The '''SOWPODS''' lexicon, more commonly now referred to as '''Collins''' or '''Collins Scrabble Words''' ('''CSW'''), is a word list first published in 2007 by Collins, and updated in 2012 and 2015.NASPA has sanctioned official games played in the CSW lexicon in a separate[[SOWPODS rating system|CSW rating system]] since January 2010. The 2012 edition was in effect until August 31, 2015; the 2015 edition took effect on September 1, 2015.
[[Image:CSW_countries.png|400px|center|alt Map of the CSW world]]
English-language Scrabble as a whole is played to two lexica, depending on country. This map shows countries according to the lexicon(s) they use. Currently, 47 countries use CSW (green), and 4 use predominantly OWL2the Official Tournament and Club Word List 2016 edition ([[OTCWL|OTCWL16]], the North American lexicon), with some CSW play (. These countries, shown in blue: , are Canada, Israel, Thailand, and the United States).
== Statistics ==
* The 2012 2015 edition of CSW has 276,663 words from 2-15 letters, up from 270,163 words; in the 2015 2012 edition is reported to have , an increase of 6500 additional words.* The 2012 2015 edition included includes all of the words that were are acceptable in TWL2; the 2015 edition includes most words that were added to TWL2014current North American OTCWL16 word list, but with a few omissions, including CALSthe exception of 59 2-8 letter words, BAYER and JAKER.1844 9-15 letter words* In 2014, 8% of all games played were CSW-rated; , the remainder being played in the [[OTCWL]] lexicon.
== Coinage ==
The name “SOWPODS” was coined as an anagram of OSW+OSPD, the names of the two lexicons (the British Official Scrabble Words and the American Official SCRABBLE Players Dictionary) that were originally merged to form SOWPODS. The SOWPODS word list is currently edited by the [[WESPA]] Dictionary Committee; comments concerning the list should be directed to the NASPA [[International Committee]]. The CSW word list contains almost all of the words found in [[OTCWL|OTCWL14OTCWL16]], as well as a large number of other English words from around the world.
== More information ==
The purpose of these webpages is to provide informative and, hopefully, interesting information to those North American tournament and club players who are curious about trying out the CSW game. They do not, therefore, aim to introduce Scrabble play as a whole, but those parts of it that change if one plays moves from playing OTCWL to playing CSW. Thus, we start with how the game differs from OWLOTCWL, introduce the most useful extra words to know, address some commonly asked questions and concerns, then describe the current CSW scene as it is evolving in North America. Finally, we present links to further resources outside of this wiki.
The sections below follow on from each other in order, but each can be read on its own.
* [[How Collins differs|How is the game different?]]* [[Important Collins words|How many more words are there, and what would I need to learn?]]* [[Obscure Collins words|Are all the words obscure, obsolete, foreign, etc.?]]* [[Collins updates|How often is the list updated?]]* [[Downsides to Collins|What are the downsides?]]* [[CSW TournamentsCollins tournaments and ratings]]* [[CSW ratingsTry it]]* [[CSW Collins links]]* [[CSW12]]* [[Try it|Try it!]]
Comments concerning <br>Please direct comments about this page may be directed to its author, [[Nick Ball]].