March Meta Matters Challenge, Check-in No. 1

[yourlibrarian]

Welcome to year 6 of the Meta Matters Challenge! I'm your moderator, yourlibrarian.

These posts will be used for us all to check-in with one another, offer encouragement and answers to questions, and maybe tips we come up with as we copy our work to another location.

Before we begin, some reminders. Please look over the FAQ as there are some important bits for everyone to follow, namely:

Remember to tag all your posts with the "Nonfiction" tag in the "Additional Tags" section of the posting form.

Remember to add your meta to the March Meta Matters Challenge community on either AO3 or Squidgeworld.

If you've already begun copying over your meta, you can always edit the files to add in the tags and collection assignment.

Also for those using Squidgeworld.org for hosting, they will be adding fanvid hosting to their image hosting! The service may be down for upgrades over the next 24 hours but is expected back soon.

Since this is our first check-in, please comment with one or more of the following:

1) Details about you: This could include canons (if any) you've written meta in, years in fandom, things you tend to write about (if you've noticed themes), or whatever else you'd like to share.

2) Details about your meta: How much of your past work are you going to be looking through? Have you already started reviewing fandom accounts? Do you have organizing tips to share as we go sorting through our posts?

3) Goals you have: Maybe you want to back up a certain number of posts. Maybe you want to update older meta. Maybe you're looking forward to writing new meta. We all have hopes of what we can accomplish this month. Feel free to share them!
Also, if you have any questions not already covered in our introductory post or in our FAQ, include them here.

Remember, this account accepts anonymous comments, so if you don't have a Dreamwidth account we still want to hear from you and have you take part. Just sign your messages with your username and we'll all get to know you!

Comments

[yourlibrarian]

1) Details about you:

As of the last few years, what I've written mostly falls into TV show reviews, but there have been a few meta pieces too. At this point I've been in online fandom for 30 years though I wasn't writing and posting until 2004. Canons have changed a lot, but it's always possible I'll drag an old one into a current discussion ⚰️

2) Details about your meta:

I am very excited about this year, because I am finally going to catch up completely on my meta archiving! I left off at the end of 2023 last year, and started working on 2024 this past week. I didn't post that much these past two years so I think I'll get through the last two years partway through March.

3) Goals you have:

I hope to do some meta writing this year, something I've rarely done in March because reviewing and sometimes editing old posts (as well as copying them) has taken so much time. I have an Andor piece that has been waiting for several years, and came across notes for a Buffyverse one that predates MMM entirely! So let's see what happens.

[cornerofmadness]

1. I'm a multifandom fan who has been in fandom nearly 50 years so I have plenty I could pull meta from. I have some from my own worlds too for all my original fiction. Heck I need to be doing more of that if I'm honest.


2. I actually do not write tons of fandom meta but usually it's about something I feel passionately about, good or bad or something a show has gotten particularly right or wrong. Occasionally it's about something that I've noticed a chunk of fandom has misunderstood (still thinking of doing one about living with a functional alcoholic for Prodigal Son since almost every fanfic I saw for the one character only seems to know the abusive beat your child type and zero understanding that that is not the only way)

3. goals, I hope to get some new meta for Hazbin Hotel's second season. I have some of it barfed out in my journal that isn't particularly cohesive. I want to clean it up and share it around. I might check to see if any of my old Buffy the Vampire/Angel the Series meta is ...well anywhere. One of those pieces won me an ethics scholarship the last time I was in school (that stuff is like 20 years old now)

[mrsluigivargas]

1) I seem to write meta about videogames :) Mostly Super Mario, but also some other miscellaneous canons, too. Sometimes one detail bugs you enough to write a few paragraphs about it, lol.

2) Luckily last year I finished a project where I crossposted nearly everything I've ever posted to social media onto Dreamwidth, so all I'll have to do is scroll through that to find meta to back up! I've even already gone and tagged some! Around 30 posts to sort through, after an initial scan. The actual number will probably be smaller. Plus I have one more that I wrote last week that I haven't posted yet! :D

3) My primary goal is to back up my meta to my personal site, because currently the meta masterlist there just links to the original posts. My secondary goal is to back up some meta to Squidgeworld (and some to AO3). My tertiary goal is to finish archiving that Voltron fandom survey blog I ran in like 2018, lmao. I've got one write-up left!

[yourlibrarian]

Wow, that is a lot of work ahead. Good on you for planning it out, it sounds like a really good idea and I hope you make good progress 😃

[osteophage]

Copying over my PF comment:

Hello! I didn't write a lot that's fandom-related over the past year, but I did take notice of that last fall and make sure to get one new essay out the door, at least.

My goals this time around:

• Make SQW/AO3 backups of the new Halloween essay.
  
• Make Neocities backups of the AO3 comments essay (needs an update) and the Antifandom Manifesto (needs a reread).
  
• Add more bookmarks to the SQW/AO3 collections.

[yourlibrarian]

I suspect I will discover the same thing about 2025, but it's great to be able to feel everything is current and shipshape 😊

Hello!

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> Remember to tag all your posts with the "Nonfiction" tag (in the "Additional Tags" section of the posting form if using AO3 or SquidgeWorld).<<

I typically post my meta on Dreamwidth, and some of the older stuff is on LiveJournal. Some is in notes under fiction I've posted on AO3. Since AO3 changed its user agreement and is now visible only to members who have signed that, I have quit posting there. I'm not on SquidgeWorld. But if anyone wants to copy my meta to another site, that's fine as long as you leave the credits intact.

Among my continuing goals is to do more archiving on the Wayback Machine, so that is where I will typically copy my meta in addition to Dreamwidth posts. Ghost and Archive.fo are pretty much useless now.

I also recommend the new community datahoarders which is pretty much what we are doing here with our meta.

My Meta tag includes descriptions of genres from another world, meta about some of my other writing worlds, links to other other people's meta often with discussions, meta about fanfic/fandom in general, some musings on how to handle particular topics, identity literature, and a few bits that touch on some particular canon. A lot of it involves me poking holes in other people's arguments, pointing out how suggestions are troublesome, and suggesting other alternatives instead. I also write Reviews.

My How To tag includes a lot of meta, although it's not always tagged as meta.


>>1) Details about you: This could include canons (if any) you've written meta in, years in fandom, things you tend to write about (if you've noticed themes), or whatever else you'd like to share.<<

Canons: I have a lot of original writing and I write meta for most of it. Hardcore meta. I mean I have oopsed a book repeatedly doing that and not all of them were even dictionaries. I have Tolkienesque amounts of notes and other meta. A Conflagration of Dragons and Daughters of the Apocalypse are a couple original series where I've posted substantial amounts of the meta because those settings really benefit from seeing their background materials. Quixotic Ideas has some meta posted. Peculiar Obligations, a series about Quakers and pirates, is one of several with a new series page.

I wrote massive amounts of meta for the Torn World project but that website is no longer visible to the public. :( I did most of the work building three related languages and several ecosystems, and other folks did different ecosystems and scads of other worldbuilding entries, how-to-write guides, etc.

One of the bigger pieces I've posted about someone else's stuff is a guide to The Ursulan Cycle, which is genderbent King Arthur. The Shared Worlds page has links to other background materials.

I've written fanfic in many canons. *chuckle* Some of my earliest hardcore meta is still being passed around the Valdemar fandom, because they're demifiction guidebooks on how to do stuff. If I remember right, there was one on games and one one dyes/disguises. My biggest fanseries is Love Is For Children (The Avengers). That landing page has a bunch of meta in it along with links to the entries.

Time in fandom: I have decades in fandom, and more before that when I was a fan but had not yet discovered fandom as a community.

Things I tend to write about: I have a bunch of recurring themes that I address both in meta and fiction/poetry. These include but are not limited to adoption (including found-family and interspecies), boundaries and consent, ethics, family of choice and diverse family shapes, fish out of water, how to make the world a better place, identity, implications of special abilities, languages-linguistics-xenolinguistics, sex/gender dynamics (especially alien/fantasy iterations), sociodynamics, spirituality, trauma and recovery.


>> 2) Details about your meta: How much of your past work are you going to be looking through? Have you already started reviewing fandom accounts? Have you archived a lot of it already in past challenges? <<

I still suck at tagging meta as meta.

Last year I went through and archived my Meta, How To, Review tagged material. I'll need to do that again for the 2025 material.

I still run the communities newcomers and goals_on_dw which feature a lot of meta about those topics and how to use Dreamwidth, plus a little about fandom.


>> 3) Goals you have: Maybe you want to back up a certain number of posts. Maybe you want to update older meta. Maybe you're looking forward to writing new meta. We all have hopes of what we can accomplish this month. Feel free to share them! <<

* Continue working to promote this challenge so more people will take part in it and/or find new meta to enjoy.

* Look for all the meta from 2025-early 2026, then make sure it has been tagged appropriately.

* Archive my meta from 2025-early 2026 on Wayback.

* Make a Follow Friday post listing active meta communities on Dreamwidth.

* Do more work on the notes about Pleistocene extinctions and which species survived in Peculiar-Earth.


Finally, my next Poetry Fishbowl will be on Tuesday, March 3 with a theme of "World Cuisine." If you want to drop by and leave me meta-related prompts, I can write characters talking about meta; I've done a few pieces of that in the past. I have also created several algorithms for making food such as soup or red rice, so I'm up for that kind of prompt too.

Re: Hello!

[matsushima]

Ooh, I was wondering if original fic meta would count for marchmetamatterschallenge and if you're in, I'm in!

Re: Hello!

[ysabetwordsmith]

*high five* We're all in!

Tolkien wrote massive amounts of meta for some of his settings. It happens to be famous now, but when he was doing it, that was just his nerdy little habit that he talked about with other nerds in the Inklings, some of whom also liked writing meta about their own or other people's work.

One of my goals this month is to chip away at exploring what animal species are extinct or not in Peculiar-Earth. I noticed the bus-sized crocodiles first, then the boat-sized turtles, and that tipped me to the fact that the Pleistocene extinctions were definitely lighter there. It's been ... interesting. They have galloping crocodiles.

[stardust_rifle]

1: M, in a lot of anime/manga/2D idol fandoms, and I’ve written meta for Ensemble Stars and Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure, as well as panfandom meta. I love fandom stats, especially niche ones.

2: I am going to go through my past accounts to find old meta that I’m going to put on Ao3, (I’ve already identified one piece of meta that I only posted on Reddit, for some reason)

3: My main goal for this month is to start research on a piece of meta that’s been percolating in my head, about Nagisa Ran (Ensemble Stars), the effects of profound isolation on early childhood development, canon’s treatment of the above, and its differences and similarities with reality. Gonna have to dig into canon AND the scientific literature for this one, but it’ll be fun! I hope.

[yourlibrarian]

Ooh, I rather like seeing fandom stats as well! That's great that it's one of your works.

I'm so glad you brought up the Reddit piece, because I think that can become so true over time. We post something either off the cuff or in response to something in a certain place, and then it never gets collected with other works.

Good luck with the meta writing!

[netbug009]

Eyo! My goal this month is to get my WALL-E/EVE ship manifesto onto ao3! That's the only meta I've done besides Youtube videos. But the original graphic headers died ages ago, so I'd like to make new ones while I'm at it, so that's probably gonna be what takes the most work. Maybe I'll also add some new recs and whatnot since a lot of the links are probably broken and so much new content has been made...?

[yourlibrarian]

Aw, that sounds like it'll be a great post, I'd love to see it. And once Squidgeworld gets their video hosting rolling you can always post your videos there as well! They just posted some guidelines for it: https://squidgestatus.dreamwidth.org/120430.html

It would be great to see more recs to meta as well -- meta_warehouse is a good spot for it here on Dreamwidth, but there is also recthething for fanwork recs.

[atamascolily]

1) I write a lot of meta about Gen Urobuchi's oeuvre, focusing on Madoka Magica and Thunderbolt Fantasy.

2) This year, I want to archive the last year or so of Madoka Magica-related tumblr posts that I've made, focusing on those that don't directly relate to the new movie that's supposed to come out this year. I also want to go through my older finished essays and update links as needed.

3) I have a bunch of longer and more involved essays that I'd like to get out of my head/drafts folder and out into the world, so it would be nice to post at least one new piece if possible.

[yourlibrarian]

Oh that'll be good timing given the movie's release!

Your comment about updating links make me think of how often stuff is no longer online that I once linked to...

Your #3 is very much like mine. I'm pretty sure there will be at least one essay this month, but I'd really like to get more out there.

[atamascolily]

Yeah, I've learned the hard way that if I cite sources, I also have to archive those sources in some fashion, otherwise they might disappear on me!

Also, citing specific iterations of wiki pages rather than the main page can be helpful if there are a lot of updates/changes over time and the specific thing I was citing disappears from the main page (but thankfully is still available on the wiki itself if I dig through the update log for it).

[yourlibrarian]

A good tip for others!

[enchantedsleeper]

Yeah, I've learned the hard way that if I cite sources, I also have to archive those sources in some fashion, otherwise they might disappear on me!

A lesson I too learned the hard way 😅 I've started making it a rule to link the Wayback Machine archived version of any links in meta that I archive, and if there isn't a version saved, then that's my cue to save it. I think there have only been one or two that I wasn't able to retrieve.

[tally]

1) Details about you: Most of my fandoms are video games (Rimworld, Mass Effect, Dead Space, Overwatch, many more) though I do have a few shows and movies I get fannish over! Oh, and I love horror of any type!

2) Details about your meta: I've written only a very little bit of meta, like a couple canon promos here and there and stuff.

3) Goals you have: To write some meta, and then archive it! I have plenty of thoughts and musings on various fannish meta subjects, but I never seem to write them down! Hoping this will help me remember to do so!

[yourlibrarian]

Canon promos are great! I wrote one this past year too 🙂 I hope to do more writing too, so let's see if we get it done this month.

[enchantedsleeper]

o/ A little late, but I'm hoping that I will manage MMM in some form this year! I love this event. It's a busy time for me at the moment, but one aspect of meta archiving that I've yet to get to is archiving my fandom and ship pimp posts/manifestos that I've posted to various places around Dreamwidth and Pillowfort. I want to get these onto my personal fanworks archive. One ship manifesto/primer is already up, but there are a few others dotted about that I want to collect together. It would be a short-ish endeavour, and so doable, I think.

I'm always keen to write new meta, so I'll also be keeping an eye out for prompts in case anything inspires me so much that I drop everything to get it written 😆 Also, just through browsing last year's prompts I learned about fanifesto, which is great, so maybe I'll also bring my past ones there ^^

[yourlibrarian]

That sounds like a great plan! Hopefully things will work out timewise for you. And yes, it'll be great to revive existing communities with new content.