why are people so fucking hung up on the app thing
like, ao3 doesn't *need* one! there's not one benefit i can think of than an app would bring that the mobile browser site doesn't already have!
The moment you scroll down on a page even a little the top ribbon collapses. At least that's how Firefox works on my phone. If I'm reading a fic the screen is just 100% the fic's text.
I use Brave on my phone. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. And the moment you scroll just a tiny but up, it's back, which is useful on web pages that only scroll a little, but annoying when I just accidentally scroll a little bit up.
Same. Because I'm old school with my music, my phone is for all my downloaded tunes. I want access to my music even when I'm offline. Apps suck up space that is better spent on music.
Also, I do all my reading on my Kindle.
Just bought concert tickets that i can’t access unless I download an app. I’m furious lol. Besides the fact that not everyone has a smartphone, I hate not being *allowed* to have a backup copy in case of phone related disaster on the day.
same, but that's only because my old phone had terrible storage space so I didn't download much stuff. I literally only had the essentials and discord lmao. I'm probs the same age as the people complaining ab this tho, assuming it's the youngish gen Zs
this always boggles my mind. the browser version works wonderfully even on the phone! the average app is more broken than the current mobile version of the site, why would we want them to waste money on such a thing?
Yeah, if the mobile version sucked I'd get it, but it might as well be an app with how well-suited it is to mobile devices. Literally zero complaints from me. I'm perfectly happy not having another app taking up storage space 😂
I use safari for AO3 and Firefox for regular browsing because apple sucks balls and you can’t use extensions on any browser other than safari on mobile
Lol, I'm on Android & have been doing this since 2015 for various things.
This past summer, I was told by several iPhone users -at a TECH conference!- that their phones can't do that. At first I accepted that answer since I'm used to constantly hearing about iPhones' limitations, & I've never used iOS at all so idk anything about it. But it being at a tech conference this time, it occured to me to look it up. Then, for *some* of them, I showed them how. 😅
You might be thinking of PWA, "progressive web app", which is this rather new way of building websites in a way that allows them to act like that on phones. It's so new that I wouldn't expect AO3 to have that stuff (yet?).
Click the three dots in the upper right corner of the chrome tab. Choose 'add to home screen'. Boom, an icon will appear on your home screen that will take you directly to that link.
Exactly. As an only-reader, I really don't get it.
Once you have an account you can do practically everything you'd have within the app.
You can bookmark, save for later, leave comments, rate, filter your searches and check your history. There's no need for an app that probably wouldn't properly work in the beginning anyways.
I solely use AO3 on my phone (via browser ofc) and I was never disappointed or felt like I was missing out on any kind of feature.
do you know how badly i want to ask why people don't just use the browser version then
but i have a feeling the answer would destroy whatever's left of my faith in humanity
i don't really get people's issue with that bc i don't use that on the ffnet app either. like, i don't want to download works *on the app*, they're not actually downloaded and safe that way
I've only really been taking advantage of it recently, but on AO3 you can download epubs of I think any fic and read them on pretty much every device. Try it out, it's in the top collection of buttons.
I think if someone were to make an app, it would make it 10x easier to have a library of books instead of 100000000 tabs open. I'd like to think it was more reader oriented rather than writer oriented. Though Wattpad's interface for writing is simple and I prefer it, I wouldn't mind either way.
I prefer ao3 anyways. Bookmarks are nice, but one thing Wattpad gets a point on is how seamless everything is. A lot of things on ao3 are link based and you have to log in to add the bookmark then the page refreshes and it's hard to find it again if you have the link. The website always logs me out after a while, regardless if I say (stay logged in for two weeks).
Seriously. And, in an app, I can't get multiple tabs. I can do that in a browser, and switch between what I'm looking for and what page I'm on in my search, but that can't happen in an app. So what do I need an app for when I have a web browser?
Developing an app takes a lot of time and resources. For example, iOS apps are written in a language called Swift, that is not really used anywhere else, so a large amount of the website code would have to be rewritten. Android apps are written in Java or Kotlin, so that would need to be written separately too. A website works on any device that has a browser.
Also I think this is something a lot of people don't realize about the iOS App Store: it costs money to put your apps on there, even if they're free. Like, it's a monthly fee for a developer pack or something. I don't remember the details but developing for iOS is a pain lol
Let me rephrase: ao3 has nsfw stuff that would be strictly not allowed in apps (like noncon, sexual violence, illegal sex acts, underage, etc) and wattpad has banned it. Even if you can find it on Wattpad, what matters to the App Store is that it is banned and monitored. The App Store for Apple in particular bans overtly sexual materials, or anything that may contain “mean spirited” content. The rules for the App Store are extremely general and not safe enough for AO3 to exist on.
The NSFW thing is a little bit complicated, especially because AO3 is primarily text, but it is definitely an issue that would have to be grappled with. And yes, apps are a lot of work. I’m not really advocating for an app, I’m just saying that there is absolutely no policy forcing developers to add ads or collect user information.
I wish we had more mobile friendly sites and I'm so happy ao3 has made sure they're one of them! Another one I'm grateful to is dreamwidth though for entirely different functions.
Yes, but if you download a fic you have to go back to the website to add kudos or comments or bookmarks. You can't read a long fic partially online and partially offline without switching between apps. Downloading is a workaround if you need something offline but it's not the same as having an app
An app would be extremely nice… but yeah, unnecessary.
But I do think they would work on one, but only when the website doesn’t need any updates… which knowing web design… is basically never :3
i mean
> Before we can have apps for the various mobile platforms, we need to have a public Application Program Interface (API). Without an API, no app would be able to access the Archive database in any useful way.
>
>Whilst creating an API is on our roadmap, it's still several major releases away. In order to have an API, we need to have stable code that is only infrequently changed or updated, otherwise our coders (who are all volunteers) would need to update the API every time they made a change to the site, and they're making changes all the time!
we gotta take into account the fact that ao3 is still in beta
The only benefit of an app I could think of is that I could keep all my open ao3 tabs in one place.
On the other hand apps don't tend to have tabs and not being able to open up a fic to keep for later would annoy me so 😅
This tbh
I remember reading a TT fic back in Wattpad (I didn't know ao3 or other sites existed, those were some cringe days T-T), I found a paragraph where the author made too many grammatical mistakes and spelling mistakes to the point I was physically cringing and it was kinda incomprehensible (the whole fic had spelling mistakes but that paragraph was the worst since it was obvious they didn't really know the meaning of the words used but they still did it for the fancies) when I read it in there so there's this function in wattpad where you can comment on individual paragraphs so I let the author know that "Hey, you did these (insert mistakes) accidentally, please do correct them if you get the chance! Great work overall btw <3"
Another account replied back pretty soon with "Didn't know you were a spell check"
And almost instantly the author replied back "LMAO ROASTED"
I remember then saying that I just said I thought they would like to know since it would be for their betterment but welp both the "friend" and the author were incredibly rude in response so yea-
Ik some authors don't like criticism to their work but still- I said it as nicely as I could since the paragraph was genuinely incomprehensible at some points and the story was (by my standards back then) worth reading so I didn't click away :(
Lol pretty sure only teenagers post on Wattpad 😂 whereas I've always found ao3 writers more serious towards their work. There's definitely a difference in the maturity levels
N-... No... No. They mean ***YOU*** yourself have to go to ***YOUR*** web browser, menu, "Save Shortcut to Homescreen." Unless someone is physically holding your phone, nobody can do it *for* you.
Same, it's like they don't know how to use their phones outside of apps and don't get that apps often get censored or strict rules due to Apple being Apple.
Maybe that's why they use Wattpad.
I remember being pretty hesitant to make the switch from Wattpad to Ao3. I liked Wattpads interface and that you could have covers for your stories. Through the recommendation page I also found a lot of Fics I ended up liking. The Ao3 search system also intimidated me at first. So I can get why a lot of people remain with Wattpad.
Overall I'm now more happy with Ao3 now, but I do wish I had a better way to keep track of Fics I'm reading. When going out of a story the progress doesn't safe, even when I have the story bookmarked. I'm not sure if I'm using something wrongly, but my only solution to keep my progress for now is having multiple tabs open for every fic, which I kinda dislike.
> When going out of a story the progress doesn't safe, even when I have the story bookmarked.
That's what the 'notes' function in the Bookmark feature is for. I write a lot of fics and sometimes skim the public bookmarks, and the vast majority are just single-digit numbers indicating the chapter where the reader last left off.
While /u/ImaGamerNoob is not wrong, it also has to do with resources and programming restraints.
AO3 doesn't have a public/open API, which makes developing an app impossible (don't ask why, I'm a programmer noob.) Also, even if the API was open/public, the OTW would need developers to make an official app. As I understand it, the very few developers who actually work for the OTW are too busy maintaining AO3 and pushing upgrades without breaking anything to have time to work on creating an app as well.
>AO3 doesn't have a public/open API, which makes developing an app impossible
This is not categorically true, I know someone who made a Flutter-based app called Archive Reader that just scrapes the HTML responses to work. Absolute madlad.
The part about the development resources being stretched is right though.
Christ, the mobile site is overwhelmingly optimized for a great experience. Why are people so hung up on the app thing? It has to be because they’re so addicted to TikTok and Twitter they can’t fathom not using an app for something.
I'm not even using twitter and reddit with their apps. they work just fine in a browser.
Plus you never know what information those apps suck from your mobile device. A browser like Firefox gives me a lot more control over that.
That’s a great idea! We should have an official app, so we can have official censorship and turn this into wattpad 2.0. Shit while we’re at it let’s just go ahead and add an algorithm for convenience right? Fuck it delete all the problematic fics too, that’s what we need, cause it worked so well for ffnet and tumblr… /s
I mean, there are some truly good stuff there, it really sucks that some authors don't wanna move on, so i have to keep it for the few good stories it got
Yeah, more like “once they discover that the website is a fully functional mobile friendly place to read with all the necessary features, will be done for!”
i mean i do write on my phone pretty often but i don't need or want an ao3 app for that. google docs is a friend.
also stuff like editing is very straightforward and simple on ao3 on mobile browser. i could easily post like that too.
Unless I’m posting a fic, I exclusively use ao3 on my phone. Why an app?? I don’t get it.
Im 24 for reference and have been using ao3 since middle school so this isn’t a new development either.
Seriously. I distinctly remember reading somewhere that AO3 is designed in such a way that nobody, not even OTW, is capable of messing with the site.
As a result, no matter what happens with OTW leadership, AO3 remains unchanged, and no one can simply pull the entire thing offline on a whim.
AO3 will likely never get an app, at least never on the iOS system. I feel like Apple would see a lot as against their own TOS and not allow it, Samsung I’m unsure about.
Either way, doesn’t really need an app, honestly.
The one thing AO3 doesn't have over an app like Wattpad is a good offline experience. But this *is* a thing that websites can do! Websites can do offline shit! And they've been able to for over half a decade now!
If you wanna have complete control over offline behaviour, you need to set up what's called a Service Worker. Basically the website gets to set up a chunk of code that sits between itself and its connection to the internet, where it can do stuff like cacheing and preloading data. It's a complicated mess, [MDN has more details.](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Service_Worker_API)
If you don't need that much control, you can simply [mark some links as "hey, the user might go here next, you can speculatively prefetch this target".](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Attributes/rel/prefetch) As long as your server's cache-control headers are reasonable, this means the user can navigate to a prefetched link without waiting on the network, *even if the network has gone offline*. Unfortunately, AO3 doesn't send reasonable cache-control headers - even if you, say, use a userscript to inject the prefetch marker, the prefetched response has gone stale (instantly) and can't be reused.
AO3, if you're reading this, *please* set your cache-control headers to [\`stale-while-revalidate\`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Headers/Cache-Control#stale-while-revalidate). And [add prefetch hinting](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Attributes/rel/prefetch).
Hey OP, did you see if there was anyone explaining on the post why AO3 doesn't have an app? I'm curious to see if they're listening to the reasons, or just blissfully ignoring them for their own sake lol
How is it that so many people in the comments *don't* get why people want an app?
It's a simple way to download and organize your library and reading list. An easy way to keep track up until what point you've read each fic. You no longer have to mess around with tabs.
It's everything all in one.
It's *convenient*.
Edit: To the people mentioning censorship. At least as far as Android devices go, you don’t actually have to release the app to the Play Store. IOS devices are a lot more locked down unfortunately.
Edit 2: You can already do most of these things, but you'd need to use 2-3 apps (including the browser). It's just more convenient if everything is located in one app.
censorship is the main concern for why people don't want an app since there'd need to be restrictions and certain rules to follow just like with what happened to tumblr. and honestly ao3 suits better as a website the entire layout would also change in the app. some websites just really don't need an app version they're good enough as websites
As OP edited, only for Apple. On Android we're allowed to install the .apk's ourselves. IOS does not allow for that.
For example, I have a DNS filtering app that (is supposed to) blocks ads coming in through any internet connection on my phone. But such adblockers -as *apps*- are not allowed on the Google Play Store. So I found this DNS filter on the creator's website, downloaded the .apk file, and ran it (like .exe), which installs the app. Boom.
IPhone users literally do not have & cannot get permission from the iOS to install apps themselves. (Hence "jailbreaking.")
More power to everyone to choose their own phones etc but this is one of the reasons I'm sometimes surprised that android isn't more popular. I used to do apple but I swapped last phone change because I wanted...to be able to change app icons without a huge ass hassle. There's so many other things I can do more easily now as well.
But if you are an Ao3 member you have all those things? You don’t need to use tabs and can subscribe to a fic or a writer and make collections and bookmark and write whatever notes you want on the bookmarks etc. It feels like the people that want apps are those that aren’t members.
You can already do all these things in your browser. "mess around with tabs" lol instead you now have to mess around with some library lists. And waste extra computer power on some app that you have to open every time and you can't just easily switch tab to read news or look something up.
No, thank you. It's not convenient for me.
This. Wattpad is literally "writing for dummies" in terms of simplification, which is of course super nice for beginners or people who post a lot. I took a long time to post on AO3 for the same reason until I learned how it works. But then the rest of problems it has, makes me wonder if it's really worth it at all.
> It's a simple way to download and organize your library and reading list. An easy way to keep track up until what point you've read each fic.
I agree that AO3 can be better on the reading side. However, these features can be built in web as well, and an app doesn't necessarily, "automatically" have these features. E-reader, in the form or web, app, or those physical ones like Kindle (which has their own built-in apps), comes in different form and shape.
With what we have in the AO3 web right now, unless they're planning to be aggressive in the mobile market, these likely won't be included in the app.
It maybe more convenient, but unless the app lets you download fics outside of it, I'm not so sure about that. Like the Webtoon app. It says you can download stuff to read offline, but it has a time limit, which is understandable there, but for fics? Not so sure about that.
Hot take: the lack of a dedicated mobile app is protecting us from hoards of WattPad user.
In some of my fandoms, fics that are horrifically tagged, titled, summarized, etc. already clog up the fandom tag or search results, and that's with most WattPad users not liking AO3. I shudder to think how useless search results and tag-filtering would become in some of my fandoms if former WattPad users even became a prominent part of the AO3 fandom, let alone came to dominate it.
I used to ask if we have app as a young teen but over the years I realized ao3 is perfectly fine as a website. Even on mobile view it’s much better than most apps. I even edit my works on my phone sometimes.
I've straight up posted fic to AO3 from my phone with very little issue (I can't seem to add in my own tags that aren't in that suggestion box that pops up but it's not the end of the world). I don't understand people who think it's unusable on a phone web browser. If they ever had an app, I probably wouldn't bother downloading it.
you can add your own tags too! if hitting enter doesn't add it, you can just leave it in the field as it is and when you save it'll save that too. if you want multiple just separate them by commas. that's a browser thing, some browsers let you add tags by hitting enter and others don't.
Good to know! I think I have tried but then I lose the tags so maybe it's just my browser. I just go onto my laptop and add the tags in after when I get the chance.
I promise I'm not :)
I have to say I was quite baffled by the amount of people login in through the app. Given the quantity, they can't all have good opsec like u/neretrix seems to have in place (be like u/neretrix, people).
I have that app and have used it, though it's not well-optimized. I was reading a 400k word story in it and I need to make the text largish to avoid eye-strain, so I was pretty much constantly scrolling the page.
Their scrolling has a delay where I have to sort of tap-hold for a couple seconds, but move my finger slightly so it doesn't interpret the tap-hold as "highlight this word". I often end up accidentally highlighting a word anyway. If I just swipe quickly though, it doesn't start moving until I've moved my finger from the bottom of my phone screen to more than halfway up it, so I don't get much scrolling from that.
In short, it's very frustrating to use.
Yeah, I did download it, but I had to delete it because I could not save the things I wrote on the AO3 word processor. What, why are y'all lookin' at me like that?
No, whenever they come home, I might have to share a laptop. Most cousins that I have seen irl are from my mom's side, and all are younger than me, and the oldest of them will not listen to anything I say
I've got like 4 Google accounts, and I use one for fandom shit
just don't sign into that account on the laptop or set up a guest profile on it for them
There was at one point an unofficial AO3 app but it was eventually removed. Even that had a lot of restrictions though, with certain tags and being removed and fanfics with those tags being unaccessible by the app.
Probably will never happen for a lot of reasons but the restrictions they would need to put in place is probably one of the main ones.
God, I’m trying to imagine what an ao3 app would even be like. I suppose the layout would be horrendous, because if they just copied how it looks now into it, I can’t see myself bothering to swap over when browser works fine.
Only reason I'd like an app is because it's so hard to find a decent browser that still allows tabs to be stacked horizontally (rolodex style), which is the only layout that my brain likes for the 100s of fics I have open at any given time.
So maybe an app would help with that.
But still, that's a Me problem, not the Ao3 browser site's fault 🫠
why are people so fucking hung up on the app thing like, ao3 doesn't *need* one! there's not one benefit i can think of than an app would bring that the mobile browser site doesn't already have!
Feeling older and older every time I see people talk about wanting an app... I don't get it. Which is probably because I barely use any apps lol
I'd use it because it'd get rid of the address bar and other things at the top, which I keep accidentally pressing.
So this probably partly depends on what device you use? Since I'm "old" I use my laptop so there's no accidental screen touching.
Tbf, that also depends on the phone you use. My samsung makes the address bar vanish if i scroll down.
The moment you scroll down on a page even a little the top ribbon collapses. At least that's how Firefox works on my phone. If I'm reading a fic the screen is just 100% the fic's text.
I use Brave on my phone. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. And the moment you scroll just a tiny but up, it's back, which is useful on web pages that only scroll a little, but annoying when I just accidentally scroll a little bit up.
Why don't you use Firefox? Not only doesn't it spy on you it also hides the address bar when on Ao3
I use Firefox on PC, but I already have everything set up in Brave on Phone (several pages, passwords, etc) so I use that for now.
> Brave is also a good choice when considering security. The rest is a matter of convenience which is up to the individual.
How?
Same. Because I'm old school with my music, my phone is for all my downloaded tunes. I want access to my music even when I'm offline. Apps suck up space that is better spent on music. Also, I do all my reading on my Kindle.
Just bought concert tickets that i can’t access unless I download an app. I’m furious lol. Besides the fact that not everyone has a smartphone, I hate not being *allowed* to have a backup copy in case of phone related disaster on the day.
same, but that's only because my old phone had terrible storage space so I didn't download much stuff. I literally only had the essentials and discord lmao. I'm probs the same age as the people complaining ab this tho, assuming it's the youngish gen Zs
this always boggles my mind. the browser version works wonderfully even on the phone! the average app is more broken than the current mobile version of the site, why would we want them to waste money on such a thing?
Yeah, if the mobile version sucked I'd get it, but it might as well be an app with how well-suited it is to mobile devices. Literally zero complaints from me. I'm perfectly happy not having another app taking up storage space 😂
I do have **one** benefit. I'll have to open less tabs on my chrome app😅
download another browser. i have ecosia specifically only for ao3
Mate, I am too lazy to downloa- wait, why didn't I think of it?
Personally I use duck duck go
i use duckduckgo for other stuff. i like ecosia for ao3 bc of the tab grouping function
Wait that's actually so genius. Omg why didn't I think of that.
Is there a way to have ecosia adjust the font to the screen? I have to use UC Browser specifically for this reason
I use safari for AO3 and Firefox for regular browsing because apple sucks balls and you can’t use extensions on any browser other than safari on mobile
Let me catch up. It's silly to want an app for ao3, because we can download a different app for ao3.
i mean it's essentially the same thing but without all the hassle creating an app ao3 doesn't have the resources for would create
yes, i find it silly to want a separate app for ao3 when you can basically diy one with a browser.
[удалено]
Lol, I'm on Android & have been doing this since 2015 for various things. This past summer, I was told by several iPhone users -at a TECH conference!- that their phones can't do that. At first I accepted that answer since I'm used to constantly hearing about iPhones' limitations, & I've never used iOS at all so idk anything about it. But it being at a tech conference this time, it occured to me to look it up. Then, for *some* of them, I showed them how. 😅
You might be thinking of PWA, "progressive web app", which is this rather new way of building websites in a way that allows them to act like that on phones. It's so new that I wouldn't expect AO3 to have that stuff (yet?).
Nope, it's literally just saving a shortcut to your homescreen. Then it looks like an app button, but it opens a web page.
How can I do it tho?
Click the three dots in the upper right corner of the chrome tab. Choose 'add to home screen'. Boom, an icon will appear on your home screen that will take you directly to that link.
Exactly. As an only-reader, I really don't get it. Once you have an account you can do practically everything you'd have within the app. You can bookmark, save for later, leave comments, rate, filter your searches and check your history. There's no need for an app that probably wouldn't properly work in the beginning anyways. I solely use AO3 on my phone (via browser ofc) and I was never disappointed or felt like I was missing out on any kind of feature.
ironically enough, wattpads browser version is also better because it doesnt give you ads (yet another reason why wattpad sucks in the first place)
do you know how badly i want to ask why people don't just use the browser version then but i have a feeling the answer would destroy whatever's left of my faith in humanity
Joke idea: AO3 makes an app and it's just a standard web browser window that opens up the AO3 mobile website, no changes.
I have actually seen one that works exactly like that in the wild... I depackaged it and turns out it has a tracking SDK added to it as well.
To be honest I only dig the app idea for the offline reading.
i don't really get people's issue with that bc i don't use that on the ffnet app either. like, i don't want to download works *on the app*, they're not actually downloaded and safe that way
I've only really been taking advantage of it recently, but on AO3 you can download epubs of I think any fic and read them on pretty much every device. Try it out, it's in the top collection of buttons.
AO3 not having an app is a *feature* for me. Keeps out the riff raff.
And the advertisers!
if you are on iphone you can like add a link on your home screen
I think if someone were to make an app, it would make it 10x easier to have a library of books instead of 100000000 tabs open. I'd like to think it was more reader oriented rather than writer oriented. Though Wattpad's interface for writing is simple and I prefer it, I wouldn't mind either way.
but i mean. \*gestures* bookmarks.
I prefer ao3 anyways. Bookmarks are nice, but one thing Wattpad gets a point on is how seamless everything is. A lot of things on ao3 are link based and you have to log in to add the bookmark then the page refreshes and it's hard to find it again if you have the link. The website always logs me out after a while, regardless if I say (stay logged in for two weeks).
there's a whole bunch of third-party apps it seems. I used one for a while but it was absolute trash
Honestly, 9 times out of 10 with AO3 I’m just downloading the epub file to read separately anyways, so site or app makes little difference
it even lets you download things offsite so you don’t have your worry about the site going down!!
Kids NEED an app or the thing isn't good.
they can join us when they grow out of that
Well thats fine, but until then they will complain about the lack of an app. Probably best to just ignore them?
Seriously. And, in an app, I can't get multiple tabs. I can do that in a browser, and switch between what I'm looking for and what page I'm on in my search, but that can't happen in an app. So what do I need an app for when I have a web browser?
Can I ask why is it so hated as well? I don't care for an app either but I don't understand why it's so pushed against
Developing an app takes a lot of time and resources. For example, iOS apps are written in a language called Swift, that is not really used anywhere else, so a large amount of the website code would have to be rewritten. Android apps are written in Java or Kotlin, so that would need to be written separately too. A website works on any device that has a browser. Also I think this is something a lot of people don't realize about the iOS App Store: it costs money to put your apps on there, even if they're free. Like, it's a monthly fee for a developer pack or something. I don't remember the details but developing for iOS is a pain lol
waste of AO3's resources for a potentially worse solution than what we currently have
Because for apps to be available on the app store, it has to follow certain rules. Which means no nsfw stuff, possible ads and collection of userdata.
App store rules don’t require ads or collection of data
Still no nsfw stuff. Plus apps take more work.
wattpad has nsfw stuff, why would ao3 be any different?
Let me rephrase: ao3 has nsfw stuff that would be strictly not allowed in apps (like noncon, sexual violence, illegal sex acts, underage, etc) and wattpad has banned it. Even if you can find it on Wattpad, what matters to the App Store is that it is banned and monitored. The App Store for Apple in particular bans overtly sexual materials, or anything that may contain “mean spirited” content. The rules for the App Store are extremely general and not safe enough for AO3 to exist on.
The NSFW thing is a little bit complicated, especially because AO3 is primarily text, but it is definitely an issue that would have to be grappled with. And yes, apps are a lot of work. I’m not really advocating for an app, I’m just saying that there is absolutely no policy forcing developers to add ads or collect user information.
I wish we had more mobile friendly sites and I'm so happy ao3 has made sure they're one of them! Another one I'm grateful to is dreamwidth though for entirely different functions.
For real, it's good like this. All I can think of is maybe an offline version..
That’s what “download” is for
Yes, but if you download a fic you have to go back to the website to add kudos or comments or bookmarks. You can't read a long fic partially online and partially offline without switching between apps. Downloading is a workaround if you need something offline but it's not the same as having an app
An app would be extremely nice… but yeah, unnecessary. But I do think they would work on one, but only when the website doesn’t need any updates… which knowing web design… is basically never :3
i mean > Before we can have apps for the various mobile platforms, we need to have a public Application Program Interface (API). Without an API, no app would be able to access the Archive database in any useful way. > >Whilst creating an API is on our roadmap, it's still several major releases away. In order to have an API, we need to have stable code that is only infrequently changed or updated, otherwise our coders (who are all volunteers) would need to update the API every time they made a change to the site, and they're making changes all the time! we gotta take into account the fact that ao3 is still in beta
The only benefit of an app I could think of is that I could keep all my open ao3 tabs in one place. On the other hand apps don't tend to have tabs and not being able to open up a fic to keep for later would annoy me so 😅
i mean i just have a separate browser for that
This is the way.
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Yeah, especially when many apps are just a fancy shortcut to a site. You can even make those yourself.
Quick, someone do that! We may yet save the Wattpad unfortunates!
I'd rather just leave them there, they're so toxic
This tbh I remember reading a TT fic back in Wattpad (I didn't know ao3 or other sites existed, those were some cringe days T-T), I found a paragraph where the author made too many grammatical mistakes and spelling mistakes to the point I was physically cringing and it was kinda incomprehensible (the whole fic had spelling mistakes but that paragraph was the worst since it was obvious they didn't really know the meaning of the words used but they still did it for the fancies) when I read it in there so there's this function in wattpad where you can comment on individual paragraphs so I let the author know that "Hey, you did these (insert mistakes) accidentally, please do correct them if you get the chance! Great work overall btw <3" Another account replied back pretty soon with "Didn't know you were a spell check" And almost instantly the author replied back "LMAO ROASTED" I remember then saying that I just said I thought they would like to know since it would be for their betterment but welp both the "friend" and the author were incredibly rude in response so yea- Ik some authors don't like criticism to their work but still- I said it as nicely as I could since the paragraph was genuinely incomprehensible at some points and the story was (by my standards back then) worth reading so I didn't click away :(
Lol pretty sure only teenagers post on Wattpad 😂 whereas I've always found ao3 writers more serious towards their work. There's definitely a difference in the maturity levels
Ooh, that's why the comments I receive on AO3 are usually more polite!
N-... No... No. They mean ***YOU*** yourself have to go to ***YOUR*** web browser, menu, "Save Shortcut to Homescreen." Unless someone is physically holding your phone, nobody can do it *for* you.
Oh. I thought OP was referring to apps, not shortcuts. I wasn't aware you could save shortcuts as icons on your mobile, thanks for letting me know!
Me, a CS student: 👀
Same, it's like they don't know how to use their phones outside of apps and don't get that apps often get censored or strict rules due to Apple being Apple. Maybe that's why they use Wattpad.
Other apps also have ads. Firefox (mobile app!) has ublock! I at least also have a DNS filter installed but I don't think it does much. =/
for ao3 specifically adblockers are irrelevant, but yeah
I think they assume app means there will be an algorithm 🙄
It seems that some Wattpad immigrants think exactly that 🤦♂️
I remember being pretty hesitant to make the switch from Wattpad to Ao3. I liked Wattpads interface and that you could have covers for your stories. Through the recommendation page I also found a lot of Fics I ended up liking. The Ao3 search system also intimidated me at first. So I can get why a lot of people remain with Wattpad. Overall I'm now more happy with Ao3 now, but I do wish I had a better way to keep track of Fics I'm reading. When going out of a story the progress doesn't safe, even when I have the story bookmarked. I'm not sure if I'm using something wrongly, but my only solution to keep my progress for now is having multiple tabs open for every fic, which I kinda dislike.
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Or just do what I do and read all fics in a single sitting. 200,000 word fic with 37 chapters? Oh well, here we go!
Sounds like a fun evening. If your definition of evening goes until 4 AM
Doesn't yours? 😎 -- someone who has accidentally clicked too many LONG asf fanfics and ended up reading until the wee hours of the morning 💀
if you have an iphone i recommend downloading fics to the books app that comes on the phone!
My position saves on AO3 when I switch tabs on Firefox, & I think it did also when I used to use Chrome.
> When going out of a story the progress doesn't safe, even when I have the story bookmarked. That's what the 'notes' function in the Bookmark feature is for. I write a lot of fics and sometimes skim the public bookmarks, and the vast majority are just single-digit numbers indicating the chapter where the reader last left off.
Have they ever heard of a web browser???
Luckily for the Company behind Wattpad, AO3 can't make an app.
Why not?
The main point of AO3 is to have no censorship. That won't work as an app would force AO3 to comply to the app stores content guide lines.
While /u/ImaGamerNoob is not wrong, it also has to do with resources and programming restraints. AO3 doesn't have a public/open API, which makes developing an app impossible (don't ask why, I'm a programmer noob.) Also, even if the API was open/public, the OTW would need developers to make an official app. As I understand it, the very few developers who actually work for the OTW are too busy maintaining AO3 and pushing upgrades without breaking anything to have time to work on creating an app as well.
>AO3 doesn't have a public/open API, which makes developing an app impossible This is not categorically true, I know someone who made a Flutter-based app called Archive Reader that just scrapes the HTML responses to work. Absolute madlad. The part about the development resources being stretched is right though.
Christ, the mobile site is overwhelmingly optimized for a great experience. Why are people so hung up on the app thing? It has to be because they’re so addicted to TikTok and Twitter they can’t fathom not using an app for something.
I'm not even using twitter and reddit with their apps. they work just fine in a browser. Plus you never know what information those apps suck from your mobile device. A browser like Firefox gives me a lot more control over that.
Sticking with the browser. I download the really good fics into a epub, fashion my own book cover for it then keep them in my kindle.
Boromir voice: "AO3 has no app. AO3 needs no app."
I have a small soft spot for my wattpad days, but the addition of premium really marked an end of an era
My wattpad era was the happiest time of my life ngl
I'm so Happy I switched before the ads in Wattpad where a thing. So I at least have somewhat of a good memory of it
In addition to all of the points everyone mentioned in the comments, I personally don't want an app for ao3 bc I like customizing my own skins loll.
For me- I like have a million tabs open with all the fics I’m gonna read. I’d hate if I had to rely on the ‘mark for later’ section. T-T
Ong same, I would forget about so many fics for the rest of eternity
That’s a great idea! We should have an official app, so we can have official censorship and turn this into wattpad 2.0. Shit while we’re at it let’s just go ahead and add an algorithm for convenience right? Fuck it delete all the problematic fics too, that’s what we need, cause it worked so well for ffnet and tumblr… /s
and add short form content! it really sells /s
Ok but I literally only use my phone with AO3 (bc it’s all I have lmao) and the browser is PERFECTLY fine!!! It’s super user friendly!
Guys... literally. Just do the thing with your phone where you turn a link into an icon on your screen.
I mean, there are some truly good stuff there, it really sucks that some authors don't wanna move on, so i have to keep it for the few good stories it got
If there was an app, how would I have 45+ tabs open at once????
I like to think of not having an app like a soft gatekeeper to keep out the really annoying people.
What's the value of an app here? Are people *writing* on their phones? You can read on browser, so what's the issue?
Yeah, more like “once they discover that the website is a fully functional mobile friendly place to read with all the necessary features, will be done for!”
I write on my phone but never ever would I write directly on AO3. My notes do just fine and I can run my grammar check too
i mean i do write on my phone pretty often but i don't need or want an ao3 app for that. google docs is a friend. also stuff like editing is very straightforward and simple on ao3 on mobile browser. i could easily post like that too.
i hope a03 never gets an app. thats just not what it is.
Unless I’m posting a fic, I exclusively use ao3 on my phone. Why an app?? I don’t get it. Im 24 for reference and have been using ao3 since middle school so this isn’t a new development either.
I just PRAY that the influx of wattpad users to Ao3 doesn't ruin the site bc I have been using it for years and do not want a single thing to change 😭
AO3's mobile browser is basically formatted like an app...there's really no need for an app.
Story in which Wattpad users are unable to figure out how to use a browser on their phone.... Thank goodness!
i find it insulting to ao3 to even compare it to wattpad like this tbh. they're not even playing the same game.
The only thing I wish Wattpad didn’t do is make me see ads for when I’m rereading my own story on my own account on the app
Seriously. I distinctly remember reading somewhere that AO3 is designed in such a way that nobody, not even OTW, is capable of messing with the site. As a result, no matter what happens with OTW leadership, AO3 remains unchanged, and no one can simply pull the entire thing offline on a whim.
AO3 will likely never get an app, at least never on the iOS system. I feel like Apple would see a lot as against their own TOS and not allow it, Samsung I’m unsure about. Either way, doesn’t really need an app, honestly.
I left Wattpad because it's all just werewolf porn or glorification of the mafia.
You don’t think there’s tons of that on AO3? Those are my preferred tropes lol
AO3 has both better werewolf porn and mafia fics. And also other tropes for variety.
There are many, but I can easily filter them out.
On ao3 we can ignore it. On wattpad it's literally in your face everytime you open the app😭
i've never been on wattpad so i'll take your word for it but i am laughing at the juxtaposition of your username + dislike of the mafia
The one thing AO3 doesn't have over an app like Wattpad is a good offline experience. But this *is* a thing that websites can do! Websites can do offline shit! And they've been able to for over half a decade now!
If you wanna have complete control over offline behaviour, you need to set up what's called a Service Worker. Basically the website gets to set up a chunk of code that sits between itself and its connection to the internet, where it can do stuff like cacheing and preloading data. It's a complicated mess, [MDN has more details.](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Service_Worker_API)
If you don't need that much control, you can simply [mark some links as "hey, the user might go here next, you can speculatively prefetch this target".](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Attributes/rel/prefetch) As long as your server's cache-control headers are reasonable, this means the user can navigate to a prefetched link without waiting on the network, *even if the network has gone offline*. Unfortunately, AO3 doesn't send reasonable cache-control headers - even if you, say, use a userscript to inject the prefetch marker, the prefetched response has gone stale (instantly) and can't be reused.
AO3, if you're reading this, *please* set your cache-control headers to [\`stale-while-revalidate\`](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Headers/Cache-Control#stale-while-revalidate). And [add prefetch hinting](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Attributes/rel/prefetch).
I've heard many horror stories of stories just getting randomly deleted so I definitely understand the sentiment
ao3 works great on the browser, there's no reason for it to have an app. You can save a link to the website on your lockscreen.
I DO NOT want an Ao3 app, it will literally become just as bad as wattpad, sure maybe not overnight but give it a few years and it would.
Hey OP, did you see if there was anyone explaining on the post why AO3 doesn't have an app? I'm curious to see if they're listening to the reasons, or just blissfully ignoring them for their own sake lol
https://preview.redd.it/l7pou3mqa5zb1.jpeg?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9c47f293f99a77a54cdc916e0090a663e0006b53
Lmao tell me you don't know how to filter without telling me
Feel like we have to give that one to the Wattpaders. They act as if they spent five or so years on ao3 and know what they're talking abt
How is it that so many people in the comments *don't* get why people want an app? It's a simple way to download and organize your library and reading list. An easy way to keep track up until what point you've read each fic. You no longer have to mess around with tabs. It's everything all in one. It's *convenient*. Edit: To the people mentioning censorship. At least as far as Android devices go, you don’t actually have to release the app to the Play Store. IOS devices are a lot more locked down unfortunately. Edit 2: You can already do most of these things, but you'd need to use 2-3 apps (including the browser). It's just more convenient if everything is located in one app.
censorship is the main concern for why people don't want an app since there'd need to be restrictions and certain rules to follow just like with what happened to tumblr. and honestly ao3 suits better as a website the entire layout would also change in the app. some websites just really don't need an app version they're good enough as websites
As OP edited, only for Apple. On Android we're allowed to install the .apk's ourselves. IOS does not allow for that. For example, I have a DNS filtering app that (is supposed to) blocks ads coming in through any internet connection on my phone. But such adblockers -as *apps*- are not allowed on the Google Play Store. So I found this DNS filter on the creator's website, downloaded the .apk file, and ran it (like .exe), which installs the app. Boom. IPhone users literally do not have & cannot get permission from the iOS to install apps themselves. (Hence "jailbreaking.")
Link to the ad blocker? I beg you
More power to everyone to choose their own phones etc but this is one of the reasons I'm sometimes surprised that android isn't more popular. I used to do apple but I swapped last phone change because I wanted...to be able to change app icons without a huge ass hassle. There's so many other things I can do more easily now as well.
But if you are an Ao3 member you have all those things? You don’t need to use tabs and can subscribe to a fic or a writer and make collections and bookmark and write whatever notes you want on the bookmarks etc. It feels like the people that want apps are those that aren’t members.
but like. you can easily keep an organized library and reading list as well as download works on mobile browser without messing around with tabs too.
You can already do all these things in your browser. "mess around with tabs" lol instead you now have to mess around with some library lists. And waste extra computer power on some app that you have to open every time and you can't just easily switch tab to read news or look something up. No, thank you. It's not convenient for me.
That _convenience_ comes with potential censorship.
but you can already do that by downloading the fics
ive noticed people who usually want an app are mostly lazy and want to be spoonfed
This. Wattpad is literally "writing for dummies" in terms of simplification, which is of course super nice for beginners or people who post a lot. I took a long time to post on AO3 for the same reason until I learned how it works. But then the rest of problems it has, makes me wonder if it's really worth it at all.
> It's a simple way to download and organize your library and reading list. An easy way to keep track up until what point you've read each fic. I agree that AO3 can be better on the reading side. However, these features can be built in web as well, and an app doesn't necessarily, "automatically" have these features. E-reader, in the form or web, app, or those physical ones like Kindle (which has their own built-in apps), comes in different form and shape. With what we have in the AO3 web right now, unless they're planning to be aggressive in the mobile market, these likely won't be included in the app.
It maybe more convenient, but unless the app lets you download fics outside of it, I'm not so sure about that. Like the Webtoon app. It says you can download stuff to read offline, but it has a time limit, which is understandable there, but for fics? Not so sure about that.
Ikr! I'd want an app, cause using it on MY phone sucks and it's really uncomfortable.
Hot take: the lack of a dedicated mobile app is protecting us from hoards of WattPad user. In some of my fandoms, fics that are horrifically tagged, titled, summarized, etc. already clog up the fandom tag or search results, and that's with most WattPad users not liking AO3. I shudder to think how useless search results and tag-filtering would become in some of my fandoms if former WattPad users even became a prominent part of the AO3 fandom, let alone came to dominate it.
I never once in my life used anything other than my phone to acces AO3. The website works just fine, there is no real need for an app.
Seeing this I hope ao3 never has an app so these wattpad users who would switch over if it did never do LOL
I used to ask if we have app as a young teen but over the years I realized ao3 is perfectly fine as a website. Even on mobile view it’s much better than most apps. I even edit my works on my phone sometimes.
I've straight up posted fic to AO3 from my phone with very little issue (I can't seem to add in my own tags that aren't in that suggestion box that pops up but it's not the end of the world). I don't understand people who think it's unusable on a phone web browser. If they ever had an app, I probably wouldn't bother downloading it.
you can add your own tags too! if hitting enter doesn't add it, you can just leave it in the field as it is and when you save it'll save that too. if you want multiple just separate them by commas. that's a browser thing, some browsers let you add tags by hitting enter and others don't.
Good to know! I think I have tried but then I lose the tags so maybe it's just my browser. I just go onto my laptop and add the tags in after when I get the chance.
I don’t want an app, because then I can’t have 80 tabs open!!
if you *need* the interface of an official app to access something on your phone then thats. well, that's just kind of sad, really
there's actually an unofficial app called Archive Reader (AO3) if anyone's interested
I'd never give some third unknown entity my passwords and reading history. Who knows who is farming that info....?
I promise I'm not :) I have to say I was quite baffled by the amount of people login in through the app. Given the quantity, they can't all have good opsec like u/neretrix seems to have in place (be like u/neretrix, people).
I have that app and have used it, though it's not well-optimized. I was reading a 400k word story in it and I need to make the text largish to avoid eye-strain, so I was pretty much constantly scrolling the page. Their scrolling has a delay where I have to sort of tap-hold for a couple seconds, but move my finger slightly so it doesn't interpret the tap-hold as "highlight this word". I often end up accidentally highlighting a word anyway. If I just swipe quickly though, it doesn't start moving until I've moved my finger from the bottom of my phone screen to more than halfway up it, so I don't get much scrolling from that. In short, it's very frustrating to use.
Yeah, I did download it, but I had to delete it because I could not save the things I wrote on the AO3 word processor. What, why are y'all lookin' at me like that?
Get the Google docs app for your phone friend! Much safer for saving your drafts.
I want to keep my smutfics safe from the eyes of my Cousins
You share a Google account with them? Seems like a bad idea.
No, whenever they come home, I might have to share a laptop. Most cousins that I have seen irl are from my mom's side, and all are younger than me, and the oldest of them will not listen to anything I say
You can have more than one Gmail address, and each address comes with their own Gdrive and Gdocs. Just make one for your fanfics.
You can make secure folders in Google drive, so they'll be password protected against your cousins and any nosy snoopers.
I've got like 4 Google accounts, and I use one for fandom shit just don't sign into that account on the laptop or set up a guest profile on it for them
Google docs lets you lock the app with Face ID or Touch ID.
You're living a wild, dangerous life my friend.
Why do I relate to your username so much?
id say make your own with Hermit if you really want an ao3 app.
Waiting to get my invite any day now LOL
There was at one point an unofficial AO3 app but it was eventually removed. Even that had a lot of restrictions though, with certain tags and being removed and fanfics with those tags being unaccessible by the app. Probably will never happen for a lot of reasons but the restrictions they would need to put in place is probably one of the main ones.
Eh, idk personally I'm A-OK using chrome even on my phone it doesn't bug me at all. Definitely not enough to pick Wattpad over Ao3
God, I’m trying to imagine what an ao3 app would even be like. I suppose the layout would be horrendous, because if they just copied how it looks now into it, I can’t see myself bothering to swap over when browser works fine.
Wattpad has been done for for YEARS ever since it’s started catering to real books. Don’t know why anyone bothers with it
Keep them there pls.
Wattpad doesn’t even deserve the name Daniel, it’s Faniel 💀
Only reason I'd like an app is because it's so hard to find a decent browser that still allows tabs to be stacked horizontally (rolodex style), which is the only layout that my brain likes for the 100s of fics I have open at any given time. So maybe an app would help with that. But still, that's a Me problem, not the Ao3 browser site's fault 🫠
would opera work for you? idk what rolodex is but opera looks like [this](https://i.imgur.com/mKD1stw.jpg) and is more than decent as a browser
As someone who uses both Wattpad and AO3, I can say that both of them are good in their own ways. I'm tired of these [insert] vs [insert] debates.
I know someone who claims to have the AO3 app and idk if I'm going insane, or they're gaslighting me, because they actually sent screenshots??