Think about what that means for publishing: the state of piracy today is so awful publishers can't even give away copies in a meaningful way.

Fenian's policy isn't going to change despite this. #WeLoveOurReaders.

fenianhouse.com/readers/

[Fin]

We decided it was worth it just to say to librarians, the poor, and the disabled that y'all are first-class citizens and we want you as readers and we want you to know you're *not pirating*, it's a *gift*. As a symbol it's meaningful, but we're under no illusions it matters a damn practically.

3/

This means libraries, the disabled, and the poor, can contact the publisher and get an officially-blessed copy for free.

The state of piracy is so awful that we genuinely wondered if this policy was even worth having. Anybody we want to be able to get our books for free *already can*.

2/

ObDisc: I have some writing going on with Ad Astra, but I'm writing here about a different publisher. _Agency_ went through a small authors' collective with a simple manifesto. One of the core principles is we provide fully functional non-DRMed EPUB editions to the usual suspects.

1/

Fenian House publishing (a very small imprint, but we produce some of Amazon's SF bestsellers) needs relationships with good cover artists. We don't have Musk money to throw around, but we're willing to pay good money for good product. If you're interested, send me a DM.

If you think something I write is worth 4+ stars, please consider buying it. Fight enshittification. Or, put another way:

If you like _Agency_ and buy it, we'll finish the sequel and you can enjoy that, too.

But KU doesn't incentivize us to finish _Free Agency_. Not very much, at least.

5/5

The book I co-wrote with Sean Fenian, _Agency,_ is available on KU. We view it as free marketing with an occasional roulette payout. There's nothing inherently wrong with that, mind you, but… we prefer proper sales.

4/

One of the enshittification tricks Amazon uses is if an author makes something available for KU, we have to give Amazon exclusive rights to sell it online. We can't also sell epubs directly from our own author sites and enjoy 100% royalties from those sales.

3/

If you want to fight enshittification — and why wouldn't you: that's just called "demanding better" — you can do that easily and effectively. Incentivize the people who aren't making shit, and don't inventivize people who want to charge you more to deliver less.

2/

Ken's not wrong. By all means, find authors you like on KU. If you find a book you'd grade as 4- or 5-star, *please* consider buying a copy. We get more royalties, our sales rank improves, our visibility goes up, and for most of us small fish we price ourselves lower than a Starbucks latte.

1/