diff --git a/HISTORY.rst b/HISTORY.rst
index 75e684b..ab798ed 100644
--- a/HISTORY.rst
+++ b/HISTORY.rst
@@ -3,6 +3,11 @@
 History
 -------
 
+?.?.? (????-??-??)
+++++++++++++++++++
+
+* Added --noexts option for setup.py to avoid trying to build the C extensions
+
 0.2.2 (2014-03-27)
 ++++++++++++++++++
 
diff --git a/README.rst b/README.rst
index 1b6428b..4de9ad6 100644
--- a/README.rst
+++ b/README.rst
@@ -19,6 +19,12 @@ fuzzysearch is useful for finding approximate subsequence matches
 * Free software: `MIT license <LICENSE>`_
 * Documentation: http://fuzzysearch.rtfd.org.
 
+Installation
+------------
+Just install using pip::
+
+    $ pip install fuzzysearch
+
 Features
 --------
 
diff --git a/docs/installation.rst b/docs/installation.rst
index e597bce..0bc19f6 100644
--- a/docs/installation.rst
+++ b/docs/installation.rst
@@ -4,9 +4,15 @@ Installation
 
 At the command line::
 
-    $ easy_install fuzzysearch
+    $ pip install fuzzysearch
 
 Or, if you have virtualenvwrapper installed::
 
     $ mkvirtualenv fuzzysearch
-    $ pip install fuzzysearch
\ No newline at end of file
+    $ pip install fuzzysearch
+
+Installation should succeed even if building the C extensions fails. If not,
+you can force the installation to skip building the extensions::
+
+    $ pip install fuzzysearch --noexts
+
diff --git a/setup.py b/setup.py
index 673ccb3..83dec84 100644
--- a/setup.py
+++ b/setup.py
@@ -10,9 +10,13 @@ from distutils.command.build_ext import build_ext
 from distutils.errors import CCompilerError, DistutilsExecError, \
      DistutilsPlatformError
 
-if sys.argv[-1] == 'publish':
-    os.system('python setup.py sdist upload')
-    sys.exit()
+# --noexts: don't try building the C extensions
+if '--noexts' in sys.argv[1:]:
+    del sys.argv[sys.argv[1:].index('--noexts') + 1]
+    noexts = True
+else:
+    noexts = False
+
 
 def readfile(file_path):
     dir_path = os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__))
@@ -151,7 +155,7 @@ def try_building_extension():
         echo(line)
 
 
-if not (is_pypy or is_jython):
+if not (noexts or is_pypy or is_jython):
     try_building_extension()
 else:
     run_setup(False)
\ No newline at end of file