Archive of Our Own ^beta

Do you have strong non-fiction or technical writing skills or experience working in Public Relations? Or are you a highly organized person? Or are you fluent in a language other than English? Or do you love meta and research on fans? Or do you have experience moderating social media and Tumblr? The Organization for Transformative Works is recruiting!

We're excited to announce the opening of applications for:

• Communications Fanhackers Volunteer - closing 25 January 2023 at 23:59 UTC
• Communications Tumblr Site Moderator - closing 25 January 2023 at 23:59 UTC
• Elections Communication Specialists - closing 25 January 2023 at 23:59 UTC
• Elections Public Relations Specialists - closing 25 January 2023 at 23:59 UTC
• Elections Team Coordinators - closing 25 January 2023 at 23:59 UTC
• Translation Volunteer - closing 25 January 2023 at 23:59 UTC

We have included more information on each role below. Open roles and applications will always be available at the volunteering page. If you don't see a role that fits with your skills and interests now, keep an eye on the listings. We plan to put up new applications every few weeks, and we will also publicize new roles as they become available.

All applications generate a confirmation page and an auto-reply to your e-mail address. We encourage you to read the confirmation page and to whitelist our email address in your e-mail client. If you do not receive the auto-reply within 24 hours, please check your spam filters and then contact us.

If you have questions regarding volunteering for the OTW, check out our Volunteering FAQ.

Communications Fanhackers Volunteer

Do you love meta and research on fans? Are you familiar with Transformative Works and Cultures and other fan studies research? Are you interested in volunteering for the OTW? Great! Fanhackers is a project and blog that aims to make fan studies research accessible to fans. The Fanhackers team is currently looking for someone who can spare a few hours a week to help us collate, curate, compile, and manage academic work on fans and fannish meta. We would love someone with a good knowledge of fan studies (both historical and current) who is interested in communicating complex research to a more general audience.

Communications volunteers are responsible for the distribution of information internally to OTW personnel and externally to the general public, the media, fans, and other fannish organizations. Communications is also typically the first point of contact for someone interested in or wanting help from OTW.

Applications are due 25 January 2023

Communications Volunteer: Tumblr Site Moderator

Are you familiar with the conventions of Tumblr posting and have experience moderating a social media page? The Communications Committee is recruiting a Tumblr Site Moderator to manage the Organization for Transformative Works' presence on Tumblr, the social networking site.

The moderator will be part of a small team of social media moderators working across the OTW's social media outlets. They will be expected to maintain an active presence on Tumblr, reblogging a range of posts of relevance and interest to the OTW's userbase. They will also handle incoming user queries and manage responses to the OTW's original news content.

This position is part of the Communications Committee. Communications is the main information distribution team for the OTW. We distribute information both internally to OTW personnel and externally to the general public, media, and fans. We also serve as the general first point of contact for those contacting the OTW.

For this position, we would like to find someone who is familiar with the conventions of Tumblr posting and has experience moderating a social media page. We would also be interested in hearing from those with customer service experience, especially in an online environment. We will expect you to have an interest in fandom at large and an understanding of the concerns and activities of the OTW (although we will of course provide you with training once you start). You should enjoy working in a team and you will need to have roughly 4-5 hours of time available across the week to dedicate to your OTW responsibilities.

If you're a frequent Tumblr user who enjoys helping others, has wide-ranging interests across the fandom space, and is curious and willing to learn, we'd love to hear from you!

Applications are due 25 January 2023

Elections Committee Communications Specialist

Do you have strong non-fiction or technical writing skills? Are you interested in writing and editing public newsposts? Then come join the Elections team! The Elections Committee is responsible for running OTW Board elections; we ensure the fairness, timeliness, and confidentiality of the process.

We are currently looking for Communications Specialists to act as the lead writers and editors of the committee. They are responsible for the quality of public news posts and large announcements, as well as editing internal documentation.

Applications are due 25 January 2023

Elections Committee Public Relations Specialist

Do you have experience working in Public Relations? Do you want to help the OTW by improving awareness and understanding of the annual Board election process? Then come join the Elections team!

The Elections Committee is responsible for running OTW Board elections; we ensure the fairness, timeliness, and confidentiality of the process.

We are currently looking for Public Relations Specialists to help us promote the annual election and improve understanding of the Elections Committee's work.

Applications are due 25 January 2023

Elections Committee Team Coordinator

Are you a highly organized person? Do you like working in a team environment, making sure that essential tasks are done? Then come join the Elections team!

The Elections Committee is responsible for running OTW Board elections; we ensure the fairness, timeliness, and confidentiality of the process. We are currently looking for Team Coordinators to maintain our internal documentation and keep the team organized. Applicants must have strong organizational and administrative skills.

Applications are due 25 January 2023

Translation Volunteer

If you enjoy working collaboratively, if you're fluent in a language other than English, if you’re passionate about the OTW and its projects, and want to help us reach more fans all around the world, working with Translation might be for you!

Translation volunteers help make the OTW and its projects accessible to a wider global audience. We work on translating content by the OTW and its projects from English to other languages, such as site pages, news posts, AO3 FAQs and AO3 Support emails. (However, we do not translate fanworks.)

We really need volunteers who speak Afrikaans, Bengali, Bulgarian, Estonian, Filipino, Hebrew, Hindi, Korean, Kyrgyz, Lithuanian, Macedonian, Marathi, Persian, Romanian, Sinhala, Slovenian, Thai, Turkish and Welsh—but help with other languages would be much appreciated. If you're interested in starting a team for a language we don't have yet, you're very welcome to!

(Please note that our Arabic, Catalan, Chinese, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Malay, Norwegian, Polish, Brazilian Portuguese, European Portuguese, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Spanish, Swedish, Ukrainian and Vietnamese teams are not accepting new members at this time.)

Applicants may be asked to translate and correct short text samples and will be invited to a chatroom interview as part of the selection process. More information about us can be found on the Translation committee page.

Applications are due 25 January 2023

Apply at the volunteering page!

Save the date: it’s almost International Fanworks Day!

Celebrated on February 15th, International Fanworks Day (IFD) was created by the OTW in 2014 in honor of the one millionth fanwork published on AO3. It’s a recognition of fanworks in all their forms—fics, art, vids, zines, and more—and of their awesomeness and importance for fans across the world.

This year, the OTW will be observing the ninth annual IFD. Our theme for the year is When Fandoms Collide. Have you ever wondered what would happen if Sam and Dean Winchester butted heads with L from Death Note on a criminal investigation? Or if Katsuki Yuuri and Victor Nikiforov were in an Our Flag Means Death-style pirate AU? This is your opportunity to write, draw, or filk your wildest fandom crossover ideas!

You can participate however you want, but here are a few suggestions:

• Create rec lists of your favorite crossovers to share as part of our Feedback Fest, starting February 12
• Post your own crossover fics, fanart, and more on AO3 using our International Fanworks Day 2023 tag
• Share crossover headcanons on social media using the tag #IFD2023 or #IFDChallenge2023

Follow OTW News on social media to find out in a few weeks what we’re doing to celebrate IFD 2023. If you or your fandom communities will be hosting your own activities, let us know so we can signal boost them!

The Organization for Transformative Works is the non-profit parent organization of multiple projects including Archive of Our Own, Fanlore, Open Doors, Transformative Works and Cultures, and OTW Legal Advocacy. We are a fan run, entirely donor-supported organization staffed by volunteers. Find out more about us on our website.

As we continue to work on better balancing the responsibilities of our Support and Policy & Abuse committees, we are shifting two further types of issues from Policy & Abuse to Support's mandate:

Fannish Next-of-Kin

This is an option we offer that allows a designated person to manage your account if you die or become incapacitated. To learn more about the Fannish Next-of-Kin program, you can read our TOS FAQ on the subject. Please note that if you have a currently-in-process Fannish Next-of-Kin request, our Policy & Abuse team will complete the ones that they have already received.

Going forward, if you wish to set up a Fannish Next-of-Kin, or need to change or activate one currently in place, please contact Support.

Duplicate works

Sometimes, due to a glitch or error, a work may be posted multiple times. This can be reported to our Support team, who will investigate and take down exact duplicates. Please note that works that contain different content (such as a work that is an edited or rewritten version of another work) will not be considered exact duplicates.

If you wish to report works that are exact duplicates of one another, please include links to both or all of the works in question in your report to our Support team. We hope these changes will be helpful by allowing our Policy and Abuse team members to devote more of their time and energy to other issues!