On February 21, the moderators reportedly suspended it for a month on a technicality - but this hasn’t fixed the problem, and its author has vowed to return with a vengeance. Over the past few months, this fic has enraged users, become a target of ridicule and harassment, and been the subject of so many abuse reports filed by members of the AO3 community that moderators reportedly stopped accepting complaints about it. But lately, the site’s approach to moderation, curation, and what even counts as fanfiction have all been thrown into upheaval and caused widespread consternation - all thanks to a single fic. Until now, that permissive approach has worked well for most AO3 users. Longstanding calls for AO3 to more closely moderate fics with toxic elements, for example, have generally been met with a polite but firm “no” from AO3 according to that mantra - a variant of the classic free-speech idea that permissiveness and openness, not restriction and censure, will bring the most benefit to the community. Because the history of fandom includes a long lineage of fanfic authors fighting for the right to write and publish fanfiction without facing deletion and/or legal threats, AO3’s rules are incredibly permissive: “Our goal is maximum inclusiveness,” explains the platform’s Terms of Service. It’s run by a fandom nonprofit, coded and moderated by volunteers, and reliant on its huge community of users to help it carry out its mission of preserving and protecting fans’ work.

The Archive of Our Own - the beloved, Hugo-winning fanfiction platform shorthanded affectionately as AO3 - was famously created by fans, for fans.

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