Some advice I suppose for people going to ao3 as I'm much more active on that now than here:
- Don't like, don't read. Ao3 is first and foremost an archive. If you see anything you don't like don't go bitching about it or trying to report it. Ao3 has very handy filters that you can use to avoid anything that may be triggering
- unlike Wattpad, which is also a social media, ao3 is just a writing site. Sure there are comments and all but if you want to make announcements and stuff like on here I'd recommend making a Tumblr account. Its very closely linked to ao3 and a lot of the well established authors on there already have Tumblrs. So no you can't really customise your account on it with cool stuff like on here. You CAN do that for Tumblr accounts though.
- Really, just write whatever you want. HOWEVER they must be fics or some other form of fanwork. No books for just your random thoughts like you could see here.
- Yeah, it's really just a writing site tbh. No one calls them books and you don't add covers like on here.
- Applyfics aren't really a thing?? Or if they are I've never seen them
- Original works are a lot more few and far between, unlike on here, while they're not as common as regular fics you do see them a lot.
- last but not least: store your stuff somewhere else!! I usually write them onto a Google doc and then copy and paste them onto there. Ao3's save system is pretty finicky and will also automatically delete whatever works you have after a month of making the draft. It's not worth the risk.
And that's the guide if you want to make the switch over, as Wattpad imo is continuously getting more and more enshittified.
