You may not know it, but for the past four days a pixel war has been raging somewhere on Reddit . It all happened on a digital mural called Place that allowed users to place a pixel from a 16-color palette onto a collaborative digital canvas. After putting a pixel the user had to wait between five and 20 minutes to be able to edit it or add a new one. The project has sparked a curious battle between users who organize themselves into communities to decorate the digital mural with motifs from their country (flags from many countries, the Eiffel Tower, maple leaves, the national coat of arms of Mexico, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz , the Statue of Liberty, among many others) and dominate the creative space.
Reddit Although there is much more than nationalism. On the immense canvas you can see Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi walking with their backs to each other, Papa Smurf, Tintin and Milú, Asterix and Óbelix, Tux (the Linux penguin) and even the original Star Wars poster. All in an explosion of color and community creativity.
The digital mural was enabled on April 1 on the r/Place subredditt , a community of more than 3.7 million members, and closed at 10 a.m. Mexico City on April 4. Influencers and streamers called on their followers to join the project through social networks and platforms such as Twitch and TikTok, unleashing a collective madness and awakening nationalism to capture their national symbols and hide or modify those of other countries.
THE ORIGIN OF THE PROJECT
The 2022 edition of this mural is actually a second part. The first was released on April 1, 2017 (for April’s Fool Day) as a social experiment. In that first edition, the canvas was open for 72 hours and achieved the collaboration of more than a million users who edited at least one pixel. In total, 16 million “tiles” were created (small portions of different textures that, when placed next to each other, give the sensation of being a single piece graphic).
For this year’s edition, the creation period was extended by 24 hours, so we can assume that user participation will also have increased, although at the moment there are still no metrics around the original project.
Here you can see the final result of the complete mural and we share some user posts sharing their work.
Bill Cipher from Gravity Falls spotted on r/place. pic.twitter.com/RSDRb6w1Wb
— Andrew Roth+ (@RothsReviews) April 3, 2022
To @NintendoAmerica classic. pic.twitter.com/WEQUeGF2Wp
— Reddit (@Reddit) April 3, 2022
Found the Lions, Red Wings, MSU, and U of M on the r/place canvas. pic.twitter.com/K3vHuWJDpS
— Andrew Roth (@RothTheReporter) April 3, 2022
Found the Lions, Red Wings, MSU, and U of M on the r/place canvas. pic.twitter.com/K3vHuWJDpS
— Andrew Roth (@RothTheReporter) April 3, 2022
