The New York Times Acquires Wordle: And Why That’s a Predictable Move

The New York Times Acquires Wordle:

And Why That’s a Predictable Move

Here’s a fact about me that you may hate:

I don’t play Wordle.

But I do know about it. How could I not? The game has seeped into my commute, my team meetings at work, my free time with friends. I feel like all I’ve been doing recently is watching people play Wordle or hearing about their Wordle score that day.

And so it came as no surprise when the New York Times announced this week that they had bought Wordle off of creator Josh Wardle for a number in the “low seven figures”.

The lack of surprise wasn’t from the game’s sky-rocketing growth. It was because recently, the New York Times has been on a shopping spree, buying up many smaller companies in the hopes of achieving its goal of growing subscribers and serving as a “lifestyle services company" and not just a newspaper.

The Background:

Many of your favorite segments from the New York Times probably started as a smaller company at one point. Love product recommendations from the Wirecutter section? The New York Times bought that in 2016. Do you like getting your news articles read aloud through Audm? The New York Times bought that too. Were you on the edge of your seat listening to Sarah Koenig uproot the murder case of Hae Min Lee in Serial? Well, the New York Times bought the entire production company. At a time when print journalism is on a one-way trip to the graveyard, the New York Times is trying to buy its way to becoming a true, lifestyle brand.

Why this matters:

Why are they on a shopping spree?

Newspapers have been on a decades-long search for a new revenue model. Because people will no longer dish out a quarter at their local bodega for the daily edition of The New York Times, it has raised the question of how online media companies will make money? The answer is usually from selling advertisements, which is what the New York Times focused on for a while. However, in 2011, the New York Times doubled down on its revenue model by introducing a paywall to non-subscribers—a feature that only the most coveted newspaper companies can do. Since then, the New York Times has been on a search for subscribers, setting (and then reaching) very high subscriber goals. Recently, that goal was 10 million subscribers by 2025.

Hypothetically, you could reach subscription goals by getting more people to read and value the news. But this is difficult because 1) only so many people read the news and 2) the news cycle is incredibly volatile. During the Trump years, the subscriptions to the New York Times news service grew rapidly as everyone wanted to follow the latest Trump events. But since Biden took office and things have (debatably) become less hectic, the news cycle has waned and subscription growth has slowed. To continue growing its subscriber base and hit its goals, the New York Times is trying to be known for more than just news. This is why the New York Times offers cheaper subscription services to sections like "Cooking" and "Games". People’s interest in playing the crossword or finding new recipes has very little to do with what’s going on in the world and are therefore more reliable. But building several lifestyle divisions takes time so to accelerate the process, the New York Times buys smaller companies that are the best in their niche field and have attracted a customer base that the New York Times hasn’t quite captured yet. This type of logic is exactly what spurred the New York Time’s recent acquisition of The Athletic, a sports journalism company that had a loyal customer base of 1.2 million, a group that had very little overlap with the pre-existing subscribers to the New York Times. The New York Times’ January 2022 acquisition of The Athletic allowed the company to surpass its subscription goal of 10 million subscribers 3 years ahead of schedule. In return, these companies get a nice payout that is sometimes nice for lining the wallet (as seen with Josh Wardle) and is sometimes necessary. In 2019 and 2020, The Athletic lost $95M annually, a deficit that they needed to solve by selling.

Why Wordle is (a bit) different:

Sure, Wordle isn’t a lifestyle news company like Wirecutter or The Athletic, but for 300,000 people the game has become a key part of day-to-day living. The New York Times hopes that by bringing the Wordle players onto the New York Times website, they can make loyal subscribers out of them. But to many Wordle players, the acquisition by The New York Times was a stab in the gut. Wordle started with small, genuine intentions as Josh Wardle created the game to entertain his partner. The game is a love letter to word-enthusiasts. Wordle is free and brings in no revenues. Your score is not public unless you share it off the site (i.e., on Twitter). In the age of mass consumerism, it seemed like Wordle was the only thing not playing the revenue-seeking game. Although The New York Times has promised to keep Wordle outside of its paywall (and thus accessible to all), Wordle fans are upset about the sale. To many, it seems to be the ultimate symbol that pure intentions do not survive in the capitalist world: “I was waiting for our Wordle fun to be ruined by a big company, just like everything else. And here it is. It was nice while it lasted,” wrote one Twitter account. The New York Times can certainly buy companies, but whether it can keep the Wordle customer base is still to be determined.

Other things going on this week:

I. Lonely Men

Some economists argue that men are in a “friendship recession”. While the pandemic has made everyone lonelier than ever, men have been hit especially hard. According to a recent Economist article, “In 1990, 55% of American men reported having at least six close friends; today, only 27% do. The survey found that 15% of men have no close relationships at all, a five-fold increase since 1990.”

II. Song of the week: “Ophelia” (cover) by The Wood Brothers

This Grateful Dead cover knocks it out of the park just like most of the Wood Brothers songs. I attended The Wood Brothers concert this week, and they may be one of the best bands I’ve ever heard live.