Germany – Reporters Without Borders has found a way to bring censored news articles to countries without press freedom: music.
The project, shown at this year’s Dutch Design Week, is the brainchild of Reporters Without Borders, a non-government organisation dedicated to defending the freedom of the press. The company noticed a loophole in most countries’ censorship laws: that despite bans on social media sites and search engines, music streaming services are not as strictly policed.
In partnership with DDB Berlin, it reached out to journalists from countries where press censorship is rife – China, Egypt, Thailand, Uzbekistan and Vietnam – and turned their previously censored articles into pop songs. The songs were then uploaded to Spotify, Apple Music and Deezer.
At Dutch Design Week 2018, many installations challenged the neutrality of today’s news and questioned how these stories can be told in more experiential ways.