Subject: wordbox

What horses? What barn? What's gonna happen? I've been doing this for 25 years.  That's not to say I won't have identity theft tomorrow but it ain't gonna be cuz I gave some basic publicly available data to a company that anyone could get from a number of places. I mean assuming you live somewhere and have had phone service at some point in your life.

MrFixit 

True or false:  Once one signs up for, example, the Play Store, google 'gathers' all your 'connected' activities -  where you go, shop, eat, travel, etc.  What you do on social media, who all your faceybook contacts are, and on and on.  Once that info is collected and collated, it can't be put back "in the barn".  Am I wrong about that?

I'm obviously not a tech professional, and you are, so your knowledge should outweigh mine.  But I've read very extensively on this.  What do I have wrong?

I've got nothing to hide or be ashamed of.  But I just think it's morally wrong for a person or entity to make money of me just living my life.  To be able to leverage *my* activities for *their* profit.  It's not exactly like the Native American concept of a camera stealing one's soul, but it's slightly akin to that. 

https://wordbox.game

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12 Feb 2025 : 21 swaps

Today was a good day!

https://wordbox.game

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12 Feb 2025 A: 13 swaps

This was the good one. 

its possible to get a 10 on today's puzzle C 

Replying to "cellmate"...

Considering that you would need to get both letters in the correct spot on each of ten moves, I'm going to say no.

true. this is the only one i've seen where its even a possibility

checking now, its been done twice already. wasn't me.

I came here to comment on puzzle C as well, I smell a cheat.

I got 10.  I think I was the second to do so.knowing that it had been done made me alittle more patient and careful than usual.first swap was two on the same row, one of them an E. 

Feb 17          0    A   B    C
my scores: 24   19  18  19   (first attempt)
solver:       16   15  12  15   (calculated, not played)

Awesome on main and C!

@jimmyp Wow, that's impressive! Congratulations! I think I've been a little too impatient, I need to slow down and think about the moves before I make them.

Feb 18         0    A   B    C
my scores: 25   23  21  21   (first attempt)
solver:       18   13  16  12   (calculated, not played)

Feb 19         0    A   B    C
my scores: 26   18  22  23   (first attempt)
solver:       16   14  14  14   (calculated, not played)

Feb 20         0    A   B    C
my scores: 28   29  27  20   (first attempt)
solver:       17   15  14  15   (calculated, not played)

The thing I most like about Eric's game is his magic Word Choosinator. Mostly common easy-to-guess words as opposed to crazy crossword puzzle words that no one uses.

Feb 21         0    A   B    C
my scores: 25   18  23  15   (first attempt)
solver:       16   14  15  13   (calculated, not played)

Feb 22          0    A   B    C
my scores:   24  22  21  19   (first attempt)
solver:         18  14  14  16   (calculated, not played)

Feb 23          0    A   B    C
my scores:   20  22  19  20   (first attempt)
solver:         16  15  15  15   (calculated, not played)

* Hmm... somebody beat the solver, got 14 on C

I had a decent night: 19, 23, 17, 17

Grid A obviously flummoxed me.

Eric - 2 things

1. Emit stats for all 4 (or all played)

2. Option to play a random game from your corpus of past games

"Mostly common easy-to-guess words"

We still get a surprising number of complaints about words that are considered too obscure.

Really proud of myself today, my score on the last 3 puzzles was third from the best score! My first attempt wasn't great though. I've had pretty bad scores (for me) for a bit here, glad to make a comeback.

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@EricSink - there are a lot of weird Scottish words and even Latin words that show up, as well as rarely-used English words. I am well-read and always made top marks in English, but I've seen words in this game I've never seen before in my life! And really bizarre iterations of common words as well. I guess I need to start keeping track of them.

interesting that REDO appeared twice in the Feb 7 main puzzle

Feb 24          0    A   B    C
my scores:   23  15  20  21   (first attempt)
solver:         16  13  15  14   (calculated, not played)

Folks who do crosswords or play competitive Scrabble see tons of weird words. Wordbox uses probably less than 15% off the beaten track words. It’s part of the guessing. 

Feb 25          0    A   B    C
my scores:   24  21  23  23   (first attempt)
solver:         18  14  14  16   (calculated, not played)

I got 24 16 16 17

Feb 26          0    A   B    C
my scores:   30  21  17  20   (first attempt)
solver:         20  15  15  15   (calculated, not played)

Feb 27          0    A   B    C
my scores:   30  25  20  23   (first attempt)
solver:         16  15  13  15   (calculated, not played)

Feb 27:  So - is today's puzzle easier?  I think I got my best scores when playing this morning --  18, 18, 18 and 15  

The grids are definitely harder or easier.  Unusual letter distribution (not odd words just odd letter combos) affects things. Lack of clues (the little arrows) significantly impacts "easiness" as well. But hitting the doubles which is really where you gain seems to me mostly like it's luck.  Every once in a while I can engineer a double when I've figured out what the words are (usually pretty late in the game) but most of my doubles are pure happenstance.

Today I got 22 20 16 and 21.

MrFixit aka Denny

I thought today's main puzzle was harder than usual because the words were less common.

Feb 28          0    A   B    C
my scores:   27  21  23  18   (first attempt)
solver:         17  14  15  14   (calculated, not played)

Mar 1           0    A   B    C
my scores:   19  18  22  18   (first attempt)
solver:         16  15  14  16   (calculated, not played)

Mar 2           0    A   B    C
my scores:   26  16  16  26  (first attempt)
solver:         18  14  14  16   (calculated, not played)

Mar 3           0    A   B    C
my scores:   25  24  19  20  (first attempt)
solver:         19  17  14  14   (calculated, not played)

https://wordbox.game

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4 Mar 2025 : 17 swaps

Mar 4           0    A   B    C
my scores:   24  26  18  19  (first attempt)
solver:         17  19  18  17   (calculated, not played)

Mar 4

19 21 21 18 - played, first attempt 

Mar 5          0  A  B  C
My scores: 25 23 15 18  (first attempt)
Solver:       14 14 14 15  (calculated, not played)

24 18 14 16 - played, first attempt 

https://wordbox.game

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5 Mar 2025 : 14 swaps

My best score ever on the main board, so I gotta post the gloat.

That's rarified air, Erik. Gads. 

Wow! I got 19 on the main grid and was pretty happy with that. Looks like you tied cellmate's solver!

Mar 6          0  A  B  C
My scores: 25 16 20 22  (first attempt)
Solver:       18 14 14 14  (calculated, not played)

Play Word Box

I sucked last night. When I start out with a coupla bad guesses then I just go into "blow thru it" mode.

MrFixit

Wordbox requires incredible patience and a fair amount of good fortune. Having neither can push you into the 25+ range in a heartbeat. 

Branding....

Too subtle. You need a flashy easily noticeable banner that appears on every page

The Today's Puzzles page doesn't even mention Word Box