Happy Birthday Kalim! :)

Happy birthday Kalim! :)

credit goes to Kiiro_iroiro on twitter btw!

ppl who celebrate fictional character birthdays are annoying pass it on

It’s all “The Draconia bloodline is saved!!” until the prefect doesn’t want kids

I got this comment on a story from my Other AO3 Account this morning.

(Info redacted because I prefer keeping these accounts separate but no one follows me on the side blog I have for that account.)

The story was posted almost a year ago and is relatively “popular” by my average statistics even though it has tropes and themes that are big turnoffs for a lot of people (hence separate accounts). This popularity is undoubtedly because it’s a Marvel Loki story and that fandom is massive.

So there is obviously an algorithm or a bot scrubbing ao3 statistics and leaving this comment on fics that meet a certain metric with the main character of the fic inserted into the comment.

I had a little time to kill this morning so I decided to investigate further. And y’all this is so predatory. Come on this journey with me. It made me mad. It may make you mad.

First, if you go to Webnovel’s website, you HAVE to choose between male lead or female lead stories before you can go any further. WTF?

And that’s weird, but this gets so much worse. This is basically a pay-to-read site that has different subscription models. Which… okay BUT! The authors don’t get paid! Look at that comment again. They’re promising a supportive and nurturing community, but zero monetary compensation. It’s basically, “post your stuff here so we can get paid and you can get… nice vibes?” I mean look at this Orwellian writing:

Using the phrase “pay-to-read model” in the same sentence as “qualitative changes in lifestyles for authors” deliberately makes you think that you can get paid and maybe even make a living on this website. But that’s not actually what it says and authors will not receive one red cent.

Oh but wait, the worst is still to come. In case this breaks containment (which I kind of hope it does) this is where I mention that I’m a lawyer in the US.

I don’t do intellectual property or copyright law but I do read and write contracts for a living. So I went to look at their terms of service. It was fun!

Highlights the first, in which Webnovel gets a license to do basically whatever they want with content you post on their site. This is how they get to be paid for people reading authors’ writing without paying them anything.

Highlights the second, in which Webnovel takes no responsibility for illegally profiting off of fan fic. This all says that the writer is 100% responsible for everything the writer posts (even though only Webnovel is making money from it).

Highlights the third which say that by posting, the author is representing that they have the legal right to use and to let Webnovel use the content according to these terms. So if a writer posts fan fiction and Webnovel makes money from people reading the fan fiction, and the House of the Mouse catches wise, these sections say that that’s ALL on the writer.

So that’s a little skeevy to start off with but the thing that is seriously shitty and made me make this post was that these assholes are coming to ao3. They are actively recruiting people in comments on their fan fiction. And they are saying they are big fans of the character you’re writing about and that they share your interests.

They are recruiting fan fiction writers and giving every impression that you can make money from posting fan fiction on their site and hiding the fact that you absolutely cannot but they can make money off of you while you try, deep in their terms of service which no one but a lawyer who writes fan fic and has some time to kill will read.

I see posts on here regularly from people who don’t understand how this stuff works, don’t understand that they (and others) can not legally make a financial profit from fan fiction. And there are tons of people who will not take the time to dig into the details.

Don’t deal with these bastards. Fuck Webnovel.

Here’s a little wip for a Pride 2023 project I’m working on! These five are my OCs, some of you might recognise Rabbit from my previous posts, and a friend and I are collaborating on a little comic using them!

Red head is Flossy, she likes plants, I used a random picker and it chose lesbian and the flag was a nightmare to do. She’s a little timid, but once she stood on a table during an argument to get higher ground so yea.

Pink hair needs a name, but he likes to dye his hair different colours every three weeks or so, and he can make jello frogs! He gay. Sooo gay.

Occasionally, after a break up, Rabbit will open his apartment door and just a bunch of jelly frogs will flood out into the corridor, and she’ll be like, ‘Oh shit it must be really bad this time’. Fun fact he has a pond because his frogs kept flooding the building.

Middle is Kia, she’s kinda mysterious (or she tries to be), kinda like Vanitas, but less.. dramatic, and she absolutely hates carrots. Like, she just refuses to eat them. She’s also pan, and during pride month, she dyes the ends of her hair in the pansexual colours.

The Enby is Jester, he also needs a proper name like Froggo man and Rabbit, goes by he/they, and he has a five year old child who regularly tries to eat the jello frogs, but they follow the lil toddler around a lot.

Last is Rabbit, I’ve made like, 2 posts about her here I think, and my friend literally squinted at her for about two minutes, and then said, ‘She’s ace,’ so she’s ace now.

To anyone who actually read my oc info dump, thank you for reading my rambling. As you can see, I’m having wayy too much fun with the lighting, I recenting started messing around with the blending modes on ibis paint.

AYO I MISSED THIS :’D AS AN ARO I FEEL SAD THAT I WAS NOT INFORMED but still WOOOOOOOoooooooooOOOOOOOooooo-

HAPPY FIRST EVER INTERNATIONAL AROMANTIC VISIBILITY DAY

My friend and I made this :)

mild twst chapter 7 spoilers

I made a helpful chart