How to win at Scrabble

How to win at Scrabble if you're perhaps not that good at the words thing.

Scrabble isn't a game of who can get the best 6 letter words. It's a game of points and squeezing 2 letter terms into corners. Mehal Shah takes us through clean and sometimes dirty ways to win at Scrabble.

(via radar)

Scrabble points inflation

Recent additions to the official Scrabble dictionary -- like za, qi, and zzz -- have upset the letter distribution balance of the game, causing high scoring letters like z & q to become overvalued. The three-point line in college basketball and Monopoly's Vermont Ave. are similarly mispriced.

There's a big kerfuffle (how many points

There's a big kerfuffle (how many points do I get for that?) over Hasbro, makers of Scrabble, suing Rajat and Jayant Agarwalla over their popular Facebook application, Scrabulous.

Non-profit writing organization 826NYC is holding a

Non-profit writing organization 826NYC is holding a Scrabble for Cheaters competition on January 19th with the proceeds going to benefit their programs and students. The more money a team raises, the more they can cheat. Here are some of the cheats:

Flip a letter over and make it blank: $100
Add Q, Z, or X to any word, anywhere: $200
Passport: play a word in any language: $250
Reject another team's word: $450
Invent a word (must have a definition): $500

Entry information and rules available on the web site. Oh, and you'll be playing against John Hodgman.

There's a new Scrabble world record: 830 points,

There's a new Scrabble world record: 830 points, including a play of quixotry on a triple-triple for a record score of 365. "Looking at the game as a whole, it's clear that a lack of expertise created the conditions for the record."

The competitive Scrabble world is starting to

The competitive Scrabble world is starting to see some top-notch players for whom English is not their native language. At he highest level of competition, "Scrabble's secret is that it's a math game: board geometry, strategic decision making, probability and chance." And sometimes it's better not knowing English so the player can focus solely on the memorization of patterns and gameplay. Interesting stuff.