Hi folks, I want to learn #TokiPona, but I haven't been able to find pu — the first book (Toki Pona: The Language of Good, by Sonja Lang) in English anywhere except Amazon.

Weirdly, my local bookstore is able to find it in other (less helpful) languages like Esperanto, just not English. It also can order the new dictionary. Same with Bookshop.org. Why is this?

Is there a good alternative way to buy pu, that doesn't make Jeff Bezos even richer? (I know other toki pona resources exist online.)

@skyfaller

As I understand it was published by/on Amazon, and so that's where it is available.

I have found used/overstock copies on ebay a few times, might be worth a look.

@RussSharek Yeah, I see a couple copies on eBay, but they're like twice the price after shipping.

And it appears you're right about it being self-published through Amazon. Publisher is Createspace according to GoodReads: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CreateSpace

That suggests that buying it elsewhere would not help much, if the upstream source is still Jeffrey Bezos. I guess buying used is the only real alternative.

CreateSpace - Wikipedia

@skyfaller

Sadly true.

Buying outside the Amazon ecosystem, while potentially costing more, is still a nice middle finger towards the beast.