Group Builds Massive New Library of Censored Articles Inside Minecraft

In countries where websites, blogs and a free press are strictly limited, Minecraft "is still accessible by everyone," notes the official official web site for Reporters Without Borders (an international nonprofit defending freedom of information): Reporters Without Borders used this backdoor to build "The Uncensored Library": A library that is now accessible on an open server for Minecraft players around the globe. The library is filled with books, containing articles that were censored in their country of origin. These articles are now available again within Minecraft hidden from government surveillance technology inside a computer game. The books can be read by everyone on the server, but their content cannot be changed. The library is growing, with more and more books being added to overcome censorship.

On March 12 — the World Day Against Cyber Censorship — the Uncensored Library will open its doors, giving young people around the world access to independent information, through a medium they can playfully interact with. The campaign runs under the hashtag: #TruthFindsAWay...

Additional to banned articles from journalists, visitors of The Uncensored Library can find the Reporters Sans Frontières World Press Freedom Index and reports on the current press freedom situation of 180 countries in the world.
They spent three months working with the design studio BlockWorks to assemble 12.5 million blocks into a vast structure with a neoclassical architecture.

You can see it in a short film at uncensoredlibrary.com, or access it in Minecraft at visit.uncensoredlibrary.com

How is this safe from censorship?

[Riceballsan]

If I'm not totally lost here... Wouldn't the minecraft server then have a blockable IP... If not couldn't they just pressure MS to region block the server?

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[gosso920]

Get out of here with your logic.

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[aevan]

They mention offline play, so I'm assuming it's available as a... mod? savegame? something or another, and that might sneak past cursory screening by 'great firewalls' and censors. Sure you can block the main dl site or server, but it could be passed by player to player and so on.

I imagine it would take a lot more effort to scan ever-changing game files for however they stores their internal books? Or they could just ban minecraft and other games of the type.

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[sabt-pestnu]

The more books you put in minecraft, the larger the saved game is. They're talking non-trivial game archive sizes there.

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[tlhIngan]

The more books you put in minecraft, the larger the saved game is. They're talking non-trivial game archive sizes there.

Depends. Articles are fairly small items - about a few K in plain text. Add in pictures and they get somewhat larger. You can fit a lot of banned or censored articles in a megabyte of storage. A gigabyte of world data could hold quite a lot before you started cycling out older articles.

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[Joce640k]

If I'm not totally lost here... Wouldn't the minecraft server then have a blockable IP... If not couldn't they just pressure MS to region block the server?

I was going to mod this "Insightful" but it's too facepalmingly obvious for that.

Re: How is this safe from censorship?

[satanicat]

Oh definately, im certain this will happen. But i think its notable how all this tech designed to isolate people becomes ineffective as soon as people do the obvious thing, find a difderent way to communicate.

Probably, once this is defeated (blocked), something else will eventually pop up.

Re: How is this safe from censorship?

[phantomfive]

And the more things a dictator blocks, the more annoying he becomes. The more people he annoys, the more likely he will be ejected.

Congratulations

[ludux]

You've now gotten Minecraft blocked in those countries. Assholes.

Re:Congratulations

[SuricouRaven]

Which is itsself a point, in a way: Firstly, having the censorship start taking away people's fun reduces the popular support for that censorship and those who advocate it. Secondly, it results in more people learning how to circumvent the censorship.

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[kenai_alpenglow]

Like the red chinese care (as opposed to ROK or Hong Kong).

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[kenai_alpenglow]

Sorry, meant Republic of China (i.e., Taiwan).

What popular support?

[BAReFO0t]

You actually believe the propaganda that censorship is popular??

Re: What popular support?

[phantomfive]

From what I can see, it is popular when people oppose what is being censored.

Re: What popular support?

[ToasterMonkey]

Are we supposed to see any overlap between the Minecraft players and popular censorship groups?

I don't see that. I don't think it's realistic to think this will change the way anyone thinks about censorship.

Lets be real, it will make some restricted content available to those really looking for it, and maybe in extreme cases bring more restrictions.

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[phantomfive]

Are we supposed to see any overlap between the Minecraft players and popular censorship groups?

I would expect those two categories to be orthogonal. That is, the proportion of people who support censorship and play Minecraft match the proportion of the general population.

"Reporters" sans frontiers?

[ClickOnThis]

I'm not a fan of franglais.

They should have called themselves "Journalistes Sans Frontiers."

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[ClickOnThis]

I'm not a fan of franglais.

They should have called themselves "Journalistes Sans Frontiers."

Oops, sorry. Typo and missing diacritic: Journalistes Sans Frontières I should heed my own advice.

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[gurps_npc]

Everything you wrote is bull.

1) Q is a bad joke that only an idiot believes. Not hard at all to arrest child molesters, you don't need a silly conspiracy, and you certainly do NOT publicize ANYTHING about a 'secret' investigation. That is called 'leaking your top secret information to the enemey'.

2) There is nothing preventing any administration from pardoning a crime as long as they are in power. Before the election, after the election, does not matter. What matters is just "are you the president now

What are you two nutjobs even talking about?

[BAReFO0t]

Q is a character from Star Trek! And from the alphabet.

Wont somebody think of the brats.

[sg_oneill]

Finally a place where edgy 14yos can read Mien Kampf.

Basically they made 4chan.

Re: Wont somebody think of the brats.

[BAReFO0t]

> Mien

Why are you so maen to thsoe poor wrods?

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[gosso920]

Spleling is hrad.

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[flyingfsck]

'hrad' = 'castle' in most Slavic languages. So won't you please think of the Central Europeans?

Yeah, right

[cwesley]

Still accessible by everyone.... with a Microsoft account.