Introducing the Category Change Workgroup!

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2012-10-28 19:32:25 UTC

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Hello, this is Sole G., the Category Change workgroup lead, and I'd like to introduce the workgroup, talk a little about our goals, and ask for some initial feedback from all of you as fellow fans and users of AO3.

The Category Change workgroup was created to address a long-standing debate, both internally and externally - that is, whether or not the current Fandom Categories in the Archive are the best possible browsing solution. Our goal is to take a look at the current categories and how they work and see what other options we can come up with that might be more effective at representing different fannish traditions, aiding fandom browsing, and reflecting the diversity of the Archive.

While we are taking previously held discussions into account, we are analyzing the issue from scratch and trying to find new perspectives. We are looking at the Fandom Categories framework and analyzing it from every possible perspective - even considering whether or not they are necessary at all or how the browsing experience can be changed to better reflect the needs of our users.

The most heatedly contested categories are 'Anime & Manga' and 'Cartoons & Comics & Graphic Novels'. To begin with, this division strikes some fans as artificial, since they are all either forms of animation or different traditions of comics under geographically- or culturally-determined names. Naming those two categories explicitly also implicitly leaves out other traditions, such as manhwa, manhua, bande dessinée and historieta. In addition, the inclusion of all different East Asian comic traditions under 'Anime & Manga' is inaccurate, as well as culturally insensitive.

Concerns about 'Music & Bands' and 'Celebrities and Real People' have also been raised, again citing the artificial division and the confusing categorization of albums and bands side-by-side. Other issues that have been brought up are, for example, multimedia fandoms, audio-based sources, folklore and mythology fic, etc.

We're looking for a solution that balances complex, sometimes competing, factors such as diverse fannish traditions, user behavior (current and potential), and ease of browsing.

Since this is a task that involves the purview of several different committees, a workgroup consisting of members of all involved committees has been formed. These committees are:

Accessibility, Design & Technology (AD&T), due to the certain possibility of changes in the AO3 code being required, and the potential impact on design, user experience and archive browsing.
Internationalization & Outreach (I&O), since one of the issues with the current Media Categories is related to the different boundaries between media categories international fandoms have.
Tag Wrangling (TW), because tag wranglers are in charge of categorizing fandoms, and any changes will have direct impact on tag wranglers' procedure and workload.
Support, since any change in the categories will involve responding to users' concerns.

This workgroup was developed by I&O and then backed by all of the involved committees. Each committee then chose their own representatives from among their interested staff members. While several of the Category Change staffers are also tag wranglers, a tag wrangler volunteer was recruited as well in order to directly represent the interests of that volunteer pool.

One of our top priorities is to maintain a healthy, fluid communication with the Archive of Our Own userbase, so we want to start gathering feedback as soon as possible. If you have any opinions, feedback, suggestions, knowledge or ideas, you can either leave a comment on this post or you can contact us through the Category Change contact form. We don't see the emails used when you post guest comments, and you can request that any feedback that you send through the contact form be archived anonymously in OTW workspaces so that your name and contact information are only visible to members of the workgroup and not to all staff and volunteers.

We are particularly interested in answers to these questions:

1. Do you currently use the Media Categories in order to browse the Archive? If yes, then how do you do it? For example, are you generally looking for a specific fandom or do you browse the different pages to see what fandoms are listed on the site or to find new ones? What are your usual routines? If you want to find a specific fandom on the archive for the first time, how do you do that? How do you find fandoms by more casual browsing? Don’t be afraid to be as specific and detailed as you want; details and step-by-step descriptions are really useful to us.

2. What issues have you run into with the current media categories? Are there fandoms that aren't listed where you might have expected them to be? Are there other problems you've noticed with fandoms being either grouped with or separated from one another in a way that's not ideal?

3. How would you like to see the categories and the media/fandom pages be improved? What's your vision of a better way to find, browse, and organize fandoms? We're open to all kinds of ideas, not just different names for the existing categories.

Please feel free to comment and brainstorm, and also to discuss and engage with each other. We're very interested in hearing what you think, and thanks in advance for your feedback!

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Kelly (Guest) Mon 29 Oct 2012 09:09PM UTC

I use the fandom categories most when I'm reading in fandoms that have more than one canon set - eg. movies and comics, movies and books. Using Avengers as an example since it's popular right now: I prefer the comics universe(s), so I like being able to find what comics 'verse fic there may be. And it's a much smaller subset of Avengers fic, so reducing the number of pages to dig through is a definite plus.
I agree with VampirePaladin that if you're going to group anime and manga in another category, 'anime and cartoons' and 'manga, manhua, manhwa, comics, graphic novels' makes a *little* better sense. It's still not perfect, considering how long that second tag would be, but I think it makes a little more sense than saying anime and manga are the same canon.

(Count another for clearer NOT exceptions in the search.)

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1. ErinPtah Tue 30 Oct 2012 07:41PM UTC
  
  Splitting up anime and manga would be terrible for functionality. It would leave tons of fandom tags duplicated across categories, and cause unnecessary work and confusion for people in those fandoms.
  A few specific cases that would cause problems:
  --Madoka Magica started as an anime, and has a manga adaptation. They're so similar that there would be no benefit to having separate tags, and nobody has tried. Would we have to artificially impose separate tags to get it into separate "animation" and "comics" categories? Or would we just have the same tag show up twice?
  --FAKE (manga) is a series that started as a manga, but had a short animated adaptation of one of the stories. Again, the adaptation followed the original closely, and nobody has bothered to tag it separately. Do we make a new top-level tag? Do we end up with a fandom tag containing the word "manga" in the "animation" category? Do we leave it in the "comics" category, and risk someone who got into the series through the anime looking there and not finding it, and assuming there are no works for the series?
  --Monster (manga) explicitly has people using the phrases "anime or manga" and "Manga/Anime" in their tags. A great example of how users blur the two together, while avoiding terms like "cartoon" or "comic".
  --Fullmetal Alchemist involves a manga and two anime, and they're not similar in plot. In fact, there are wildly different twists and backstories involved. Even then, many users don't bother to specify a version in the fandom tag! They put that information in other tags (Canon - Manga or Canon - Anime), or in the summary.
  By and large, people who are in anime/manga fandoms don't differentiate along media lines first. Our multifannish spaces (anime clubs, anime conventions, the Anime Web Turnpike, anime-manga.dreamwidth.org, etc, etc) are open to all drawn media from Japan, and within them we seek things by series title first, and format later -- if at all. The AO3's categories should reflect this.
  
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2. hl (hele) Wed 31 Oct 2012 02:11AM UTC
  
  Hi,
  Thank you for telling us how you use the Archive, and for your suggestions! I have registered your
  feedback; we promise to consider it all carefully. As the process continues, we will post more about our progress and request further input.
  Best,
  hele
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Firerose Mon 29 Oct 2012 10:33PM UTC

1. Yes, I use the top-level media categories. I mainly read rarelit and would very much prefer it not to be swamped with other types of media, which are often more popular. I do browse from time to time to see whether there are new book fandoms. I tend to use the browser search box on the books page to find new fandoms, often by searching for the author name. I find the few anime fandoms I do read very hard to find, partly because the non-English names are unfamiliar (and inconsistent) so it's hard to know where to look. The grouping of mythological sources with no specific canon under Books & Lit feels appropriate to me.
2. I don't find the 'all media types' supercategories helpful, and they often get in the way of finding book canon fiction, particularly where there are adaptations that are a long way from the original book canon eg Sherlock BBC. Personally I'd combine Theater with Books & Lit, as Shakespeare is the fandom I can never find, but I understand that other people prefer that separate.
3. (a) I would prefer that there was an option to list books by author (preferably by surname), so that say works by Gaiman were clustered and it was easy to see which books had fanfiction. A submenu presentation would work for this too. Ideally one could click Gaiman, Neil and open a submenu of say American Gods, Graveyard Book, Neverwhere &c, without leaving the main Books & Lit listing.
(b) I'd love an option just to view English names for sources.

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1. hl (hele) Wed 31 Oct 2012 02:45AM UTC
  
  Hi,
  Thank you for your explanations and suggestions! I have registered your
  feedback; we promise to consider it all carefully. As the process continues, we will post more about our progress and request further input.
  Best,
  hele
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sarken Mon 29 Oct 2012 11:47PM UTC

1. I occasionally use the Media Categories to browse the Archive. There are fandoms that I both read and write, which I check daily or multiple times a day by going to My Home and using the links on my works, which I do to avoid the Media Categories page. Then there are fandoms I only read, and I check them maybe once a week by going through Media Categories. When I get to the list of Fandoms, I use Cmd+F to find the fandom I'm looking for. I often forget the letters at the top of the page are links; even so, it's easier to use my browser's search function than to read through the list.
2. This is definitely wandering away from the point since it's more related to tag naming, but I run into problems with the inconsistent use of "The" in fandom tags. I'm always expecting to see "The West Wing" in the Ts with "The Newsroom" and "The X-Files," but it's under W because it's been shortened to "West Wing." I've also noticed that some RPF fandoms turn up in TV Shows (Cmd+F "RPF" shows six at the moment), which strikes me as odd. On one hand, it's kind of nice because I find out there is RPF for things I don't expect; on the other hand, if I didn't like RPF, I'd be unhappy to see it there.
3. I don't know! /o\ Some people mentioned subcategories, which would be helpful for browsing for something new (it would split the information into more digestible chunks), but not so much for finding things I already want (it would add another click to an already too-difficult process). This is a ridiculous idea of questionable feasibility, but something like being able to type "Shortcut: The X-Files" into a search box in the header (or on the front page -- whatever) and then go directly to the works index for The X-Files (as opposed to the standard search results page) would make it easier to get to frequently-visited fandoms.

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1. dizmo Tue 30 Oct 2012 02:19AM UTC
  
  The "The" issue is over in the Wrangling Guidelines, if you search for 'common stop words'. The The is only left in place if it's only a one word fandom if removed. Other than that, they trim the article in question. It's also listed as an interim solution, but a fix hasn't been coded yet.
  
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2. hl (hele) Wed 31 Oct 2012 03:27AM UTC
  
  Hi, sarken!
  Thanks for the comment! I have registered your
  feedback; we promise to carefully consider it all. As the process continues, we will post more about our progress and request further input.
  The 'RPF' titled fandoms in TV shows look like miswrangled tags -- I've passed them along to the wranglers for checking and fixing (or just checking if they aren't mistakes). If you see anything else weird with tags, don't hesitate to just let someone from Tag Wrangling (or Support, if there are no wranglers around); with more than 400,000 tags on the Archive, we appreciate all the feedback we receive about them. For anyone not a volunteer (or a volunteer who doesn't regularly see Tag Wrangling or Support people in chat), don't hesitate to contact Support through the Support and Feedback form if you see something weird going on with the wrangling. Worst case scenario, the weirdness was intended and we will pass along the wranglers' reasoning for it.
  Best,
  hele
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amarna77 (Guest) Tue 30 Oct 2012 01:03AM UTC

1) Yes, sometimes, because I don't feel like typing the name in, or I want to see what fandoms there are.
2) The metatag situation means that that the /media page itself is not very useful. I also wish that on the category pages that there was an option to sort by popularity.
3) On the anime/manga situation: as an anime/manga fan who primarily looks in that section, I would like it if the anime/manga tag were to still exist in some form on the media/fandoms page, either as a category as it currently is, or a sub-category under Comics/Animation. I think that manhua and manwha should be removed from the anime/manga category, as it is incorrect to put them there, and either be moved to their own sub-category or be placed under Comics.
Some forms of metatags should be removed from the fandoms listings, because they are multimedia and thus don't make sense in a listing that sorts by media, or because they are redundant and clutter up search results. Maybe there could be a separate section for popular metatags.

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1. hl (hele) Wed 31 Oct 2012 03:28AM UTC
  
  Hi there,
  Thanks for commenting with your experience and suggestions! I have registered your
  feedback; we promise to carefully consider all suggestions. As the process continues, we will post more about our progress and request further input.
  Best,
  hele
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stereosymbiosis Tue 30 Oct 2012 03:55AM UTC

I'm not sure how to offer advice on how to make this stuff better, but I'll just let you know how I search for things...
1. I usually come here looking for something in particular, like a particular fandom. So if I want to read something from The Avengers (Movie), I'll find it on the fandoms page without having to click on the categories because it's one of the top 5 most prolific fandoms or something. Then I filter by hits, to show which ones have the most hits, and find something from there. If I want to read something from say, Teen Wolf, I'll go to the fandoms page, then click Tv shows, command+f and type in Teen Wolf to find it. If I want to find a new fandom, I'll usually just do the same thing I would in that last instance. I don't really browse casually, I usually have something specific in mind when I come here.
2. I haven't really noticed any problems, but I only read from a few fandoms.
3. I think one reason I don't browse casually is because the fandoms are so spaced out on the list pages. I know this makes it easier to read, but maybe if there were four columns instead of two, and they were squished together, I might be more inclined to keep scrolling down and look for new fandoms. maybe if there was an option to change the layout back and forth like that, it would be easier to do so

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1. hl (hele) Wed 31 Oct 2012 03:35AM UTC
  
  Hi,
  Thanks for letting us know how you find things in the Archive, and for your suggestion! I have registered it; promise to consider it all carefully. As the process continues, we will post more about our progress and request further input.
  Best,
  hele
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kurushi Tue 30 Oct 2012 08:44AM UTC

1. Yes. Generally I browse through categories to get an overview for the change in fandoms I am interested in. I find the separation between Western and Asian origin comics very useful, because these pages can summarise what fic is out there and what is popular in anime and in western fandoms. This exposes me to new source material, but I have never found the AO3 very easy to browse to find fanfiction to read. I do not browse the AO3 to find new things to read. I generally come to the AO3 when I am following a link from a crosspost or a bookmarking site, or to search for a known story or author.
2. The site does not seem designed to help readers find fiction, and the categories and canon/fandom titles are inconsistent, particularly in terms of specifying media type (take a catch-all canon tag for an anime/book/manga series). Sometimes, it looks like you've gone and put your lagoon inside your flamingo, instead of your flamingo inside your lagoon.
3. User-oriented design. I think a lot of your problems could be solved if you simplify your problem. Recognising country of source origin is important because that gives a cultural context to browsing. It's not a category. Media types are themselves dependent on culture, and AO3 seems to confuse media type with content and container, they are all not really good as categories. Look to users, readers, and how you can use the blank structure of categories to suit their browsing. I think a practical approach like this will make browsing better in the long run, whether or not people think the category titles are 100% perfect right now.
Um. Hope that's useful and not just me gibbering from my current coursework readings. Good luck working things out.

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1. hl (hele) Wed 31 Oct 2012 03:37AM UTC
  
  Hi,
  Thank you for your experience and suggestions! Of course it's useful. I have registered your
  feedback; we promise to carefully consider it. As the process continues, we will post more about our progress and request further input.
  Best,
  hele
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Elf_Herself Tue 30 Oct 2012 04:12PM UTC

1. Do you currently use the Media Categories in order to browse the Archive? If yes, then how do you do it?
I use it for two things:
1) Find mega-fandoms, often by going to the initial "Fandoms" page and looking at the top 5 under each category;
2) Find specific small fandoms by picking a category and using the browser's "find" function.
I also use the Yuletide collection fandom list page, and would probably use other collections' fandom list pages if collections weren't borked. (Searching for collections is a glitchy and doesn't often work. Skimming through them is worse; there's no way to tell the difference between "fic fest collection," "themed collection assembled by someone," and "single author's set of stories in their AU-verse." AO3 needs categories for collections.)
2. What issues have you run into with the current media categories?
I don't use it to browse for fandoms because I find it awkward and annoying. The spacing between listings is too big--I want a condensed version. The naming of fandoms is so random that there is no easy "scroll and skim;" I have to actively read every fandom in the category to get a sense of what's available.
The lack of ability to tell what's a metatag vs what's an "actual" fandom is also annoying. I want lowest-level fandom tags to be highlighted somehow--this would, among other things, encourage authors to *use* those tags, instead of tagging all the Batman fic "DCU-Comicsverse." (I'm guilty of this myself; Batverse fandom doesn't tend to acknowledge individual comic book titles. Sorting out which fic is Batman vs Detective Comics vs Robin vs Nightwing is considered irrelevant, for the most part.) (And that's before we get into Young Justice/Teen Titans/JLA crossovers.)
I am annoyed that the mega-fandom tags show up in every category they have a presence in, even if what makes them a mega-fandom is not that category.
3. How would you like to see the categories and the media/fandom pages be improved?
I want, very much, an option to sort a category by number-of-fics rather than alphabetical.
I would love the separation of Superhero Comics from other comics; I have no stake in the manga/manwha etc split but my daughter does (she doesn't use the archive much because it's lousy on a Kindle, but I have hope); I want the paper and animated versions in the same category, because fans often treat them the same.
I'd like the "other fandoms" category to include a list of examples. Potentially, would like those fandoms to be tagged with their media type. (Board Game, Painting, Internet Meme, etc.)
I want the books-and-lit category sortable by author last name. I don't need the fandoms renamed by author; some fandoms have more than one author. I'm in Sime~Gen fandom, and everyone involved knows *that* is the name of the fandom. Star Trek book fandom includes dozens of authors. But the book fandoms should have an author metadata field that allows searching--and it would need to have multiple options; S~G has two authors. (Unsure if things like Trek should allow all those authors, but certainly the Star Wars series by the same author should be searchable by author.)
I want the tv/movie fandoms somehow tagged to their category so that the list for book fandoms *doesn't include them.* Or at least, doesn't include them in the top-five-visible-fandoms if what makes them so huge is not part of that category. That might have to be done manually. If there are only 5 visible fandoms showing, I think manually excluding mega-fandoms could be added to someone's workflow without being overly draining. (I know that adjusting the code to *allow* manual exclusion is another matter.)
Top 5 fandoms for books should be:
Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling (28625)
Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien (2752)
A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin (2694)
Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer (1861)
PRATCHETT Terry - Works (1573) [or, if we skip "Works" metatags, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins (1206)]
NOT the current list, which has both LotR - All Media *and* TOLKIEN - Works.

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1. ErinPtah Tue 30 Oct 2012 07:45PM UTC
  
  I think manually excluding mega-fandoms could be added to someone's workflow without being overly draining. (I know that adjusting the code to *allow* manual exclusion is another matter.)
  Presumably it wouldn't take any major recoding to create a "Megafandoms" category, at which point it would be very easy to manually move a bunch of things over there. Certainly it's an option several wranglers have already asked for and been eager about.
  
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2. hl (hele) Wed 31 Oct 2012 04:05AM UTC
  
  Hi, elfwreck,
  Thank you for your very detailed answer! I have registered your
  feedback; we promise to carefully consider all suggestions. As the process continues, we will post more about our progress and request further input.
  Best,
  hele
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on_verra Tue 30 Oct 2012 07:51PM UTC

This is totally random and probably not very helpful, but whatever categories end up being devised in future, I would love to see the Categories Page list all categories in order of # of stories (which is often but not always the same as Size of fandom).
Right now Categories are listed Alphabetically, w/Anime & Manga first, followed by Books and so on. Once the page was set up in this way, it ceased to be useful for me. I seem to recall originally that TV fandoms came first, having the largest # of stories compared to the largest # of stories in other categories, as opposed to Alphabetically. That old way was useful for me, as I would often visit for a sort of "Snap-shot" of AO3 activity.
Of course, I might be biased because my main fandom is Supernatural - currently the TV fandom w/the most fic in the Archive! - but it was actually not in the #1 spot back when the Categories page was set up that way! Perhaps the most judicious solution would be to create some sort of statistics-based flip of what's on top (like, whatever category saw the most posting action on a particular day would appear first? Although this would also be problematic for anyone who likes to see the same thing in the same place from day to day. Depends on what the majority of people who actually use the Categories Page for actual regular browsing have to say about it ^.^

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1. hl (hele) Wed 31 Oct 2012 04:48AM UTC
  
  Hi,
  Thank you for your comment! It's indeed very helpful, as is all feedback; I have registered it. We promise to carefully consider all suggestions and ideas. As the process continues, we will post more about our progress and request further input.
  Best,
  hele
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2. 1. Zebra Wed 31 Oct 2012 10:42AM UTC
    
    Afair, weren't the categories originally in an 'first input' order, that's why some categories ended up after the 'uncategorized' fandoms and in weird places. After some talk the abc order was implemented.
    
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  2. 1. hl (hele) Wed 31 Oct 2012 08:28PM UTC
      
      Yes, I seem to remember something like that -- the change to alphabetised order, anyway!
      
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crazylove1980 Wed 31 Oct 2012 01:43AM UTC

I use the media categories all the time, the one problem I have is that there are no crossover categories. That is the one thing that bugs me about the media categories. There are so many awesome crossovers out there but there is not a category topic for them, so if they are popular shows, it can take forever to fine tune my looking especially if I can't remember the name or author!

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1. hl (hele) Wed 31 Oct 2012 04:50AM UTC
  
  Hi,
  Thank you for your comment! I have registered your feedback; we promise to carefully consider it. As the process continues, we will post more about our progress and request further input.
  I mention in case you aren't aware -- currently, your best bet to find crossovers easily is to do a search by typing in:
  "Crossover" "Fandom of your choice"
  in the Tag field of the Work Search form.
  This, of course, will not catch all crossovers, because it depends on the authors tagging for it, or even all works in that fandom, given there could be some variability in the tags used. The upcoming filters should make this easier (by using the tagging structure!).
  Best,
  hele
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Aiffe Wed 31 Oct 2012 07:45AM UTC

As someone who does spend some time in animanga fandoms, I think separating anime and manga from each other by putting anime with other animation and manga with other comics would be a mistake. The thing is that a lot of anime is based off manga, and some manga is based off anime, and often they follow the exact same plot, sometimes shot for panel, line for line. I've written fics that I honestly could not tell you if they were animeverse or mangaverse, and it didn't matter, and other fics that were fusions, taking small details from both versions of canon. Making [Title] - The Anime and [Title] - The Manga into two very separate categories would just be confusing and disorganized. Many authors would only put their fics in one category, though some would list theirs twice, meaning readers would have to trawl through two separate sections, with overlap. Then the fandom might get a third tag to consolidate it, which I suspect would only complicate things further.
I don't have any real objection to anime/manga being merged in with cartoons/comics, though I think Japanese media might end up dominating the category, since there's so much of it, and I imagine some people would complain about that. I am not actually sure we need the media categories, though? Well, Real People sort of needs its own category because it's like reality is the fandom itself more than each individual celebrity is their own fandom, but...it does feel to me like the media categories are failing to categorize whatever it is they're attempting to sort. You know, is Harry Potter a series of books or a series of movies? What about Doctor Who, which is less a matter of adaptation and more just sprawling into every kind of media that exists? If I write a fic set between Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra, using canon details from the comic series The Promise, what media is that? Heck, what fandom even is that?
There isn't the same sort of link between Western comics and cartoons (though there are certainly adaptations going both ways, and I can think of several examples) that exists between anime and manga. So linking the two makes a lot more sense in Japanese fandoms. I do wonder if Japanese drawn media ought to get its own category, not to other it or anything, just because there's so much of it, and when you have a lot of something you give it its own category so everything else doesn't get buried under it. Which means the manwha would go in with the Western comics as a kind of, "stuff that's drawn that's not of Japanese origin" category. Though what do you even do with fusion media like the Kingdom Hearts comics? What about that run of Uncanny X-Men penned by famous mangaka Kia Asamiya, or even the new Marvel anime series, made in Japan, for Japanese audiences? What about anime movies based on English novels, like Howl's Moving Castle? Since live-action Japanese-made adaptations of animanga exist, where do we put those? What about the Western-made animanga adaptations, like that Dragonball: Evolution movie? (Hey, someone, somewhere, might want to write fic of it....) Peter Chung created both Alexander Senki and Aeon Flux, but because one was in Japanese and the other was in English, should they be in separate categories?
I will say that I generally only use the categories to narrow down my search for a fandom I already know I want to find. Like, if I want to read Farscape fic, I'll click on TV shows first. (Though there were comics, too.) If I just want a certain kind of content (e.g. vampire AUs, don't judge me bro) I'll go on the tag for that and just look at fics from any and every fandom.
You probably just need to have a tag for each fandom, with complicated fandoms possibly being behind the kind of "____ and related fandoms" sort of thing we have now. I guess that already works, then.
Also, as for this dilemma of what to call the medium which encompasses comics, graphic novels, manga, manwha, etc, the technical term I've seen around is "sequential art" or "sequential images." Too stuffy? Not recognizable enough? IDK.
But tl;dr: there is a part of me that wants everything in neat categories, however ultimately I think the categories create more confusion than they solve.

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1. hl (hele) Wed 31 Oct 2012 08:35PM UTC
  
  Hi,
  Thanks for commenting explaining your experience and the issues involved! I've registered it; we promise to consider all suggestions and issues carefully, and post more about our progress and request further input as the process continues.
  Best,
  hele
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Kalloway Wed 31 Oct 2012 01:30PM UTC

1. If I just want to read something, I pick a top-level category and scroll til a fandom jumps out at me. Sometimes I just look through to see what people have written (for). If I'm looking for something in particular, I'll generally pick from the letter listing for what I'm hoping it starts with.
Which is really where my main problem comes in.
2. I mostly browse the Anime & Manga category, and it can be a very frustrating category to browse. While it's nice to see full Japanese titles used for fandoms, they are used with no consistency and because they often start with a different letter, they pop up at completely different places in the listing than I'd expect.
For example - Yukikaze. Localized as 'Yukikaze' on both the DVDs and novels, it's listed as 'Sentou Yousei Yukikaze | Battle Fairy Snowstorm'. I'm not sure I've ever seen the English translated title used anywhere except for on a couple of sites selling related model kits. So while my first thought would be to look in the Y's, obviously I'd have to resort to CTRL+F if I even thought it might be somewhere else after checking the Y's.
The categories for Gundam are even worse. Some of the various Gundam series are listed as Gundam XYZ. Zeta Gundam is hiding in the Z's. When I first thought to look outside the G's, I looked in the M's, since the series is generally localized as 'Mobile Suit Gundam'. The only one there is Mobile Fighter G Gundam. And then the K's, since the Japanese is 'Kidou Senshi'... Well, for most of them.
I'd really like to see a consistent fandom titling scheme instead of having to CTRL+F. Especially since most of the time, I am not looking for anything specific, just something to read in any of the dozens of fandoms I'm familiar with.
3. A very basic guideline on naming/alphabetizing non-Western/non-English fandoms. Right now, the setup is messy and frustrating.
And yes, I realize that would lead to more CTRL+F, unless fandoms could also be sorted by 'common' or localized names instead (and still have the full Japanese title in place). Obviously, that does invite more issues, but I would happily exchange the current mess for knowing I need to CTRL+F.

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1. surskitty Thu 01 Nov 2012 05:52AM UTC
  
  With Gundam, I'd think that could probably be made a lot easier to navigate by having a parent Gundam franchise tag so the right tags for what you're actually looking for'd be listed together. 8/ I don't understand why metatags don't get used here more often, particularly since the canonical tags aren't exactly consistent ....
  
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2. 1. briar_pipe Mon 12 Nov 2012 04:24AM UTC
    
    I can answer this one!
    We do finally have a metatag for Gundam & Related Fandoms. You can see the whole set from there.
    (Thanks to the user who submitted this request!)
    
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3. hl (hele) Thu 01 Nov 2012 11:52PM UTC
  
  Hi,
  Thanks for explaining how you browse and the problems you encounter! I've registered your comment; we promise to consider all issues carefully, and post more about our progress and request further input as the process continues.
  I also passed along your feedback about tag organization to the Tag Wrangling Committee. They're looking into the problems and talking to the wranglers. (Many of these problems arise because there are different names under which users may be looking for particular fandoms -- this particular problem is being discussed with the coders, but I'm afraid they're not near finding a solution yet.)
  You can look at the current guidelines for titling non-English language fandoms in the Introduction to the Wrangling Guidelines and the Anime & Manga section of the Fandom Wrangling Guidelines for more specific rules.
  Best,
  hele
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godsdaisiechain (preux) Thu 01 Nov 2012 02:18AM UTC

I go through and browse and the current system is clunky to me because of the artificial division of what should be a fandom (imho) by specific text and genre. For example--it would make more sense to me to have a Star Trek Fandom as the major category and then the breakdown of shows, movies, etc, within that fandom. Same for Sherlock Holmes and Sherlock TV, etc...
In fact, I'd consider organizing at least in part by how popular the fandoms are--Star Trek and Sherlock are huge and need a different type of structure to be helpful. Some people are really interested only in specific pairings and it should also be easier to find those across the Star Trek Fandoms (for example).
I also think it's rather artificial to have every fandom listed as "equal" when quite a number seem to have only a handful of works.
It might be helpful to retain the current library structure (I'd consider categories like 'belletristic literature and classics' 'children's books' 'classic science fiction and fantasy' 'vampires, werewolves, and monsters' 'superheroes' 'anime and manga' 'mystery and thriller' 'IRL performers and musicians') but have a main page where the most popular fandoms (those with say more than 10,000 or 25,000 works) and the most active (those with updates every week) are just listed out alphabetically.
I'd also consider pulling out or tagging all the fandoms with fewer than 100 works that have not been updated or added to in over a year and putting them in some type of separate section. For those with fewer than 25 works, I'd even consider not treating them as 'fandoms' (which implies a community) but as 'fanworks' that can fall into categories but can be filtered out for people who are trying to get a feel for which fandoms are active or more interesting to them.
I hope this is helpful.

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1. hl (hele) Fri 02 Nov 2012 12:03AM UTC
  
  Hi,
  All feedback is helpful! Much thanks for detailing your suggestions and the reasoning behind them. I've registered them; we promise to consider them all carefully, and post more about our progress and request further input as the process continues.
  Best,
  hele
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2. 1. preux Fri 02 Nov 2012 12:33AM UTC
    
    dear hele--
    That's extremely kind of you (and it was terribly nice of you to have replied so quickly as well). Likely an important reason I find it hard to navigate now is that I don't really understand the fandoms all that well.
    Thank-you very much for all the work you're putting into this so that I and so many other people can take part in this and have all this lovely fiction to read.
    I really appreciate it, and I would be happy to help in any other way I can as well.
    Best
    
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Silvereyed (Guest) Thu 01 Nov 2012 04:54AM UTC

It would be nice to be able to deprecate between single fandom fics and multi-fandom crossover fics :)

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1. hl (hele) Fri 02 Nov 2012 12:10AM UTC
  
  Hi,
  Much thanks for commenting! I've noted down your suggestion; we promise to consider them all carefully, and post more about our progress and request further input as the process continues.
  Best,
  hele
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surskitty Thu 01 Nov 2012 05:43AM UTC

I usually search based on fandom name.
I'd kind of like original language as default top-level, with Animation ('Cartoons' has :/ connotations), Comics/Graphic Novels, Books, Theater, Live Action, Video Games, and Other below that. (I don't know what to do with RPF and anthropomorfic in that scenario, though, besides maybe having a language-independent flag for, say, political rpf so it gets displayed regardless.) Possibly keep top-level media things in case it's hazy and people'd rather ctrl-f than futz about with search. I'd much prefer going Japanese → Comics, than dealing with manga flattened alongside American comics by default (since then the list is even longer), or manhwa and manhua flattened into Anime & Manga, or the category labelled 'Eastern comics'. And 'Anime & Manga/Manhwa/Manhua' is a little unwieldy. Media → Language is probably easier to browse, though.
There might be a lot of anime and manga tags that are justifiably flattened together, buuuut I'd prefer defaulting to having a parent tag and then flattening when it actually is roughly the same. Light novel tags, too. It's kind of funny how Anime & Manga is a single category when a lot of series started out as light novels, but no one's suggesting flattening those in, too. (Not that I'm suggesting doing that. It's just kind of interesting.)
Is the tag sidebar thing going to be able to handle NOT? It'd be nice to, say, be able to search 'Fullmetal Alchemist' and exclude anything specifically tagged with -- .... Fullmetal Alchemist isn't currently a metatag for the first anime's continuity and the manga + Brotherhood? That's kind of annoying. 8( Maybe that's why no one bothers disambiguating. Well, if it was disambiguated, it would be nice to be able to easily exclude anything specifically tagged with one continuity. It often doesn't matter, but it's annoying whenever it does.
Also, is there a way to have things only display literally that tag, not any of the synonyms or subtags?

I'd like it if the fandom listings filtered out based on things being probably useful, as deemed by wrangling and probably people sending in comments or support tickets. Currently, the top five for Movies are all various tags for The Avengers, and the top five for Video Games includes the Final Fantasy metatag (which is approximately useless for browsing works (though not for finding Final Fantasy tags), though if it had Dissidia as a subtag I could see it being handy for that once tag filtering's back up. Why isn't Dissidia a subtag? Then you could filter for Cloud and Squall in the same fic while excluding KH. Or something.) and both the Compilation of FFVII and FFVII. It'd probably be annoying to implement, but I'd like a flag for if a parent tag should display on fandom lists. If the parent tag is useful enough to display (like in the Compilation's case, since it's not a parent tag or disambiguation for a bunch of barely-related things), skip the child tags at least on the top five and possibly on the fandom list. Add the child fandoms to the top of the works list regardless.

Last Edited Thu 01 Nov 2012 06:00AM UTC

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1. hl (hele) Fri 02 Nov 2012 01:00AM UTC
  
  Hi
  Much thanks for explaining your suggested organizational scheme! I've registered it; we promise to consider all suggestions carefully, and post more about our progress and request further input as the process continues.
  As for 'NOT' in the sidebar -- the answer is a conditional 'yes'. The version that will be initially implemented will allow filtering out specific tags, but not their synonyms. It's something very often requested, though, and I think the coders plan to add it eventually (it's more complicated than the current version).
  There isn't any way to display the canonical tags versions instead of the syns. What specific tags display on works is up to the creators, though the coders are contemplating ways to allow users to hide unwrangled and noncanonical tags at their choice.
  I've sent your issues with the Fullmetal Alchemist and Final Fantasy tagging structures to the Tag Wrangler Committee. They will check with the wranglers in question and see if there's anything they can do to make them more intuitive.
  Best,
  hele
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Arduinna Thu 01 Nov 2012 10:35PM UTC

I've been reading the comments and thinking about this, and am wondering if the way to go might not be a top-level split among actual source *types*, with subcategories that provide more useful breakdowns listed underneath them, rather than the current fandom listings (which I find less and less useful).
The types I'm thinking of are very broad, very general creation styles: drawn, live action, real people, written, audio, games, other. Then within each, a breakdown to a flexible list of more familiar subcategories, which gives the option of increasing the number of subcats under any given top-level broad category rather than trying to force multiple subcats to exist as one thing (like putting manhwa and manhua fandoms in the Anime & Manga category just because they kinda sorta fit better there than anywhere else).
I'm thinking a setup something like this (with the huge caveat that I pulled the subcategories out of thin air, and they will obviously need to be fixed/expanded to things that are more useful to the fans who use them; and also that I hope this table posts properly).

Drawn Source

Live Action Source

Real People Source

  Anime & Manga

  Movies

  Acting

  Manhwa & Manhua

  Television

  Sports

  Cartoons

  Theater

  Politics

  Comics & Webcomics

  Historical

  Paintings

  Music & Bands

Written Source

Audio Source

Game Source

  Novels & Short Stories

  Radio Plays

  Video Games

  Poems

  Songs & Albums

  Board Games

  Plays

Other Source

Multimedia/Mega Fandoms

Uncategorized

  Anthropomorphic

  Multimedia

  ???

  Commercials & Advertisements

  Mega Fandoms

  PROFIT!!

  Original

(... I'm a little iffy on those last two boxes. *kof*)
The boxes won't ever be even, but I think it would make it much easier to find things in general. Fandoms could be wrangled into both the top-level category (say, "Written Source") and their direct category ("Poems"), and both could be browsable, so people could get a page with all written-source fandoms on it, or narrow down to just poem-source fandoms.

Last Edited Thu 01 Nov 2012 10:37PM UTC

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samjohnsson Thu 01 Nov 2012 10:38PM UTC

oooh. User here likes this - this might actually get me browsing. Some fandoms would end up being multiply listed, but still!

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Arduinna Thu 01 Nov 2012 10:46PM UTC

Bouncing off of that, I was thinking that when the archive starts actively hosting other kinds of fanworks, that sort of a setup could be carried over to a Fanworks Category page, so you could have something like:

Written Works

Drawn Works

Video Works

  Fanfic

  Hand-drawn

  AMVs

  Meta (?)

  Digitally Drawn

  Vids



  Wallpapers

  Machinima

  Icons & Avatars



Audio Works

Physical Works

Other Works

  Podfic

  Knitting

  ??

  Filk

  Jewelry



  Fanmixes & Soundtracks

  Baking

(Again, pulled entirely out of thin air, about some fanwork types I know little about; apologies for inaccuracies and missing things, but I just wanted to give the gist.)

Last Edited Thu 01 Nov 2012 10:51PM UTC

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1. hl (hele) Fri 02 Nov 2012 01:01AM UTC
  
  Hi
  Much thanks for the suggestions and the illustratory tables! I've registered your comments; we promise to consider all issues carefully, and post more about our progress and request further input as the process continues.
  Best,
  hele
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2. Arabiana Fri 02 Nov 2012 04:00AM UTC
  
  I am sincerely in love with your organizational methods! My little OCD heart is thrilled! <3 <3 <3
  Official admin-type people, this is what I'm looking for! <3
  
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3. Pslasher Sat 03 Nov 2012 06:10PM UTC
  
  Another vote for your organizing method!
  
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notloggedin (Guest) Fri 02 Nov 2012 04:32AM UTC

I like this idea! Although, I think it could get a bit frustrating if you wanted to browse - for example - all movies and you had to skip between Live Action for live action movies and Drawn Sources to see Disney movies, Pixar etc; same with web series - some would be under live action, some would be under... where-ever computer animation is going and maybe some under video games? Or under RPF for vlogger fic?
I like this set up A LOT, but I'd also like a way to be able see all fandoms that fall under one medium (All Movies, All Webseries) for example, even when the medium spans over more than one Source category.

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navaan Fri 02 Nov 2012 03:38PM UTC

As long as all of this would work with the subcategories you list, this would perfectly work for me!

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ErinPtah Sat 03 Nov 2012 06:28PM UTC

This is really beautiful! I expect there would be a lot to hash out re: what specific subcategories to have and where to put them, but the general layout is just so intuitive. I love it.

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Muffie Thu 01 Nov 2012 11:14PM UTC

1. I barely use the media categories. I am interested in specific pairings in specific fandoms. I will click on the media that most likely holds the fandom I'm in to, find the closest approximation of the fandom and click, find the character in the pairing (if the pairing isn't a visible tag itself) and click, and then find the pairing. From there, off I go. Generally, though, I go through my history (brilliant idea!) and click pairing to bring up the new fic in my preferred thing. I do find some irritating, such as the Avengers thing. The Steve/Tony I prefer is in a multitude of fandom categories, so picking one fandom will limit my access while picking the pairing will up the access. Overall, I tend to ignore fandom except as a jumping off point for pairing. I used the search feature to find a fandom once, but I can't remember why I didn't like it.
2. The "T" section is kind of ridiculously large. "The" is one of those titles that don't count, but no one seems to know how to categorize anymore, so "The Sentinel" is filed under "T" rather than "S" as "Sentinel, The". This tends to obscure actual "T" titles, like "Teen Wolf". To be honest, I have no idea how to fix this problem, or if it's even a problem for those of us who are not anal retentive. Perhaps a T-tg, th, ti-tz indexing button to split the T category up?
3. I think of archives as libraries, so overall categories (TV, movies, books, real people, animation) works well for me. I'm used to thinking of the stacks as sociology, theory, gender studies; or religion, pagan, druids. Subcategories would work for me, but I don't know how general that would be for site use. Animation could have a list of things like anime, cartoons, manga, comics, etc. on the front fandoms page instead of a list of fandoms. TV could have drama, comedy, sci-fic, instead of a list of fandoms. I don't know if this would help because most people know that Bleach is anime and Teen Titans is a cartoon, so the current filing system does work. How to make it easier? No idea. That depends on how people use fandoms lists. Do they use them to find a fandom they already enjoy or do they use them to find new fandoms? I don't use them to find new fandoms. Generally, if I read a fic I like, I click on the author's name and might read a fic she wrote in a new fandom.
Anyway, the easiest way for someone to find a preferred fandom is to type it into a search bar and have it kick back a user friendly page. Perhaps a "front" page for the fandom that includes the fandom name, related fandoms to click on (e.g. Buffy the Vampire Slayer fandom with related fandoms Angel the Series, the various comic books, Jossverse, and so on), popular fandom tags, and a list of the latest stories, or random stories, or random collections (collections rock). That would give me a great deal of info, new places to go, and a fandom "home" page I could bookmark.
However, I don't find the current set-up bad, just unwieldy. Any indexing system with that many categories will be unwieldy, though, so, yeah.

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1. hl (hele) Fri 02 Nov 2012 01:02AM UTC
  
  Hi,
  Many thanks for the explanation of your experience and your suggestions! I've registered your comment; we promise to consider it all carefully, and post more about our progress and request further input as the process continues.
  The 'The' issue is an interim solution to a technical problem posed by the internationality of the Archive -- we would love to resolve it! You can find an explanation of the current rule in the Base Rules section of the Fandom Wrangling Guidelines (scroll down to the 'Fandoms Beginning With Common Stop Words' title), along with a link to the code issue that neccessitated its creation.
  Best,
  hele
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godsdaisiechain (preux) Fri 02 Nov 2012 12:37AM UTC

Wow... that's a really smart, interesting way to organize things for people who are looking for specific types of works.

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Arabiana Fri 02 Nov 2012 03:54AM UTC

Everything that Poi said here http://archiveofourown.org/comments/1629338. SUBCATEGORIES!
OMG what Arduinna said! Especially here http://archiveofourown.org/comments/1645545, which is EXACTLY what I wanted to say, only with a much better illustrative explanation! Podfic! Fanmix! Knitting! Meta! AMVs! All in an easy to reach, easy to sort by date, title, author, hits, (kudos?), etc. list! I am in organizational love with her charts!
I'd like to elaborate on the only part of this that I have had any experience in trying to search through: Podfic.
It is extremely, intensely hard to browse podfic. Since podfic is not currently a category, the only thing unifying it for browsing purposes is the "Podfic" tag. Except not everyone tags with that. And, oh wait, there are Podfic: tags now, and various other tags that complicate things more. So there is actually no way to browse through every single podfic on the archive. Of course, having to do that would be tantamount to browsing through the works button at the top of the site that is currently impossible to use.
Being able to go to a Podfic category and then pick a fandom and browse though it, and sort it by date, title, author, *reader*, hits, kudos, time, etc. would be spectacularly helpful!!! The "pick a fandom" part I mentioned: fandoms should only be listed under the Podfic category *if there is actually a podfic in that fandom*! It seems strange to have to say that I don't want to have to scroll through 10,000 fandoms, when only 1,000 of them actually contain podfic, but I want to make that clear. This would make finding which fandoms actually have podfic a much easier task.
Podfic being a different category might make coding easier to apply strictly to these works. Like having header sections for Reader, Time, Original Fanwork Title, Original Fanwork Author, Original Story Tags, Original Fanwork Summary, Podfic Specific Tags, etc. And if the Original Fanwork is hosted on the AO3, inputting that type of link in Original Fanwork Location could automatically auto-populate Original Fanwork Title, Original Fanwork Author, Original Fanwork Tags, Original Fanwork Summary, etc. And maybe even make it so that those auto-populated sections could change as the Original Fanwork is edited, i.e. better tagging, clearer warnings, etc., maybe as a option choice. I don't know how hard the coding for that would be, and if I had any ability to do so I would have already volunteered and started coding. For all the effort it would take, I, and I believe the podfic community at large, would greatly appreciate it. Since the amount of podfic has swamped Jinjur's archive and made it harder to use, there's no repository for finding podfics all in one place, even though there are still places to host them, and smaller comms spread out across the web.
I won't read anything I haven't seen the source material for, but I'll listen to all kinds of podfic. THIS is how I find new fandoms to interact with, and it's practically impossible to do in an organized manner on the AO3.
That was a pretty convoluted explanation, and I'm sure I've forgotten things I meant to mention. I hope I have both made my ideas clear and not stepped on any toes.
I love this place! I want to be able to get all my fandom fixes from here. I've already stopped getting my fic from anywhere else, I'd like to be able to come here for other fanworks as well. Thank you for all that you do for us!

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1. hl (hele) Fri 02 Nov 2012 06:48PM UTC
  
  Hi,
  Much thanks for your feedback and your kind words! You made yourself very clear; I've registered your comment. We promise to consider all suggestions carefully and to post more about our progress as the process continues.
  In the meantime, I can assure you the whole Archive team is very keen in having better ways to post other fanworks apart from fanfic!
  Best,
  hele
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navaan Fri 02 Nov 2012 03:30PM UTC

Only one comment, really, because the distinctions between the categories, I will personally be fine with however it hashes out. But it would be absolutely lovely if, at least on the main fandoms page, metafandoms didn't show up, to stave off the complete unhelpfulness of having five variations of Marvel as the top five movie fandoms, for example.
I agree so much with this. I also think they should in general be listed in a different list alltogether and not under as fandoms under the media forms. (If I go looking for book based fanfic and come across about many "All media types" tags I'm always confused. Why do I click on books then?)

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1. hl (hele) Fri 02 Nov 2012 06:52PM UTC
  
  Hi,
  Thanks for your suggestion about fandom metatag listings! I've registered it; we promise to take all suggestions carefully and post again about our progress in the future.
  Best,
  hele
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facetofcathy Fri 02 Nov 2012 04:44PM UTC

I am a browser by nature. I can't spell, I hate search boxes and I really, really hate search boxes that don't use fuzzy logic or require me to remember special formats or characters. I would use the Fandoms page exclusively it worked in a useful way. Right now it really doesn't.
I've got a list of tech issues, but for now I'll stick to the more theoretical.
The philosophy of categorization:
Metaphors are useful tools, but they're also dangerous. Put your flamingo in the lagoon, not the lagoon in the flamingo, as said elsewhere, is one very useful way to look at it. But what if you've got salmon and otters and platypuses too? And then before you get bogged down in deciding if it's fish or flesh or if you need a lagoon and a meadow, you find things that will not be defined. (Is Daily Show fic RPF or FPF?)
The other popular metaphor for categories is physicality. This comes up in the epic Fanlore discussions on this topic too, and what I'm going to say here will seem very familiar to veterans of those conversations. It's easy to imagine a library full of fanworks on shelves labelled with fandoms and in rooms labelled with categories, but this leads to the category as single defining characteristic and gets you into is Anime a media type or a regional origin discussions that will never end because everyone is right and no one is wrong.
But the physicality is an illusion.
Looking at what Arduinna is getting at, I think that's an excellent user-focused start, but it still uses a mostly flat structure. It's a flowchart with a few cross-connections.
Then I think on what Kurushi said, "Recognising country of source origin is important because that gives a cultural context to browsing. It's not a category."--I'm thinking that what I want to browse by is not categories and subcategories at all but a variety of contexts that fandoms might share. And I think those contexts might arise from the canon or the fandom or within the work itself.
I want to see all the live-action TV or maybe the animation or maybe something from Korea or maybe I want music fandoms or RPF, and I bet many fans can tell me things that fit more than one of those contexts. Because I want to browse lists, not see a taxonomy of fandoms so I know what the canon source is defined as officially.
So could the fandoms have these various and multiple contexts assigned to them? Attributes I'll call them.
So Bron|Broen (The Bridge) is Source: Danish and Source: Swedish and Source: English (Subtitles) and TV and Live Action TV and a really good show that needs fic. If those Attributes are applied to the fandom tag when it's wrangled (and this needs some limits or it gets out of control and actively acts against browsing utility), so that when I look a the Fandoms page, I'm shown fandoms pulled by one base criterion which I can then filter by Attributes...hey, that seems so familiar, where have I seen that before?
Then if the results were sortable by a bunch of other Attributes, like Name, New Works added, Number of Works, well that seems familiar too.
Now let's make that filtering layerable with a breadcrumb trail on the page so I can filter my Live Action TV by Source: Danish and then I can find Forbydelsen more easily even though I can't remember how to spell it, and we're really getting somewhere.
And, it may be necessary to make some very broad Attributes more easily findable on a filter--I don't want to wade through a long list to find the TV Attribute for example. But that's refinement, not concept.
The archive is all browsing. That's really the function of almost every page on the site, even works pages themselves have browsing tools to other works. Sticking to one concept of browsing throughout will make it possible for users to figure it out without FAQs or help text, because you should always assume they won't ever get read.
So far the Works, Collections and User pages have similar functionality, and Tags as well, even if the page design obscures that--I can't remember what Bookmarks looks like and it won't load so..., but Fandoms is a whole other animal right now and I think that contributes to its lack of utility.

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1. hl (hele) Fri 02 Nov 2012 07:02PM UTC
  
  Hi,
  Many thanks for the thoughtful comment!
  Fandoms could indeed have attributes -- we're open to thinking about things in new ways, and it's even in our purview to reconsider the idea of categories for browsing altogether.
  I've registered your observations and suggestions! We promise to take it all into account carefully and post more about our progress as the process continues.
  Best,
  hele
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2. Pslasher Sat 03 Nov 2012 06:05PM UTC
  
  I agree with your description of Attributes and how to organize with them.
  
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Drawn Source	Live Action Source	Real People Source
Anime & Manga	Movies	Acting
Manhwa & Manhua	Television	Sports
Cartoons	Theater	Politics
Comics & Webcomics		Historical
Paintings		Music & Bands

Written Source	Audio Source	Game Source
Novels & Short Stories	Radio Plays	Video Games
Poems	Songs & Albums	Board Games
Plays
Other Source	Multimedia/Mega Fandoms	Uncategorized
Anthropomorphic	Multimedia	???
Commercials & Advertisements	Mega Fandoms	PROFIT!!
Original

Written Works	Drawn Works	Video Works
Fanfic	Hand-drawn	AMVs
Meta (?)	Digitally Drawn	Vids
	Wallpapers	Machinima
	Icons & Avatars
Audio Works	Physical Works	Other Works
Podfic	Knitting	??
Filk	Jewelry
Fanmixes & Soundtracks	Baking

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