Wordle Archive, a popular site which hosted older Wordle puzzles, has been forced offline by The New York Times.
The site now hosts a message, spotted by Ars Technica, which states: “Sadly, the New York Times has requested that the Wordle Archive be taken down.”
“The usage was unauthorised, and we were in touch with them,” a NYT spokesperson said. “We don’t plan to comment beyond that.”
In January, NYT bought Wordle from its original creator Josh Wardle for a seven-figure sum, and has since made several changes which have irritated Wordle fans.
The puzzle’s move to the NYT website reset the prized play streaks of some players, while the subsequent removal of some rude and obscure words messed with the game’s code, leading to a day where Wordle featured two separate words for different groups of players.