How To Make Your Own Fanfiction Archive, In Just Ten Easy Steps

How To Make Your Own Fanfiction Archive, In Just Ten 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!

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> 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 > 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=" . Then paste in the link you copied. Then type "> Then put in the title of the fic. Then type < /a> . Then save the index page again when you're done. 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.)

Blogpost version, with FAQs and discussion

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 here ! I want to see!

From now on, I'll also refer to Max as a lion and cheetah (the lion is explained, but let me explain why cheetah).

Both Max and a cheetah are fast, the fastest in their worlds. They know when to use that speed, when the best moment is and when they need to save up their energy.

They're both easily mistaken for something else, the cheetah gets confused for leopards while Max gets mistaken for his father Jos.

They are mistaken for something they're not. people think Max is aggressive and rude (he is not!) while the cheetah is considered being like other big cats, like lions and tigers (they're so fucking cute and make chirping sounds!)

Last but not least, cheetahs sometimes need an emotional supportive dog companion since they cam develop anxiety Max needs his besties for his emotional sanity.

So, Max's a lion/cheetah, confirmed :3

I took the liberty to analyse Max's first 11 races from last year and this year, I also left out cancelled races since they wouldn't be representative of Max's pace.

--

2022 (2 DNFs and 1 Sprint Race)

Laps lead: 237/623 (38.04%)

Distance lead: 1,203.14 km/3,129.55 km (38.44%)

Points achieved: 181/268 (67.54%) - the points are: maximum of 8 points for the sprint race and 10 times 26 points (10 times first place and fastest lap 10 times)

--

2023 (2 Races Cancelled and 2 Sprint Races)

Laps lead: 441/596 (73.99%)

Distance lead: 2,008.48 km/2,918.81 km (68.81%)

Points achieved: 229/250 (91.6%) - the points are: maximum of 16 points for 2 sprint races and 9 times 26 points (9 times first place and 9 fastest laps)

--

So far, he has achieved 229 points from last year's 454 points (50.44%) and 229 points from last year's 181 points in 11 races (126.52%).

--

Sure, the car has gotten better and faster, but it also shows how strong Max really is (compared to Sergio's performance), no matter what others might say. This year, Max has a stronger start compared to last year. Driver and car are a good combination this year, so let's see what the stats say in four races/sprints.

Just Got Word The World Is Ending - I'm Still Laying In My Hammock And Enjoying The Rain

(Thanks to @rafarogeliofr for enjoying my idea, I had a small inspiration kick and decides to write the first words, enjoy🩷🩷 p.s. not edited, still in the writing phase)

When he was a child, he dreamt about sleeping on the moon, on clouds and maybe on stars. He dreamt about flying over cities and forests, over villages and oceans. Whenever he dreamed, he was free and felt light, like a bird or even a mighty dragon. His parents were proudly listening whenever he spoke about his dreams, fueling him with more dreamy ideas for more nights to fill. When he was a child, the sky and space had been his sole comfort, his inspiration to have enough money to buy his parents their own home on the moon so they could meet those who got wings and flew to the stars.

Alas, childhood bleed over to adulthood and his dream soon faded away with responsibilities, with the smell of exhaust gases, the sight of dark grey asphalt and the sound of roaring engines. The young boy who once dreamt about flying above anything had become the man that dreams about flying over the circuits, collecting trophies, gaining money and spreading awareness of how destroyed the Earth now is; nobody listened.

Now, hundreds of years later (and with forbidden methods and technologies), this man stares out of the window of his apartment on a giant spaceship, shaped in the form of a whole city. He stares into the black nothing called space, eyes tired from seeing almost nothing and heart dead of having lived through life-alternating operations just to end up in nowhere. He's no longer the young boy who dreamt about space, he's more of a machine with parts of human organs. He's jo longer "my little Lew" or "Sir Lewis Hamilton", he's just a privileged and rich man in space, with no sense of direction or spirit.

Top Max / anyone 👿

Sorry anon but you have the wrong person here. I'm only shipping bottom Max/Lewis or Charles or an OC, not him as a top.

If you want to read top Max, I can recommend @thetwelfthcrow | @thethirteenthcrow (aka Zhalia), they (edited) write good stories about top max too :)

I'm feeling slightly down, so if you want to, you can send whatever might be on your mind in my ask box, anon or not 🤗🤗

Kiddo softie Max 🥺🥺

"Is it a fast car? Did you like it?" 🥰