EXCHANGES 101
Nov. 10th, 2022 05:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mgsx_modWelcome to my ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
mgsx exchange guide! If you don't understand something in the general exchange process, read on! This guide is intended to be as beginner friendly to exchanges as possible, so it should hopefully answer whatever questions you have.
General
DNW
A DNW or "Do Not Want/Do Not Write" is something that a requester absolutely does not want in their fic. So long as it is contained in the ao3 request, whatever is in a requests DNW must be respected by the author of their fic/artist that matches to them. Meaning, don't draw/write whatever is in the DNW!!
Try to keep your DNWs as impersonal/non-fancoppy as possible, please.
Do not try to "railroad" or force your author to write something specific with highly specific DNWs.
Example of a good DNW list: "DNW- scat, farting, bodily fluids other than blood, abuse, child death, animal death."
Example of a bad DNW list: "DNW- Anything but bosselot where theyre soulmates and actually super love eachother so much and they go out for ice cream every day and..." As it is with most things exchanges, try to see how other people use their DNWs. The AO3 app is a great way to see how other exchange participants format their signups!
Nominations
Why?
Nominations are necessary in any machine matched exchange. If there were no nominations, the algorithm that matches offer A to request B will not be able to match the two easily, because the requests do not use the same pool of tags for the machine to pick from and match to.
If I were hand matching, I could be much more lenient with the general ~vibe~ of a request and match offer A to request B, but a machine cannot vibe check like I can.
How?
You have one whole week, 7 days, one hundred and sixty eight hours to think of anything and everything you would want to request someone to make for you. You must put these tags that describe your dream fic/art in the tagset from December 10th 11:59 est to December 17th 11:59 est. Simply plug the tags you want to have in your request in the proper fields.
if you want a reference for general formatting, look at This tagset.
You are free to nominate your freeforms with additions such as "Scenario-[insert scenario tag here]"
You can nominate up to 10 relationship/characters and 20 freeforms. If you want to nominate a single character, please format it as Solo:X in the relationships tab. Example, Solo:Liquid Snake Pairings can be nominated as follows.
A/B for a sexual or romantic pairing,
A/[OMC,Mob or Any Enemy Soldier] for a sexual or romantic pairing with an original character or unnamed mob soldier(s).
A & B & C for platonic pairings
The freeform tags can be any tropes, kinks or scenarios. They do not need to be canonized ao3 tags. examples,
Alternate Universe - Soulmates
Accidental Soulbond
Cannibalism
If you have any questions related to nominations, feel free to email me at mgsx22@gmail.com or comment on the dreamwidth contact post.
Sign ups
Why?
In order to get your request in, you must fill out the signup form. it will be linked on the AO3 collection and is easy to get to.
How?
At this stage, the only tags you will be able to use are from the tagset. Make sure to nominate as much as you can!
You can now use the tags you nominated to create requests and offers. You must have 2 ships and 4 freeforms as a minimum per request and offer. Or, you may put any ship or freeform with the Any check-box. Its all up to you.
One thing though, you must offer to match to someone else's request in the collection. Your offers are what you are willing to create and you are free to put do not match notes, but you must be matchable to at least one other person. By matchable I mean that you must offer something that matches someone else's request.
If you are unmatchable, or do not have an offer that pairs with someone else's request, I will contact you through your ao3 email. please keep tabs on your ao3 email around the dates of December 25th-28th. This is when I will be reaching out to unmatchable people. If I don't hear back from you by the 28th, I will delete your sign up. So please keep in touch if you don't go out of your way to be matchable!
Pinch hit?
A pinch hit is when someone doesn't have anyone to make a gift for them. I will post their requests on my page and wait until someone takes it. By the way, the collection wont open until everyone has a gift.
If you have any questions related to sign ups, feel free to email me at mgsx22@gmail.com or comment on the dreamwidth contact post.
Assignments/Due Dates
Why?
Everything must adhere to the schedule so that the collection can open on time with everyone having a gift that meets the minimums. Like a traditional secret santa! Everyone who participates should get something on the reveal date.
How?
You must be finished with your gift, either 500 words of fic or a clean sketch if you draw, by January 29th 2023, 11:59 PM est. You have a whole month to create something. If you arent done by then, or think you wont be done by then, please contact me immediately via email (mgsx22@gmail.com).
Defaulting?
If you must default, please press the Default button in your ao3 assignment tab. You do not need to contact me or ask permission to default. Just do it as soon as you can (Any time before January 27th, 2023) so we can get a pinch hit for your recipient.
Treating?
Treating is when you create something for a person you were not assigned to. Maybe you were really inspired by their prompt but only saw it after signups closed, and you weren't able to match to them! You are free to write/draw for them too.
How?
Simply post your gift work as you usually would, but put it in the mgsx_2023 collection. You can do this from the 'Post to collection' button on most pages of the collection Be sure to spell your recipients name correctly.
Please make sure that gifting is enabled on your ao3 account, everyone!
If you have any questions related to assigns or treats, feel free to email me at mgsx22@gmail.com or comment on the dreamwidth contact post.
Fanart on ao3
Posting fanart on ao3 is as easy as it gets. All you have to do is upload your image to an image hosting site and link it in the work field with this guide.
Here are some other image hosting options that I reccomend!
Catbox Max file size 200mb, allows any drawn porn, no matter the kink. Great for guro art, loli/shotacon art, etc.
Squidge guest hosting max is 2.5mb, 256mb with an account. Hosting by fans, for fans. Another great site. Just recently banned loli/shotacon, so keep that in mind.
Imagevenue Has rules against gore, which im sure is about irl gore...but just to be safe, keep the guro to catbox. But if you want to upload a single sfw image, this is a pretty good option, too.
Mastodon On services like Baraag and Aethy, you are able to upload images as private, they will hotlink and embed as if you uploaded to a proper image hosting service. They allow all fictional art, including loli/shotacon
Tumblr Drafts If you upload your picture to tumblr, but SAVE IT AS A DRAFT. AND DO NOT POST THE DRAFT!!!!!!!!!!! it will create an anonymous link to your picture that you can then insert into the ao3 text field. Try to keep it sfw, but keep an eye on the tumblr TOS.
Services to avoid
Discord Max file size 8mb, good for anonymous imagehosting. - They are cracking down on hotlinking images uploaded.
Imgur Requires a phone number for making an account, but hosts the infamous tailsbench. You can upload images anonymously and get direct links easily, but beware! they cannot be edited without an account! - imgur TOS forbids hotlinking for fanworks.
Above all else, keep your image as anonymous as possible until reveals. You are free to upload your pictures wherever you want (social medias, etc) after creator reveals (February 5th, 2023) but please keep your images anonymous until then. I will be contacting people who have imagehosts that display their username/otherwise de-anon them so please keep this in mind when posting your pictures.
mgsx exchange guide! If you don't understand something in the general exchange process, read on! This guide is intended to be as beginner friendly to exchanges as possible, so it should hopefully answer whatever questions you have. General
DNW
A DNW or "Do Not Want/Do Not Write" is something that a requester absolutely does not want in their fic. So long as it is contained in the ao3 request, whatever is in a requests DNW must be respected by the author of their fic/artist that matches to them. Meaning, don't draw/write whatever is in the DNW!!
Try to keep your DNWs as impersonal/non-fancoppy as possible, please.
Do not try to "railroad" or force your author to write something specific with highly specific DNWs.
Example of a good DNW list: "DNW- scat, farting, bodily fluids other than blood, abuse, child death, animal death."
Example of a bad DNW list: "DNW- Anything but bosselot where theyre soulmates and actually super love eachother so much and they go out for ice cream every day and..." As it is with most things exchanges, try to see how other people use their DNWs. The AO3 app is a great way to see how other exchange participants format their signups!
Nominations
Why?
Nominations are necessary in any machine matched exchange. If there were no nominations, the algorithm that matches offer A to request B will not be able to match the two easily, because the requests do not use the same pool of tags for the machine to pick from and match to.
If I were hand matching, I could be much more lenient with the general ~vibe~ of a request and match offer A to request B, but a machine cannot vibe check like I can.
How?
You have one whole week, 7 days, one hundred and sixty eight hours to think of anything and everything you would want to request someone to make for you. You must put these tags that describe your dream fic/art in the tagset from December 10th 11:59 est to December 17th 11:59 est. Simply plug the tags you want to have in your request in the proper fields.
if you want a reference for general formatting, look at This tagset.
You are free to nominate your freeforms with additions such as "Scenario-[insert scenario tag here]"
You can nominate up to 10 relationship/characters and 20 freeforms. If you want to nominate a single character, please format it as Solo:X in the relationships tab. Example, Solo:Liquid Snake Pairings can be nominated as follows.
A/B for a sexual or romantic pairing,
A/[OMC,Mob or Any Enemy Soldier] for a sexual or romantic pairing with an original character or unnamed mob soldier(s).
A & B & C for platonic pairings
The freeform tags can be any tropes, kinks or scenarios. They do not need to be canonized ao3 tags. examples,
Alternate Universe - Soulmates
Accidental Soulbond
Cannibalism
If you have any questions related to nominations, feel free to email me at mgsx22@gmail.com or comment on the dreamwidth contact post.
Sign ups
Why?
In order to get your request in, you must fill out the signup form. it will be linked on the AO3 collection and is easy to get to.
How?
At this stage, the only tags you will be able to use are from the tagset. Make sure to nominate as much as you can!
You can now use the tags you nominated to create requests and offers. You must have 2 ships and 4 freeforms as a minimum per request and offer. Or, you may put any ship or freeform with the Any check-box. Its all up to you.
One thing though, you must offer to match to someone else's request in the collection. Your offers are what you are willing to create and you are free to put do not match notes, but you must be matchable to at least one other person. By matchable I mean that you must offer something that matches someone else's request.
If you are unmatchable, or do not have an offer that pairs with someone else's request, I will contact you through your ao3 email. please keep tabs on your ao3 email around the dates of December 25th-28th. This is when I will be reaching out to unmatchable people. If I don't hear back from you by the 28th, I will delete your sign up. So please keep in touch if you don't go out of your way to be matchable!
Pinch hit?
A pinch hit is when someone doesn't have anyone to make a gift for them. I will post their requests on my page and wait until someone takes it. By the way, the collection wont open until everyone has a gift.
If you have any questions related to sign ups, feel free to email me at mgsx22@gmail.com or comment on the dreamwidth contact post.
Assignments/Due Dates
Why?
Everything must adhere to the schedule so that the collection can open on time with everyone having a gift that meets the minimums. Like a traditional secret santa! Everyone who participates should get something on the reveal date.
How?
You must be finished with your gift, either 500 words of fic or a clean sketch if you draw, by January 29th 2023, 11:59 PM est. You have a whole month to create something. If you arent done by then, or think you wont be done by then, please contact me immediately via email (mgsx22@gmail.com).
Defaulting?
If you must default, please press the Default button in your ao3 assignment tab. You do not need to contact me or ask permission to default. Just do it as soon as you can (Any time before January 27th, 2023) so we can get a pinch hit for your recipient.
Treating?
Treating is when you create something for a person you were not assigned to. Maybe you were really inspired by their prompt but only saw it after signups closed, and you weren't able to match to them! You are free to write/draw for them too.
How?
Simply post your gift work as you usually would, but put it in the mgsx_2023 collection. You can do this from the 'Post to collection' button on most pages of the collection Be sure to spell your recipients name correctly.
Please make sure that gifting is enabled on your ao3 account, everyone!
If you have any questions related to assigns or treats, feel free to email me at mgsx22@gmail.com or comment on the dreamwidth contact post.
Fanart on ao3
Posting fanart on ao3 is as easy as it gets. All you have to do is upload your image to an image hosting site and link it in the work field with this guide.
Here are some other image hosting options that I reccomend!
Catbox Max file size 200mb, allows any drawn porn, no matter the kink. Great for guro art, loli/shotacon art, etc.
Squidge guest hosting max is 2.5mb, 256mb with an account. Hosting by fans, for fans. Another great site. Just recently banned loli/shotacon, so keep that in mind.
Imagevenue Has rules against gore, which im sure is about irl gore...but just to be safe, keep the guro to catbox. But if you want to upload a single sfw image, this is a pretty good option, too.
Mastodon On services like Baraag and Aethy, you are able to upload images as private, they will hotlink and embed as if you uploaded to a proper image hosting service. They allow all fictional art, including loli/shotacon
Tumblr Drafts If you upload your picture to tumblr, but SAVE IT AS A DRAFT. AND DO NOT POST THE DRAFT!!!!!!!!!!! it will create an anonymous link to your picture that you can then insert into the ao3 text field. Try to keep it sfw, but keep an eye on the tumblr TOS.
Services to avoid
Above all else, keep your image as anonymous as possible until reveals. You are free to upload your pictures wherever you want (social medias, etc) after creator reveals (February 5th, 2023) but please keep your images anonymous until then. I will be contacting people who have imagehosts that display their username/otherwise de-anon them so please keep this in mind when posting your pictures.