Reddit protests see r/Place experiment immediately hijacked with grotesque graffiti

Not nearly as grotesque as it could (should) have been.

I don't even have the motivation/curiosity to check it out. That used to be a great place, now it's another corporate promotion.

I don't quite get how a "collective art piece" could get "hijacked". If it can be hijacked than it's only collective and collaborative for the ones that Reddit likes.

Of course this is the only way they could present it, but as far as I'm concerned the cool thing about r/place, in principle, is that you can see the chaos of the world, with opposite views, opinions, goals, tastes, interests sharing the same space, the same place, and interacting with each other.

I'd much rather see swastikas alongside sickles and hammers, stickmen being murdered alongside unicorns, dirty jokes alongside the Mona Lisa, than this corporate PR stunt.

I think it also shows that the protests have been somehow successful. Sure, Reddit won't fail, but if they decided to do another r/Place it's only because they know how loved it is by the community and hope to make people forget about the disaster.

I like that this is being covered in The Independent, which, afaik, is not a tech-specific publication. Sure, they’re being prim about the phrasing of the protest message, but they’re presenting the motivation behind it in a relatively sympathetic way.