My husband is over-the-top obsessed with Words with Friends. For those of you living in the dark ages, it’s basically the game of Scrabble designed to allow users to engage in games with each other via their i-appendage (iPhone, iTouch, iPods, and iPad).
At any given time, Tim has about five games simultaneously running. He is playing his boss and his bosses ‘wife”, our football coach’s son, a dad from baseball, and some random guy he met in the Words with Friends cloud. I thought about being jealous of all his new wordie friends and the enormous amount of time he dedicates to this hobby (for about a minute), but then decided it was too much fun watching him kick some serious Scrabble bootie to get mad at. The truth is my sweetie-pie is a strategic word genius. Give him a few letters and a board (even a mini one) and the man can make some magic.
Occasionally people accuse him of cheating. Clearly, anyone who would suggest this ridiculous concept does not know my honest to a fault hubby very well. In seminary, he once went to a professor and confessed he hadn’t done all the reading. He actually admitted his earnest and sincere effort to read every page and subsequent failure to complete the last few chapters of one of the thirty books assigned. I still scratch my head at that one (Honey, I think the professors knew the reading load was a tad overwhelming…just saying).
Honest Abe has got nothing on Tim Keller.
But this whole concept of cheating brings up some rather interesting observations… because quite frankly, I know quite a few who do cheat! (No names of course)
What factors influence a person to be so competitive as to cheat on an itty bitty game played over the internet? No money is involved, no status, nothing other than bragging rights to the one loser you just beat. So why cheat?
I googled Scrabble Word Finder and about twenty cheater apps popped up. It seems like we have a culture of cheaters that enable other cheaters.
Too bad someone can’t morph a lie-detector test into an iPhone app. But honestly, when a player types in argute or ascesis for a 110 point word, it’s pretty obvious Pinocchio is playing the game.
So, fess up people…do you cheat or play fair?
Related Articles
- Cheaters believe they’re that good, even when they’re not (arstechnica.com)
- Scrabble Helper helps you improve your Words With Friends gameplay (downloadsquad.switched.com)
