Thanks for supporting the Sun puzzle

As many of you know, the New York Sun will no longer publish. This is significant for crossword constructors and solvers alike. Puzzle editor Peter Gordon boldly challenged the New York Times, the de facto creme of puzzledom, by raising the rates paid to constructors and by demanding the very best in return. Many have said that the Sun puzzle is just as good as the Times. Indeed, it seems unfathomable that the Sun puzzle would simply disappear. Not fair to solvers, not fair to constructors. Certainly not fair to Peter who has put his heart and soul into the Sun Puzzle. Over the next few days the Sun puzzle will be made available for free here at cruciverb.com. Beginning next week, the puzzle will be available exclusively to Sun Subcribers (details to follow). The fee will be low and certainly well worth it. I hope all of you who have enjoyed the Sun crossword puzzle will provide support by subscribing.

- Kevin

Constructor Roy Leban has announced his new puzzle site, puzzazz.com. Here's a blurb from the About page:

"Puzzazz has a simple mission: to give people who like puzzles a quick, fun diversion every day. Whether you're a casual puzzler or a serious puzzle addict, Puzzazz can fill the bill. As a bonus, Puzzazz users can invite their friends to join in for some friendly competition. If you're a Twitter user, you can even have Puzzazz automatically tweet for you whenever you solve a puzzle."

Site URL: http://www.puzzazz.com

Puzzle constructor Davis Levinson Wilk ponders political bias in crossword puzzles in his entertaining Politico article, which appeared today. Check it out:

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0908/13888.html

If you haven't checked out Matt Gaffney's Weekly Crossword Contest, be sure you do! It's challenging and fun. How does it work? A weekly crossword contest is posted every Friday afternoon. To enter, you solve the puzzle then send your answer to the contest's email address. One winner selected at random will receive an autographed copy of any book written by Matt.

For details check out the contest website here:

http://www.crosswordcontest.blogspot.com

Antony Lewis has just released Crossword Solver 1.0. This is a very slick crossword player that can open .puz files, xml files and more. It runs on Windows and Mac and can also run on Linux if Sun's Java is installed. Check out the program at the URL below:

http://www.crosswordsolver.info/

Robert Stockton recently announced the 1.0 release of his crossword construction program, Crossfire. It runs on Windows, Mac and Linux. MOre details can be found at the Crossfuire website here:

http://beekeeperlabs.com/crossfire