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Ambitious Project Seeks to Re-Create Every Structure on Earth in Minecraft (rockpapershotgun.com) 60

Posted by EditorDavid from the a-small-world-after-all dept.
An anonymous reader quotes Rock, Paper, Shotgun: For as long as there's been Minecraft, there's been people who want to re-create the world in Minecraft. For one modder, though, it's not enough to have a to-scale replica of our pale blue dot recreated in Mojang's block-builder. A new project named Build The Earth is looking for talented builders with too much time on their hands, bringing them together to fully recreate every last man-made structure on Earth in Minecraft.

YouTuber PippinFTS unveiled the project in a YouTube video earlier this week. It's awfully dramatic, but give the guy a break — he's only trying to go and build a planet.

PippenFTS' project is building from Terra 1 to 1, a project headed up by modders orangeadam3 and shejan0. Using a few extra mods to get around the game's strict world limitations, Terra 1 to 1 uses public terrain datasets, street maps and forest databases to accurately map the earth's terrain, roads and woodland areas in Minecraft... [H]e wants to build a community that can collectively recreate thousands of years of human history by filling out every single man-made structure on Earth. His "Build The Earth" project hopes to crowdsource player-recreated cities, towns, stadiums, bridges and otherwise. PippenFTS himself will contribute with his own hometown.

"Regardless," he writes, wistful in his obligation, "I will build Seattle. Super excited."
The project already has a Patreon account -- plus 5,500 members in its subreddit.
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Ambitious Project Seeks to Re-Create Every Structure on Earth in Minecraft More

Ambitious Project Seeks to Re-Create Every Structure on Earth in Minecraft

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  • 'Cause I will never tell him where that shed is I built on the farm.

  • Uhhhh (Score:1, Flamebait)

    by Cylix ( 55374 )

    Who gives two fucking shits...

    • Building something nerdy from within a computer game. Normally I'd say people on Slashdot give a shit. Judging by your UID I'd say some of the original Slashdot crowd may be reaching the point in their life where they start getting senile.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Pascoea ( 968200 )

      Who gives two fucking shits...

      Apparently, you do. Otherwise why waste your time clicking on the article? Or do you get joy out of telling other people the things they like to do are stupid?

      • False logic.
        In order to find out whether two fucking shits should be given, one must digest the information, then decide.

      • Minecraft - Reconstruct the entire earth. I mean, I'm not against it. How long will it take? What utility is in doing it?

        COVID-19 - Constructing face-masks. I mean, I'm not against it. How long will it take? What utility is in doing it?

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Pascoea ( 968200 )
          I don't understand. I assume you're implying that constructing face masks is a better use of time than playing Minecraft? Surely it would be, but if you were a medical professional, would you really trust a face mask made by some nerdy kid that would rather be playing Minecraft? Having done some work in the safety field, I can tell you for certain that sub-standard PPE is just as bad as no PPE.

          • Having done some work in the safety field, I can tell you for certain that sub-standard PPE is just as bad as no PPE.

            Where I live, all of the medical professionals would strongly disagree with what you're saying. Maybe you're thinking about a respirator? Making a face mask is really simple and easy. You only need to cover the nose and mouth in order to prevent any airborne particles (as a result of an infected person sneezing, or coughing in your face as you try to apply medical attention).

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Pascoea ( 968200 )

              Making a face mask is really simple and easy.

              Yes, but is it effective? My problem is that bad PPE lulls you into a sense of security. I come from a construction background, so that's the only examples that I have. Say you're grinding on something, you have your face shield on so you think you're fine without safety glasses. Turns out that face shield was some POS from Harbor Freight, and now you're a pirate. My point is, if you get into a situation where you need your equipment to protect you and it's not designed and implemented properly what goo

              • I'm a member of an organization called 'The Heartfulness Institute'. We've literally been asked, by doctors and other hospitals around the world, to make these grandma hobby lobby specials. Is it what they want? Hell no. But like you say, it's better than nothing. Ideally, each medical professional would have a full-body hazmat suit. But...

                In times like this, it's literally INSANE to turn down grandma's hobby lobby special, when that's all that's available. Now, this being said, a really big boat jus

                • Re: (Score:2)

                  by Pascoea ( 968200 )
                  Yeah, after I thought my way through my last comment, I would tend to agree with you. In the construction world, as a safety guy, if I didn't like what I saw I was required to shut the work down until my guys could be safe. Not really an option in the healthcare world. As far as the liability part, that's going to be an interesting one that gets sorted out in the wash. I just hope the judges crucify a couple of ambulance chasers that try to make a buck off someone getting sick "due to a faulty mask".

                  • Yeah, after I thought my way through my last comment...

                    Often people have this experience here on slashdot, and never comment on it. This has brightened my day today. Thank you for that, my new friend.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Who gives two fucking shits...

      Not you, apparently.

      I guess you prefer the endless political trolling and mud-flinging.

      Why don't you just fuck off and be done with it?

  • For those who want an "explore the Earth" experience now, Wander [oculus.com] utilizes Google Maps street view data to allow you to explore in wraparound VR virtually any populated place on the globe, and you can do so along with friend(s).

    Certainly higher resolution than Minecraft, if arguably a bit less interactive.

    (No financial association with the company, just a satisfied customer.)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by znrt ( 2424692 )

      https://arvr.google.com/earth/ [google.com] has been available for a while now. imo one of the best vr apps ever, simply mind blowing.

      besides street view it also reconstructs '3d' from satellite images fairly convincingly (ymmv). i've used it a lot to prospect potential property or travel areas or simply going to interesting places and exploring, it never gets old. last i checked it didn't support history for street view like wander, though, that's nifty.

  • We already have Chia Earth.
  • Recreating all the neurons in the brain of a person playing minecraft in minecraft.

    That minecraft brain will be able to help humans completing and keeping up to date all kinds of minecraft projects.
  • Why spend so much time with Minecraft? Isn't there a better solution, or is it just a thing?

    • Why spend so much time with Minecraft? Isn't there a better solution, or is it just a thing?

      No, there's nothing better.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Pascoea ( 968200 )
      Just a thing. Having never played the game, only watched others, I can only assume it's like Fallout 4. Once you're done playing the game as intended, you just get bored and start building things. Eventually you think of something that would be cool to build, so you see how far you can take it. Some people just take it too far, in my opinion. But good on him, he found himself something to entertain himself with.

      • With Minecraft there really isn't 'a way to play the game as intended.' It's totally sandbox from the start.

  • Will this model include the air pollution, the global warming, the dying species such as butterflies and rhinos? Will it present palaces of greed and bastions of political, corporate, religious and military power as the cause of life out of balance? A realistic look at the state of our planet is not a fun thing to do.

    More likely this model will romanticize and further encourage the reality distortion of our well armed and well financed masters, who keep us just unbalanced enough that we can't see the string

  • Obligatory Borges (Score:3, Insightful)

    by jalvarez13 ( 1321457 ) on Sunday March 29, 2020 @06:40PM (#59886312)

    In that Empire, the Art of Cartography attained such Perfection that the map of a single Province occupied the entirety of a City, and the map of the Empire, the entirety of a Province. In time, those Unconscionable Maps no longer satisfied, and the Cartographers Guilds struck a Map of the Empire whose size was that of the Empire, and which coincided point for point with it. The following Generations, who were not so fond of the Study of Cartography as their Forebears had been, saw that that vast map was Useless, and not without some Pitilessness was it, that they delivered it up to the Inclemencies of Sun and Winters. In the Deserts of the West, still today, there are Tattered Ruins of that Map, inhabited by Animals and Beggars; in all the Land there is no other Relic of the Disciplines of Geography.

    —Suarez Miranda, Viajes de varones prudentes, Libro IV, Cap. XLV, Lerida, 1658

  • Feeding OpenStreetMap instead? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by ptaff ( 165113 ) on Sunday March 29, 2020 @07:33PM (#59886388) Homepage

    Why don't they contribute to OpenStreetMap instead, then import that data into their game, so that their project becomes useful for even, gasp, people who don't play Minecraft?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      What OSM needs is some AI working with satellite imagery. That's how Google got so far ahead with both accurate maps and accurate 3D models of every building, landscape, even tree and hedgerow in areas it has suitable imagery for.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by ptaff ( 165113 )

        What OSM needs is some AI working with satellite imagery. That's how Google got so far ahead

        As if satellite imagery was even close to something sufficient. Satellite imagery does not give you the names of the streets (nor the door numbers) (nor the building names). That's pretty much the meat and bones of any online map. AI-reconstructed approximate 3D shapes of trees are pointless for OSM.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

          Of course it's not enough on it's own, but combined with the existing data already in OSM it could quickly and accurately add a lot of detail like buildings, and also correct things like incorrectly shaped roads or flag up areas that appear to have changed in the years since someone modelled them.

  • to find out where North Korea hid its underground nuclear facilities. Brilliant!

  • why mindcraft ? (Score:3)

    by Tom ( 822 ) on Monday March 30, 2020 @02:04AM (#59887040) Homepage Journal

    Yes, but why Mindcraft? Sinking such an unbelievable amount of effort into one product is just mentally unstable.

    Create a product-independent dataset that can be imported into Minecraft - or other, similar tools. When it comes to voxel terrain, for example, there are much more advanced tools on the market today.

  • Is this an evolution from Friendster to MySpace, or from MySpace to FaceBook?

    Long Live SissyFight and HabboHotel

    From the original sockpuppet https://www.goodreads.com/book... [goodreads.com]

  • I wonder how they are gonna do the map projection from sphere to 2d grid?

  • Let me know when it gets to the level of WestWorld.
  • This reminds me of the early days of Google Sketchup, ah the memories! Google had the idea to add 3D to their satellite images by crowdsourcing modelling of buildings that could then be placed in Google Earth, with varying levels of accuracy. Eventually software replaced the efforts of amateur modellers and Google tossed the product aside, like it has done with so many projects that distract from the core business. So yeah, this sounds cool, but not quite as cool as building a realistic model of your neighb
  • While I don't "get" why one would want to do this ... well, they're not the first to, uh, strip this mine. Several years ago the British Geological Survey translated their in-house model of the solid and drift geology of the West European Archipelago into Minecraft. I assume for similar reasons. I doubt that thy were the only national body to do the same.

    How complex the lithology database and how high the resolution. I've no idea. But it has been done before, on a significant scale.

    This might be sufficie

    • Oh, I misunderstood. When they said "every structure on the Earth", I read it as meaning "every structure on the Earth", not "every human built structure near the current surface of the Earth. Suddenly vastly more restricted and less interesting.

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