Archive of Our Own faces two to four week shutdown
Archive of Our Own shut down and will not fully restore for at least two weeks, possibly four.
Archive of Our Own (AO3) is a non-profit site hosting millions of fan stories. The site announced a multi-week shutdown Thursday after an unplanned outage grew worse.
The outage started as an estimated 12-hour problem. The situation has now become a multi-week shutdown.
The Organisation for Transformative Works runs the site. They now estimate restoration will take at least two weeks, possibly four.
The update said the platform might come back in worse condition sooner. Temporary shutdowns will continue as repairs progress.
The exact cause is not yet known. A web-wide security patch from earlier this month may have caused it.
- 12 hours
- Initial outage estimate
- 2 to 4 weeks
- Restoration estimate
- Organization for Transformative Works
- Operator
- October 21
- Fanlore patched
Why it mattersMillions of readers worldwide cannot access their favourite fan stories. Writers cannot upload or edit new work.
AustraliaNo direct Australian consequence yet, but Australian fanfic readers and writers using the free platform are locked out until service restores.
✓ Claims checked against the source and corrected before publish. checked 2 h ago
