What is it like to post on AO3 and/or RR?

[Corty]

Since I have dyslexia, seeing that bell icon red is a nightmare in RR, in contrast to SH where I can happily respond to my reader's comment without the pressure of having to do better.

 

[SailusGebel]

Gib me your lunch money.

 

[Premier]

Lol. That sounds just as rigged as real life.

It's just because RR system for trending is so easy to abuse. At least here people need to actually read the fic.

 

[Corty]

It's just because RR system for trending is so easy to abuse. At least here people need to actually read the fic.

They should be open about it like neobooks. Pay seven bucks and be on the front page until other payers push you out. I have more respect for that than a system that is being played by a bunch of circle-jerking twats.

 

[SailusGebel]

RR has an issue with people gaming the recommend lists by downvoting any work that isn't in a group. You will get downvoted no matter how good your work is as people don't want you to take their spot on trending.

So this is what Puppet means by saying RR is better.

 

[doravg]

RR: elitists. But they give feedback.
AO3: lurkers. If you get a kudo, when you are not writing for a popular fan doom, then it is a miracle.
Personally, I like DeviantArt the best. There I can post images in a gallery, and when the book is done, post that also in a gallery. Still... lurkers.

 

[Underload]

RR is all about getting into the trending list. You do everything you can for that. Swap reviews send dm's to people, force other writers to shout out your story... ahem. If the story doesn't trend then just write another one. Your life will be much easier once you have a popular work.

I don't know about AO3

 

[Maya_Di_Angelo]

Not sure about RR but AO3 is pretty good. As someone said before, AO3 culture mainly revolves around readers showing gratitude rather than being entitled. The tagging & filtering system is also pretty solid. You can add pictures inside the published work itself, many people post fanarts there too. Both original work and fanworks have audience though, og work might have a little less. AO3 mainly works on donations so it's not monetised. Because of this, AO3 also has a solid legal team to defend against any attacks. I would suggest trying it out yourself a few times before either posting new works or passing it.

 

[Sabruness]

AO3 is p. good in my experience - readers are polite, and the culture is more about showing gratitude to authors than being critical. The tagging system is very robust, although there are some limitations. And the audience is pretty large as well.

This is mostly because AO3 does not allow any kind of monetization and it's purely for fanworks - original works will get reported and removed. So if you write fanfiction, then it's great!

AND AO3 is very open to lewd content.

 

[RedHunter2296]

Royal Road

A lot of readers looking for a novel they like.

A lot of authors who are offended that you have one more reader than they do and will try to tear down your work mercilessly for any mistake you make with any argument that crosses their minds.

Post your novel there if you want more readers, but don't make it your main site if you want to keep a calm mind.

I usually make a huge backlog of chapters and post them to be published once a week, then I forget that the platform exists until the following one or two months.

 

[Iamnotabot]

so you write on webnovel?

I tried

 

[KrakenRiderEmma]

I'd have to create a smut-light version of my series for RR (their ratio is something like 1/11 for explicit content?) so I've never gotten around to it, but I posted the first volume of my series on AO3.

It's an original work, so it doesn't get as much attention as a fandom work, for sure. But nobody bothers with trying to get it taken down.

Comparison for same time frame:
AO3: 80 Kudos, 20k views
SH: 500 Faves, 45k views

 

[TheKillingAlice]

RR: elitists. But they give feedback.
AO3: lurkers. If you get a kudo, when you are not writing for a popular fan doom, then it is a miracle.
Personally, I like DeviantArt the best. There I can post images in a gallery, and when the book is done, post that also in a gallery. Still... lurkers.

That with Ao3 was also what I meant with prose. I thought there wan an option to post original works, but I doubt it would go well, unless it's in a big fandom like... Harry Potter or something.

RR is all about getting into the trending list. You do everything you can for that. Swap reviews send dm's to people, force other writers to shout out your story... ahem. If the story doesn't trend then just write another one. Your life will be much easier once you have a popular work.

Well, that does sound a bit terrible. I had the idea to post there for a while. When I looked up a site to move my stories to, SH came up with RR and I chose SH for a fast move.
So I just actually went there, seeing as reception wasn't bad, now I'm feeling a bit iffy. But I guess it's fine if it's just that. I don't care, as long as they aren't as grimey as Webnovel.
And I like the fact that they actually check if a story is stolen! Not gonna lie, that took me by surprise.
Well, bad for me, as I can't access my dashboard on Webnovel, since those disabled it for some reason without notifying me about it, after I moved my stories (I'm still fuming about that, thank fuck I deleted all my chapters beforehand, yet the books itself "can't be deleted", and now I can't even access them anymore to take down the covers and such). Well, I edited the author account on Webnovel itself, I guess that works to identify me. But the Idea that RR actually asks for prove is a nice touch, if I may say so.
Also: Another kind reminder to stay away from Webnovel.

 

[Tyranomaster]

Everyone else said most of the RR stuff.

RR has about 20x the traffic as scribblehub though. So if it isn't just hobby writing, you should post there.

 

[ReadLight]

Alright, Thx All

 

[Zakuro]

RR seems nice, but apparently not every contents/fandom are welcomed there.

RR is just SH but with review swaps and actual feedback for stories. In SH, everything is either *1 or *5 based on the reviewer's mood and preference.

AO3 seems to be a website with a lot more traffic, but seeing no images whatsoever gives me an unfamiliar vibe.

AO3 is great for posting fanfictions. Every fandom are welcomed there no matter how strange the story/pairing is. Original works, not so much.

 

[John_Owl]

So, I recently heard that it's beneficial to post on multiple platforms, and that the good choices seem to be either Royal Road or AO3.

RR seems nice, but apparently not every contents/fandom are welcomed there.

AO3 seems to be a website with a lot more traffic, but seeing no images whatsoever gives me an unfamiliar vibe.

To authors who have done it or are doing it, what's it like to post your work on AO3 and/or RR?

I can't speak to RR, as none of my content was accepted there. my prior pen name was rejected for the writing not being good enough (it was rough, i admit. i took time off to better myself). this go around, it was rejected as the platform had changed, and no longer welcomes smut (they claim it's no stories that are pornographic, meaning meant solely for the purpose of sexual pleasure, but i tried to upload one that had 1 mention of sex, and no actual scenes, and it was still rejected for sexual content, so take from that what you will).

AO3 is kinda the opposite. it's almost too relaxed. as long as it's not blatantly illegal, they allow it. and by blatantly illegal, i mean like, the forbidden fruits of smut are allowed, as long as it's all fictional. the lack of censorship can be nice, but on the flip side, it's a real pain in the ass because every one can and does post. i've read stories that sounded worse than peter griffin when he became a porn writer, but i've also seen a handful of stories that read like George R.R. Martin himself wrote it (meaning it's good, not that it's overly expositional). sadly, the bad tends to drown the good over there.

 

[ElliePorter]

Can confirm, my lunch money is always being stolen by someone every week.

I can confirm this as well... I always see @Sola-sama being surrounded by 3 or 5 girls dressed in all black and have facemasks on. The ringleader wears a brown trenchcoat and counts the money while he's being beaten up by those hooligans...

Wipes tear with $50 bill

 

[Succubiome]

AO3 you can't advertise on at all, as a self-protection measure from them so they don't get accused of helping people profit off of fanfic. I've used it more for reading original works than fanfics, myself. They also have like, hands down, the most writer-friendly policies. I really like them, but most of the content is fanfic.

I'll probably try out RR if I ever get around to writing a non-smut thing.

 

[Sola-sama]

I can confirm this as well... I always see @Sola-sama being surrounded by 3 or 5 girls dressed in all black and have facemasks on. The ringleader wears a brown trenchcoat and counts the money while he's being beaten up by those hooligans...

Wipes tear with $50 bill

It's not bullying if the victim enjoys it.

The 3 to 5 grills dressed in all black and facemasks have chokers on, and I'm weak to grills with chockers and daddy issues