
Reddit's /r/place April Fools Experiment [video] - vinchuco
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XnRCZK3KjUY
======
Ajedi32
A detailed explanation of what this is, for those unaware:

For April Fools' Day this year, Reddit ran a social experiment in which they
gave each of their users the ability to paint one 4-bit color pixel on a
1000x1000 grid once every 5 minutes. A new subreddit, /r/place, was created to
host the event, which lasted 72 hours. This video is a timelapse of the entire
image.

I found this whole thing to be incredibly fascinating. It's pretty amazing to
see how everyone just sort of spontaneously banded together to create little
works of art on the board which they could never have made on their own.
Everytime I watch this timelapse I notice something new.

It's also interesting to note that because the impact of any individual user
on the board was pretty limited (you could only place one pixel every 5
minutes, and even then there was no guarantee the first pixel you placed
wouldn't be overwritten by someone else before you were even allowed to place
another), every significant piece of artwork on there had tens or even
hundreds of people involved in creating and maintaining it.

In addition to the various artworks on the board, there were also several
major factions scattered throughout the board with their own goals.
/r/TheBlueCorner dedicated themselves to filling the empty space in the bottom
right corner of the board with blue pixels, while /r/theblackvoid formed to
erase various artworks by replacing them with black tiles. If you pay
attention you may also notice several other factions in the timelapse.

Other interesting events to note include [the German invasion of
France]([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ParHJmq2aCs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ParHJmq2aCs))
(and resulting peaceful resolution), [The Void's (unsuccessful) attack on the
OSU logo]([https://i.imgur.com/Tpmvrcc.gif](https://i.imgur.com/Tpmvrcc.gif)),
and [several factions ganging up to attack the US
flag]([https://gfycat.com/InfamousShyEeve](https://gfycat.com/InfamousShyEeve))
while most of the US population was asleep. There's plenty of other stuff you
might notice too if you look hard enough. (For example, can you find Waldo?)

[Here's the final
result]([https://i.imgur.com/ajWiAYi.png](https://i.imgur.com/ajWiAYi.png)).
Other interesting stuff to note include [this animated
heatmap]([https://i.imgur.com/a95XXDz.gifv](https://i.imgur.com/a95XXDz.gifv))
by /u/jampekka of activity on the canvas, and [this
graphic]([https://i.imgur.com/SEHaUSJ.png](https://i.imgur.com/SEHaUSJ.png))
by /u/alternateme highlighting all the white pixels which never got touched
throughout the experiment.

