Today’s Wordle puzzle had players crying foul: the answer, ‘Borax’, is an obscure one and played on Americans’ knowledge of the product, which may not be applicable to everyone outside of the US.
Wordle, created by Josh Wardle, was initially set up with a list of over 2000 solutions with an assigned date. Recently, however, Tracy Bennett (the game’s first dedicated editor) and The New York Times (NYT) began introducing more solutions and adjusting the original list.
This new approach brought the game a whole new level of difficulty – e.g. answers ‘GUANO’ (Game #646) and ‘SNAFU’ (Game #659). And today’s answer, ‘BORAX’, is no exception.
According to Merriam-Webster, Borax is a dense hydrated sodium borate used as a flux, cleansing agent, water softener, or fireproofing agent. The problem is, it is no longer available in the EU and was even banned in the UK in 2010.
Therefore, this simply puts non-Americans at an immediate disadvantage, as the answer ‘Borax’ is not a word known to many outside the US. This directly contradicts The NYT’s original intention to make the game more accessible.
Although the original solutions list was downloaded by some players (for media analysis), it should be noted that cheating with it wasn’t the goal – it was only ever used to compile Wordle analysis.
Today’s answer aside, Wordle does provide its players with value and fun. But it also means that now more than ever, it is important for The NYT to review the answers list and to ensure it is indeed accessible to all players, especially considering its international presence.
In addition to playing Wordle, the creator Josh Wardle is also the founder of an independent software company, Josh’s Postware. This company has created several apps such as Grammarly, a writing assistant designed to encourage better writing practices.
Tracy Bennett is The NYT’s Editor for the Wordle game. She is also the editor-in-chief of the same company, and is tasked with curating and mixing up the answers list to make the game both accessible and more exciting.
Overall, with its mixture of fun, accessibility and surprise, today’s issue of Wordle proves to be an anomaly and will hopefully be rectified for similar instances moving forward.
