Allow Clean Reader to swap 'bad' words in books – it's a matter of free speech

Writers who are up in arms over the ebook app's 'profanity' blacklist have no right to dictate how the reader should read their books

An ebook app called Clean Reader has writers up in arms over its blacklist of "profanity". While you read your ebooks, it looks for hot-words and swaps them with milder versions like "fiddlesticks". This is a stupid, offensive app, but it's emblematic of the best the electronic age has to offer.

Since the first days of the web, we've celebrated tools that let us alter the things we see according to our specifications. When I'm on expensive, metered mobile data, I turn off images. My increasing discomfiture with online tracking prompted me to install an ad-blocker. I used to use a plug-in that warned me whenever I was reading a site owned by Rupert Murdoch. I dote on this plugin that changes linkbait headlines into milder versions, so "Will Blow Your Mind" becomes "Might Perhaps Mildly Entertain You For a Moment" and "One Weird Trick" becomes "One Piece of Completely Anecdotal Horseshit".