We already published a few days ago the success of Wordle, a online word game very interesting in which we had to guess a puzzle by entering five-letter words to find a hidden word. In just six attempts, the player has to match the term, and his only help during the game is the color that each letter acquires. Well, in a matter of weeks dozens of clones. Y Apple is removing them from its App Store.
Wordle clones come out from under the stones
It was obvious that it was going to happen. It is not the first time that a developer programs something successful and immediately, shows no interest in monetizing it. This was clearly stated by its creator, Josh Wardle in an interview with BBC Radio 4 a few days ago.
Where Wardle has seen no interest, other developers have seen money. We first saw a unofficial version in spanish —It’s not that funny, by the way, because the funny thing about Wordle is that the structures of English words are pretty predictable— and then clones of all kinds started popping up all over the place. iOS and Android app stores.
Why is Apple removing apps from its store?
Basically, in the clauses that Apple put in your marketplace of applications, it is made clear that the developer cannot simply copy an application from another creator and upload it to the platform:
«Don’t just copy the latest popular app from the App Store, or make small changes to the name or user interface of another app and pass it off as your own.»
This is known by many devs, but even so, they have tried their luck uploading all kinds of plagiarism. Twitter is now full of wailing and wailing from programmers who really know they have violated the rules of the Apple App Store, but even so, they do not see the decision that has been made with them as fair.
Wardle inadvertently follows an official app for his game
One of those developers is Zach Shakked, who even got Josh Wardle’s number and had a phone conversation with him. He offered him a commission of more than one hundred thousand dollars and the possibility of ujoin him to develop the official game for mobile phones, later distributing the percentages as he saw fit.
When he informed me that he wasn’t interested in that, I told him I would consider changing the name and was looking at other options when Apple removed the app and was fully prepared to do so.
– Zach (@zachshakked) January 12, 2022
Wardle’s response was a resounding no. That’s when Shakked considered changing the name of his app to avoid problems with Apple. But it did not matter, because those of Cupertino were going to end their game regardless of the name it had, because it is still a plagiarism from an original game.
What conclusion do we draw from all this?
We saw a similar case a couple of years ago, when the coronavirus pandemic began. A 17-year-old boy programmed a fascinating website, with worldwide contagion data in real time and a spectacular design. After months, many companies offered him real millions, which would have solved his life. But for beginning, he said no. The market did its thing and hundreds of copies came out. Today, no one remembers much more of that boy —and not to give him the fat bitch, I’m not going to Google his name to post it here.
What can be seen between the lines is clear. If life gives you lemons, make lemonade. It is true that it does not have to be funny that a person who has plagiarized your invention comes offering you tickets. But in the same way, by not exploiting Josh Wardle his game, he has put a very sweet candy to other people ahead. On the other hand, uncreative programmers they have been portrayed. Many have defended themselves simply claiming that the trademark ‘Wordle’ is not registered. And they may be right, but it is equally considered plagiarism if you shoot an intellectual property from top to bottom.
