Kind of mixed feelings, right now.

On the one hand, I dislike tariffs*. On the other hand, I don’t like how the gaming and independent fiction industries talked themselves into using products and services from the People’s Republic of China, despite the fact that the PRC’s supply chain is corrupt and unreliable at best, uses wink-and-a-nudge slave labor at worst, is run by people who are ideologically opposed to several core principles of Western society, and is about as ecologically friendly as a guy spraying out chlorofluorocarbons from his extra-leaded gasoline-powered mobile throne while directing a Soviet-era hydroelectric project.

And on the gripping hand? This has been a possibility for about a year, a certainty for four months, and a ticking package for weeks. There’s a lot of people out there suddenly blinking on how their books’ profit margins have just taken a huge (and frankly inevitable) hit, and it’s all I can do to not shake them while asking, Why did you not plan for this situation? I publish with Amazon and DriveThruRPG for reasons, and this is one of them. They’re not immune to tariffs, but my per-book costs with them aren’t going to go up by a half next week, either.

I guess I just don’t get why any of this is a surprise.

Moe Lane

*Just accept that I do, please.

#commissionearned