diff --git a/doc/source/conf.py b/doc/source/conf.py
index 60d83ec..ab35750 100644
--- a/doc/source/conf.py
+++ b/doc/source/conf.py
@@ -65,9 +65,9 @@
 # built documents.
 #
 # The short X.Y version.
-version = u'0.3'
+version = u'0.4'
 # The full version, including alpha/beta/rc tags.
-release = u'0.3alpha'
+release = u'0.4'
 
 # The language for content autogenerated by Sphinx. Refer to documentation
 # for a list of supported languages.
diff --git a/doc/source/tutorial.rst b/doc/source/tutorial.rst
index 4b46b26..9eb87f8 100644
--- a/doc/source/tutorial.rst
+++ b/doc/source/tutorial.rst
@@ -81,9 +81,9 @@ This operation will write a local file representing the terrain tile.
 If you don't want to create a physical file but only need its content, you can use:
 
   >>> tile = encode(geometries, bounds=bounds)
-  >>> content = tile.toStringIO(gzipped=True)
+  >>> content = tile.toBytesIO(gzipped=True)
 
-This operation will create a gzipped compressed string buffer wrapped in a `cStringIO.StringIO` instance.
+This operation will create a gzipped compressed string buffer wrapped in a `io.BytesIO` instance.
 
 To define a water-mask you can use:
 
@@ -147,7 +147,7 @@ Using the `requests module`_, here is an example on how to read a remote terrain
 The you won't need to decompress the gzipped tile has this is performed automatically
 in the requests module.
 
-  >>> import cStringIO
+  >>> from io import BytesIO
   >>> import requests
   >>> from quantized_mesh_tile.terrain import TerrainTile
   >>> from quantized_mesh_tile.global_geodetic import GlobalGeodetic
@@ -156,7 +156,7 @@ in the requests module.
   >>> [west, south, east, north] = bounds = geodetic.TileBounds(x, y, z)
   >>> url = 'http://assets.agi.com/stk-terrain/world/%s/%s/%s.terrain?v=1.16389.0' % (z, x, y)
   >>> response = requests.get(url)
-  >>> content = cStringIO.StringIO(response.content)
+  >>> content = BytesIO(response.content)
   >>> ter = TerrainTile(west=west, south=south, east=east, north=north)
-  >>> ter.fromStringIO(content)
+  >>> ter.fromBytesIO(content)
   >>> print ter.getVerticesCoordinates()
diff --git a/quantized_mesh_tile/__init__.py b/quantized_mesh_tile/__init__.py
index 219e344..1c00b6f 100644
--- a/quantized_mesh_tile/__init__.py
+++ b/quantized_mesh_tile/__init__.py
@@ -9,6 +9,13 @@
 from .topology import TerrainTopology
 
 
+# Enable Shapely "speedups" if available
+# http://toblerity.org/shapely/manual.html#performance
+from shapely import speedups
+if speedups.available:
+    speedups.enable()
+
+
 def encode(geometries, bounds=[], autocorrectGeometries=False, hasLighting=False,
            watermask=[]):
     """
diff --git a/setup.py b/setup.py
index 8a9167c..070886d 100644
--- a/setup.py
+++ b/setup.py
@@ -12,7 +12,7 @@
     requires = ['shapely', 'numpy']
 
 setup(name='quantized-mesh-tile',
-      version='0.3alpha',
+      version='0.4',
       description='Quantized-Mesh format reader and writer',
       author=u'Loic Gasser',
       author_email='loicgasser4@gmail.com',