Bite-Sized Fandoms 2025 Rules & Info

[firebatvillain]

Hello, and welcome to Bite-Sized Fandoms Exchange, the exchange for fandoms whose canons can be read, watched, played, or otherwise experienced in 8 or fewer hours!

Quick Links:

2025 Collection | Tag Set | Sign-ups | Evidence post | Fandom Promo Post

Schedule:

Nominations Open: March 18, 11:59 AM

Nominations Close: March 30, 11:59 PM

Signups Open: April 1, 11:59 PM

Signups Close: April 9, 11:59 PM

Assignments Out By: April 12, 11:59 PM

Works Due: May 25, 11:59 PM

Works Revealed: June 1, 11:59 PM

Creators Revealed: June 8, 11:59 PM

*all due dates/reveals are in US Eastern Time unless otherwise noted

The Premise

What's special about this exchange? In this multifandom exchange, fandoms are only eligible if they can be read/watched/played in under 8 hours. You can request and even offer these easy, bite-sized fandoms even if you aren't familiar with them yet, and pick up the fandom over the course of the exchange. Or, take this opportunity to share and create for your favorite bite-sized fandom you're already familiar with, whether it's a movie, standalone novel, music video, commercial, song, painting, or something else!

Eligibility

To be eligible, it must be possible to experience a fandom in 8 or fewer hours. Here is how to determine if a fandom is eligible:

• For Movies, TV, Podcasts, Cartoons, Music Videos, and other timed fandoms: total runtime of all seasons/films in the main fandom should be 8 or fewer hours.
• For Books & Literature, internet posts, memes, and other written fandoms: total length should be at most 500 book pages or 125,000 words.
• For Comics, Manga, Graphic Novels, Webcomics, and other sequential image panel fandoms: it should be readable in 8 hours, which means it varies depending on format. Generally, the total length should be no more than 6 manga volumes/comic trades, or 35 manga chapters/comic issues, or 1,000 fast-to-read paneled pages, or 500 full-size, text-heavy paneled pages.
• For Video Games, Board Games, Visual Novels, and other interactive media fandoms: total time for a complete playthrough that imparts significant canon knowledge should be 8 or fewer hours, as shown on howlongtobeat or demonstrated by a non-speedrun “let’s play” style video on YouTube.
• For Visual Art, Photographs, Sculpture, and other non-written, non-interactive, non-timed fandoms: approved as long as apprehending the entire work takes 8 or fewer hours.
• For Historical or Media/Actor RPF: an evidence post comment on a per-character or per-ship basis showing that the relevant media, documentary film, biography, and wikipedia/fanlore/fandom wiki pages can be read and/or watched within eight hours. This post should be linked in sign-up request details so that participants will know where to find canon. 
• For RPF not tied to historical figures or specific media: these will be approved on a case-by-case basis if it can be demonstrated in an evidence post comment that all relevant material is easy to find and can be consumed within 8 hours. This post should be linked in sign-up request details so that participants will know where to find canon. 
• For Crossover pairings: canon length is determined by the combined canon length of the two fandoms.
• Anything not covered above: will be approved on a case-by-case basis: make a comment in the evidence post!

Individual stories in anthologies count as their own fandoms. Examples include a season of True Detective, an episode of Black Mirror, or an episode of a non-serial competition-style TV show.

Exceptions will also be made for single books, movies, etc that, while technically part of a larger series, are sufficiently distinct from the greater series and can stand on their own, on a case-by-case basis.

What are the requirements for participating?

You must have an Ao3 account and be at least 18 years old to participate. When you sign up, you are committing to creating a fanfic of 1,000 words or more for your recipient during the writing period.

Nominations:

During the nominations period, you will be able to submit your nominations to the tag set. Each participant can nominate up to 10 fandoms with a maximum of 10 relationships for each fandom. Relationships and characters should be disambiguated by fandom for clarity, with (OW) being used to indicate original work nominations. Single characters should be nominated as “Solo: Character Name” in the Relationships field. Romantic relationships should be indicated with a / and platonic ones with a &. 

Example nominations:

Fandom: The Ballad of Smokin' Joe Rudeboy - Tom Cardy (Music Video)

Relationships: Bo/The Outlaw (Smokin’ Joe), Solo: The Outlaw (Smokin’ Joe), The Outlaw & The Daughter (Smokin’ Joe)

Fandom: Incompetent Time-Travelling Saxophone Haters (Tumblr Post)

Relationships: Solo: Time Travelling Assassin (Saxophone Haters)

Fandom: The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas - Ursula K. Le Guin  

Relationships: Solo: The Child (Omelas)

Sign-Ups:

Your sign-up must request at least three different fandoms up to a maximum of ten. Fandoms must be unique, i.e. if you have ten requests they must be for ten different fandoms. There are two freeform tags used to specify medium preferences: Medium Opt-In: Fic, and Medium Opt-In: Art. You must select at least one medium, but you can select both if you are happy to receive either art or fic. You must select at least one pairing or ‘Any Relationship’ per request. You may sign up with a maximum of one well-behaved sock; please ensure that your sock is not matchable to your main account.

Please be courteous to other participants. We will not entertain asshole behavior.

DNWs must be listed in the Optional Details text box to be enforced—we cannot enforce DNWs that are only listed in an external letter.

In your sign-up, you should offer at least four unique fandoms. They can be the same fandoms as those you request. Before the end of the sign-up period, please check to make sure that you are matchable. It's fine if no one is offering the fandoms you're requesting (we'll take care of that with a pinch hit if necessary), but you should make sure that your offers are matchable to at least one person so that you have something to create.

Matching:

This exchange uses OR matching. Your assignment only needs to include one of your recipient’s fandoms and one of their relationships. Recipients can mention additional pairings besides those in the tag set, but inclusion of these pairings will not be enforced.

If there is anyone you do not want to be matched to, please contact the mods via Dreamwidth or email at bitesizedfandomsex@gmail.com and let us know their username and how you’d like us to handle it if they ask to pick up your pinch hit or write you a treat.

Assignments:

You must complete a story of at least 1,000 words OR 1 finished art piece minimum.

Your assignment should be in a requested fandom and include at least one requested relationship/character. It should also be in one of your recipient's requested mediums (i.e., if your recipient only requested fic, you cannot fill their request with art). You only have to submit one assignment based on one of your recipient's requests, not all of them! You are not required to fill the request that you matched on if another one of their requests catches your eye. For example, it's fine if you match on your recipient's request for Genghis Khan - Miike Snow (Music Video) but decide you'd rather go with their Tetris (Video Games) prompt.

You are not required to follow the recipient’s exact suggestions or prompts, but you should respect your recipient’s DNWs. Please don't submit spitefic, we know it when we see it.

Art pieces should be finished and of a quality that you would be happy to receive yourself. Scanned traditional art should be on unlined paper with a clean background.

The use of LLM or other AI tools to generate works is not allowed.

Please remain anonymous until creator reveals. Please refrain from discussing which work you created, placing your work in a personal series/collection with other, revealed works, or including other identifying information while works are anonymous. You are free to do this after creator reveals!

Treats:

Treats do not need to meet the minimum length requirements, but should feature a requested medium, fandom and relationship (unless the recipient has stated it's fine to do otherwise). Please follow the recipient's DNWs.

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Please feel free to contact the mods via Dreamwidth or email at bitesizedfandomsex@gmail.com if you have any questions about your assignment.

Comments

Eligible?

[(Anonymous)]

For an internet series that can be viewed from multiple content creator profiles such as a collaborative Minecraft server or videos where content that may be cut on one channel is available on another, would the "total runtime" be determined by the length of EVERY channel's view time? (For example, a 5 episode series with 6 people, would the POVs for all 6 people need to be under 8 hours when combined?)

Re: Eligible?

[firebatvillain]

It depends on whether the POVs contain unique plot relevant information. If someone could watch just one POV and get all the info, then only one POV is counted for run time.

In circumstances where multiple POVs are needed to get the whole plot, then additional videos must be added to the runtime, whether that's whole other POVs, selections from other POVs, or compilation/summary videos to supplement a single POV, counted jointly.

Because this is a case-by-case basis scenario, please make a comment on the evidence post when noms open up with the relevant videos and explanations. Once approved, requests for this fandom should link to the evidence post comment so that creators know how to experience this bite-sized fandom.

[useyourtelescope]

Hello, I'm wondering whether crossover pairings are eligible for this exchange if perhaps the characters are in fandoms that can be consumed within the usual guidelines?

[firebatvillain]

For crossover pairings, canon length is determined by the combined canon length of the two fandoms.

For example, Julian Slowik (The Menu)/Cyan Dag (The Tower at Stony Wood) would be allowed because The Tower at Stony Wood by Patricia McKillip is 300 pages (60% of limit) and The Menu (2022) is 107 minutes (22% of limit). Combined together, they fit under our bite-sized fandom size limit: your creator will be able to consume all relevant canon within 8 hours.

[useyourtelescope]

Great, thank you!

[(Anonymous)]

Hello, I'm wondering if, for example, a non-English song with a translation linked would be allowed?

[firebatvillain]

Yes, as long as the combined runtime of the song and reading time of the linked translation does not exceed 8 hours.

[marquisguyun]

Hi! I have a question that is relevant for two different noms.

I'm thinking of nomming/requesting two different movie series where two films in the series are currently released, but only the first film is reasonably available. (Of the two series, one has a film still in theaters and the other was in theaters briefly earlier this year). Is that okay if I assume anyone creating for them might have only seen the first film? Or would it be against the spirit of the exchange? Both individual series are under 8 hours. Thank you!

[firebatvillain]

If only part of the canon is available, it's probably okay to nominate just that part - we'd like to evaluate this one on a case by case basis, so please come by the evidence post (link) and provide the details and we'll give a thumbs up if it looks good.

[marquisguyun]

I don't really want to just nominate the one part, since *I've* seen both and would be happy to receive a gift that takes both into account. I just don't want to make people feel like I expect them to have also seen both? Which probably does mean that these fandoms aren't the best fit for this particular exchange, honestly. There's not really an easy way to make that distinction clear except in Optional Details. I think I'll just save them for another exchange.

Thank you, though! Sorry, I think asking the question clarified how I was feeling about it

[(Anonymous)]

Hi, quick question regarding video games - for games that you can watch the cutscenes of for the full plot in under 8 hours but actually playing it would be over that time, would that count? Thank you!

[firebatvillain]

It depends on how much of the gameplay is relevant to plot, characterization, and so on. For example, in some games, most of the canon exists in the environment and gameplay. So, this will be approved on a case by case basis. Please make a comment on the evidence post (link) and we will review the relevant canon and cutscene video.

Reader-inserts allowed?

[(Anonymous)]

Are we able to nominate Canon/Reader or Canon & Reader relationships under eligible fandoms for this exchange?

Re: Reader-inserts allowed?

[firebatvillain]

Yes, reader is allowed as a character in a ship in an eligible fandom

Re: Reader-inserts allowed?

[(Anonymous)]

Thank you!!

[(Anonymous)]

Can trailers for currently unreleased films/series be nominated?

[firebatvillain]

Yes, though please nominate them as their own fandom distinct from the film/series that scopes it to the trailer so people know what they need to watch. For example, "Movie Name (2025 Movie Trailer)"

[stillturningout]

Just checking whether recursive fandoms are allowed (for recursive OW). Provided there is author permissions and they are the correct length :)

[firebatvillain]

You can nominate someone's original work as a fandom if it's under 8 hours and if they have a posted statement allowing transformative works. If it's hard to find or specify just by name, please also make an evidence post comment linking to the fic.