21 ms·

Ask HN: What do you think of the Wordle guy not monetizing it?

• paramk 5y ago
  Here is a NYT article about the creator - https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/03/technology/wordle-word-game-creator.html https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/03/technology/wordle-word-ga...
• tony-allan 5y ago
  A pure simple idea well executed. Making money changes the relationship between us and Josh. If he is happy not to make money from the idea, that's great. Well done Josh Wardle!
• snarf21 5y ago
  Maybe monetizing it turns it into a job instead of the gift it was. Not everything has to be a transaction. If I volunteer my time or donate goods, it is a gift. I don't waste my time worrying about how my gift is monetized.
• 1123581321 5y ago
  I like his decision as it feels like it keeps him unencumbered with worry. And of course the game is delightful in its light and simple state. He doesn’t owe me an unmonetized game, so were he to change his mind, I wouldn’t be upset. Anklebiter copycats are always going to profit off someone’s work. If someone does make a derivative, monetized game that surpasses Wordle, I don’t see how monetizing and defending Wordle in the App Store would have meaningfully delayed that. Games are an aggressive market.
• phs318u 5y ago
  I love the fact that I can only play this once a day and there's nothing I can do about it.
  • steve_adams_86 5y ago
    Likewise. I don’t let myself play games because I can’t regulate myself very well and play too much, or even if I don’t, I feel guilty for being unproductive. This strikes a great balance, personally - it’s a fun little distraction that lasts just long enough to be interesting, but not long enough to make me feel like I’m wasting time.
• optymizer 5y ago
  I'd probably attempt to monetize it, but it looks like he might be generating more buzz by not doing so, which is an interesting strategy. He's going to be competing with clones that will flood the app stores either way, and users aren't going to necessarily know which one is the original (a past drama about 2048 comes to mind), so it's going to be down to whoever does the most marketing and manages to get featured in the app store, which is a lot of work and stress, and may not be worth it in the end. I guess he decided that the risk/reward is not worth it.
• avalys 5y ago
  It’s a cool concept and nicely done but I’m not sure I see it as some kind of shining beacon of purity that must be protected from the dirty corruption of money. It’s a single-player word puzzle game, not a religious experience or scientific breakthrough or something. He should monetize it, and donate the proceeds to a good charity if he really doesn’t need it and doesn’t think anyone in his immediate family or social circle needs help either.
• gkoberger 5y ago
  Right now, his is ubiquitous because everyone has the same word. There's an odd network effect, where posting it on Twitter means something because everyone had the same exact puzzle. Nobody wants to see how you did on 6Word or whatever. It's a fun game, but it's not inherently fun (something like Scrabble already uses the same parts of your brain)... the fun comes from everyone having the same word every day. He may not monetize it by selling it on the app store (honestly, who would buy? I think most people would just fizzle out rather than pay $1), but he'll definitely end up monetizing it in a unique way... the gigantic success of this will set him up for a huge number of opportunities (awesome job offers! promotions! raising money for a company! higher consulting rate!) that will last long after Wordle does.
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  • taeric 5y ago
    I disagree. Sort of. I agree on why folks like it. Is a fun shared exercise. And it is the unique way of sharing that makes it popular with this crowd. This is a game that is fun to share, and does not ask for permission to my accounts to make that share.
    • gkoberger 5y ago
      I think we agree completely!
      • taeric 5y ago
        Ah! Apologies on my bad read then! :)
  • masswerk 5y ago
    Actually, going viral doesn't guarantee big money, not even a decent job.
    • raverbashing 5y ago
• Arainach 5y ago
  It's a mistake. It will be cloned and the original author will get nothing. This exact scenario played out with Flappy Bird.
  • aleksandrh 5y ago
    What do you mean? Flappy Bird made a crap ton of money.
• deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
• anonymousiam 5y ago
  It reminds me of "Flappy Bird" and how the developer suddenly gave up everything. It was never said, but I suspected he was being extorted by some ranking (Vietnamese) government official. Note: I'm not saying that the same thing is happening here.
  • mongol 5y ago
    I always thought that so strange. It did not cross my mind that he might be extorted
• yoyopa 5y ago
  whenever i see some catchy game like this or the countless others like flappy bird or whatever, i think of that star trek episode and don't get involved
  • tqkxzugoaupvwqr 5y ago
    What happened in that episode?
    • sidpatil 5y ago
      Spoilers: Tubas on a checkerboard turned out to be an addicting VR game, to the point where the entire crew of the Enterprise was essentially zombified. Wesley and Ensign Robin Lefler (played by guest star Ashley Judd) saved the day.
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  • ggm 5y ago
    flappy bird guy freaked out on the monetization. When you aim for low 10k and get 16m it can be .. punishing. There are worse fates, but (the little I read suggests) he wasn't entirely happy with it
• prawn 5y ago
  If he doesn't want to ruin his personal experience of it too much, he could license the name and UI in some way to a developer whereby the developer gets some return, but the bulk goes to a foundation of his choosing. That way he doesn't get too embroiled in the work aspect. The clones are inevitable, so might as well head them off and continue the positive vibe. (My wife and I play it, as does our 9yo. It's a morning (LOL, 00:01...) ritual of sorts, playing and then later discussing our tactics and the logic involved.
• hgs3 5y ago
  I never heard of Wordle until this post mentioned it so I'd say his decision is good advertising.
• sohkamyung 5y ago
  Here's an article about the IP around Wordle [1]. In short, people cannot rip-off the 'look-and-feel' of Wordle, but they may work around it. The idea behind Wordle itself is, as the article points out, not original. Hopefully it works out for the creator. Maybe helping to spread the word that 'app X is not the original Wordle' might help to give him more visibility among people playing the game. [1] https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2022/01/wordle-and-ip-law-what-happens-when-a-hot-game-gets-cloned/ https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2022/01/wordle-and-ip-law-wha...
• lhorie 5y ago
  > I'd rather the guy who made the original rather than an app cloning team in China or some bay area tech bro My two cents is don't think too hard and just enjoy the game. Let it be. Que sera, sera. Isn't it said in startup circles that ideas are nothing and execution is everything? Isn't it also said elsewhere that money doesn't buy happiness? Someone else's viral fad doesn't need to fit neatly into some preconceived idealistic notion of success. It's literally a viral fad; the whole point is to not fit neatly into predictable molds.
  • bruce511 5y ago
    It's such a Western / Capitalistic thing to do - look at someone else's success and either assume he's being paid the big bucks, or on hearing he isn't start wondering why not. And yet we live in a world where the Linus Tovalds, or John Resig's and literally a million others happily created enormous social value, and got nothing (directly) out of it. (Those who were around in the early days can remember some of the words bandied around to describe Open Source, Communist et al.) >> I'd rather the guy who made the original rather than an app cloning team You don't need to worry about Josh making money or not. He's doing what he wants to do for rewards other than money, and debasing his effort into some sort of money grab is not necessary.
    • em500 5y ago
      > And yet we live in a world where the Linus Tovalds, or John Resig's and literally a million others happily created enormous social value, and got nothing (directly) out of it. Linus Torvalds reportedly got $20M stock from the Red Hat IPO (appreciating to >$100M in later years), and receives at least a few million per year from the Linux Foundation. Fully deserved of course, and arguably only a miniscule fraction of his contribution to society. But he is comfortably Ultra High Net Worth category.
      • nottorp 5y ago
        He didn't get that 2 weeks after his OS got viral right? :)
• thedz 5y ago
  Pretend Wordle was an open source MIT licensed game that someone created and released online. Or pretend Wordle is one of the countless examples of freeware (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freeware https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freeware) that exist online. Would we be having the same conversation? It's strange to me that many folks can't accept some people release things and don't necessarily care how it's further used, when the exact thing happens for many other examples of software and software products.
  • esturk 5y ago
    It's a form of FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) that's rooted in some personal insecurity. Some people can walk away from temptations of great wealth and power but I can also see how many people can't.
    • ben_bradley 5y ago
      It's such a common capitalist concept that a word was invented for it: Monetize.
    • skinnymuch 5y ago
      You’re attacking people as if every one has the same motivation and every one is only self serving. I’d like people who are in opportunities like this and can’t retire for life if they wanted to, to make a quick million or what have you because I don’t enjoy our status quo of how society functions.
    • dniculescu 5y ago
      Come on, Mr. Frodo. I can’t carry it for you…
  • mrweasel 5y ago
    I was thinking the same thing. Say that someone builds a fantastic web framework, or the very best package for Node... say a single package that brings together all the comforts that would normally require 200 dependencies. Almost one would ask why you'd release that for free, source code included. Honestly I think it's great. More of us should find small project, where the current selection is just awful half-baked apps, develop by someone who only goal is to stuff as many ads as possible into your face, and just undermind them with free well designed apps.
• goddstream 5y ago
  What happened to us, as a society, that creates the expectation that a thing should be monetized? I don't like ads, on the internet or TV, and therefore refuse to inflict them on anyone who plays the little game apps that I release, otherwise I'd be a hypocrite. Well done to Josh for having the humanity for just making a thing that people enjoy, and stopping there.
  • analyte123 5y ago
    The more inequality there is in a society, the worse the consequences of not having money are. Money isn't about not having a second jet-ski or a five-star instead of a three-star hotel anymore - it's about not working 70 hour weeks while your kids are getting beat up in a dangerous school.
    • mr90210 5y ago
      That's exactly what I have been working for. For instance, I love cars, I used to love it even more, but nowadays I don't imagine myself putting USD 1 million on car, that just obnoxious. I would rather use that money to change my next generation.
  • acchow 5y ago
    Yes, applause to Josh for doing such a thing. But I think getting paid for work is quite human, no?
  • foepys 5y ago
    To be fair, HN is run by a startup investor, which attracts a specific audience. A lot of commenters here have kind of fetishized money and early retirement.
    • tomcam 5y ago
      I grew up not rich and not safe. You could say I've fetishized money because I've got a fair amount of it and greatly enjoy my work. But I see it as the most efficient way to protect me and mine. Living in a nearly crime-free neighborhood and having a shade tree doesn't seem like a fetish to me. This would put me in the group of people who are interested in, but not obsessed by, a choice not to monetize.
• napolux 5y ago
  2048 didn’t teach anything (other than the powers of 2)
• pivic 5y ago
  I think he sounds like a sane (and caring) human being. Greed is a flaw while empathy is a basic and sound human tendency.
  • ggm 5y ago
    This. he may have future FOMO but I think that will be a small part of his make up, overrun. by the reality he made 100m+ people very happy
• thedz 5y ago
  like art, not all software must be commercial
• omalleyt 5y ago
  He should create a free Wordle app that lets you play once daily, and then a $9.99 in-app upgrade that lets you play unlimited, that pops up after you’ve completed the word of the day. The unlimited users should still see the word of the day whenever a new one is available (to keep sharing high). Best of both worlds.
  • mrpopo 5y ago
    No.
  • raytube 5y ago
    Not alot of fun in unlimited goes. Multiplayer challenging has more allure.
• allenu 5y ago
  It's a fun game and I like that you can only play once per day. I have to admit I was surprised to find that the game was free, especially after seeing the NY Times article with its narrative of "Wordle is a love story". I thought for sure that was some marketing story tossed together. I think it says a lot about me (and society!) that my first thought was he was selling it. I think I'm also disappointed that numerous clones are coming out and they're all going to cash in on the craze and will probably eclipse the original.
• LeonM 5y ago
  After reading this post I googled to see what Wordle is. I immediately recognized Wordle as a clone of 'Lingo' [0], a popular TV game show that started somewhere in the 80's, and is still broadcasted today. It's very popular here in the Netherlands. > But I can't help but feel that the guy is about to let someone else benefit from his creation and am not sure how to feel about that I'm not sure how the creators of Lingo must feel about this Josh Wardle getting credit for 'creating' a game that they have been broadcasting for over 40 years. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lingo_(Dutch_game_show) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lingo_(Dutch_game_show)
  • pkd 5y ago
    It does seem like everything has been invented! It's possible that he arrived at the puzzle independently but what's more puzzling that this is the first time I'm hearing about this Dutch game show given the sensation that Wordle has been.
    • cookie_monsta 5y ago
      Not saying that you need to read every comment, but pretty much every "Wordle" post here has someone commenting that Lingo was the original. And the "Dutch game show" was just an international version of the US original[0]. It's run in 16 countries and is presently airing in 5. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lingo_(American_game_show) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lingo_(American_game_show)
  • Kiro 5y ago
    Lingo was not the first but it doesn't matter. Wordle is not popular because it's a copy of an ancient game that had been played as long as language has existed. It's popular because of its execution, tapping in to our current day and age (shared word once a day, easy emoji sharing).
    • raytube 5y ago
      Sharing doesn't work in Firefox for me.
• Farbklex 5y ago
  It is great and it is his choice. But I also don't judge the copycats. Video games get copied all the time. In the beginning, we will get blatant clones which share the same ui and name. Give it some time and we will see clones which add their own twist. The game will evolve.
• Kiro 5y ago
  I've launched multiple successful things that have gone viral where I didn't earn a cent. It was simply not the objective. More importantly I don't want to taint my things by selling out. It would destroy the soul of the project.
  • masswerk 5y ago
    Totally agree. Moreover, most of the projects which still do have "soul", wouldn't exist in the first place, if the sole goal had been monetizing.
  • skinnymuch 5y ago
    How viral?
    • Kiro 5y ago
      Much less than Wordle but viral enough to be picked up by newspapers.
• deltree7 5y ago
  Money is a natural concept that roughly describes how much value you created. Eschewing money on the outset seems taking the high-road, but from a value creation and compounding perspective, it is pretty dumb. If you create value, you better capture the value that you have created, so that you can compound it and give back the goodness 10000x. Gates / Buffett can deploy Billions to large-scale charity because they captured value. Elon Musk can deploy his Billions to revolutionize exploration. If you think Josh is good with no-money, imagine how much good he can do with $10,000,000,000 money. Paradoxically, Nice people should build wealth. Else, someone else will build wealth and they will deploy it in a not-nice way
  • bobdobbs23 5y ago
    "Greed is good" is fewer words.
  • cat_adorer 5y ago
    You could say that, but value is only created upon the creation of goods, while anything else merely amounts to the transfer of value; hence, only those who create (harvest) raw materials have any worth to society, and therefore should be the only ones to benefit. If this situation strikes you as preposterous, then value is clearly something other than money. Secondly, the rich are relatively ungracious; the money means far less to them than it does others and they use far more of it on themselves (even if they use less proportionally), so their goodness is less than what it would be if they had declined to profit and instead improved their employees' lives such that they could do good with their money. Thirdly, your last statement implies wealth will be built, whereas government action (such as enforcement of a trademark by the author in this case, or the breakup of Meta) can prevent wealth from accumulating without reason and thus spread wealth out for maximal utility.
• onion2k 5y ago
  Right now Josh owns Wordle. He can do what he wants with it. No one has any claim over his time or his game. If he started monetizing it he would lose that. He'd also probably have to start supporting it, or defending it. I can see why he might not want to do that.
• raytube 5y ago
  Just let the CIA implant words into the collective conscience via Wordle for mind control, and offer him a hammock in the Bahamas in return.
• tempestn 5y ago
  I guess my question would be how the original creator monetizing his version would prevent copycats from making a windfall. If anything monetizing would remove a differentiating feature from Wordle, driving more traffic to copycats. The only way he can prevent copycats cashing in is to both monetize and use the revenue for marketing (and/or feature development). But then you have a business rather than a hobby, and it sounds like not a business he wants to be in.
• gfykvfyxgc 5y ago
  It offends me, as someone who has never succeeded building something people want. I say that a touch light hearted but it’s kinda true.
• raytube 5y ago
  He could add an ad platform or a simple sponsor without debilitating the product.
• jack_pp 5y ago
  Fun game, could be a nice interview test. Better than fizzbuzz imo
• Borrible 5y ago
  It took this planet about 3.5 billion years for a conscious intelligence to emerge that was just barely curious enough to notice Wordle on Hackerne.ws a few minutes ago. That's me. After reading about Wordle, this very being thinks that guy should take every bloody buck out of their pockets, without any remorse but pure heartless greed, and donate them to whomever or whatever he thinks needs it the most. That'll teach them.
• hooby 5y ago
  It's his choice, his decision to make and then live with whatever positive and/or negative consequences stem from it. It's definitely not my place to judge that. I don't know how much money he could expect to make? But obviously he values his principles and convictions higher than whatever amount he estimates he could make - thus he choose the option that provides the most value to him personally. I see no problem with that - it's totally within his rights to do whatever he wants with his game. There are many possible reasons to not monetize something. Like for example, if you do something and enjoy doing it - and then start monetizing it, you will be exposed to certain pressures and responsibilities. For example, once you enter a seller/buyer relation-ship, you have to treat your fans as customers, which comes with a set of expectations that you can dodge as long as the app remains free. These new pressures and responsibilities turn a hobby into a profession - and can totally suck the fun out of it. If you want to keep your hobby a hobby that you do just for fun, without big commitments, then it's probably better to not monetize it. At least not in a way that creates any responsibilities. Maybe there's a way to accept donations as pure gifts, without any strings attached. But many people would still feel like they had to give something in return, when receiving donation money. Like that little nagging thought, that they should put out an update, since many people donated for it... that sort of thing. I feel that when people say "He's stupid for not taking the free money he could get!" - there might be a bit of jealousy behind that kind of statement. To someone who's trying hard to come up with a startup-idea that could generate money, it must of course feel maddening to see someone sitting on such an idea and not generating money from it. Makes you feel: "I wish I had a viral sensation app like that...", doesn't it? ;)
• exreddit 5y ago
  I still can't get over that I looked at the morning's news, saw something about this, recognized the same, and was like "I know that guy!" Congrats on the viral hit and all the free press. Josh is a great guy. I doubt there's much value here to squeeze. People lose interest in these things pretty fast. By the time it's productionized, it might be too late, and it ruined a fun hobby. The big value is he has a platform to launch something else, or enough attention to land a pretty good next gig.
  • skinnymuch 5y ago
    Yeah the last paragraph is key. The repeated spreading of its a passion to project for his SO is great both outside of any financial capitalist aspect and also in that way too because who doesn’t love a genuine, great person who can also do kick ass work?
• axiosgunnar 5y ago
  What is a „tech bro“?
• deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
• DamnInteresting 5y ago
  I can't speak for the creator of Wordle, but some of us just want to put some nice things out into the world without the stinking pollution of advertising.
• vpilcx 5y ago
  It reminds me of the Flappy Bird guy who was making $50K a day or whatever. Its ridiculously privileged and only someone who's already well off would do something like that. I mean, maybe they'd have a leg to stand on if it was like that guy who didn't patent that vaccine in order to make it more publicly available, but these are games.
• edanm 5y ago
  I don't think it means much, TBH. Different people have different situations and different priorities. Maybe he doesn't need money cause he's already rich? Maybe money isn't a particularly important objective for him? Maybe this is part of a long-term strategy to get recognized as a leading viral game dev? Who cares? His situation his his situation. I neither think much better of him nor any worse of him depending on whether he monetizes or not. (Though there's something "romantic" about just creating a thing because you like it existing.) > If someone is gonna inevitably end up benefiting from it, I'd rather the guy who made the original rather than an app cloning team in China or some bay area tech bro. Why? If people want to play this on iOS, and the creator chooses not to provide it, or even makes an inferior version, why not let some other team create a "clone" of it that satisfies a need people have? For a forum in which so many people hate IP and copyright, this is a funny sentiment :)
• gcanyon 5y ago
  Deduce, a somewhat similar game has been available for ten years on iOS: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/deduce/id351558195 https://apps.apple.com/us/app/deduce/id351558195 Differences: * Deduce uses 6-letter words * Deduce just tells you the number of correctly placed letters, it doesn't show you where they are or give you wrongly placed letters. * Deduce can be played as often as you like * You can take as many guesses as you need * Deduce is paid, but reasonable and one-time I've played Wordle a couple times, and Deduce is much harder.
• marginalia_nu 5y ago
  Not everything has to be about making money. I can only speak for myself. I too build stuff for free without expecting to get rich off it. I work part-time, 32 hours a week, and I'm reasonably well paid. I don't want to run a business, and becoming financially independent doesn't particularly appeal to me. I've already tried not working. Seems like a great idea until you do. Just took a year off and lived off savings doing whatever the heck I felt like. Turns out that gets kinda boring in the long run.
• coldtea 5y ago
  We could use less monetization (including via ads)...
• serdar 5y ago
  I came up with this idea 10 years ago (not knowing Lingo or alike) and made a game "Isogram Puzzle[0]" with Flash. It's listed by some Flash game portals, never got popular. Recently I ported it to Android, it has 23 active users at the moment. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ [0] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=air.com.gamevase.isogram https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=air.com.gameva...
  • bena 5y ago
    To be fair, "Isogram Puzzle", while it may be an accurate name, is relatively boring. "Wordle" is quirky. Plus, I think the quasi-social aspect of it is a draw. If I post my Wordle score/grid for today, you can compare it directly for yours. Not only that, but since we both have the same word, that's all I have to do. Hell, all I have to post is "Wordle 3/6" and you just know what I mean. If feels like a shared secret. But also one we share in public with a knowing wink and nod.
    • serdar 5y ago
      Right, all good points. That's why it has only 23 active users after all. It's also harder to play, more cryptic hints with numbers and maybe the UI looks kind of old.
• mattbrewsbytes 5y ago
  Apparently I live under a rock and am just hearing about this, had to google what it is. Its a neat game play loop of one word and one play per day and makes it not really copy-able. I mean yeah you could create a game to copy the concept but then if someone is playing with friends and they are playing a different game with a different word it kinda won't work. If people play once per day and it takes a few minutes, _any_ amount of advertising would probably kill the game. I think its awesome to not monetize something. Not everything needs to get on that hamster wheel. Whats next? multiplayer? private games? corporate events? More versions that are just like it - 6 character words, then 7, etc. Maybe the person just wanted to create a fun game. His best bet is a tip-jar, if Apple allows that.
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
• mtmail 5y ago
  I hope the author at least trademarks 'Wordle' to be able to counter some of the copycats.
  • fleddr 5y ago
    Wordle itself is the copycat. It's just Lingo.
    • prvnsmpth 5y ago
      which in turn, is based on Mastermind, right?
• Ekaros 5y ago
  I think it is positive example. Creation for sake of creation not to profit. I really wish more of Internet were to go back to that.
  • gaws 5y ago
    Everyone has a price.
• giantg2 5y ago
  It seems like people want an app and not a website? You don't have to monetize apps. Someone here could volunteer to make it for the guy for free. If they felt strongly enough.
• dangus 5y ago
  I agree with the general idea of sticking to your principles. On the other hand, when it comes to your side projects, it truly is once in a lifetime that something becomes a global hit. A company or even a non-profit wouldn't hesitate to monetize this, and yet individual is the one who is given more scrutiny when they "sell out." This simple little app being popular is something that could make a single developer financially independent (or just bring in a steady side income that gives you more career options). The author isn't exactly independently wealthy, he's still doing salaried work for a company. He is still (trapped, depending on your perspective) in the 9 to 5 like the rest of us. It's not like Wordle is healthcare, something that is monetized that shouldn't be. It's just a game. A lot of people love it so much that they would gladly pay for some premium version of it. Another way to keep the original product 100% free would be to open a store with merchandise or use something like Patreon. I think of the Open Source movement not being about "freedom as in beer." It's 100% okay to sell open source software, but the point of open source is "freedom as in speech." Monetizing is not the same as selling out or being predatory or immoral, because how you monetize is a very important detail. Zach could stick to some kind of principles like those while still monetizing. Consider this as well: there's a good argument that not monetizing something as popular as Wordle is doing his family a disservice. All of our families, especially in a capitalist system to which we are subscribed with no opt-out, are basically little kingdoms that have to do their best to secure the stability of their future. Giving up a low-effort income source like this is kind of like turning away 10,000 soldiers who want to join your kingdom's army – it can only hurt you in the long run.
• _moof 5y ago
  Anil Dash said it better than I can: "The real web is @powerlanguish making a game for someone he loves, not smothering it in surveillance-based ads or creepy growth hacks, and limiting it so it doesn’t even try to steal more than a few minutes of your time. Wordle deserves all its success."
• eruci 5y ago
  Wordle 208 4/6 ⬜⬜ ⬜⬜ ⬜⬜ Awesome game! Got it on the fourth try. Maybe the guy can put a donation box somewhere. I'd buy him a coffee.
• maxehmookau 5y ago
  What do I think of it? Literally nothing. He made a thing. People enjoy it.
• nottorp 5y ago
  He'll get an offer he can't refuse from EA who will then ruin the game. Happened before, remember Popcap?
  • skinnymuch 5y ago
    Popcap was always a for profit startup, no? Or at least it was for the majority of its time before acquisition, I’d think. Their games were all micro iAP freemium sort of stuff I think.
    • nottorp 5y ago
      Nope. I paid once for Plants vs Zombies 1 and played it as much as i liked. Then the EA acquisition came and they went IAP and i got a code to continue to play without IAPs. But it only worked on one of my iOS devices not all, like the initial purchase from independent PopCap.
      • skinnymuch 5y ago
        Ah wow. That’s awful.
• darkMatterDev 5y ago
  I hadn't thought anything of it. I'd rather he adds some (nice) ads to it rather than taking it down.
  • dannyr 5y ago
    Do you think it's going to be a monetary reason in case he takes it down?
• kgm 5y ago
  I once wrote a popular browser-based tool for a popular game. Other tools existed in the space at the time I started the project, but I felt the need to go at the problem my own way, and I managed to add some mathematical sophistication that the other extant tools lacked. I did all of this purely for my own benefit: I was playing this game, and I wanted this tool to exist to aid in doing so. I threw it online for other people to use, and it quickly gained traction. I'd estimate that it has had over ten thousand users, possibly multiple tens. Some of these users expressed, unprompted, an interest in giving me money for providing this tool. I simply set up a page on a payments website that caters to creators, and linked it from the tool. I provide no benefits for contributions; it is purely to provide an avenue for those that wish to do so. If you total up the amount of work I've put into the project, and the total amount of money I've received, I would estimate I've earned somewhere in the vicinity of $1/hour for my work. I didn't do the project for the money. I did it because I wanted the thing I made. It is an entirely selfish project. That others find it useful is gratifying, but the motive wasn't profit, and to try to pivot to a profit motive would be nonsense to me. (Not to mention, I don't want to insult the developers of the game for which the project is an aid, by charging money off the back of their work.) Some things just aren't businesses, you know?
  • thizzbuzz 5y ago
    I run a language learning site / web app that is totally free, no ads too, going on about 8 years now. It's for one specific language that has not had much attention from the software community but could use it. I've never tried to promote it and have never updated it much, but there have been some random people over the years who have given me money. I had a few people send me 50$ unprompted, plus some people I met IRL pay for dinners and things like that when the topic came up.
• burlesona 5y ago
  I don’t think he’s foolish or wrong not to monetize, but at this point the opportunity cost of not doing it is truly enormous. I understand he has a personal feeling that this was not meant to be monetized, and I can respect that. But even so, it would make a lot of sense for him to put a tip jar on the site. He’d probably make $100,000 over the next weekend, and he’s certainly earned it.
• mjmasn 5y ago
  Wordle is cool in its simplicity and focus on 'once per day' but the mechanic is literally a clone of Lingo already (the UK gameshow version at least, which I think is also a clone of the American Lingo gameshow). You can see the official apps here: https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/lingo-official-mobile-game/id1564413692 https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/lingo-official-mobile-game/id1... https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=uk.co.twowaymedia.lingo https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=uk.co.twowayme... There's tonnes of clones of those too in both app stores. I also made a web based version recently, with unlimited words and choice of words lengths between 4-8 characters.
• pacifika 5y ago
  Thanks hackernews for proving the user donation model doesn’t work
• GoodJokes 5y ago
• shimonabi 5y ago
  Isn't Worlde just an easier "Hangman"?
• achenatx 5y ago
  I created the first online texas holdem poker game (1992). I did not monetize and definitely regret it :) I have missed a lot of opportunities in my life, but that is the biggest one. The thing is monetization isn't just about making money. The money is used for improvement so when you monetize you can possibly create something even more amazing.
• citizenpaul 5y ago
  He's a fool. It's just a game not some service to humanity. If anything it's a disservice to humanity by allowing people to waste time gaming for free. On top of that someone else is already rushing to monetize it. (presumably) There is nothing admirable about working for free while someone else takes your money.
  • nicbou 5y ago
    He's a maniac and he must be stopped!
    • citizenpaul 5y ago
      Ok so I'm dramatic. Still though it irks me to see this weird tech community rose colored utopia where money doesn't matter. If you want to make change in the world take the money and donate it somewhere. Its not like the millionth mobile free game is doing humanity any good.
• SergeAx 5y ago
  I am more surprised that there are no hundreds of clones around, it is so easy to do. Original is fully client-run, it is even has a dictionary unencrypted inside bundled js-file.
• cat_adorer 5y ago
  What I in fact find to be the most compelling reason for strict (as in non-optional) monetization is that making a service without monetization can make it significantly better than other services, potentially increasing the quality of the experience of the consumer, but reducing the potential for any other developer of entertainment to profit, which, if they were in need, could significantly harm them. The solution to this, of course, is to set up a (government) service to pay artists, such as game developers, for their work.
• sprkwd 5y ago
  Good in him. Not everything is about money.
• laughingbovine 5y ago
  Its mastermind with letters... not original and not hard to implement. To monetize, the majority of work would be monetization stuff. That sounds like it wouldn't be fun.
• jcranberry 5y ago
  It's good that he wants to continue distributing it for free. If he wanted to make money off of it, that's also good too.
• flubflub 5y ago
  Some people have enough money and don't need more. It is hard to say what is the case.