Clones of Popular 'Wordle' Game Flooding App Store, Including One Charging $30 Per Year [Updated]

[ridddder55]

Played the game, am not a fan, reminds me of the old board game called mastermind. Instead of using colored pegs, you use letters with so many attempts to get the correct sequence, and order. Same reason I don't like Sudoku, or some other puzzle games like crosswords. I am too right brained, to like it I guess.

 

[iBluetooth]

Would be nice to see Josh issue a cease and desist to all these people and for Apple to remove all the clone apps, but I have a feeling Apple won't because they don't want to miss out on their 15% or 30% cut of sales.

The story is wrong as Wordle is not the first version of this game, that appeared in a tv show long before Wordle came. So, is he the owner or the tv show about guessing words, that I forgot the name of.

 

[Arran]

Copying the game is fine, it's not new. Using the name "Wordle," on the other hand, is blatantly misleading and fraudulent.

Moreover, he copied the look-and-feel of the original product. That misleads customers into thinking they're dealing with the original (trusted) supplier - when in reality they're dealing with an impostor.

When someone copies the exact look and feel of another product (its "trade dress") it's called counterfeiting. When the cloned product is a website it's often a sign of phishing. Not something to be encouraged or defended.

 

[ChromeAce]

I’m laughing at the number of people lined up to be surprised with how capitalism and trademarks and patents work.

Waiting for Apple to cut a check to Xerox for “stealing” the graphical user interface.

 

[Michael Scrip]

Maybe he finally sees the error of his ways...

Wordle copycat creator apologizes for ripping off the popular free word game

After Apple removed the knockoff app from the App Store

www.theverge.com

 

[CheesegraterMac]

Wouldn’t all apps that perform an api be a clone?

You had me.

 

[name99]

I thought one of the argument for having the App Store as the ONLY WAY to get apps was to prevent scams and knockoffs like this from happening?

Ah, the old "Even if make murder illegal, people are still killing each other! Therefore we shouldn't bother with laws against murder" argument...
So anything that is not absolutely perfect shouldn't be done?

Not a great argument in the context of murder, not a great argument in the context of the Apple Store.

 

[Abazigal]

I thought one of the argument for having the App Store as the ONLY WAY to get apps was to prevent scams and knockoffs like this from happening?

I don’t think anyone has ever said that, though I do feel that it’s still better to have some form of curation than not. At least Apple provides a way for me to monitor all my subscriptions in one place and the ability to terminate them at will.

To use an analogy, having law enforcement in your country will not eliminate all crime, but I don’t think anyone will ever use that as a reason to do away with the police force altogether. Instead, multiple solutions include better education for citizens so they avoid falling prey to scams, proposed reforms and the like.

 

[bensimps]

No argument there. I'm saying what is the relevence of "not supporting" the creator, when he doesn't want monetary support?
iow, MR said we should be aware that buying the copycat apps is "not supporting" the creator. But using the creator's OWN game is also "not supporting" him financially, because he doesn't want support. So, basically, using his app, or using someone else's, results in the same: NO monetary support to the creator.

It does not. You're giving Josh's site traffic, which he can then use (at a given point if/when he so desires) to say "I get this may daily users, so I feel the game/site/ad space is worth ______."

To decide "he doesn't want support" on the terms you're thinking of is incorrect.

 

[metapunk2077fail]

Commentary by this legend

 

[Michael Scrip]

Here's something I just thought of...

There are obviously scam apps and clones on the App Store. It sucks and we can certainly complain about it.

But how many are removed? How many of these bad apps aren't on the App Store anymore?

Maybe the app review team is removing these bad apps as fast as they can... but some still sneak through.

If there are a thousand brand new apps uploaded every day that need to be approved... and tens of thousands of existing apps that have updates that also need to be approved... obviously it's a big job.

I don't know the answer. Does Apple need to hire more people for app review?

I'm not trying to defend Apple here. I was just thinking that we're focused on the offending apps in the App Store... but no one talks about the apps that were removed or that didn't make it onto the App Store in the first place.

Who knows... maybe app review stops 10x more scam apps than they let in...

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[metapunk2077fail]

I’m laughing at the number of people lined up to be surprised with how capitalism and trademarks and patents work.

Waiting for Apple to cut a check to Xerox for “stealing” the graphical user interface.

Common myth based on hearsay and that **** Steve Jobs movie starring Ashton Kutcher.

The true story is that GUIs concepts were being conceptualised since the late 60s and Jef Raskin was working on them before the Xerox visit. The Apple Lisa is one early example.

Here, educate yourself...

The Xerox PARC Visit

 

[Dremmel]

Meanwhile ... every other developer who creates original apps has them plagiarised relentlessly ... Welcome to Apple's App Store

 

[Scoob Redux]

It does not. You're giving Josh's site traffic, which he can then use (at a given point if/when he so desires) to say "I get this may daily users, so I feel the game/site/ad space is worth ______."

To decide "he doesn't want support" on the terms you're thinking of is incorrect.

that would, by definition, be "monetizing" it. that's not my terms, that's how the internet works.

 

[ChromeAce]

Common myth based on hearsay and that **** Steve Jobs movie starring Ashton Kutcher.

The true story is that GUIs concepts were being conceptualised since the late 60s and Jef Raskin was working on them before the Xerox visit. The Apple Lisa is one early example.

Here, educate yourself...

The Xerox PARC Visit

Interesting. But it was when Steve Jobs himself saw the light, and that’s what pushed forward the development of the Mac, which could have otherwise been killed.

 

[metapunk2077fail]

Interesting. But it was when Steve Jobs himself saw the light, and that’s what pushed forward the development of the Mac, which could have otherwise been killed.

No. Jef Raskin pushed for it and had been working on GUIs since the mid 70s. Raskin should be given more credit for the early Mac than even Jobs. He created the Macintosh project and worked on it for a year in secret without Jobs even knowing about it.

Jobs respected Raskin more than anyone there and borrowed a lot from his vision.

As for Xerox, they invested in Apple. So the claims that Apple stole from them is just rewriting history with BS.

 

[ChromeAce]

No. Jef Raskin pushed for it and had been working on GUIs since the mid 70s. Raskin should be given more credit for the early Mac than even Jobs. He created the Macintosh project and worked on it for a year in secret without Jobs even knowing about it.

Jobs respected Raskin more than anyone there and borrowed a lot from his vision.

As for Xerox, they invested in Apple. So the claims that Apple stole from them is just rewriting history with BS.

This is in dispute. From Wikipedia: “Raskin takes credit for being one of the first to introduce Jobs and the Lisa engineers to the PARC concepts, though he ultimately dismissed PARC's technology and opposed the use of a computer mouse.”

It is widely believed his initial concept was more of an easy to use appliance than a flash and bang graphical interface with a radical case design and a new human input device.

 

[metapunk2077fail]

This is in dispute. From Wikipedia: “Raskin takes credit for being one of the first to introduce Jobs and the Lisa engineers to the PARC concepts, though he ultimately dismissed PARC's technology and opposed the use of a computer mouse.”

It is widely believed his initial concept was more of an easy to use appliance than a flash and bang graphical interface with a radical case design and a new human input device.

You took one line from Wikipedia but didn't bother quoting the rest about how his team worked on the all-in-one design and interface for a year without Jobs knowing.

There are disputes among the early Mac designers, but that's natural when the evolution of the design was fragmented among them, some taking credit for one thing and others taking credit for another thing.

More detailed reading is available elsewhere:

How Jef Raskin started the Macintosh project - Mac History

It had been a long way until the day of the official introduction of the Macintosh on January 24th, 1984. Five years earlier, in spring 1979, Apple chairman

www.mac-history.net

 

[ChromeAce]

You took one line from Wikipedia but didn't bother quoting the rest about how his team worked on the all-in-one design and interface for a year without Jobs knowing.

There are disputes among the early Mac designers, but that's natural when the evolution of the design was fragmented among them, some taking credit for one thing and others taking credit for another thing.

More detailed reading is available elsewhere:

How Jef Raskin started the Macintosh project - Mac History

It had been a long way until the day of the official introduction of the Macintosh on January 24th, 1984. Five years earlier, in spring 1979, Apple chairman

www.mac-history.net

The more I read, the more I know that what shipped in 1984 as the Macintosh was the result of a group effort of several people, including those at Xerox, Raskin, Jobs, and the entire Mac team at Apple.

 

[hlvoran]

Technically, they have not stolen the name from Wardle, as there has been a Wordle game by Steven Cravotta with an entirely different interface in the App Store for over 5 years.

 

[hlvoran]

#7 wordle! Has been on the App Store 5 years. Not sure that’s a clone of the current popular wordle

You are correct; it isn’t. It’s a completely different interface.

 

[macgabe]

Told ya

 

[Michael Scrip]

Told ya

Hmmm... so he created Wordle as a gift for his girlfriend... and now he's giving it to the New York Times?

?

 

[genovelle]

Would be nice to see Josh issue a cease and desist to all these people and for Apple to remove all the clone apps, but I have a feeling Apple won't because they don't want to miss out on their 15% or 30% cut of sales.

I believe they will require him to do so first, especially since it sounds like he didn’t protect the name legally and is actually not even an App Store developer.