Author Censors Own Book To Sell On iTunes

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I am not sure which is worse, Apple rejecting this guy’s book or the fact that he caved in and actually censored his own book just to get it on iTunes. Damn shame.

My friend David Carnoy, whose day job is an editor at CNet, finally got his greenlight from iTunes, but he had to change all the S-bombs to "damn" or "crap" and pull a lot of F-bombs too. Not only does "F me like you mean it" fail to maintain the same ring as the original NSFW dialog, but this chilling effect, directly or indirectly censoring our budding novelists, isn't something Apple should be engendering.
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You don't have to be profane to get your point across in a book. Ted Dekkar has managed to write over a dozen awesome books without any profanity.
 
You also don't need needless gore to have a good movie. Yet 'The Silence of the Lambs' is a highly regarded movie.
 
Censorship is wrong, period... by any meaning, or so-called standard. Apple's monopolistic tactics on the App Store... I'm really surprised it's lasted this long without a major stink.
 
Whisperfang said:
You don't have to be profane to get your point across in a book. Ted Dekkar has managed to write over a dozen awesome books without any profanity.
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That's not the point, jackass... this tactic infrings on free speech, a basic right we are supposed to have in this country.
 
Jack Hammer said:
We have free speech in this country. He had the freedom to find another publisher if Apple didn't like what he wrote.
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Exactly my point. He wrote a profane book (i was not arguing whether he should have done that or not) and then willfully censored it so it would be displayed in Apple's store. It's the same thing as Wal-Mart only allowing censored music in their stores. An artist can choose not to re-record or bleep the music, but then they don't get the wide publication of their album that being in Wal-Mart would surely bring.
 
These "profane" words are profane because we make them. We give them their taboo nature when they're simply words. Just words.

Of course, they wouldn't be nearly as fun to say otherwise. :D
 
Nobody is forcing this guy to censor his own book. Apple is a company, not the government. A company has a right to dictate any standards for products it sells. If you don't like it, then go to another company or start your own.

Just because you wrote a book, doesn't mean you are entitled to have it published; nor does it mean the company publishing it has to accept it as-is. You'll find that publishing companies often have standards and requirements for authors to conform their works to them. It's called "editing" and works quite well.

Besides, in my opinion, it shows a great lack of intelligence if you have to express yourself in writing or speech using swear words as emphasis to or replacement of legitimate adjectives or verbs. It's an excuse for a lack of imagination to use proper words to convey emotion or feeling, or even mood. Listening to someone with such a lack of intelligence or imagination becomes tedious and even frustrating. It's just the same as listening to a teenager who cannot form a sentence with the word "like" in it. Instead of a series of coherent words and sentences designed to communicate clearly, you have to weed through a series of useless "like" comparisons (as that is what the word "like" is used for) to gather the meaning.

I can understand the occasional use of the word to reflect extreme frustration or fear, but overuse the words and their severe purpose disappears into uselessness. For example, remember the movie "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom"? You will find that throughout that whole movie not a swear word was used until it made complete and purposeful sense, just once. Where do you say? It was when Indy and his friends were stuck on the rope bridge with bad guys approaching them from both ends. His utterance of "oh sh**" was appropriate and gave the viewer a greater impression of how serious the situation was.

A truly good author will use swears only if the character absolutely needs it and not as a regular substitute for an intelligently thought of adjective.


Steve said:
I am not sure which is worse, Apple rejecting this guy’s book or the fact that he caved in and actually censored his own book just to get it on iTunes. Damn shame.
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So, apple sells music where people say the words, but they won't sell a book where it is printed?

I'm missing some underlying guiding principle here.
 
SuperSparky said:
A truly good author will use swears only if the character absolutely needs it and not as a regular substitute for an intelligently thought of adjective.
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Unless of course one of the character flaws is that the character is profane. There are reasons to use profanity than simply because you can't think of a good word. For example, a book that included a gang member from the slums would be absurd if all the dialogue were clean, yet could also be a well written, articulate piece of literature.
 
"These "profane" words are profane because we make them. We give them their taboo nature when they're simply words. Just words."


Well, your words are just words and cant undo the taboo nature of the words you question...
 
Censorship is inevitable in a culture that, for the most part, does not understand the difference between tolerance and acceptance.

So when does Apple start ripping pages out of other books that it wants to publish on its "private network" of public information?

@Tokamak
Say it the way I tell you to say it or don't say it at all?
Is that the statement?
 
SuperSparky said:
...
Besides, in my opinion, it shows a great lack of intelligence if you have to express yourself in writing or speech using swear words as emphasis to or replacement of legitimate adjectives or verbs. It's an excuse for a lack of imagination to use proper words to convey emotion or feeling, or even mood. Listening to someone with such a lack of intelligence or imagination becomes tedious and even frustrating. It's just the same as listening to a teenager who cannot form a sentence with the word "like" in it. Instead of a series of coherent words and sentences designed to communicate clearly, you have to weed through a series of useless "like" comparisons (as that is what the word "like" is used for) to gather the meaning...
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Maybe you've never written anything creative, so I'll excuse the ignorance. When you're writing a book or a screenplay, you are usually not writing from your own perspective. I don't know when the last time you stepped outside was, but there are thousands of interesting people who cuss like sailors! Real life dialogue consists of many f-bombs. Oh, I'm sure Fight Club could do without any, let's censor Huckleberry Finn and those n-words while we're at it :rolleyes:

I don't know what's more upsetting in this case, that apple censors or that the author freely censored his work.
 
We have the right to free speech in America, but that does not mean authors have the right to get their books published. Apple has every right not to pull lush a book for any reason at all. They aren't preventing this guy from expressing his ideas; they are simply refusing to help him do so. Apple does not have any legal duties to do so.

If a family radio station refuses to play an explicit song to avoid offending their audience, are they violating the First Amendment? Of course not. Businesses have rights, too.
 
Liu Kang said:
That's not the point, jackass... this tactic infrings on free speech, a basic right we are supposed to have in this country.
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Please explain to me how this infirnges on free speach?

This is a business deal, pure and simple.
 
Steve said:
I am not sure which is worse, Apple rejecting this guy’s book or the fact that he caved in and actually censored his own book just to get it on iTunes. Damn shame.
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Don't like it? Itunes doesn't have a monopoly on the market. If you're shocked and outraged at this, why aren't you outraged that Amazon won't sell porn, or walmart explicit lyrics, or why doesn't my local library have the complete hustler collection?

Every sales outlet has their standards. If you don't like them, sell somewhere else. The beauty of the internet is that it allows easy access to the marketplace.
 
HOCP4ME said:
We have the right to free speech in America, but that does not mean authors have the right to get their books published. Apple has every right not to pull lush a book for any reason at all. They aren't preventing this guy from expressing his ideas; they are simply refusing to help him do so. Apple does not have any legal duties to do so.

If a family radio station refuses to play an explicit song to avoid offending their audience, are they violating the First Amendment? Of course not. Businesses have rights, too.
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I can understand this stance if it wasn't for the fact that they are selective on who and what they censor. They ask that the book's text be censored, yet the audiobook version will make it through uncensored. It makes no sense to me that you would not permit a book's text on your site, but yet you allow movies, audiobooks and music with content that is worse than that. I can't read the word fuck in a book, but I can download "Reservoir Dogs?"

Reservoir Dogs said:
LAPD Officer Marvin Nash: That fuck! That sick fuck! That fucking bastard!
Mr. Orange: Marvin, I need you to hold on. There's cops waiting less than a block away.
LAPD Officer Marvin Nash: What the fuck are they waiting for? This fucking guy slashes my face, and he cuts my fucking ear off! I'm fucking deformed!
Mr. Orange: [yells] FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU! I'M FUCKIN' DYING HERE! I'M FUCKIN' DYING!
[pauses and calms down]
Mr. Orange: All right, now you heard them, we'll make the move when they get back, so don't pussy out on me now, Marvin. We're just gonna sit here and bleed until Joe Cabot sticks his fucking head through that door!
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Liu Kang said:
That's not the point, jackass... this tactic infrings on free speech, a basic right we are supposed to have in this country.
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Learn your rights citizen. The 1st amendment prohibits the GOVERNMENT from infringing on your speech in most cases. When itunes is elected president, and stops you from saying what you want, you can whine about free speech.
 
This is not censorship. There is nothing wrong with this.

I drop F-bombs if/when I please. Sometimes I drop a lot of them. Sometimes I don't. Depends on where I am, and if my kids are listening. I drop a lot of them in the bar, over beers, on Saturday night. In church on Sunday, not quite so many.

This is not really any different. If apple is paying to publish something, they should be able to set their standards for they consider to be decency any where they want, even if they are so ridiculous as to allow the profanity in audio, but not in print.

Freedom of speech is about protecting one's right to say something. There is nothing in there about obligating another to repeat(or publish) it.
 
It's hypocrisy in action, and censoring to boot. As noted by another poster, Apple is selling movies through iTunes that would make some people puke in terms of violence, "profanity," and many other aspects, so that's what I consider an open door.

To tell the movie studios it's ok for them to furnish materials that some people would find objectionable and Apple sells 'em through iTunes, and yet a smaller author of some content gets slapped in the face because his book has some stuff that a few might find objectionable...

Get real. It's censorship, and monopolistic too. They're using unfair practices that aren't creating a level playing field:

Big movie studio: "We've got this movie with <insert big name star in hit> saying the word 'Fuck' every 30 seconds or so, guaranteed, it'll be a monster hit"

Apple: "No problem..."

compared to...

Single author with a damned book: "Hey, mind if I get on the iTunes bandwagon and sell a book through your service?"

Apple: <insert behind the scenes backstabbing and dealings> "We're sorry, but your material simply doesn't meet our criteria for 'acceptable', have a nice day."

Please...
 
Censor all forms, or freely allow all forms.

If I can purchase rap music talking about drugs,sex and violence, I should be able to get a book from the same place that has the same content. Most especially if I can get movies from there depicting the same thing. To suddenly not be okay with words like shit damn and fuck in a written format but being okay wit it being said numerously in a song or in a movie is rather stupid and unfair to legitimate authors. Why should they be held to such a standard if no one else is?

I do have to agree. It doesn't matter what you call it, it's still retarded to do.
 
As much as I don't like Apple this isn't their fault really. A company has a right to sell the products it wants to. This is all the authors fault for caving in and censoring his own book. Obviously he doesn't have a very high regard for his work.
 
convexion said:
As much as I don't like Apple this isn't their fault really. A company has a right to sell the products it wants to. This is all the authors fault for caving in and censoring his own book. Obviously he doesn't have a very high regard for his work.
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The bottom line is he altered his work for the all mighty dollar, and people are made at Apple!
 
I don't get it. Why is it such a big deal for an "artist" to alter his/her work? I read something like this, and I think, "no big deal." What is it that I'm not getting?
 
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