{"id":2739,"date":"2022-02-02T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-02-02T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/uncategorized\/the-guardian-view-on-wordle-let-the-game-stay-free-editorial\/"},"modified":"2025-02-28T14:41:32","modified_gmt":"2025-02-28T14:41:32","slug":"the-guardian-view-on-wordle-let-the-game-stay-free-editorial","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/the-guardian-view-on-wordle-let-the-game-stay-free-editorial\/","title":{"rendered":"The Guardian view on Wordle: let the game stay free | Editorial"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Joyful and innocuously addictive, the online word game harks back to a more innocent age. The new owners must respect its spirit<\/p>\n<p>Smart daily brain tease works magic, makes eager crowd happy, later turns truly viral &ndash; until game&rsquo;s adept maker earns great money (ample Times bucks). Yes, it is sometimes hard not to think entirely in five-letter words after an encounter with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.powerlanguage.co.uk\/wordle\/\" title=\"\">Wordle<\/a>, the online game that requires participants to guess a five-letter word in six tries. It was quietly launched last October by Josh Wardle, a Welsh, Brooklyn-based software engineer who created it for the amusement of his partner.<\/p>\n<p>In November, its users numbered a few hundred. Now, they are in the millions. Mr Wardle has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/games\/2022\/jan\/31\/wordle-new-york-times-buys\" title=\"\">sold<\/a> the game to the New York Times for a seven-figure sum &ndash; having previously <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/games\/2022\/jan\/11\/wordle-creator-overwhelmed-by-global-success-of-hit-puzzle\" title=\"\">said<\/a> that he felt somewhat overwhelmed by the responsibility to the game&rsquo;s fans to keep the site running perfectly.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/commentisfree\/2022\/feb\/02\/the-guardian-view-on-wordle-let-the-game-stay-free\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Joyful and innocuously addictive, the online word game harks back to a more innocent age. The new owners must respect its spirit Smart daily brain tease works magic, makes eager crowd happy, later turns truly viral &ndash; until game&rsquo;s adept maker earns great money (ample Times bucks). Yes, it is sometimes hard not to think [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6438,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Guardian view on Wordle: let the game stay free | Editorial - Regional technology news - North - TechSparx - Business technology stories in the North<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/the-guardian-view-on-wordle-let-the-game-stay-free-editorial\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Guardian view on Wordle: let the game stay free | Editorial - Regional technology news - North - TechSparx - Business technology stories in the North\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Joyful and innocuously addictive, the online word game harks back to a more innocent age. The new owners must respect its spirit Smart daily brain tease works magic, makes eager crowd happy, later turns truly viral &ndash; until game&rsquo;s adept maker earns great money (ample Times bucks). Yes, it is sometimes hard not to think [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/the-guardian-view-on-wordle-let-the-game-stay-free-editorial\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Regional technology news - North - TechSparx - Business technology stories in the North\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2022-02-02T00:00:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-02-28T14:41:32+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/5616-2.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"140\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"84\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Editorial Team\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Editorial Team\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Estimated reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/the-guardian-view-on-wordle-let-the-game-stay-free-editorial\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/the-guardian-view-on-wordle-let-the-game-stay-free-editorial\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Editorial Team\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/#\/schema\/person\/a67e7f1ec4654ee30ec6c9c2899a146e\"},\"headline\":\"The Guardian view on Wordle: let the game stay free | Editorial\",\"datePublished\":\"2022-02-02T00:00:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-02-28T14:41:32+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/the-guardian-view-on-wordle-let-the-game-stay-free-editorial\/\"},\"wordCount\":169,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/the-guardian-view-on-wordle-let-the-game-stay-free-editorial\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/5616-2.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"Uncategorized\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/the-guardian-view-on-wordle-let-the-game-stay-free-editorial\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/the-guardian-view-on-wordle-let-the-game-stay-free-editorial\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.techsparx.co.uk\/north\/the-guardian-view-on-wordle-let-the-game-stay-free-editorial\/\",\"name\":\"The Guardian view on Wordle: let the game stay free | Editorial - 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