Given the theme of this newsletter, I decided it would just make sense for me to also try and build something. So, I would like to announce that I’ve recently created Substack Tools:

Substack Tools

Currently, it’s a simple browser extension that allows previewing footnotes and sharing stuff on Twitter (much like Medium). I’ll be working on more tools in the future, so if you want to keep up to date, make sure to subscribe! And feel free to drop me some feedback.

Wordle is a web-based word game created by Josh Wardle, where players have six attempts to guess a five-letter word.

The mechanics are nearly identical to the 1955 pen-and-paper game Jotto and the US television game show Lingo. Wordle has a single daily solution, with all players attempting to guess the same word.

Josh developed the game initially for himself and his partner but decided to release I to the public in October 20221. The game then became extremely popular at the end of 2021, beginning of 2022.

The game rose in popularity due to a functionality added by Josh that gave players the ability for players to copy their daily results as emoji squares, which were widely shared on Twitter. People really enjoyed both the game and the social sharing part of it. Being the first to share, having the least amount of tries, etc…

From what I understand, Josh didn’t monetize the game in any way. But the thing is that he sold it to the NY Times “an undisclosed price in the low seven figures”. That is, at least, $1M. Pretty awesome pay-out for such a simple game.

Following Wordle's sudden rise in popularity, a number of clones appeared - as expected. Some of these clones revised the Wordle formula in novel methods, other clones include one that uses only four-letter swear words as its vocabulary pool and one that lets players change the word length. The New York Times ended up filling a trademark for Wordle shortly after acquiring it to help protect its intellectual property.

Wordle

Want to know how to build such a simple game? Here’s a great tutorial, step-by-step, on how to do so!

Your opinion means a lot to me: Awesome | Liked | 50/50 | Meh | Terrible

I’m also curious about what you think about this post, and what you’d be most interested in reading about - leave a comment and share your thoughts, I’ll 100% reply!