injokes I don't get

[ratcreature]

So what is the "Do Not Archive (The Magnus Archives)" tag on the AO3 supposed to indicate?

Obviously it doesn't have the normal meaning like that label had on lists, since the stories are already posted on a fanfic archive, and they don't seem to have anything obvious in common wrt content when I look at the works. I wondered whether it was maybe a kind of "don't podfic" label because of the archive tapes in canon, but I saw at least one podfic with the tag, so that's not it.

I'm also wondering whether to participate in the Rusty Quill Secret Santa 2019, which includes The Magnus Archives. It allows fanart, and the requirements look fairly low-key and manageable, and I never seem to produce even sketches anymore without outside pressure, so that might be fun.

Comments

[ratcreature]

Though according to other comments here it looks like it indicates a more fandom specific meaning of not wanting creator-fan interaction with fanworks. So the Discord maybe also takes its name from that?

[melannen]

my guess is: Tumblr fandom used the tag to mean various things; the discord names itself after the Tumblr tag; people started to tag for the discord on AO3; someone on Ao3 realized the discard name and the general meaning were getting mixed up, and created the disambigged tag (I can't see why else it would be disambigged w the fandom - a tag meaning creators don't read or don't repost would be treated as a panfandom concept); the disambigged tag was not clear enough either, and now it is also being used for both things.

[ratcreature]

Something got lost in translation at some point for sure with this tag. And the wrangling is just weird imo. Making "Do Not Archive" a subcategory of "Do Not Archive (The Magnus Archives)" which currently seems the case makes no sense. I mean it is mostly used in that fandom but also Rusty Quill Gaming which may be the same creators but a different fandom, and at least a few other works also have it.