4 ms·

As someone who has worked for the NYT and has also been requested to takedown data later on (I scraped crossword data for fun), I do get why they did this. It’s

As someone who has worked for the NYT and has also been requested to takedown data later on (I scraped crossword data for fun), I do get why they did this. It’s sucks, but I get why. Kudos if it was a ‘request’ and hadn’t gone too deep into lawyer mode.

alan-hn 5y ago
'Compel' sounds awful lawyery to me Edit: down voting because you disagree? I'm more than open to hearing other viewpoints on the verbiage. >compel kəm-pĕl′ transitive verb To force (a person) to do something; drive or constrain: synonym: force. To necessitate or require, as by force of circumstance; demand. To exert a strong, irresistible force on; sway. https://duckduckgo.com/?q=compel+definition&ia=definition https://duckduckgo.com/?q=compel+definition&ia=definition
Aeolun 5y ago
Why do they do it? I don’t get it at all? Do they lose anything from someone playing an old wordle on this site?
- robbrown451 5y ago
  They could offer an archive themselves if they thought that was a positive. They don't, and to me the fact that you can only do one a day is a brilliant yet counterintuitive strategy that helped get Wordle popular. But that strategy is defeated if others offer what they choose not to. I really like the idea of them being able to say "don't worry, you can't get overly addicted because we only offer one a day and don't let you binge." And as owners of the IP, they do have that right.
  - n4r9 5y ago
    The brilliance of the strategy is that there's a "today's word". Like how a newspaper has a daily crossword. You feel like you completed today's challenge, and can compare like for like with your friends and family. Having the archive doesn't affect that. I used the wordle archive so that I could go back to days I missed. That way I can still share the experience with my family even if I've had a really busy day. It's undeniably a positive and I'm upset that I can't do this anymore. Several of the variants e.g. Quordle have an unlimited play variant, but I've never felt a desire to use it.
    - robbrown451 5y ago
      Right but if there is an archive, and you can play indefinitely, the concept of "today's word" loses its meaning. And people might start going to the archive instead of the main site, seeing as it has a major features the main site doesn't. (i.e. ability to keep playing) Obviously they don't want that. They want 100% of your concentration to be on today's word. They want you to look forward to tomorrows puzzle where you can play again. Playing archived games decreases that, as you can satisfy your craving that way. I sort of miss the archive, but at the same time I am glad it is gone. I like that feeling of "I'm done with Wordle for today" without that nagging "but I can do 100 more .... now where did my morning go?" This is a rare case where I support a company being protective of its IP.
      - n4r9 5y ago
        > if ... you can play indefinitely, the concept of "today's word" loses its meaning All I can say is that this is not my experience. In my family WhatsApp people post today's result and we sometimes have a bit of a chat about what it was like. Sometimes we do today's globle and quordle too. The quordle has an infinite play version but I don't think any of us spend much time on it.
  - Aeolun 5y ago
    > I really like the idea of them being able to say "don't worry, you can't get overly addicted because we only offer one a day and don't let you binge." I think their motivations are a little bit less altruistic. Which your post helped me figure out. They don’t want an archive because that requires everyone to visit their site at least once a day. If there is an archive people could skip a day without repercussions.
- nextlevelwizard 5y ago
  If nothing else at some point they will run out of five letter words and presumably NYT is making money off of Wordle. So they will have to start from the beginning at some point. So they do lose if you can just binge on the game in this archive.
  - n4r9 5y ago
    They don't have to start from the beginning and loop through in the same order. They can just select a random new word each day, possibly with a constraint that it hasn't been used for at least 100 days.
    - nextlevelwizard 5y ago
      That doesn't change anything
      - n4r9 5y ago
        I'm afraid I don't see what the problem is. Wordle doesn't become easier just because you've seen the hidden word in one of your last thousand or so games. I don't think the list of possible solutions would be worth keeping secret.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
prepend 5y ago
I don’t get it and it seems like a jerk move and one that the author didn’t do. Now that NYT is trying to maximize commercialization it seems more like how NYT is ruining a good, fun thing. But I would like to know what I’m missing and appreciate that you may be able to elaborate why.
recuter 5y ago
Lets get preoccupied with some obscure low traffic toy website that was about to be memory holed. Get some very important meetings going on the calendar, throw some billable hours to your lawyer friend, I do get why they did this. It sucks, but I get why. Kudos for not turning it into a lawsuit.
ensan 5y ago
“I do get why they did this. It’s sucks, but I get why.” Please, do tell.
- moate 5y ago
  "The economy, stupid!" Because they want to make as much money as possible off their acquisition. If someone else is housing a history of the game, and people can go play the game there instead of on NYT, that's a net bad for them. There's no NYT ads or 3rd party tracking pixels on the archive, so it's tapping into their market. If I gave a fuck about guessing a 5 letter word each day, I personally would prefer to do it in a way that doesn't continue to support the Gray Lady, so I'm going to do it on the Archive instead of the NYT page.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - TAKEMYMONEY 5y ago
    There is certainly a 3rd-party tracker on the archive. NYT's goal with the acquisition was not the billions of dollars in ad revenue a free-to-play word game brings in :) but widening their subscription marketing funnel. I'd guess they want to quash competitors, and also face pressure from Legal to defend the "Wordle" name.
    - moate 5y ago
      There are no 3rd party trackers for the NYT on it was my point. I'm not in the mood to get into the semantics of "How the NYT is using Wordle to make money" but I think a good faith read of my comment and yours would say we're agreeing: They're doing it to protect an investment that they assume will make them money in the long run.
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]

alan-hn 5y ago

'Compel' sounds awful lawyery to me Edit: down voting because you disagree? I'm more than open to hearing other viewpoints on the verbiage. >compel kəm-pĕl′ transitive verb To force (a person) to do something; drive or constrain: synonym: force. To necessitate or require, as by force of circumstance; demand. To exert a strong, irresistible force on; sway. https://duckduckgo.com/?q=compel+definition&ia=definition https://duckduckgo.com/?q=compel+definition&ia=definition

Aeolun 5y ago

Why do they do it? I don’t get it at all? Do they lose anything from someone playing an old wordle on this site?

robbrown451 5y ago
They could offer an archive themselves if they thought that was a positive. They don't, and to me the fact that you can only do one a day is a brilliant yet counterintuitive strategy that helped get Wordle popular. But that strategy is defeated if others offer what they choose not to. I really like the idea of them being able to say "don't worry, you can't get overly addicted because we only offer one a day and don't let you binge." And as owners of the IP, they do have that right.
- n4r9 5y ago
  The brilliance of the strategy is that there's a "today's word". Like how a newspaper has a daily crossword. You feel like you completed today's challenge, and can compare like for like with your friends and family. Having the archive doesn't affect that. I used the wordle archive so that I could go back to days I missed. That way I can still share the experience with my family even if I've had a really busy day. It's undeniably a positive and I'm upset that I can't do this anymore. Several of the variants e.g. Quordle have an unlimited play variant, but I've never felt a desire to use it.
  - robbrown451 5y ago
    Right but if there is an archive, and you can play indefinitely, the concept of "today's word" loses its meaning. And people might start going to the archive instead of the main site, seeing as it has a major features the main site doesn't. (i.e. ability to keep playing) Obviously they don't want that. They want 100% of your concentration to be on today's word. They want you to look forward to tomorrows puzzle where you can play again. Playing archived games decreases that, as you can satisfy your craving that way. I sort of miss the archive, but at the same time I am glad it is gone. I like that feeling of "I'm done with Wordle for today" without that nagging "but I can do 100 more .... now where did my morning go?" This is a rare case where I support a company being protective of its IP.
    - n4r9 5y ago
      > if ... you can play indefinitely, the concept of "today's word" loses its meaning All I can say is that this is not my experience. In my family WhatsApp people post today's result and we sometimes have a bit of a chat about what it was like. Sometimes we do today's globle and quordle too. The quordle has an infinite play version but I don't think any of us spend much time on it.
- Aeolun 5y ago
  > I really like the idea of them being able to say "don't worry, you can't get overly addicted because we only offer one a day and don't let you binge." I think their motivations are a little bit less altruistic. Which your post helped me figure out. They don’t want an archive because that requires everyone to visit their site at least once a day. If there is an archive people could skip a day without repercussions.
nextlevelwizard 5y ago
If nothing else at some point they will run out of five letter words and presumably NYT is making money off of Wordle. So they will have to start from the beginning at some point. So they do lose if you can just binge on the game in this archive.
- n4r9 5y ago
  They don't have to start from the beginning and loop through in the same order. They can just select a random new word each day, possibly with a constraint that it hasn't been used for at least 100 days.
  - nextlevelwizard 5y ago
    That doesn't change anything
    - n4r9 5y ago
      I'm afraid I don't see what the problem is. Wordle doesn't become easier just because you've seen the hidden word in one of your last thousand or so games. I don't think the list of possible solutions would be worth keeping secret.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

prepend 5y ago

I don’t get it and it seems like a jerk move and one that the author didn’t do. Now that NYT is trying to maximize commercialization it seems more like how NYT is ruining a good, fun thing. But I would like to know what I’m missing and appreciate that you may be able to elaborate why.

recuter 5y ago

Lets get preoccupied with some obscure low traffic toy website that was about to be memory holed. Get some very important meetings going on the calendar, throw some billable hours to your lawyer friend, I do get why they did this. It sucks, but I get why. Kudos for not turning it into a lawsuit.

ensan 5y ago

“I do get why they did this. It’s sucks, but I get why.” Please, do tell.

moate 5y ago
"The economy, stupid!" Because they want to make as much money as possible off their acquisition. If someone else is housing a history of the game, and people can go play the game there instead of on NYT, that's a net bad for them. There's no NYT ads or 3rd party tracking pixels on the archive, so it's tapping into their market. If I gave a fuck about guessing a 5 letter word each day, I personally would prefer to do it in a way that doesn't continue to support the Gray Lady, so I'm going to do it on the Archive instead of the NYT page.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- TAKEMYMONEY 5y ago
  There is certainly a 3rd-party tracker on the archive. NYT's goal with the acquisition was not the billions of dollars in ad revenue a free-to-play word game brings in :) but widening their subscription marketing funnel. I'd guess they want to quash competitors, and also face pressure from Legal to defend the "Wordle" name.
  - moate 5y ago
    There are no 3rd party trackers for the NYT on it was my point. I'm not in the mood to get into the semantics of "How the NYT is using Wordle to make money" but I think a good faith read of my comment and yours would say we're agreeing: They're doing it to protect an investment that they assume will make them money in the long run.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]