Sad news today.

PayPal is initiating a crackdown on vendors who sell erotica, and this in turn is forcing Smashwords to pass along that crackdown to its authors.

The erotica topics under fire include the usual suspects: incest, bestiality, and underaged sex. In addition, “pseudo incest” (involving step parents, etc.) and “barely legal” (where the youth of a character is emphasized, though there’s no actual underaged activity) are also included in PayPal’s verboten list. In other words, some sexual acts that are perfectly legal to perform in real life are now forbidden in fiction where PayPal has any say in the matter.

Tra la, tra la. Human stupidity marches boldly onward.

So many of my titles will no longer be available from Smashwords, or from the various retailers that Smashwords distributes to. That last category notably includes the Apple iBook store, which represents a significant portion of my sales, as did direct sales from Smashwords.

The bottom line for my eBooks is that, for the time being, many of them will be available only in the Barnes & Noble Nook store -- and gosh only  knows how long it will be before Barnes & Noble joins in on the mad rush to 17th century puritanism.

In the longer term, I don’t know what’s going to happen. I may be able to get my newly-banned titles back into the Apple iBook store. Other options may crop up to take the place of Smashwords and/or PayPal. Or things may only get worse -- more and more censorship, less and less free choice for all of us.