Chanced upon a ASOIAF fic the other day - https://archiveofourown.org/works/4424084 (To go Forward) and it was pretty good but had pretty shit tags (pretty much none) and a horrible title and description. Similar encounter with A Half Blood Romantic (which is a really good HP fic), pretty shit title and description, but great story. Made me a bit depressed on how many great, amazing fics that I haven't read because they're not tagged properly and I can't find them (stupid ffnet doesn't even have a tagging system plus their search engine sucks), they look bad on first glance or they're posted on some random tumblr blog, never to see the light of day. I suppose only two ways to combat that - read every fic with even the most mediocre of title/descriptions (but this would take wayyyy too much time, which I don't have) and rely on forums like DLP and others. Still, there are probably tons of fics out there that will never be read because of the reasons mentioned. Thoughts?

 

The issue with AO3's tags is much like the issue of FFN's summaries - they're only as useful as the author chooses to make them.

If they don't care enough to actually advertise their fic - whether by giving it a summary like "I can't write summaries just read the fic please", or tags like #KindOfAUButNotReally, #ThisIsMyFirstFic or #IKnowItsRubbishPlsBeKind - why would I care enough to read their fic? You have to at the very least tell people what the fic is about, otherwise they simply won't open it.

 

Yeah, I get similarly depressed whenever I stumble on a hidden gem with low faves/kudos, ha. I also have this very niche pet peeve about how it's impossible to find compelling OCs whose stories expand canon, because it's impossible to filter out SIs.

 

Isn't it usually the other way round (too many tags)? Tags and summary (for this one) seem fine to me, maybe generic in wording. I suppose everyone has their own preferences for spoilers.

 

Aye, the infamous wall of tags, that tags anything and everything possible even if they are obliquely mentioned once. Dear God those are annoying to filter out. Also, please, don't tag your drarry fic as Harry/Ginny if that only exists for the first chapter.

 

Pardon?

You just include the OC tag and exclude the SI tag. It's not perfect but does get the bulk of them.

 

I basically think of any "sister of Harry Potter" or "daughter of Remus Lupin" as a SI, and that's the bulk of what that include-exclude algorithm will turn up. I know that's unfair and, yes, technically inaccurate. I'm sure some of these stories are good. Still, it really feels like the vast majority of these authors are inserting themselves into a replica of JKR's existing story.

Where's the Daily Prophet reporter who's 10x better than Rita but who can't find the right scoop, until... ? Where's the Flourish and Blotts owner who started holding secret rebellion meetings in the basement of his bookshop when the Ministry refused to acknowledge Voldemort's return? Where's the beast hunter who procures all the wand core materials for Mr. Ollivander?

So, yeah. Like I said. Very niche pet peeve.

 

In my experience, this is, like, 99.999% true. To the point where I almost refuse on general principles to read anything with a OC-as-major-character tag (especially a MajorCharacter/OC pairing tag). I think I've seen maybe one "sister of HP" OC that wasn't a thinly veiled SI wankfest, and that was in an otherwise poorly written fic anyway.

 

For the 'Flourish and Blotts owner rebels' plotline you've mentioned, I've always liked Florean Fortescue (the ice cream shop owner) in such a role. Is there a fic with him in a major role, incidentally?