Editing Sudoku (section)

=== Spread outside Japan ===

In 1997, Hong Kong judge [[Wayne Gould]] saw a partly completed puzzle in a Japanese bookshop. Over six years, he developed a computer program to produce unique puzzles rapidly.<ref name=Smith />

The first newspaper outside of Japan to publish a Sudoku puzzle was ''[[The Conway Daily Sun]]'' (New Hampshire), which published a puzzle by Gould in September 2004.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/21/business/worldbusiness/21sudoku.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&sq&st=cse%22Conway%20Daily%20Sun&scp=1%22%202004%20gould |title=Correction attached to "Inside Japan's Puzzle Palace" |newspaper=[[The New York Times]] |date=March 21, 2007 |url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/the-rise-and-rise-of-sudoku-5336007.html |title=The rise and rise of Sudoku |website=[[The Independent]] |author=<!-- No byline --> |date=April 10, 2006}}</ref>

Gould pitched the idea of publishing Sudoku puzzles to newspapers, offering the puzzles for free in exchange for the newspapers' attributing them to him and linking to his website for solutions and other puzzles.

Knowing that British newspapers have a long history of publishing [[crossword]]s and other puzzles, he promoted Sudoku to ''[[The Times]]'' in Britain, which launched it on November 12, 2004 (calling it Su Doku). The first letter to ''The Times'' regarding Su Doku was published the following day on November 13 from Ian Payn of [[Brentford]], complaining that the puzzle had caused him to miss his stop on the [[London Underground|tube]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.thetimes.com/sport/football/article/deep-in-thought-l2wwrwqqw9k |title=Deep in thought |date=November 13, 2004 |first=Ian |last=Payn |website=[[The Times]]}}</ref> Sudoku puzzles rapidly spread to other newspapers as a regular feature.<ref name=Smith>{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/media/2005/may/15/pressandpublishing.usnews |title=So you thought Sudoku came from the Land of the Rising Sun ...|first=David |last=Smith |newspaper=The Observer |date=May 15, 2005 |access-date=June 13, 2008 |quote=The puzzle gripping the nation actually began at a small New York magazine}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Devlin |first=Keith |title=The Numbers Game (book review of ''Taking Sudoku Seriously'' by Jason Rosenhouse et al.) |newspaper=[[The Wall Street Journal]] |page=C5 |date=January 28–29, 2012}}</ref>

The rapid rise of Sudoku in Britain from relative obscurity to a front-page feature in national newspapers attracted commentary in the media and parody (such as when ''The Guardian''{{'s}} ''G2'' section advertised itself as the first newspaper supplement with a Sudoku grid on every page).<ref name=G2>{{cite news |title=G2, home of the discerning Sudoku addict |url=https://www.theguardian.com/g2/story/0,,1482817,00.html |work=The Guardian |date=May 13, 2005 |access-date=September 16, 2006 |location=London}}</ref> Recognizing the different psychological appeals of easy and difficult puzzles, ''The Times'' introduced both, side by side, on June 20, 2005. From July 2005, [[Channel 4]] included a daily Sudoku game in their [[teletext]] service. On August 2, the BBC's program guide ''[[Radio Times]]'' featured a weekly Super Sudoku with a 16×16 grid.

[[File:SudokuLive2.jpg|thumb|The world's first live TV Sudoku show, held on July 1, 2005, ''[[Sky One]]'']]
The world's first live TV Sudoku show, ''Sudoku Live'', was a [[puzzle contest]] first broadcast on July 1, 2005, on the British pay-television channel [[Sky One]]. It was presented by [[Carol Vorderman]]. Nine teams of nine players (with one celebrity in each team) representing geographical regions competed to solve a puzzle. Each player had a hand-held device for entering numbers corresponding to answers for four cells. Phil Kollin of [[Winchelsea|Winchelsea, England]], was the series grand prize winner, taking home over £23,000 over a series of games. The audience at home was in a separate interactive competition, which was won by Hannah Withey of [[Cheshire]].

Later in 2005, the [[BBC]] launched ''[[SUDO-Q]]'', a [[game show]] that combined Sudoku with general knowledge. However, it used only 4×4 and 6×6 puzzles. Four seasons were produced before the show ended in 2007.

[[File:Sudokujf.JPG|thumb|right|175px|A Sudoku competition at [[SM City Baliuag]]]]

An annual [[World Sudoku Championship]] series has been organized by the [[World Puzzle Federation]] since 2006, except in 2020 and 2021 during the [[COVID-19 pandemic]].

In 2006, a Sudoku website published a tribute song by Australian songwriter Peter Levy, but the song download was later removed due to heavy traffic. The Japanese Embassy nominated the song for an award, and Levy claimed he was in discussions with [[Sony]] in Japan to release the song as a single.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/hit-song-has-the-numbers/story-e6frf7jo-1111112155196 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20121230192938/http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/hit-song-has-the-numbers/story-e6frf7jo-1111112155196 |url-status=dead |archive-date=December 30, 2012 |title=Hit Song Has the Numbers |date=August 17, 2006 |work=[[The Herald Sun]] |access-date=October 5, 2008}}</ref>

Sudoku software is very popular on PCs, websites, and mobile phones. It comes with many distributions of [[Linux]]. The software has also been released on video game consoles, such as the [[Nintendo DS]], [[PlayStation Portable]], the [[Game Boy Advance]], [[Xbox Live Arcade]], the [[Nook]] e-book reader, Kindle Fire tablet, several [[iPod]] models, and the [[iPhone]]. Many [[Nokia]] phones also had Sudoku. In fact, just two weeks after [[Apple Inc.]] debuted the online [[App Store (iOS)|App Store]] within its [[iTunes Store]] on July 11, 2008, nearly 30 different Sudoku games were already in it, created by various [[software developers]], specifically for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Sudoku games also rapidly became available for [[web browser]] users and for basically all gaming, cellphone, and computer platforms.

In June 2008, an Australian drugs-related jury trial costing over [[Australian dollar|A$]] 1 million was aborted when it was discovered that four or five of the twelve jurors had been playing Sudoku instead of listening to the evidence.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/jurors-get-1-million-trial-aborted/2008/06/10/1212863636766.html |title=The game's up: jurors playing Sudoku abort trial |last=Knox |first=Malcolm |date=June 11, 2008 |work=[[The Sydney Morning Herald]] |access-date=June 11, 2008}}</ref>