Wordle Mania and the Remixable Web

Over the last few weeks, people all across the internet have found joy in playing Wordle, the simple-but-addicting word game made by Josh Wardle. Wordle's gameplay is basically guessing letters until you've deduced the word of the day, similar to the classic game Mastermind. And no small part of the appeal is that you can only play the game once a day, and after you win, you're immediately prompted to share your win, either on social media or as a message to friends. The signature block of green emojis was mysterious enough to pique the interest of many, and helped Wordle spread like wildfire.

But, as the New York Times documented, Wordle is just as interesting for the context in which it was made. Josh made it as a gift for his puzzle-loving partner, Palak Shah, and the Times rightly described it as "an act of love". Being a community of people who make the web, our perspective at Glitch also found a lot of romance in the idea that this is a fast, simple, well-implemented web app. Wordle is a PWA that can install instantly on any device, doesn't have a ton of extraneous junk loading on the page, and it's really speedy (a Lighthouse performance score of 95!).

No surprise, then, that Wordle has inspired a host of other creators in the Glitch community and elsewhere to make their own riffs on the idea, all of which bring fun and interesting innovations to the game:

• Lynn made "hello wordl" (love that name!), which describes itself as a simple Wordle clone, but it lets you play as often as you want and you can also try to guess longer words. You can check out the source on GitHub.
• Potch made Worble here on Glitch, which straightforwardly mimics the original game, but set the stage for some fun and interesting remixes.
• Stuart Houghton remixed Potch's Worble into Sweardle — the four-letter-word version of the game. Obviously, that one might be a little bit NSFW, but it shows the power of making it easy to remix, because a half-joking version like this probably wouldn't be worth making from scratch, but if it's just a matter of modifying an existing game to have it focus on curse words, then it's all fun, no drudgery!
• And then Jordan Bouvier took the idea to its logical conclusion, creating Queerdle. Jordan warns that some of the words in this one are definitely NSFW, but there's undoubtedly a delight in creating a fully-yassified version of the game. It's an act of love in its way, too! We expect there will be many more riffs on the theme in the days to come, as Wordle-mania reaches its peak. But in the meantime, we've gathered some of the examples above into a playlist you can check out for yourself. (Be sure to suggest any variations we've missed!)

There are big lessons from the attention and enthusiasm around Wordle that feel important to emphasize as we start a new year:

• It's absolutely possible to make something that's wildly popular and beloved solely by making a regular web app.
• A lot of the best things on the web are made as acts of love or kindness for someone in one's life, or for a community that means something.
• People are especially enthusiastic about things they can share without having to go through an App Store, or without being bogged down by having lots of their data captured during the experience.
• Users appreciate when you respect their time and attention and don't just try to capture all of it. Earning a few minutes a day in someone's routine is a wonderful thing.
• When you make something great using the web, others will be inspired to make their own versions of it, for fun or for learning, and it gives even more people a chance to connect and have fun.
• You don't necessarily need creepy "growth hacks" or weird incentives to reach your audience if they're genuinely enthusiastic about what you've made.
• It's fun and funny to make immature jokes about curse words, sometimes! In all, we're thrilled to start a new year by celebrating an undeniable example of how vibrant and rewarding the independent creative web can be. Thanks to Josh, and to all those who've remixed the Wordle idea to make it their own.