Flames, on the sides of my face

[soc_puppet]

I resisted the last time news of AO3 having been scraped by LLM ("AI") bots got around, since I figured at that time the damage was already done, but with this? Yeah, my fics are now locked. (With only one exception, though if any of my collaborators from Pod Together unlock any of our works, I will not contest that.)

Long story short: Someone has made an "Audible for AO3" app that uses AI voices to read fics aloud. A screencap in the first link suggests that archive-locked works won't be touched, which is. Something.

You know I'm 100% about accessibility. But screenreaders exist, and so do podficcers, and the comparison between this app and Spotify? Does not in any way make me think it will have a positive impact for writers or podficcers.

Edit: The app in question is currently suspended. I have not yet re-unlocked the majority of my fics because I am (justifiably, IMO) cynical about this shit, as are most of the Reddit commenters there. I'll update again if warranted.

Comments

[goodbyebird]

That is extremely shitty, wtf.

[soc_puppet]

Right? The increasing monetization of fandom has been worrying me, I will admit, but this is not something I thought to expect, and it is horrifying.

[chanter1944]

Thanks for the tip; I've now gone and archive-locked many of my fics. No, creepy scrapers of 'we will snarf your writing and then allow our machines to regurgitate it in the guise of originality which is really just theft', you cannot have my Émilie and Duusu stories, or my Star Trek stories, or that treasured Babylon 5 fic, or...

I have not yet archive-locked anything that's been gifted to someone as part of an exchange. I hesitate to do that, as I'm not sure of the etiquette surrounding locking fics written for exchanges in general. Any ideas?

[soc_puppet]

Yeah, I'm really hoping that the app in question and anything similar get super-duper killed ASAP, but I'm not holding my breath. Fandom as a whole has held out a looooong time, and I'm reasonably confident that someone in fandom can come up with a defense for us, but still. Why take that chance if I don't have to?

I've left only one fic unlocked, and that was a collaboration with someone else; I even locked down my Pod Together fics, but if my partner(s) for any of those unlock them, I won't relock them unless another big thing happens. If it does, at that point I'll contact them and ask what they'd like to do. As far as gifts, if the recipient has an AO3 account, I'd lock them down as well. (Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure this means I'll have to unlock another fic; I'll do that after I finish this comment.)

On the plus side, this whole debacle seems to have drummed up a bit more interest in creating podfic, so that's something!

[mistressofmuses]

I'm glad that this particular attempt seems to have burned out as quickly as it did, but the whole situation is really upsetting, honestly.

It feels like this sort of thing will remain a threat, because SO MANY people see the existence of AO3, and fandom in general, as something that just MUST be monetized. Everything is a side hustle, everything is a grift... I loathe how many people are bringing that mindset to fandom rather than the gift economy ethos that AO3 was founded on.

I haven't locked my fics... yet. But I feel like it's only a matter of time before I'll need to.

[soc_puppet]

I fully expect this particular app to be back in a few months once the fervor has died down, with only enough changes to be able to say, "But we're not the same as we were then! We've made ✨Improvements✨!" And if not this one, then one just like it. Once the AI/Machine Learning craze dies down a bit, I'll be less worried, but until then? Yikes.

Yeah, the culture shift in fandom is... not one I'm fond of. There were people who were on the "Fandom as an exchange economy" side even fifteen or twenty years ago, but they were generally more likely to be shouted down than applauded.

I still cross-post all of my fics here, so I know that people can still technically access them if they go looking, but. Yeah. I don't want the internet to become a place where I feel the need to lock my fics on Dreamwidth. (If it comes to that, I'll probably start posting them to a locked community rather than start granting people access here willy-nilly.)

[mistressofmuses]

Unfortunately, I do feel like the app reappearing after a bit of a rebrand is a very plausible outcome. Or yeah, even if the original creator doesn't try it, someone else very likely could. Or even outside of this particular application, it feels like a bit of a whack-a-mole game with people trying to find ways to harvest AO3 as a source of data and monetize it.

Yeah, the grifter types have certainly always been around (even if the high profile ones of ye olden days that come to mind were more personal; BNFs getting fans to buy them new laptops and such.) And of course there have always been things like fic and art commissions, to varying levels of social acceptance. I also *get* why people who are financially struggling want to take something they're good at - writing fic/doing fanart/etc. - and use it to help that situation. But the broader culture shift feels a lot... worse, to me. Maybe I'm just old.

I do hate the feeling of having to put everything on lockdown. Personal stuff, sure - I try to be mindful of just how much identifying info I put out in public, but even just fannish stuff? It's sad to feel like it has to be locked down to such a degree just to prevent bad actors from trying to exploit it.