I. FANLORE EVENTS
In May, Fanlore started gearing up to run their ever-popular Bingo Challenge during the first two weeks of June. The challenge is going on now, so be sure to check it out!
On social media, Fanlore celebrated a month of Bandom-themed posts in May and published the first post in a new series, Meet the Team, which introduces people to the volunteers working behind the scenes at Fanlore. Their first post featured longtime Policy & Admin staffer WhatAreFrogs?!
Fanlore also changed their Tumblr and Twitter handles to match one another – they are now fanlore-wiki on Tumblr and @fanlore_wiki on Twitter.
Finally, Systems has been working to upgrade the version of MediaWiki that Fanlore uses. The new upgrade is currently undergoing testing behind the scenes, and they hope to release the updated site soon.
II. AT THE AO3
Open Doors announced the upcoming import of The Buffy/Giles Fanfiction Archive, with thanks to Communications and Translation.
Tag Wrangling wrangled almost 420,000 new tags across more than 42,500 fandoms, and Support received over 1,200 tickets in April. At the time of this writing, Support had received over 1,000 tickets and Policy & Abuse had received about 2,000 tickets in May.
III. LEGAL ADVOCACY
At the end of April, OTW Legal joined allies to submit comments to the U.S. Copyright Office in response to a Copyright Office Notice of Inquiry regarding implementation of the CASE Act. The CASE Act created a tribunal called the “Copyright Claims Board” (CCB) within the Copyright Office for handling copyright “small claims,” and gave the Copyright Office discretion regarding many aspects of the CCB and its operation. Our submission gave specific recommendations regarding how the Copyright Office should limit the scope of the CCB’s power, should make it clear and easy for people to opt out of participation in CCB proceedings, and should be impartial in communications regarding the CCB.
Also at the end of April and through May, Legal informed users about copyright-law developments in Germany and helped users share their opinions with German legislators with a Change.org petition. This petition was organized by Legal, the Board of Directors, TWC volunteer Kristina Busse, and activist Julia Reda to oppose restrictions on parody, caricature and pastiche in Article 17 of the EU Copyright Directive that would have impacted transformative works. We’re delighted to say that the petition was successful – thank you to everyone who co-ordinated and campaigned on this issue!
In May, Legal Chair Betsy Rosenblatt conducted a briefing with U.S. legislative staffers about fair use. A recording of that briefing, introduced by Re:Create Coalition Executive Director Josh Lamel and followed by a round-table discussion with fair use experts from other nonprofits, is available to the public — check it out if you’ve ever wanted a 20-minute introduction to fair use law!
IV. IT’S ALL ABOUT THE PEEPS
From 26 April to 23 May, Volunteers & Recruiting received 120 new requests, and completed 149, leaving us with 16 open requests (including induction and removal tasks listed below).
As of 23 May 2021, the OTW has 1024 volunteers. \o/ Recent personnel movements are listed below.
New Committee Staff: Eonni and ScarlettLecter (both Support) and 1 other Support staffer, Hanna Hacker (TWC) and 1 other TWC staffer
New Tag Wrangler Volunteers: aliteralcat, AmberW, Asas Carmesins, Babbling Eccentric, Beatriz Tomaz, Bibliotango, Carochinha, Carpfish, Dessie, Elle, Emma M, Hawke, Helli, Hexverse, hollyleaf, Intyalote, Katlou, LadyCake, Mikinaak, MoonPsii, Nini, Nowali, Oliver, Ollie, Patrícia Ferreira, pimpinella, Pinky G Rocket, pitytheviolins, Poisson, Reaxeons, remiwolf, Rio, Rui, Sammy G, Satie, Sobriquett, Sonoma, Susie, temis, TheCrystalRing, Tor, Vincent, Vinoro, Zoey and Zozo
New Translation Volunteers: Anastasia Dumarque, Arahime, Noy Robin, Saša V., Shivani Kadam, spoilthevines, Su Sakarya, Ula and 2 other volunteers
Departing Committee Staff: Kyrstin (Support) and 1 other Support staffer, 1 Strategic Planning staffer, and 1 Fanlore staffer
Departing Tag Wrangler Volunteers: englishsummerrain, lemoncave, roguewords, and 5 other volunteers
Departing Translation Volunteers: Lora and 3 other volunteers
For more information about the purview of our committees, please access the committee listing on our website.