Alfred Butts worked out how many of each Scrabble tile to make by counting letters in 1930s newspapers, the front page of the New York Times among them. Then he came to S, looked at the honest count, and gave it only four, because with its fair share anyone could tack one on the end of a word and call that a move. So the most careful arithmetic in the game was overruled by the man who did it. Everyone since who has sat staring at a rack of vowels, wishing for an S, is wishing against a decision he made on purpose.