you about.
Firstly, a common tag I see that’s my favorite tag of mine to encounter is “No beta we die like men/No beta we die like __”. This tag comes from the tag “No beta”, which means that the author either did not get their fic read by a beta reader for errors or chose not to have someone look over it.
The whole “we die like _” part is where it gets fun. While in many fandoms the authors just chose to write we die like men, some authors in certain fandoms will write in the names of characters who die in the source media. For example, in the Supernatural fandom—wherein several characters die btw—one of the tag variants here is “No beta we die like Dean Winchester.” So you can kind of get the point. I have audibly laughed reading a “No beta” tag before.
And now for the biggest red flag of red flag tags. Remember that red box I mentioned in the content warnings bit, you know the one that tells you that a fic has major archive warnings? Well, there’s a particular tag that when combined with that red box is essentially your final warning sign before you jump right into the deep end of the darkest and deepest lava pit in hell. The tag which I have aptly used as a joke for the title of this article is “Dead Dove: Do Not Eat”, this tag is essentially the plea to judge this book by its cover tag of AO3. You see that tag alongside the major content warnings, which are by all counts NSFW if you ask me to ignore the fic; as a matter of fact, go to the exclude section and filter it out for the sake of your sanity. If those archive warnings didn’t dissuade you, this tag should because what you see is exactly what you get; like a movie trailer that gives away too much information about what you’re going to see, that tag tells you all you need to know. If you see a Dead Dove fic, read at your own risk.
With that warning to the masses, I think I’ll call it here. The lesson of this story is that AO3’s tags can be confusing unless explained with the archive itself does a great job of doing just that. Tap on the boxes and AO3 has a built-in pop up to explain. There is also a great system to sort through the junk you may not want to see and that’s great and fairly intuitive. Just be aware of all the tags on a fic before you just click on the first one you see with an interesting title and summary. I hope this is the last time I ever write a piece centered around AO3, but I like to clown on myself so this will likely not be the last time I torment myself by showing off my knowledge of AO3 (sighs exasperatedly).
Feature Image by Aleishka Ruiz via Canva
