The most interesting thing about this to me is that it belies the common impression that many have that the NYT crossword is "elitist". I mean, how can it be "elitist" if it's routinely copied by USA Today??
I think people try it, find it to be impossible to penetrate on the first try, see a couple of clues about 1930's opera or NYC-specific stuff and then punt. However, like many other things in life, there is a learning curve to basic competency. There is a common, shared vocabulary among professional crossword constructors that provides a foundation for even the most difficult puzzles. The point is that you can still finish the puzzle even without knowing anything about 1930's opera by knowing something else nearby and some intelligent guesses.
Among most solvers, the quality of a puzzle is proportional to how fun it is to solve and that is closely related to non-repetition of the theme. Good puzzles minimize this and solvers take it for granted that every puzzle will be genuinely new. The best case is a theme that is never before seen, something completely original.
The problem with plagiarism in this case is easier to understand if it's seen through the lens of an inveterate solver. It's a betrayal of this unspoken (but still very casual) ethic of originality.
The NYT crossword has a steep difficulty curve increasing over each week. It took me a few years of regular solving before I could consistently finish a Saturday puzzle. If people are only seeing the NYT puzzles on weekends, no wonder they think it's elitist. Try a Monday puzzle!
(Also, the obscure 1930's opera references have been on the decline since Will Shortz took over for the late Eugene T. Maleska. Maleska was an admitted elitist who filled the puzzles with high culture, while Shortz prefers misleading wordplay. You see a 5-letter clue, "Pentagonal part of a diamond", and it takes a while for the baseball reference to click - but once it does, PLATE is the obvious answer.)
I've looked at the USA Today crossword a few times, but found the quality relatively poor. Lots of dull clues and obscure three-letter words to make the fill fit together. No wonder he got away with plagiarism for so long, the people who'd notice wouldn't bother sticking around long enough to find anything wrong.
Back in the 90s, there was a piece in Wired by Will Shortz about then-president Bill Clinton's crossword prowess—he claimed he could solve the NYT puzzle in about 10 minutes, if I recall. But readers who would care about this would also know that there's no comparison in difficulty between a Monday and a Friday. Which puzzle could the president do in 10 minutes? I couldn't believe Will Shortz of all people would leave this out.
> impression that many have that the NYT crossword is "elitist"
If that's the case, I imagine it's partly due to it not being widely known that the difficulty of the puzzles follows a set schedule[1]. People pick up a Saturday puzzle, very reasonably suppose that future puzzles will be similar, and write off the whole business.
[1] Easiest on Monday, ramping up to hardest on Saturday, with Sunday somewhere in the middle, for anyone else unaware.
The most interesting thing about this to me is that it belies the common impression that many have that the NYT crossword is "elitist". I mean, how can it be "elitist" if it's routinely copied by USA Today??
I think people try it, find it to be impossible to penetrate on the first try, see a couple of clues about 1930's opera or NYC-specific stuff and then punt. However, like many other things in life, there is a learning curve to basic competency. There is a common, shared vocabulary among professional crossword constructors that provides a foundation for even the most difficult puzzles. The point is that you can still finish the puzzle even without knowing anything about 1930's opera by knowing something else nearby and some intelligent guesses.
Among most solvers, the quality of a puzzle is proportional to how fun it is to solve and that is closely related to non-repetition of the theme. Good puzzles minimize this and solvers take it for granted that every puzzle will be genuinely new. The best case is a theme that is never before seen, something completely original.
The problem with plagiarism in this case is easier to understand if it's seen through the lens of an inveterate solver. It's a betrayal of this unspoken (but still very casual) ethic of originality.
See almost any post from: http://rexwordpuzzle.blogspot.com/ for an example of typical daily thoughts along these lines.