Tapas is shutting down. A moving checklist for prose authors

Tapas ends service on March 31 2027. No new Ink since October 1,
unlocked content goes dark with the site, no refunds, no transfer to
other Kakao services. That is from their own FAQ, not rumor. If your
serial lives there, the next five months are the moving window.

Do these in order.

1. Keep your own copy of everything. Chapters, covers, descriptions,
   episode order. A platform can change terms, remove features, or close.
   Your own files mean options. This is the lesson of Vella and Radish
   repeating.

2. Check exclusivity before you repost. If any Tapas agreement limits
   where your series can appear, ask through their Creator Inquiry Form
   whether it still binds during the wind down. Do not assume.

3. Tell readers where to follow you off platform. Newsletter, socials,
   Discord, Patreon. Do it while you can still reach them on Tapas.

4. Pick the next home by genre and terms, not by size. Read the rights
   clause in full. Confirm no exclusivity if you want to cross post.
   Confirm how monetization triggers and what readers pay for. Confirm
   content rules for mature work.

5. Move with a backlog. Publish several chapters at launch so new
   readers have something to binge, then resume schedule.

Where authors are actually going, from the forum threads: Royal Road,
Scribble Hub, Wattpad, NovelCult, Pinya. Different rooms for different
genres, and none of them a full replacement.

Disclosure: we run Tellura (https://tellura.ink), a catalog for
original serial fiction. Authors keep copyright, no exclusivity,
everything exports as Markdown, every novel read by a human before
listing. Mentioning it here because a moving checklist that hides its
author would be the exact behavior this post warns against.