Wplace: United by Pixels or Online Safety Nightmare?
On July 21st of this year, a Brazilian developer named Murilo Matsubara launched a new website called wplace.live. Wplace is a giant pixel-art project that everyone around the world can contribute to.
Reddit’s r/place, a project made by Reddit that allows users to place one pixel on a blank 1000px x 1000px canvas every five minutes, is quite similar. However, unlike r/place, which is just a blank canvas that is only open for a limited amount of time, Wplace is set on a map of the entire world and is planning on staying open at all times.
The most memorable part of Wplace is its scale. Their canvas spans a little over 4 trillion pixels, which cover every part of the world. Every participant in this project has a certain supply of pixels, starting at 30, and a pixel refills every 30 seconds. As they stay active on the platform, their storage increases, letting them draw more at once.
With every pixel, communities are turning the world into an amazing art piece representing different cultures, fandoms, humor, and art. Since Wplace was launched, it has drawn in giant fandoms to share their interests on the website. Some of the most prominent ones are Minecraft, Deltarune, Fallout, Pokémon, South Park, and Stardew Valley.
You can watch in real time as people come together to create art. Every pixel, in a way, is digital graffiti; it can be changed, painted over, and covered. Those who use the platform sometimes have a hard time keeping their art’s place on the map as it is taken over by others.
However, this competition for a claim to the land has further encouraged artists to stake their claim and defend it with their valuable time and sanity.
“I believe the website has provided a great rise to creativity and created connections among communities. I’ve spent a great deal of time on Wplace, and it’s so fun to be able to doodle around the globe,” said Renaissance Charter School freshman Haizel Pardo, who has been very active on the website.
Still, several people hold different thoughts on the situation.
“Although I believe the website was a good idea, it certainly has a lot of issues. There’s definitely a big issue when it comes to security. Most of the people on Wplace are children, and they feel too safe giving their private information out to strangers online,” said Hialeah Miami-Lakes sophomore Emmalee Acea.
This highlights one of the main concerns about Wplace. Users on Wplace have been giving out their information, like public social media accounts, phone numbers, full names, and addresses. Giving out private information to strangers is extremely dangerous, but these dangers are being ignored, recently exposing vulnerable children to possible threats.
The developers and moderators of the platform have been attempting to fix these problems. However, with the recent jump in active users that they weren’t prepared for, they don’t have enough manpower. This is compounded due to other reports of rule-breaking they need to fix. For instance, users draw explicit images and write hate speech on the website.
Wplace has its perks and drawbacks. It’s a fun thing to do when you have the time, but make sure to stay safe online. It’s a place where you can connect with fans of practically everything, and even if there aren’t any other fans of your favorite show or game, you can always be the start of the growing community on Wplace.
