Exchanges

The Basics
In an exchange, the mods assign each participant to create a fanwork gift for another participant. All works are required to be finished by a set deadline, and are not publicly revealed until that time.

Platform
Most exchanges in modern fandom are run on the AO3, but it's possible to avoid using AO3 if you want, particularly for smaller exchanges. The two approaches have different logistical issues, so it's important to decide which you want to take early on in the planning process.

AO3 has an in-built system to collect sign-ups, match participants up, send out assignments to participants, check for completed gifts and defaulted assignments, and reveal fanworks and/or authors at the discretion of the mod. Setting up the exchange on AO3 can be quite intimidating to new mods, but the majority feel the benefits are worth it. Part of the purpose of this wiki is to provide a guide to setting up exchanges on AO3.

If AO3 is not used, then sign-ups must be collected in a different manner, such as by email or by google forms. Works may then be posted on whichever platform(s) you choose to allow. At first glance, this may sound easier than navigating the AO3's occasionally rather labyrinthine forms, but it has significant drawbacks when it comes time to confirm that everyone has a gift that is ready to be revealed, and assign pinch-hits (make up gifts) for people whose gift-creators have dropped out of the exchange. For larger exchanges, it can make matching for difficult.

Whether or not your exchange is on AO3, you need to have a main site somewhere else such as LJ, DW, or tumblr (or mirrored on all three) to provide participants with information, allow participants to ask questions and interact with each other, and promote the exchange. AO3 lacks an internal messaging system and social networking capability, and is therefore just not up for the job. It is also highly recommended that you have an exchange email account that you can share among the moderators.

Process/Schedule
An exchange usually proceeds as follows:
 * Preparation: Mods prepare for the exchange, creating the needed documentation, forms, etc
 * Formal announcement: The exchange is announced publicly, with the finalized timeline, rules, restrictions, location, etc available to be viewed by potential participants
 * Lead-up: Mods use the lead-up period, which may be a few days to a few weeks, to promote the exchange
 * Sign-ups: Participants are given anywhere from several days to several weeks to sign up by whatever method the mods have set up: usually AO3, or if the exchange is hosted elsewhere, by email, Google Forms, etc
 * Matching: The exchange mods must assign each participant to create something for another participant. If this is done by an automated system, it may take a few minutes, but extra time should still be allowed for in case of errors. If it's done by hand, the schedule needs to allow sufficient time.
 * Sending out assignments: When all matching is completed, the mods notify all participants of their assignments.
 * Creation period: Once assignments have gone out, participants spend several weeks working to create their gift.
 * Gifts due: At the end of the creation period, gifts are due. This should be at a specific time and date to avoid any confusion.
 * Pinch hits: Due to the inevitability that a percentage of participants will simply vanish at the due date, successful exchanges build in a buffer between when assignments are due and when gifts are scheduled to be revealed. This delay allows the assignment and completion of pinch-hits: creators who volunteer to take on an abandoned assignment and create the gift within a few days, before reveals begin. This ensures that all participants receive a gift.
 * Reveals: After the pinch-hit period, gifts are publicly revealed so that everyone can read/see/hear them.
 * Round-ups: At the end of the exchange, mods should ensure that there is a public location where all works are listed. Since nearly all exchanges these days occur on AO3, many simply use the collection itself. Otherwise, mods should create a masterlist of works created for the exchange.

Preparation
For a new exchange, it's not uncommon for the creator(s) to first do an interest-check, then, upon seeing that other people in the fandom would like to participate in an exchange about [focus of your exchange], start soliciting ideas for rules, restrictions, allowances, timeframe, etc. Such feedback can be very valuable.

You should be careful about putting out draft information. If you don't very, very clearly mark that a schedule is only tentative, and then later change it, it can lead to confusion, and people who are confused about your exchange are less likely to sign up (and those who do may become angry at you when they realize the dates have changed). Similarly, draft rules should be very clearly marked as such.

When you are happy with your rules, timeline, host site, etc, then you can proceed to formally announcing your exchange.

Formal Announcement
At a certain date in your preparations, you will have solidified all rules, dates, etc. When all of the above are ready and available to the public and you're ready to go, you will announce publicly that your exchange will proceed and all information can be found [link to your finished site].

After this point, the rules should not need changing and should be clear to most participants. You will still undoubtedly receive questions about rules, timeline, etc, but your goal should be that those questions are received because the person asking didn't read the existing rules properly. You should be gracious when answering such questions anyway.

After this announcement date, you do not want to have any rules/etc that are murky to fandom at large and you don't want to need to change a rule. Either will have a major negative impact on public perception of your exchange.

Lead-Up Period
Some exchanges announce that they are going forward and then immediately open to participants. Most, however, have a gap of at least a several days between when the exchange is announced and when the sign-up period opens.

Uses blah blah blah

Sign-Up Period
The platform you are using is going to greatly impact the technical aspect of how sign-ups are managed. If you are using AO3, then participants will sign up by going to your AO3 Challenge page and submitting a sign-up form. If you're not using AO3, then you need an alternate method of collection information from people. This can be email, Google forms, tumblr asks/submits, comments on an LJ or DW entry, and so forth.

There are three major requirements for your sign-up platform: You should have an exact end date and time for sign-ups, posted in as many places as possible, with the timezone clearly marked. Use tools such as Time Zone Converter to make it easier for your participants to know when the exchange closes. For the average exchange, between 25% to 50% of participants will sign up in the last 24 hours. Some will attempt to sign up at literally the very last minute. If you don't clearly mark when sign-ups close, you'll make potential participants nervous (or they'll simply miss the deadline).
 * 1) It must give you a means to send out the assignment to the participant (eg. email, returning a tumblr ask, or an automated system such as AO3 uses)
 * 2) It must be someplace central so that you can easily see that you have received a new sign-up
 * 3) It must be capable of handling the amount of information in the sign-ups. If you are asking people to provide details about what they would and would not like to write or receive, tumblr asks aren't going to provide you with enough space for many participants' answers.

Matching
Once sign-ups have been closed, the mods will assign each participant to create a gift for another participant.

Matching requirements can be as simple or as complicated as you would like to make them. At the simplest end of the scale, everyone who signed up is assigned at random to create for another participant.

However, most exchanges put restrictions on matching. For example, consider a fandom for Rad TV Show 2017, where the four main characters are Alice, Bob, Carol, and Dan. Most people will not ship all configurations of these characters, and they won't enjoy creating (or receiving) works about other ships. So, you want to match up the Alice/Bob shippers with other Alice/Bob shippers, the Alice/Carol shippers with other Alice/Carol shippers, and so on. Some people will ship both Alice/Bob and Alice/Carol and Alice/Dan, and they can be matched with anyone else who ships one of those, but it's better to match them with somebody who shares all three of their ships instead of only one (eg, an Alice/Bob, Bob/Carol, and Bob/Dan shipper). And so forth.

If the exchange is multi-fandom, not everyone will share a fandom. If the exchange is focused only on Alice/Carol, then maybe the moderators want to match up people who enjoy creating NSFW works together, or separate people who do/don't want to receive angst as opposed to fluff. And so forth. Once you start putting restrictions on matching, the process can quickly become complicated.

Platform is very important for handling complicated matching schemes. AO3 Challenges can automatically match hundreds of people based on customized-for-the-challenge tag choices. AO3 also allows moderators to manually pick out matches for each participant, which is called 'hand matching'. For smaller exchanges (approx. 20 people or less) where people are writing letters about what they would like to receive or create, often a human being can pick out better matches than the computer. If AO3 is not used as the platform, then unless you have a moderator who is a programmer, you'll need to match by hand.

Creation of Gifts
Blah

Final Due Date
Blah

Pinch Hits
Some of your participants will drop out. Some of them will drop out and you'll only find out because come the due date, they haven't submitted a gift and have vanished from the face of the internet. '''This happens to every single exchange. '''

Exchanges where not everyone who signed up gets a gift are generally considered unsuccessful and don't get a second chance.