Library Without Censorship: a videogame bypasses the regimes that censor the internet
Library Without Censorship: a videogame bypasses regimes that censor the internet
Reporters Without Borders has created the “Uncensored Library”, an archive within Minecraft that contains information banned or censored in their country of origin.
.
THE RIGHT to information is increasingly controlled in countries with repressive regimes, according to data from Reporters Without Borders (RSF). Saudi Arabia, Vietnam, Russia and Egypt are at the bottom of the global press freedom list compiled annually by the same NGO, while Greece is a humiliating 70th below Botswana, Romania and Georgia (full list HERE). In these countries it is almost impossible to access news that is not manipulated, even on the internet. But one of the most successful and popular video games has managed to break through these barriers: Minecraft. Within this universe, which amounts to a kind of digital Lego, Reporters Without Borders has created an online library, accessible to all and uncensored: the Uncensored Library.
The Uncensored Uncensored Uncensored Documentary.
There you can read articles by journalists and independent media that have been banned in their countries. Letters from Jamal Khashoggi, the journalist murdered in 2018 for criticising the Saudi regime, or Javier Valdez, a Mexican journalist who was also executed for writing about corruption in Sinaloa, Mexico, as well as news from the portals graniru.org and madamasr.com, banned in Belarus and Egypt respectively. In this way, RSF reports on the project, the information “is once again available on the Minecraft books, hidden from state surveillance technologies, inside a video game. This offers users unlimited freedom even in countries where there is no independent press.”
.
The NGO points out that one of the keys to the project is to provide information especially to younger people, so that “through a medium in which they can interact in a playful way” they can discover for themselves news that is beyond their reach. They see Minecraft as the ideal place to host the library, not only because of the freedoms it provides, but also because of its large player base. Its community is one of the largest in the world and is the best-selling video game in history, surpassing even Tetris. Launched in 2011 by a small Swedish studio, this May it surpassed 140 million monthly active players for the first time – in 2014, Microsoft acquired Mojang, the game’s developer, for €2.125 billion.
The library opened its doors on 12 March 2020 and its opening coincided with World Anti-Censorship Day on the Internet. Since then, information has been added and updated to highlight issues in more areas. The latest rooms added are those in Belarus and Brazil to denounce the behaviour of the governments of Aleksandr Lukashenko and Jair Bolsonaro. A room has also been added with data on coronavirus, which is limited to countries such as Turkmenistan and Iran. Since its opening, the library has featured specialized kiosks on Russia, Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Vietnam and Egypt.
Each of these rooms has information that has been banned in their countries, available in the library in both English and their native language, and all of the rooms have their own features. Russia – ranked 149th out of 180 in RSF’s press freedom rankings – is represented by a crow that “symbolizes the government’s extensive efforts to systematically control the internet,” the designers say. Saudi Arabia, in 172nd place, with a huge cage, illustrates the fact that it is one of the three places in the world with the most imprisoned journalists. Vietnam, ranked 176th, has a maze that reflects the difficulties its citizens have in getting unfiltered information. Egypt, ranked 163rd, has a score that shows “the country’s draconian laws that condemn those who criticize the government to long prison sentences.” In the case of Mexico, ranked 144th on the list, there are tombstones in honour of the journalists who died there, as it is one of the places in the world with the highest rate of murdered journalists.
RSF had already worked out another similar plan to get around censorship barriers online. In 2018, they launched The Uncensored Playlist, where they camouflaged journalists’ information in song form. This allowed them to reach every corner of the world via Spotify or Apple Music. But to create a library of this size they had to turn to Blockworks, a collective of 60 designers working with Minecraft to develop their projects.
But to create a library of this size they had to turn to Blockworks, a collective of 60 designers working with Minecraft, to develop their projects.
Blockworks CEO James Delaney explains that Minecraft allows players to design and build their own worlds: “Within the game you can make books, write in them and share them with other players,” and the site has more than 200 volumes. It took five months to build the complex: three months to design and two months to build. 24 builders from 16 different nationalities participated and 12.5 million blocks were used. Because it is not only the content of the library that is taken care of, but also its design. On the floor of the foyer is a world map depicting the level of press freedom in each country. And at the entrance there is a hand holding a pen as a symbol of media independence.
Delaney said: “The building is built in a neoclassical architectural style, which is usually used to represent culture and knowledge. But we also used this style to create an archive that represents the freedom of knowledge and the power of truth over authoritarian regimes.”
The next booth to open its doors will be the one dedicated to Eritrea, which ranks last in the RSF catalogue, at position 180. The NGO considers the project a success as, according to the data provided, “more than 20 million players from 165 countries have already used the library to learn about the state of press freedom around the world” and “a large proportion of them come from censored countries”. Moreover, “more than 300,000 people have downloaded it, making it virtually impossible to remove it from the internet.”
Raul Gonzalez, El Pais
newspaper El Pais
