A word about Wordle

Did you ever hear the story of the invention of chess?

A long time ago, an Indian king was in the mood for learning a new game. He sent his courtiers out to engage the kingdom’s greatest minds. Eventually, a party returned with a brahmin called Sissa?ibn Dahir. Sissa gave the king a demonstration of his creation – the progenitor of the game we now know as chess. The king was delighted and asked Sissa to name his reward. Somewhat archly (it must be presumed), Sissa replied that he would claim his rewarded in rice: he asked that a single grain be placed on the first square of the board; two on the second; four on the third and so on; the number of grains doubling with each square until the 64th square was reached.

The painstaking process of counting commenced. ???

As the counters progressed along the first row, it occurred to them that the quantities of rice were increasing quite alarmingly with each square. Some hasty calculations were undertaken, only to reveal that the number of grains required to settle the score was more than all the rice in the world. Clever move Sissa!

Who knows, perhaps this was history’s first attempt at connecting the creation of games with the exponential capture of economic value and influence. And so, the story arcs into our own age. We should know only too well that the gift of commanding attention through the disarming medium of play can afford its possessor a formidable fulcrum. To those with an ounce of skepticism, the profusion of “free” online games that we have at our fingertips can look like a harras of trojan horses. We should be attuned to how we deploy our attention and try to avoid giving it away too cheaply.

A few weeks before the holidays, an old schoolmate forwarded a link to the gang’s WhatsApp group. He had gotten hooked on a new word game that his friend’s brother had created. “It’s becoming quite popular” he told us. As the festivities came and went, I started to notice the game’s little grids multiplying on my social media timeline. Like the grains of rice on Sissa’s chess board, the players of Wordle (is it “Wordlers”?) seemed to be propagating at a ferocious rate.

There is something refreshing about Wordle. If you haven’t played – it’s a simple game. You have six attempts to guess a five-letter word. Each time you enter a guess the game reveals which of the letters are contained within the magic word, hopefully enabling you to narrow down the possibilities with each turn. It’s fun, stimulating and (yes) a bit addictive – even to someone like me, whose vocabulary is regrettably weighted towards four rather than five-letter words. It affords a wonderful opportunity to start the day by solving a problem, kicking things off with a warm little buzz – a buzz that you must savour because you only get one Wordle a day. ?

However, what seems most remarkable about Wordle is what it isn’t: it isn’t making money; it isn’t harvesting data; and it isn’t intent on luring you down the rabbit hole that leads to endless stupefied scrolling. The game was created by Josh Wardle, a Welsh émigré living in Brooklyn, for his partner, who likes word puzzles. It was a household hit, so Mr Wardle decided to share it with a few of his friends. There’s no more to it than that. Why should there be?

If the web is an ongoing experiment in the catalysation of human interaction, then this little story provides us with an unassuming and edifying finding. Play is an endearing human trait. As is sharing. Sharing new ways to play (just for the fun of it) is really lovely. ?

As a write these words I suddenly find that I have unleashed the disquieting sense of having rendered an uplifting story hostage to fortune. Perhaps there are cynical eyes on Wordle and with them the spectre of somebody making Mr Wardle an offer he can’t refuse.

Maybe, therefore, I should end with a cautionary coda. If you are wondering what happened to Sissa: he was to learn the hard way that there is such a thing as being too clever for your own good - the king had him beheaded for insolence. So, Mr Wardle, if by any chance you do read this post, please take heed, and try to avoid the lure of the inevitable cheque mate. ??????????????