cross-posted from: https://ttrpg.network/post/27970929
Recently the server staff received an e-mail telling them to moderate the Discord server and the server chat on what they deem to be "appropriate."
Below is a message from owner of the server.
Free Speech Under Attack
Dear friends, I don't often post announcements of this sort, but I feel it's very important for you all to know what's currently going on.
From the very start, over 15 years ago, one of the key founding principles of MinecraftOnline has been free speech. What started out as an uncontroversal, common sense policy, has proved to be a cornerstone of this increasingly unique community. As time has passed and Western society has wavered back and forth in its political leanings, free speech has repeatedly come under attack for political reasons. It has now become common to see arrests for posts on social media in countries such as Britain and Germany, in the name of political control, which have overtaken the numbers even of traditionally totalitarian countries such as China and Russia - a truly dystopian nightmare for freedom of expression and personal liberty.
Throughout this decade and a half of change, MinecraftOnline has held steadfast to its libertarian principles, and remained an oasis of freedom and openness in an increasingly closed and controlled internet. That is, until now.
Microsoft, through their subsidiary Mojang, have issued an ultimatum to MinecraftOnline. We have been told to do away with our free speech policy (which long pre-dates Microsoft's acquisition of Mojang), within 7 days, or face a a permanent block. If that happens, nobody will be able to play on MinecraftOnline again, and the 15-year history of this beloved server will come to a sudden and bitter end. The full email we have received today, signed facelessly only as "Mojang Enforcement", is included below.
The email makes extremely vague claims about "harmful interactions" and "harmful comments", and we are asking Microsoft to clarify what specific interactions and comments they consider harmful. In the meantime, please spread the word, share this info on social media. Defend free speech.
-SlowRiot
I've been playing on this server for several years and have posted about it on here before. They have no claims system but do have a strong anti-griefing policy that allows builds from more than a decade ago to remain untouched (map). You can go exploring, and you will find builds from 2010 and new builds from a couple of months ago. It's pretty cool seeing how building styles developed from back in Minecraft Alpha to now.
The “free speech” chat policy isn't entirely unrestricted. The servers are hosted at Hetzner in Germany and are therefore bound to their laws. This means things such as swastikas are not allowed (neither as builds nor in chat). There have been cases where people use the n- or f-word, but it's not common, and will not be appreciated by most players.
The owner (SlowRiot) is an interesting character. He runs a game studio and is a former director of Mensa UK with whom he had a legal fight a couple years back. He is not that active but checks on the server every so often. (SlowRiot's MCO wiki page)
The server has been having several technical issues for a while. It is still stuck on version 1.12.2. It has various custom Sponge plugins which are still being ported over. Furthermore, it also has issues with lag, comparable to a heavily modded minecraft server.
EDIT: This is the mail in question
And the followup mails
Mensa... time and time again we see the same thing. People desperate to prove their intelligence through tests etc. -- may be intelligent, not always wise.
They apparently didn't even hash the stored passwords. It's insane for any website, even a hobby project to store passwords in plain text.
Aka bad actors.. The world should be saved, hosted under new, proper management.
This is about Mensa UK's site, not MCO
/ignore is a pretty damn good feature if you ask me. Sad this is dismissed as "Failure to act"