Right? It's almost *too* general of a term, and it's defintiely overused to the point of it almost not really having enough meaning to be useful.

I think Potterverse AU is the perfect term to describe things like Beauxbatons!Draco or Chosen One!Neville or Voldemort Never Existed. And I think, maybe, I'd also consider resorting fics in this category as well, like Slytherin!Harry or Ravenclaw!Draco.

UGH, it is SUCH a (admittedly ridiculous) pet peeve of mine when people refer to the Coffee Shop Trope as an AU! I think it was because it originally started off as an AU (like, if Harry or Draco were Muggle Baristas, so a completely world AU with coffee) but when people apply it to the Canon verse, it's a trope, not an AU! But if that's what people are searching for, you want to tag it that way so people find it...*sigh*

Haha, babble away! That makes sense that you've been thinking about it with your AU writing, and I have always thought about it a lot because I read/rec in a lot of fandoms that have a ton of AUs (as compared to HP) and it's kind of frustrating how liberally the term is tossed about, just because it ends up leading to a real lack of clarity. LOL, I have opinions on all things, clearly.