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How To Make Your Own Fanfiction Archive, In Just 10 Easy Steps
As the go-to "person who knows about AO3" for quite a few people who read fanfic but aren't really linked-in to wider fandom culture, I've fielded a lot of questions about how to do certain things on AO3 to which my best answer is "you should really start your own archive!" I think, in general, more fans starting their own small archives would be a net good for fandom. AO3 was never meant to be the only archive for all fandom, or even the main archive, and the more spread out and backed up we are the more resilient we are.
But of course I have to be reminded that a lot of fans these days don't really have any idea how little "you should start your own archive!" really involves. (Also, that I should practice what I preach.) So I am now making my own fanfiction archive, and writing up this post as I do it to tell people how to make theirs!
Congratulations! You now have your very own personal private fanfiction archive that you are 100% in charge of and make all the rules for. It's at least as good as half the ones I was reading on when I started reading fanfiction and will serve its function well as a way to let people read your fic. You can link to it from anywhere you want! (Including your AO3 profile.)
But how do I get feedback?
If you use the AO3 downloads, they will include a link to your AO3 comments for the fic. You might also want to include your email or a social media address where people can talk to you somewhere on that page. The tutorials on neocities can show you how! If you want to be very fancy they can even show you how to include a comment form that lets people email you automatically.
How can people find my fic?
You'll have to tell them it's there. Maybe other people will tell them it's there, too! Actually there are lots of ways to make a website easier to find but they're outside the scope of this tutorial (and not necessary if your goal is just to make your fanfic available.)
What if I want to archive other people's fanfic?
You should probably ask them first, it's polite and less likely to get people mad at you. An email along the lines of "Your fic is one of my favorites, and with your permission I'd like to add it to my archive of favorites [link]. I'll make sure you have credit and you can email me if you ever want it taken down." was pretty standard.
But it's your archive, you set the rules. If you have more than one author, make sure you're very clear about which fic is by which author (you can use the <h1> tags to put author names in big letters where their list of fic starts.)
What if I want other people to be able to post their fic on my archive?
A website that lets other people post things by themself suddenly gets way, way more complicated and more likely to go terribly wrong. Don't do this unless you already have a core group of several people who get along and are willing to work together on it, at least one of whom understands moderation and at least one of whom understands databases and at least one of whom understands project management, and are not all the same person. Also, don't try to do it on Neocities - look at Squidge. (But if you see a need for this, ask around! You might be surprised at the skills that are there already.)
If you'd like to be an open archive that collects fics for a certain fandom/pairing/theme/circle of friends/Discord server, etc. you can post some text on the index.html page letting people know that they can contact you if they'd like you to archive their fic, and then they can email you their html files to post.
It's ugly! How do I make it look pretty?
Learn HTML and CSS. The Neocities tutorials are still pretty good! There's lots of other online resources once you exhaust those. But, I mean, nobody is reading your fic just because you have a nice animated gif in the background, I promise.
What if I want to add something else, like warnings or more information about the fandom or fanfic?
Learn HTML and CSS. You can add all kinds of things to the index page, or even have several different indexes! The Neocities tutorials are still pretty good. There's lots of other online resources once you exhaust those.
What about accessibility and stuff?
A bare-bones text-and-links only HTML site like this is probably about as accessible as you can get! No accessibility software should have a problem and it should be highly flexible for all kinds of devices or customization that people need.
I do all my web stuff on mobile, can I still do this?
In theory you should be able to do all ten steps in any mobile browser, and the resulting website should display just fine on one (the monitors html was designed for were often smaller than your phone screen in pixels.) Also, you probably have a local library, educational institution, or business that offers computer access. This should only take an hour or so to set up with a few dozen fics, so that would be fine.
Some of my fic is explicit or contains controversial or copyrighted content, is that ok?
Neocities has a pretty liberal TOS about explicit content and fair use, and I haven't heard anything about them taking content down frivolously, so you're probably ok. Other than Neocities' TOS, it's your site - you can post whatever you want! Yes, even commercial promotion. (But the only way to be sure is to own the servers. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯)
Anyway, here's my beautiful new fanfiction archive made using this tutorial:
(I am honestly way more disproportionately proud of finally making that than I expected to be. It's nice to have your own archive.)
If you make one, share it in the comments here ! I want to see!
(tumblr version here, except with worse HTML info, because tumblr hates < apparently)
But of course I have to be reminded that a lot of fans these days don't really have any idea how little "you should start your own archive!" really involves. (Also, that I should practice what I preach.) So I am now making my own fanfiction archive, and writing up this post as I do it to tell people how to make theirs!
- Go to https://neocities.org/ and sign up for an account. It only needs a username (which will also be your website address), password, and email. Pick a username that will be related to your archive's title!
- Choose the free account option (if you ever need more than what the free account offers for a text-only archive, you should probably look into graduating from neocities.) This should take you to a menu of "how to make a website" tutorials. You should do them! They're useful skills. But let's get your archive running first.
- Hit the big red Edit Site button, or open the menu under your username and select "Edit Site".
- Select the "Index.html" file to edit. You're now in an HTML Editor. Congrats, you're a web developer c. 1999!
- Find where it has text between the <title> </title> tags. Delete the filler text, and put in the title of your new archive. This text will be what shows on the tab when people go to your archive.
- Find where it has text between the <h1> </h1> tags. This will be big header text at the top of your page. Put the title of your archive here again. If you have no experience with HTML, you should read over the other sample text. It covers the basic basics very well! Once you've done that, you can delete everything else between the </h1> tag and the </body> tag. Save your index.html file.
- Get an HTML file for a fanfic you would like to add to your archive. If it's on AO3, you can use the html download option built into AO3. If you have it as a word processor/google docs file, you should have the option to save as an html file. Save that html file to your computer.
- Go back to Edit Site on Neocities and go to "upload". Find the html file you saved and upload it. (You can also drag and drop files to upload.)
- The file you uploaded should now be showing with your other neocities files. Right-click on the title and select "copy link".
- Go in to edit index.html again. Under where you put your header text, type <br><a href=" and then paste the link you copied. Then type "> . Then put in the title of the fic. Then type </a> . Then save index.html again. It should look like
<br><a href="http://username.neocities.org/title of page.hml">fic title</a>
when you're done. Save the page again. You can do this for every fanfic you have.
Congratulations! You now have your very own personal private fanfiction archive that you are 100% in charge of and make all the rules for. It's at least as good as half the ones I was reading on when I started reading fanfiction and will serve its function well as a way to let people read your fic. You can link to it from anywhere you want! (Including your AO3 profile.)
FAQ
But how do I get feedback?
If you use the AO3 downloads, they will include a link to your AO3 comments for the fic. You might also want to include your email or a social media address where people can talk to you somewhere on that page. The tutorials on neocities can show you how! If you want to be very fancy they can even show you how to include a comment form that lets people email you automatically.
How can people find my fic?
You'll have to tell them it's there. Maybe other people will tell them it's there, too! Actually there are lots of ways to make a website easier to find but they're outside the scope of this tutorial (and not necessary if your goal is just to make your fanfic available.)
What if I want to archive other people's fanfic?
You should probably ask them first, it's polite and less likely to get people mad at you. An email along the lines of "Your fic is one of my favorites, and with your permission I'd like to add it to my archive of favorites [link]. I'll make sure you have credit and you can email me if you ever want it taken down." was pretty standard.
But it's your archive, you set the rules. If you have more than one author, make sure you're very clear about which fic is by which author (you can use the <h1> tags to put author names in big letters where their list of fic starts.)
What if I want other people to be able to post their fic on my archive?
A website that lets other people post things by themself suddenly gets way, way more complicated and more likely to go terribly wrong. Don't do this unless you already have a core group of several people who get along and are willing to work together on it, at least one of whom understands moderation and at least one of whom understands databases and at least one of whom understands project management, and are not all the same person. Also, don't try to do it on Neocities - look at Squidge. (But if you see a need for this, ask around! You might be surprised at the skills that are there already.)
If you'd like to be an open archive that collects fics for a certain fandom/pairing/theme/circle of friends/Discord server, etc. you can post some text on the index.html page letting people know that they can contact you if they'd like you to archive their fic, and then they can email you their html files to post.
It's ugly! How do I make it look pretty?
Learn HTML and CSS. The Neocities tutorials are still pretty good! There's lots of other online resources once you exhaust those. But, I mean, nobody is reading your fic just because you have a nice animated gif in the background, I promise.
What if I want to add something else, like warnings or more information about the fandom or fanfic?
Learn HTML and CSS. You can add all kinds of things to the index page, or even have several different indexes! The Neocities tutorials are still pretty good. There's lots of other online resources once you exhaust those.
What about accessibility and stuff?
A bare-bones text-and-links only HTML site like this is probably about as accessible as you can get! No accessibility software should have a problem and it should be highly flexible for all kinds of devices or customization that people need.
I do all my web stuff on mobile, can I still do this?
In theory you should be able to do all ten steps in any mobile browser, and the resulting website should display just fine on one (the monitors html was designed for were often smaller than your phone screen in pixels.) Also, you probably have a local library, educational institution, or business that offers computer access. This should only take an hour or so to set up with a few dozen fics, so that would be fine.
Some of my fic is explicit or contains controversial or copyrighted content, is that ok?
Neocities has a pretty liberal TOS about explicit content and fair use, and I haven't heard anything about them taking content down frivolously, so you're probably ok. Other than Neocities' TOS, it's your site - you can post whatever you want! Yes, even commercial promotion. (But the only way to be sure is to own the servers. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯)
Anyway, here's my beautiful new fanfiction archive made using this tutorial:
Melannen's Fanfiction Archive
(I am honestly way more disproportionately proud of finally making that than I expected to be. It's nice to have your own archive.)
If you make one, share it in the comments here ! I want to see!
(tumblr version here, except with worse HTML info, because tumblr hates < apparently)