If you haven't already played Wordle, make sure you refresh your browser or you will get a reminder of how distressing the news is right now.
The New York Times asked Wordle players to refresh their browsers before they played in order to ensure they had the latest version of the puzzle. The solution that had been intended for today was replaced by The Times, which purchased Wordle earlier this year.
This is not the first time the Times has replaced a Wordle answer with a new one. When this happens, players who haven't refreshed their browser since the change may be served an outdated puzzle, and not the one that most people will be playing.
The Times team has been excising words from the word list in order to make the game more accessible. The May 9 puzzle had a specific and loaded connection to a current news story.
The New York Times Games takes its role seriously as a place to entertain and escape, and we want Wordle to remain distinct from the news. When we discovered last week that this particular word would be featured today, we switched it for as many solvers as possible.
If you have refreshed your browser window, you won't receive the outdated version. We know that some people won't do that and will be asked to solve an outdated puzzle.
You can see that the word for May 9 used to be FETUS on this handy archive list. It is understandable that the Times would not want to use the popular word game to offer commentary on the topic of pregnant women.
In American public life and politics, the right to abortion is always a topic of intense discussion. The leak of a draft decision by the Supreme Court has raised the temperature again. Patients in at least 13 states would lose access to abortion care immediately if the Court overturns federal protections, with more states likely to follow suit.
Wordle was built for a small group of users when we acquired it. Wordle's technology is being updated so that everyone always receives the same word.
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