Submit a Support Request for AO3 to Change Fandoms to Original Language Title

[dark_administrator]

dhobikikutti made a post last year about AO3 tags no longer limited to Roman scripts. The guideline for wrangling Transliterated/Non-Latin Alphabet Fandom Titles has been implemented for more than a year and it's not clear, but AO3 will not change existing fandoms to include the original language title unless there is a support ticket requesting the change.

dark_agenda has always promoted being accessible to users who occupy different spectrum of linguistic fluency and knowledge. We believe archive tagging systems for fandoms should prioritize users for whom an original source language is part of their heritage culture(s) and who occupy different positions on the spectrum of fluency.

AO3 has more than a year to test their new guideline for non-Latin language fandoms and as chromatic fans and users of AO3, we think it's critical for AO3 to continue to understand the importance of being diverse, accessible and open to international, indigenous and disporian fans who have different degrees of English fluency and of fluency in their fandom language source(s). We believe it is important that fandom tags should at least include the original language title.

If you would like an existing fandom tag on AO3 to include the original language title, please consider submitting a Support request:

1. Go to http://archiveofourown.org/support
   
2. Fill out a Support request:
   
   

   What is your feedback about: [Select Tags under the drop-down menu]
   Brief summary (required): Add [ORIGINAL LANGUAGE TITLE] in [FANDOM TAG]
   Your comment (required):
   Hi Support,
   
   As an AO3 user, I support the inclusion of original source language in tags. Could you change [FANDOM TAG] to add [ORIGINAL LANGUAGE TITLE]? Thank you for your help!
   
   [- signed fan of tags in original source language]

Additionally, if you noticed tags in Chinese-language source fandoms that used a circumflex accent (ˆ) in place of a macron accent (¯) for transliterated tags, please consider submitting a Support request for AO3 to change the accent mark.

An example of a Support request:

What is your feedback about Tags
Brief summary (required) Add 赤壁 in Chìbì | Red Cliff (2008) fandom tag and correct macron accent (¯)
Your comment (required) Hi Support,

As an AO3 user, I support the inclusion of original source language in tags. Could you change Chìbì | Red Cliff (2008) to add 赤壁? http://archiveofourown.org/tags/Chì%20bì%20%7C%20Red%20Cliff%20(2008)

In addition, for tags like Cáo Câo, could you correct the circumflex accent (ˆ) to macron accent (¯), e.g. Cáo Cāo?

Thank you for your help,
-A fan of tags in original source language

AO3 Support currently can answer queries in the following languages: العربية, Bahasa Indonesia, català, čeština, Deutsch, español, français, 한국어, italiano, Kiswahili, magyar, Nederlands, polski, português, Русский, suomi, svenska, Türkçe, 中文. It would be cool if you have knowledge in any of the above languages to submit a request in that language. It will take awhile for AO3 to make the change due to server load issues, but, hopefully, the Support request will be addressed.

Addendum I: Per samjohnsson's comments, we are encouraged to contact AO3 Wrangling team directly at ao3_wranglers about our requests so if you have Twitter, that is one contact avenue.

We also started a thread to list and keep track of fandoms for which we'll be submitting requests so feel free to add yours. Please consolidate your requests if possible when submitting to AO3.

Addendum II: The following proposal was submitted to AO3: Add Original Language Titles in Existing Fandoms.

This entry is posted at Dreamwidth, LiveJournal and Tumblr, and you may comment at any platform.

Comments

[samjohnsson]

Hi again:

I spoke with the Tags chairs about this, and we wanted to pass on some comments, so you're aware as to the situation: the code to support piped canonicals is working fairly well; major wrangling changes, on the other hand, are having issues. There are two main concerns right now, both caused by the massive increase in site usage:

• The servers' capacity: wrangling can place a lot of strain on the server, as changing a canonical forces a re-index for every work on that tag. Workers (pieces of code that run the tasks) that are tied up in a wrangling process are unavailable to serve users their search results or selected works or downloads.
  We do have a list of tag changes that need to be done for fandoms, characters, and relationships*, but we're only able to adjust about one tag a day on weekdays and none on weekends. Additionally, a tag that has over 35,000 combined uses on works and bookmarks goes on a list for when we get new higher capacity servers.


• The tag drop: we recently found an issue where, depending on server traffic when we "submit" changes, an old canonical fandom will link to a new form, but none of the characters and relationships and freeforms transfer to the new tag. However, they detach from the old tag, so all of these characters and relationships end up free-floating and have to be tracked back down. There is a work-around, but depending on the number of tags in the fandom, it can take anywhere from 15 minutes to 3 hours per fandom to move everything.

We will happily note down the fandom tags that need to be changed, but we want y'all to be aware that the fandoms will have to be added to the list, and will unfortunately not be changed immediately.

Best,
Sam J.
AO3 Support Chair

* Regarding freeforms: I should note that for capacity reasons, we've a moratorium on wrangling freeforms that don't fit in a specific fandom. If we completely lost the plot and connected two freeforms that shouldn't be connected, let us know; otherwise, freeform changes are going to go on a very much longer list.

[wistfuljane]

Hi Sam,

Thank you for the updates. I understand about the server loads and the bugs that AO3 is experiencing. I understand that it will take a long time for many of these change requests to be implemented, but personally speaking, I do want to clarify several things that were driving this post. Our goals are to:

• Encourage AO3 to establish a goal to add original language titles to existing non-Latin language source fandoms
  
• Show AO3 that we as chromatic fans support the inclusion of original source language in tags and of AO3 actively and continuously addressing the past, present and future concerns of chromatic fans on AO3 being diverse, accessible and open to us and other chromatic fans

It's not a matter of how long it will take to implement the changes, although that is obviously a major concern, but rather that we hope that AO3 has set and strive to achieve a goal for adding original language titles to existing non-Latin language and for them to be communicative about this goal within and outside the organization. We hope, as a whole, AO3 has set goals for each quarter and each year to accomplish projects that make AO3 more diverse, accessible and open to chromatic fans and that they again have been communicative about these goals within and outside the organization.

But it speaks volume about the goals of AO3 that this post has to be made and, thus, why this post was made in the first place.

I'm sure you understand the situation as well as the goals of this post and our community, but I just want to clarify them in cases there are any confusion.

I appreciate you for directly reaching out to us and thank you for your help. I sympathize with the works you encountered as an AO3 Support Chair.

[dhobikikutti]

This is an excellent comment and I hope you feel good about it.