If you’re looking for a decent, cheap editor, allow me to introduce you to Hemingway. He started helping me with this blog yesterday. Here is how we work together.

I write a blog post in WordPress.

I copy the text from that post.

I visit HemingwayApp.com and select all the text in the middle column.

I paste in my text.

Hemingway gives me instant feedback. He highlights text that could be improved. Sometimes, I point to those highlights and he offers his advice: “Change to active voice.” Other times, I have to refer to the color-coded notes in the right margin to understand what he’s saying.

Hemingway tells me when he thinks a sentence is hard to read. He suggests simpler phrases when appropriate. He tries to lessen my use of adverbs.

Hemingway is a web app created by Adam and Ben Long. It’s a robot editor whose goal is to make “your writing bold and clear.”  I couldn’t find any information on the site to explain how Hemington works.

The app is also available as a $6.99 program for Mac or Windows computers. For that price, you can work offline, save your text and use markdown.

No, Hemingway can’t completely replace a human editor. But I’m a zero-budget blogger with no one to read my posts at 12:41 a.m. Hemingway is the only editor I know who will work these hours for free, and he has definitely improved my blog posts.