I'm not quite sure what level of reality I'm supposed to be operating on

https://archiveofourown.org/admin_posts/35171

Do you have experience in managing or leading people? Are you a frequent Bluesky, Twitter | X, or RedNote user who enjoys helping others? Are you interested in the rescue and preservation of fanworks? The Organization for Transformative Works is recruiting!

We're excited to announce the opening of applications for:

• Fanlore Chair Track Volunteer - closing 20 May 2026 at 23:59 UTC or after 40 applications
• Communications Social Media Moderator - closing 20 May 2026 at 23:59 UTC or after 60 applicants
• Communications Social Media Moderator (Chinese) - closing 20 May 2026 at 23:59 UTC or after 60 applicants
• Open Doors Import Assistant - closing 20 May 2026 at 23:59 UTC or after 40 applications

We have included more information on each role below. Open roles and applications will always be available at the volunteering page. If you don't see a role that fits with your skills and interests now, keep an eye on the listings. We plan to put up new applications every few weeks, and we will also publicize new roles as they become available.

All applications generate a confirmation page and an auto-reply to your e-mail address. We encourage you to read the confirmation page and to whitelist our email address in your e-mail client. If you do not receive the auto-reply within 24 hours, please check your spam filters and then contact us.

If you have questions regarding volunteering for the OTW, check out our Volunteering FAQ.

Fanlore Chair Track Volunteer

Do you have experience in managing or leading people? Are you an organizational wizard? Do you have an interest in preserving fannish history or experience in wiki editing? The Fanlore committee is looking for new Chair Track Volunteers to join our team!

Fanlore is the committee responsible for maintaining and promoting the Fanlore wiki. We promote Fanlore on social media, run Fanlore editing challenges, support Fanlore editors, write the wiki's policy and help pages, and respond to emails from editors and readers. The Chair Track Volunteer position is for people who have the time and dedication to learn all about our operations so that they can be considered for the role of committee Chair.

We're looking for someone who has experience in wiki editing and an understanding of social media, who is comfortable with personnel management and training new recruits, and who is experienced in leadership or management whether in a business or nonprofit environment. Candidates also need strong time management skills and the ability to work on and track multiple tasks at a time. If that's you, please apply!

For your application to be considered, you will be required to complete a short task within one week of submitting your application.

You must be 18+ in order to apply for this role.

Applications are due 20 May 2026 or after 40 applications

Apply to be a Fanlore Chair Track Volunteer at the volunteering page! If you have further questions, please contact us.

Communications Social Media Moderator

Are you familiar with Bluesky and Twitter | X? Do you want to help connect the public with the OTW?

The Communications committee is recruiting for Social Media Moderators to help us manage our Bluesky and Twitter | X. Social Media Moderators will help the OTW maintain an active presence on their platform, creating or reblogging a range of posts of relevance and interest to the OTW's userbase, and doing outreach to fan groups and individuals on the site. Moderators are also responsible for handling user questions and managing responses to the OTW's news content. You will be working as part of a team, and you must be able to dedicate at least 3-4 hours each week to the OTW.

For this position, we are seeking people who are familiar with both platforms as they are managed jointly by the same team of people and who ideally have experience moderating a social media page. We are also interested in hearing from those with customer service experience, especially in an online environment. We expect you to have an interest in fandom at large and an understanding of the concerns and activities of the OTW (although we will, of course, provide you with training once you start).

You must be 18+ in order to apply for this role. If you're a frequent Bluesky or Twitter | X user who enjoys helping others, have a wide-ranging interests across the fandom space, and are curious and willing to learn, we'd love to hear from you!

Applications are due 20 May 2026 or after 60 applications

Apply to be a Communications Social Media Moderator at the volunteering page! If you have further questions, please contact us.

Communications Social Media Moderator (Chinese)

Do you use RedNote? Do you want to connect Chinese fans with the OTW?

The Communications committee is recruiting for RedNote Moderators to help start up and oversee the OTW's presence on RedNote, the Chinese social networking site.

RedNote Moderators will be part of a team creating content for the OTW RedNote, posting regularly about topics related to the OTW. Moderators will also respond to user questions and comments to help them find answers to their questions about the OTW's projects. Additionally, they will act as a link between the OTW and the RedNote community, providing updates to the rest of the OTW on trends and events within Chinese fan communities.

You are required to be fluent in both English and Mandarin Chinese and must be over 18 to apply for this role.

We are looking for volunteers familiar with RedNote and passionate about outreach on the platform. They should be able to maintain a consistent level of work, collaborate inside the team and with other committees, ask for help when needed, and be proactive about suggesting ways the OTW can better connect with its users. If you're interested in doing outreach to Chinese-language fandom communities, this is the position for you!

Applications are due 20 May 2026 or after 60 applications

Apply to be a Communications Social Media Moderator (Chinese) at the volunteering page! If you have further questions, please contact us.

Open Doors Import Assistant

Do you enjoy spreadsheets, self-paced projects, and helping protect fanworks from getting lost over time? Are you interested in the rescue and preservation of fanworks? Do you still guiltily--or not so guiltily--love the first fanwork that opened your eyes to fandom?

Open Doors is a committee dedicated to preserving fanworks in their many formats, and we're looking for volunteers to support this goal. The work we do preserves fan history, love, and dedication to fandom: we keep fanworks from offline and at-risk archives from being lost, divert fanzines from the trash, and more.

Our import assistants contribute to our goal by:

• Importing works to AO3 from rescued digital archives and fanzines
• Searching AO3 for existing copies of works that creators have already uploaded themselves (to prevent us from importing duplicate versions when we import an archive)
• Compiling and correcting spreadsheets of works from an archive to be imported and/or tags to use on those works
• Copyediting/proofreading works from fanzines that have been scanned from PDFs (to ensure that the scanned works were transcribed properly by the software we used)

The training is self-directed, and so is the work for the most part, though we also have weekly working meetings/parties for people to all chip in and work on tasks together! Import assistants can generally alternate the types of tasks they work on. At any one time, we usually have several tasks of different types available.

To apply for this role, you must be at least 18 years old and legally of age to open explicit fanworks in your local jurisdiction.

If you're interested, click on through for a longer description of what we're looking for and the time commitment. For your application to be considered, you will be required to complete a short task within 3 days of submitting your application.

Applications are due 20 May 2026 or after 40 applications

Apply to be an Open Doors Import Assistant at the volunteering page! If you have further questions, please contact us.

The Organization for Transformative Works is the non-profit parent organization of multiple projects including Archive of Our Own, Fanlore, Open Doors, OTW Legal Advocacy, and Transformative Works and Cultures. We are a fan-run, donor-supported organization staffed by volunteers. Find out more about us on our website.

https://archiveofourown.org/admin_posts/35171

https://archiveofourown.org/admin_posts/35166

Every month or so the OTW will be doing a Q&A with one of its volunteers about their experiences in the organization. The posts express each volunteer's personal views and do not necessarily reflect the views of the OTW or constitute OTW policy. Today's post is with Whatsit, who volunteers as a Chair in training for the Policy & Abuse committee (PAC) and a tag wrangler.

How does what you do as a volunteer fit into what the OTW does?
As a tag wrangler, I make sure that the fandoms I wrangle have properly canonized tags, which helps users find works that have the characters, relationships, tropes, and themes they're looking for. I fully and completely believe that the tagging system on AO3 is practically one of the modern wonders of the world, and I'm really pleased to be able to do my small part in contributing to it.

My other role is working for the Policy & Abuse committee, where we respond to reports of Terms of Service violations. Anyone who's ever spent time on an unmoderated comments section somewhere knows the importance of moderation in keeping a site usable and enjoyable, and PAC works (mostly) behind the scenes to make sure that's the case for AO3.

What is a typical week like for you as a volunteer?
I try to spend at least an hour or so per day on PAC work, since some of it is time-sensitive and has deadlines attached. This often involves working with tickets that have been sent in about violations, but sometimes it means working on documentation updates or helping to train new volunteers on the committee.

I usually also do at least one big tag wrangling session per week, during which I get caught up with wrangling the tags in my fandoms. I really like putting music on and settling in for a few hours (or more) of wrangling, so this setup works really well for me.

What made you decide to volunteer?
I have a background in book indexing and a particular interest in categorization and taxonomy, so as soon as I found out that tag wranglers were a thing on AO3, I definitely wanted to be one! It sounded like the kind of thing that would be right up my alley (and it was). On a broader level, I think AO3 is one of the best things going on the Internet, in terms of creating a space where people can freely share their fanworks without fear of the content purges that have plagued many other sites. With censorship encroaching on so many other spaces, I think what AO3 stands for is more important than ever. I really believe in the philosophy of the site and I'm glad to be a part of it.

What has been your biggest challenge doing work for the OTW?
Time management! I'm on two separate committees and I also have a day job and a fairly active family life, which is a lot to juggle. But I've had success setting boundaries for myself that keep me from over-committing or burning out. I find that setting specific times during which I'll do specific tasks not only keeps that task from eating up my entire day (which either wrangling or PAC work could otherwise easily do) but also allows me to really focus on that task during the allotted time.

What fannish things do you like to do?
I'm an active fic writer and I participate in quite a few multi-fandom fic exchanges. I find that having an external deadline is great for motivating me to actually finish a fic, something I was historically not great at before doing exchanges. I also hang out on a couple of fandom discords and have been known to go to the occasional convention. And, of course, I spend entirely too much of my free time reading vast amounts of fic.

Now that our volunteer’s said five things about what they do, it’s your turn to ask one more thing! Feel free to ask about their work in the comments. Or if you'd like, you can check out previous Five Things posts.

The Organization for Transformative Works is the non-profit parent organization of multiple projects including Archive of Our Own, Fanlore, Open Doors, OTW Legal Advocacy, and Transformative Works and Cultures. We are a fan-run, donor-supported organization staffed by volunteers. Find out more about us on our website.

https://archiveofourown.org/admin_posts/35166