diff --git a/IkiWiki/Plugin/mdwn.pm b/IkiWiki/Plugin/mdwn.pm
index c1f978ad3..8e037f5de 100644
--- a/IkiWiki/Plugin/mdwn.pm
+++ b/IkiWiki/Plugin/mdwn.pm
@@ -10,16 +10,24 @@ sub import { #{{{
 	IkiWiki::hook(type => "htmlize", id => "mdwn", call => \&htmlize);
 } # }}}
 
+my $markdown_loaded=0;
 sub htmlize ($) { #{{{
 	my $content = shift;
 
-	if (! $INC{"/usr/bin/markdown"}) {
-		# Note: a proper perl module is available in Debian
+	if (! $markdown_loaded) {
+		# Note: This hack to make markdown run as a proper perl
+		# module. A proper perl module is available in Debian
 		# for markdown, but not upstream yet.
 		no warnings 'once';
 		$blosxom::version="is a proper perl module too much to ask?";
 		use warnings 'all';
-		do "/usr/bin/markdown" || IkiWiki::error("failed to load /usr/bin/markdown: $!");
+
+		eval q{use Markdown};
+		if ($@) {
+			do "/usr/bin/markdown" ||
+				IkiWiki::error("failed to load Markdown.pm perl module ($@) or /usr/bin/markdown ($!)");
+		}
+		$markdown_loaded=1;
 		require Encode;
 	}
 	
diff --git a/debian/changelog b/debian/changelog
index c89500109..c83c8bce0 100644
--- a/debian/changelog
+++ b/debian/changelog
@@ -9,9 +9,13 @@ ikiwiki (1.17) UNRELEASED; urgency=low
   * Remove <br> from end of aggregate preprocessor directive output.
   * Ship ikiwiki executable as ikiwiki.pl in source to avoid issues on
     case-sensative filesystems like OSX.
-  * Display an error message if /usr/bin/markdown can't be loaded.
+  * Improve markdown loading. First, try to load it as a properl perl module,
+    in case it was installed as one. Then fall back to trying
+    /usr/bin/markdown.
+  * Document in install page how to install markdown, since it has no
+    installation procedure in the upstream tarball.
 
- -- Joey Hess <joeyh@debian.org>  Wed,  9 Aug 2006 23:01:02 -0400
+ -- Joey Hess <joeyh@debian.org>  Wed,  9 Aug 2006 23:50:25 -0400
 
 ikiwiki (1.16) unstable; urgency=low
 
diff --git a/doc/install.mdwn b/doc/install.mdwn
index d2b6b8833..49153c0d0 100644
--- a/doc/install.mdwn
+++ b/doc/install.mdwn
@@ -6,6 +6,10 @@ installed, and also uses the following perl modules if available:
 `HTML::Template` `Mail::SendMail` `Time::Duration` `Date::Parse`,
 `HTML::Scrubber`, `RPC::XML`, `XML::Simple`, `XML::Feed`
 
+If you're installing MarkDown by hand, note that it should be installed as
+`Markdown.pm` somewhere in perl's module search path, or alternately as
+`/usr/bin/markdown`. Ikiwiki will find it under either name.
+
 If you want to install from the tarball, you should make sure that the
 required perl modules are installed, then run:
 
diff --git a/doc/markdown/discussion.mdwn b/doc/markdown/discussion.mdwn
deleted file mode 100644
index dd63f1704..000000000
--- a/doc/markdown/discussion.mdwn
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1 +0,0 @@
-in order to install Markdown, I had to copy the Markdown.pl file to /usr/bin/markdown 
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/doc/plugins/orphans.mdwn b/doc/plugins/orphans.mdwn
index 2c4e52a3f..4591ebf59 100644
--- a/doc/plugins/orphans.mdwn
+++ b/doc/plugins/orphans.mdwn
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
-This plugin generates a list of possibly orphaned pages -- pages that no other page
-links to.
+This plugin generates a list of possibly orphaned pages -- pages that no
+other page links to.
 
 The optional parameter "pages" can be a [[PageSpec]] specifying the pages
 to check for orphans, default is search them all.
diff --git a/doc/sandbox/foo.wiki b/doc/sandbox/foo.wiki
index 7e58da046..e06baad61 100644
--- a/doc/sandbox/foo.wiki
+++ b/doc/sandbox/foo.wiki
@@ -1 +1 @@
-Look ma, this page uses '''wiki''' markup, not MarkDown! :-)
\ No newline at end of file
+Look ma, this page uses '''wiki''' markup, not MarkDown! :-)