questions about tagging

[jlh]

Hey all! I am coming to you with the following questions because I've reached the kind of impasse where there's a manic squirrel running around in my head and there doesn't seem to be an answer that can keep me out of trouble! Please, please, please, even if you never like to comment, even if I intimidate you, please let me know if you have any opinions about the following questions. I might have follow up questions for you if anything is unclear.

Many, many, MANY THANKS in advance!

First, AO3. I've been slowing tagging all my fics on AO3 (there are about 180) with optional tags like "alternate universe — historical" and "kink bingo" and the like. Not long ago I came across a thread on failfandomanon (don't ask) where a debate was raging about tagging fics with minor characters. Those who use AO3 tags to find characters said that if a character plays a minor role in your fic, you shouldn't tag them. Those who use AO3 tags to avoid characters said that if a character is in your fic for even a line, you should tag them. (Then there was a conversation about how the character-avoiders just grit their teeth and bear it when the character appears in canon.) Now, my assumption was that people use tags to find things, not avoid them. So the question is:

Should I tag a fic on AO3 with minor characters?

Also, I tend to write fics with ensemble casts. Sometimes, like with the Trek fics, they have a couple of clear central characters and then some secondary characters. But sometimes, like with the Potter fics, they really are a group of eight to ten characters who are all fairly evenly seen through the story, and who all get their own POV scenes and character arcs. I have tagged my stories with the appropriate character of color/gay or lesbian character tags, but I'm a little paranoid about people being displeased at the relative weight of the characters. So the second question is:

Is there such a thing as an ensemble fic, or do you believe that all stories really have one or maybe two central characters, and the others are minor? If the latter, how do you determine which ones are the more important ones? If a story contains a white male slash ship, is that always the central pairing by default, regardless of their weight in the story?

Okay, moving on to tumblr. I made a post on tumblr that you can look through for the details, which probably don't make a whole lot of sense if you're not on tumblr, but mostly my question is:

Do you think that there is an assumed norm for tagging posts on tumblr, and if so, what is that norm? Also, what percentage of a tumblr should be fannish for it to be considered a fannish tumblr? Finally, what sort of things do you assume people are using Tumblr Savior to avoid?

And if you want to reply to that tumblr post and tell me how I should revamp my tumblr tags, please do so! Clearly I need the help before I get tumblr-stoned!

Finally, DW icons. So there's this box under the icon where you put in a description of the icon for people using screenreaders, and I'm never sure what to put there. For example, the icon on this post is Bennett Cerf, and that's how it's labelled, and maybe in the description I'd put "Bennett Cerf in B&W smoking a pipe."

But should I explain who Bennett Cerf—or Clint Barton, or Seamus Finnigan, or Diana Berrigan—are? Should I say "Diana Berrigan, an FBI agent in the White Collar division on the USA show White Collar, which is about a former con man and an FBI agent who fight crime and have a bromance, where Diana works for the FBI agent, and also she's black"? Is it just a description or an explanation? I find myself frequently at sea. I'm like, um, it's a picture of Tori Amos in a beret? So the final question is:

How do you describe icons for screenreaders? If you use one, how would you like them to be described?

I do have systems that I'm using now, but with all the incoherent and unspecific grouchiness around they are apparently inadequate! I like to avoid getting into fannish trouble because then you just end up on fandom wank for having bad tags and all the old bullshit gets dragged out and trust me, I've been called a sockpuppet enough in this lifetime.

Comments

[wishfulclicking]

On Describing icons--

I am really crappy at this but at my best I just described what was going on in the picture; but instead of using the name I would sometimes say 'girl leaning against a wall'. Is there some kind of space limit for icon descriptions? If not, then I guess you could be as long as you want but if not then I'd stick to a minimal description. So with the White Collar example I'd just say black female in suit or whatever she was doing in the icon.

Tagging on Tumblr--

There really isn't much consensus on this so I wouldn't stress too much about it. People use tumblr savior to block certain tags, like spoilers for shows they are following, and for things they want to avoid--sometimes it's rough when a fandom takes over your corner of tumblr for a while. For things I am going to blog regularly I tag with the name of the show/source, but this is also for my own personal use because I like to look back on my tumblr at times. I also have phrase tags that I use regularly like 'like the way you lean', 'look at that actor', 'that JAWLINE', 'social media woe', etc.

Another note on tumblr tagging is that some people track tags and get huffy when negativity is expressed in the tag. There is no consensus on this, but I did want to give you a heads up just in case you encounter this.

On AO3 and tagging--
I, too, saw that thread.

Ensemble fics exist. I consider any fic where most of the action/narrative is spread around to be ensemble fics; different from fics with huge casts but one central pairing--obviously that line is hazy. For example, if I wrote a Criminal Minds fic that dealt with following the team on downtime and mostly everyone showed up an interacted, I'd label it ensemble. I'd even label it ensemble if there is a couple in the group as long as the couple is not the main focus. When I posted that story to AO3 I'd tag it with all of the main cast who took part in the action but I would not tag for characters who only showed up for a sentence. In the story where the couple is pulling most of the focus but the background characters get action beyond a sentence I would not label it ensemble but I would still tag all the minor characters and just tag it in some way to let people know, or perhaps I would just have it in my authors note.

I don't consider any ship to be the central pairing unless they are the focus of the story. I would tag any pairings that showed up in a story, especially if they aren't canon.

Tag a fic with minor characters within reason, I would not tag a character who showed up only in a sentence but if they had a recurring role within the story they I most likely would and I'd indicate their minor status within the story so any fans of the character wouldn't be disappointed.

[jlh]

Thanks so much for this long and considered reply! Really appreciate it.

DW icons: The consensus seems to be that I only need to tell people what they'd see if they were looking at it, and give enough info for googling, not, you know, be wikipedia about it. There is a finite amount of space in that box, so I'm going to go with that.

tumblr: The frustrating thing is that people complain as though there is total consensus on this, which is what freaks me out. And the tumblr savior thing doesn't help—it seems to me that it shifts the burden of avoidance from the person wanting to avoid to everyone else to tag things in the way the avoider anticipates. Similarly, one must anticipate all things someone wants to avoid. I mean, there's stuff I wish I could avoid? But it's frequently not fannish. I'm just going to keep on and trust that people will actually tell me or unfollow me if they have a problem.

Right now I have a tagging system that I like because it works for both fannish and nonfannish entries (and most of my tumblr is nonfannish). It's all very positive too—"television is terrific" and the like—so there's that. They aren't tags anyone would follow across tumblr, but I don't think of my tumblr as that kind of resource, anyway. It's more a storage of stuff I think looks cool.

AO3: I guess what has me paranoid all the time about any of this stuff is the dustups about wanting fics with more female and chromatic characters and what "counts" and what doesn't "count." Not only in the "hey, you want to label that femslash but it also has a male slash pairing so it can't be femslash" way or the "hey, that person is actually a minor character" way but also "your silly romcom historical AU is not really advancing the sisterhood" way. The conversations are very srs bsns and the stories I write are ... light romances, not BAMF action plots or introspective character pieces. I wonder if they are what people mean? And the CoC stuff too—does Dean Thomas still "count" as a character of color if he's being slashed with a white male? Or is it like crossing the streams? We do live in a universe where people talk about how the movie Bridesmaids doesn't pass the Bechdel Test, so this isn't really all that crazy.

But really all I can do is try to be consistent and use my judgment and hope that if people have a problem they will tell me, and not like, go straight to fandomwank or whatever.

[verity]

(1) I tag all fics on AO3 with all of the characters in the fic, unless the cast is so large that that prospect becomes ridiculous (very few cases).

(2) YES. And yours really, really are ensembles proper!

(3) I don't use tags on tumblr at all. I need to start tagging for #gifs though, and I'm pretty sure any content that's a major warning on AO3 might deserve a tag? For myself, I only care if it impacts accessibility for me or other people - and I include not-triggering as part of that making-accessible, too.

(4) I don't think you need to be that detailed. Here are some descriptions I've written:

"faith ticks the naughty box"


"spike saves buffy, once more with feeling"


"kathleen hanna reads from the book of radical feminism"


"john is reading your filthy fanfic"


"sherlock is affronted by nonmonogamy"


"a girl pulls another girl, hat-like, over her head"


"irene is wearing sherlock's coat; behind her, the text 'the woman' repeats vertically"

[jlh]

Thanks for replying and with examples!!

1) some of my casts are very large! But I'm more concerned with the people who use the tags to look for things, vs. the people avoiding things, and I guess I can't please both of them? It's harder in some ways to piss off the people avoiding things but maybe they're angry anyway?

2) Thanks! The ongoing discussion about more female characters and more characters of color and when they "count" always has me a bit worried. Is Dean still a character of color if I slash him with a white boy? I'd say yes, but in a universe where many people feel that Bridesmaids didn't pass the Bechdel test I'm sure there are many who would say no and not feel they were being unreasonable in doing so. (Similar: ensemble fics with different kinds of ships—does boyslash always trump everything else? If you have a femslash fic with a boyslash pairing in the background, is it still femslash, or does the presence of the boyslash pairing negate that?)

3) This is mostly about people using Tumblr Savior to avoid things, like, people who feel overwhelmed by all the Sherlock on tumblr, not because they don't want to be spoiled but because they really don't like Sherlock and don't want it on their dash, okay? So can everyone please tag their "sherlock" posts with "sherlock" or similar so they never have to see them? Or tag their "benedict" or their "fassbender" or whomever they are trying to avoid, please?

I've seen these complaints a lot recently and I didn't realize that there were so many things people were avoiding, and then that gets me paranoid. Is there someone avoiding Gene Kelly? Or any mention of Hitchcock and therefore gets angry when they see one of my minimalist posters?

So that's what I'm reacting to. I guess, how much responsibility do I have to accept for people trying to avoid things they don't like? And that goes back to the AO3 thing—when people don't like a thing, they are already really angry about it, so they present really angry by the time they're complaining about it, and it's all very upsetting.

4) Thanks for the examples! I think, then, that my descriptions are okay and I don't have to be wikipedia for people.

[astolat]

FWIW re AO3 tagging at least, my general assumption for any service is that whatever is easier wins, which means that regardless of what might be ideal, stories will by and large be tagged only with characters playing a significant role. ;)

[jlh]

Now that I've had more time to think about it, and talked with the people who replied, I think tagging in order for others to avoid is fraught with problems. First, I don't know what people want to avoid and to what degree. Second, people who are annoyed enough with whatever to want to avoid it so completely are already angry, and so their pleas to others to help them avoid whatever tend to be a bit more tense, I suppose, than other pleas. It's as though their anger about this thing existing, or just being oversaturated by this thing, finds its expression in anger about people not tagging shit "correctly" as though the internet has in any way agreed on how things should be tagged.

It's odd.