(no subject)

[olivermoss]

AO3 has posted about staff getting harassed. I'd seen some scuttlebutt about this before the announcement came out.

For a long time, a big drain on AO3 resources has been people trying to fuck with them:

* Mass reporting fics for BS reasons to strike out against authors

* People joining and getting trained up because they think being staff means they'll be listened to about how they think AO3 needs to change, or to try to carry out petty vendettas against authors

* Other assorted BS, like certain bad faith arguments by people trying ot grind engagement on twitter

Anyway, sounds like someone got an internal email list and is using to harass staffers. Did someone join just to get a hold of an email list? Who knows? Anyway, this BS is why it can take weeks or months to get a clear cut case of plagiarism seen to. And now it's just gotten a lot worse.

I hate people

Comments

[mxcatmoon]

I read about that nasty stuff. I hope they catch who's doing it and throw their a** in jail! (and put them on the register for life). Are they punks who think they're smart, or just idiots who don't realize the seriousness of this particular crime?

[olivermoss]

I hope so, too. But a lot of this stuff goes unpunished. If the person isn't in the US, it's possible nothing much can be done. Hopefully, all staff use AO3-specific email accounts so they can just dump the old and get new ones, like the cons I used to work. If they use email accounts also used for other things, that would make this a lot harder to deal with.

[kaffy_r]

Jesus. That's awful.

[razielim]

Jeeeesus. How do you know about the preceding stuff? I mean, I'm not surprised, hints of that have been an undercurrent throughout all Ao3 discussion the past few years, but just wondering how prevalent this was and how tied-up they've been.

[olivermoss]

I used to know a bunch of AO3 staff including someone who trained new staff for like 7 years. I don't have hard data on how reporting is attempts at harassment or how many people join trying to cause problems. I've mostly just heard venting over drinks. I've also seen similar statements from various staff on social media over the years.

I don't know any current staff, though.

[mistressofmuses]

This whole situation is so frustrating and awful. I hate people too.

I deeply appreciate AO3 and the fact that it's been built in part to keep those bad actors from gaining control in a way that harms the archive and its users in the long run. But it's absolutely awful that this sort of shit happens.

I really do hate people.

[olivermoss]

It's got to be hella stressful to some of the staff. Denise has reached out to help deal with email stuff and give resources to keep content from auto-loading in email. It sounds like they don't use role-specific disposable emails, though, which they might want to look into. That's been SOP for every Non Profit I've worked for.

[mistressofmuses]

That has to be EXTREMELY stressful. I hadn't heard that Denise had reached out - I am glad to hear that; I imagine she has a lot of helpful resources she can pass along. And yeah, disposable emails would probably be a good idea going forward, to cut down on the potential for this kind of personalized abuse.

Why do people have to suck so bad?