Notes

Minecraft 'loophole' Library Of Banned Journalism

Minecraft 'loophole' library of banned journalism By Tom Gerken BBC News, Washington DC



13 March 2020



It was initially an online forum and has since grown to become the most played video game ever. But now Minecraft is being used in a way that its creator could not have imagined.



The iconic game based around placing Lego-like blocks with more than 145 million players each month has been transformed into a center for free speech.



To host the articles of journalists that were censored online, a virtual library was carefully designed.



Work by Jamal Khashoggi, the journalist killed by Saudi agents in 2018, can be read among the myriad of books available at the library.



Minecraft has refused to comment.



The Minecraft project was initiated by a non-profit organization called Reporters Without Borders, which seeks to defend the rights of information across the globe The Minecraft library itself was created by design studio Blockworks.



Christian Mihr, executive director of Reporters Without Borders Germany, told the BBC that Minecraft was a good choice for the project because he believes that it isn't considered to be an issue by governments that restrict their media.



He claimed that Minecraft was chosen because of its accessibility. "It is accessible in every country. It is not censored as other games that are believed to be political.



"There are large communities in all the countries included, which is why it was suggested - it's a loophole for the censorship."



He explained that the authors were selected to represent countries where press freedom was restricted so that these communities could be able to access their work.



However, he explained that permissions were sought before publishing in the library.
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"We didn't put any material into the library without the consent of the respective authors If they're still alive.



"In the Jamal Khashoggi's case, we spoke to family members - to express our respect of people who have been killed and the security of their families."



Nick Feamster, Neubauer Professor of Computer Science at the University of Chicago Nick Feamster, Neubauer Professor of Computer Science at the University of Chicago, told BBC that the library could be successful in beating censors, but he was worried about how governments might react.



He said that it was an interesting concept but there were some issues. Governments will know about this - the articles are going across the internet. It's unlikely to be foolproof against a determined adversary.



He said that the strength of the library stemmed from its use of entanglement to mix up the censored materials with the game of video in the eyes of censors.



He added, "By entangling the two items, you force them all to share content." "You can't block one without the other."



In the meantime, Helmi Noman who is a Research Affiliate of the Berkman Klein Centre for Internet & Society said that he felt the library would likely to have an audience that is limited.



"The content that is censored is dynamic, diverse and distributed," he said, adding that in his research "the users prefer methods that don't prioritize and categorize content in specific spaces online.



"Any method that doesn't provide an unhindered, secure browsing experience across the entire web, social media, and direct messaging applications will most likely fail."



The server, which can host a maximum of 100 players at once was often unavailable because of the number of players tried to sign in at the same time. Despite the limitation on concurrent users, it has been visited by 3,889 players from 75 different countries and has been downloaded over 7,000 times.



After two hours of trying, BBC finally visited the virtual library and asked users what they thought.



SoulfulGenie stated that they believed "it needs more books and a brand new section on North Korea" and another user called it "ingenious in many ways", adding that since the library can be downloaded and reuploaded by other users, "it is easy to replicate and therefore hard to destroy".



ReduxPL said that the library "looks amazing indeed".



Blockworks took 250 hours to design the library which was completed by 24 people from 16 different countries.



James Delaney, the company's managing director, told the BBC that the company's goal was to create a classic design that was "on the edge of fantasy".



He said that it was plausible as a construction, but it is exceeding the limits of what is possible.



"We went for a design in the neoclassical style. It's similar to things like the British Museum and public libraries in New York."



He claimed that Minecraft was improvisational at its core, so builders were not restricted to following a pre-determined design.



He said that when there are many people working on the same task, "people can see each other's work and must respond in real-time." It's a reactive method of working and it can alter the appearance of the project.



"The style is chosen to represent authority and power - we wanted to turn that on its head.



"Instead of representing the power of the government or the regime, it's representing the free press."



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