11 ms·

I'm Leaving Mojang

1252 points by UnfalseDesign 12y ago

atriix 12y ago
The HN effect... A pastebin http://pastebin.com/n1qTeikM http://pastebin.com/n1qTeikM from https://twitter.com/notch/status/511508557200498688 https://twitter.com/notch/status/511508557200498688
- sp332 12y ago
  Wow... 15,000 views in 10 minutes!
- Kiro 12y ago
  The HN effect is real but pretty sure it's just a tiny factor in this case.
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blueskin_ 12y ago
Site is massively overloaded. Text: http://pastebin.com/GLuR7T9t http://pastebin.com/GLuR7T9t archive.today: https://archive.today/KKNNA https://archive.today/KKNNA
jere 12y ago
>As soon as this deal is finalized, I will leave Mojang and go back to doing Ludum Dares and small web experiments. It has always amazed me how down to earth Notch is. Now, he's going to be a billionaire doing little game jams. It's hard to believe and quite awesome. It's like Bruce Wayne deciding to spend the rest of his life playing with legos.
- jo_ 12y ago
  I never considered Bruce Wayne much of a tinkerer. More like Tony Stark playing with Legos.
  - TeMPOraL 12y ago
    Or just more like Tony Stark from IM1/IM2 movies, period. He has a lot of money, but he basically outsourced every day-to-day company decision making somewhere else (up to making his secretary a CEO) just so that he could do what he really loves, i.e. high-tech tinkering and saving the day (and drunk parties).
  - rubenv 12y ago
    Tony Stark? You mean Elon Musk, right?
    - Tyrannosaurs 12y ago
      Or Steve Jobs. There was a school of thought that the only reason that Steve Jobs liked being CEO of Apple was so that he could build the products he wanted, how he wanted, without anyone else telling him what he could and couldn't do. He basically created a role where he was a Product Manager with near unlimited resources who didn't have to answer to anyone else.
- aeturnum 12y ago
  >It's like Bruce Wayne deciding to spend the rest of his life playing with legos. I like this image. Bruce Wayne's character in batman is always thinking big. He tries to push things in the direction he thinks is right. The idea that someone would have all the power and decide to play with toys makes me worry about the rest of us. I would like to see people like Notch (creative, thoughtful people) having a say in what the future holds. However, it seems inevitable that after a certain point, you have to choose between living the life you want or ceeding at least some of your time to the whims of the masses of the public. Someone else mentioned Jobs and Wozniak - Notch feels like Wozniak and Mojang has no Jobs. How can we keep the Wozniaks and Notchs of the world involved in making decisions in a way that keeps them happy? We don't want to have to choose between scale and creativity.
  - simonh 12y ago
    > I would like to see people like Notch (creative, thoughtful people) having a say in what the future holds. I don't. I have absolutely nothing against Notch, in fact I have the deepest respect for the guy as a hacker and as a person with, clearly, a lot of personal integrity. However he says quite clearly himself he's just interested in tinkering. Minecraft wasn't a deeply though out, perfectly executed, planned exercise in mass market game publishing. It was an entirely accidental result of pretty much randomly hacking ideas together. He had absolutely no idea what the future held for Minecraft when he produced it. Expecting him to have any deep insights into 'what the future holds' is projecting attributes and expectations on to him that I don't think he'd welcome.
    - TeMPOraL 12y ago
      > It was an entirely accidental result of pretty much randomly hacking ideas together. He had absolutely no idea what the future held for Minecraft when he produced it. That the game became a financial success is indeed somewhat accidental. But that the game was fun was certainly not. Since Notch was "just tinkering", he optimized for a fun and interesting game, not for a profitable game. I think this is the distinction aeturnum had in mind and I agree with him. We need Notches, Wozniaks and Musks to have more say in where the future goes, because they care primarily about the problems they're solving, and not about the money they're getting.
- Cthulhu_ 12y ago
  It's like a guy that got lucky and rich and never has to work a day in his life anymore retiring early and doing what he likes to do. I'll be honest, I'm bitter and jealous, :(
  - dvirsky 12y ago
    He comes across as a great guy, that made something great - so it seems that he deserves this, so why be bitter about it? Sure, I envy his success and would like to make something great that will leave its mark on the world, too. I haven't, yet, but if anything, I'm inspired - and been so way before he sold his company.
  - angersock 12y ago
    Well, at least you're honest.
- GFK_of_xmaspast 12y ago
  "It's like Bruce Wayne deciding to spend the rest of his life playing with legos." Better than dressing up in a gimp suit, and liable to get fewer people killed.
- CatMtKing 12y ago
  I think that's exactly why he's not going to get what he wants. He's not going to have a normal life with the comforting blanket of anonymity again.
UnfalseDesign 12y ago
Full text of post until the site becomes less overloaded: ------------------ I don’t see myself as a real game developer. I make games because it’s fun, and because I love games and I love to program, but I don’t make games with the intention of them becoming huge hits, and I don’t try to change the world. Minecraft certainly became a huge hit, and people are telling me it’s changed games. I never meant for it to do either. It’s certainly flattering, and to gradually get thrust into some kind of public spotlight is interesting. A relatively long time ago, I decided to step down from Minecraft development. Jens was the perfect person to take over leading it, and I wanted to try to do new things. At first, I failed by trying to make something big again, but since I decided to just stick to small prototypes and interesting challenges, I’ve had so much fun with work. I wasn’t exactly sure how I fit into Mojang where people did actual work, but since people said I was important for the culture, I stayed. I was at home with a bad cold a couple of weeks ago when the internet exploded with hate against me over some kind of EULA situation that I had nothing to do with. I was confused. I didn’t understand. I tweeted this in frustration. Later on, I watched the This is Phil Fish video on YouTube and started to realize I didn’t have the connection to my fans I thought I had. I’ve become a symbol. I don’t want to be a symbol, responsible for something huge that I don’t understand, that I don’t want to work on, that keeps coming back to me. I’m not an entrepreneur. I’m not a CEO. I’m a nerdy computer programmer who likes to have opinions on Twitter. As soon as this deal is finalized, I will leave Mojang and go back to doing Ludum Dares and small web experiments. If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately. Considering the public image of me already is a bit skewed, I don’t expect to get away from negative comments by doing this, but at least now I won’t feel a responsibility to read them. I’m aware this goes against a lot of what I’ve said in public. I have no good response to that. I’m also aware a lot of you were using me as a symbol of some perceived struggle. I’m not. I’m a person, and I’m right there struggling with you. I love you. All of you. Thank you for turning Minecraft into what it has become, but there are too many of you, and I can’t be responsible for something this big. In one sense, it belongs to Microsoft now. In a much bigger sense, it’s belonged to all of you for a long time, and that will never change. It’s not about the money. It’s about my sanity.
- marktangotango 12y ago
bilalhusain 12y ago
Heartbreaking to read what we do to people.
- DanBC 12y ago
  I feel very great sadness for Notch. I really hope he finds fun and joy. I am immensely grateful to him (and the rest of Mojang) for Minecraft.
- crusso 12y ago
  It's sad that there are so many griefers and haters out there, but there are worse problems to have than being wildly successful. I pity what people do to society in general with their self-destructive attitudes. We all suffer as a result when we drive people like Notch out of positions of leadership. You see the same in politics where the truly good and earnest people are also the ones with a conscience and too much self-respect to submit themselves to the abuse of public office.
- at-fates-hands 12y ago
  Only heartbreaking in the sense this is the new reality for many people. If you ever gain some semblance of popularity, everything you say and do is over analyzed. From your Twitter feeds, your work, your public comments, everything. Notch just secured the best thing he could have. Now he has the money to do what he wants and not be at the forefront of what he created. Something I'm sure he's been wanting to do for a long time. Just like he said, he gets to step back into the shadows, where he's more comfortable, out of the limelight and content to do what he really wants to do. I can only imagine what we'd be writing had he opted out say a year ago, before MS bought his company. What would we be saying then?
- gadders 12y ago
  Well, there are a lot of dicks online, but I think twitter rage-storms or whatever seem to affect some people a lot more deeply than others.
  - _delirium 12y ago
    The people who deal with it best I think are sort of the aloof types. They may not even read their own Twitter feed, delegating it to a social-media staffer. Notch has the problem that he uses it as a personal account and is on it regularly, so he reads comments @directed at him, tries to reply to them, etc. He also has a public email address that he reads, and it sounds like people send weird/angry emails to that, too, so it ends up going beyond just Twitter. I could see getting annoyed if people were constantly emailing me in that manner.
iamleppert 12y ago
He should donate some of that money to some good causes if he's really a simple man like he says he is. Of course he doesn't have to do anything, and fully deserves to take the money and run, and build some giant evil castle or something.
- voltagex_ 12y ago
  I see this all the time on HN, I'm probably guilty of saying it myself sometimes too. Why should he donate $X?
adriancooney 12y ago
Wow, Notch is a pretty amazing guy. It's clear he just loves to make games. The post reminds me of Dong Nguyen/Flappy Bird situation. Let the man be.
- andyhmltn 12y ago
  Now you mention it, it's actually really similar isn't it? I've been following him since I originally bought my alpha version of minecraft and he's always seemed to be the way he portray's himself in this article. A nice genuine guy that just loves hacking away at things.
seymour7 12y ago
Google cache: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fnotch.net%2F2014%2F09%2Fim-leaving-mojang%2F http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Ahttp%...
Nickoladze 12y ago
Basically "I was successful once, it was awful". Sometimes I wish he would have just stuck with Minecraft as the only developer and stayed away from the spotlight. Plenty of very popular game creators have done so (Icefrog, Toady One). I really enjoyed the times back when Minecraft was just getting popular and you could tell Notch was adding features that he genuinely enjoyed (Redstone update, for instance). Then he started up a giant company and started assuming responsibility for things like server admins charging money, when he should have sat back and let people do what they want.
- drzaiusapelord 12y ago
  >Basically "I was successful once, it was awful". This seems to be a theme. The guy who had the frontpage the other day, flappy bird, etc. Must be nice to have the cash entitlements to "keep it real." I can't blame him, I think money just becomes arbitrary numbers after a certain point. Minecraft has probably grown to a point where its just only going to get smaller in the future and in a few years be a fun little nostalgia piece for the tweens today who will be in college, the same way we dusted off the NES when I was in college. Obviously, there's something about the nerdy personality that wants none of this, but it really makes me wonder about guys like Gates or Carmack or Zuckerberg or Jobs who thrive in these environments. Are they the rare ones or are guys like Notch the outliers?
  - georgemcbay 12y ago
    I don't know that I'd lump Carmack in with the rest of your list. Yes, he is quite financially successful from id, but he never stopped being, first and foremost, a coder who will sometimes just disappear for a few weeks to separate himself from the world and get coding done. I wouldn't list Jobs either for almost the opposite reason in that while he had a huge impact on the tech industry, he was always a "suit" (even if he didn't wear one).
    - drzaiusapelord 12y ago
      Good point, but he always came off as a hard-ass to me who liked to get into arguments and thrive on stress. I kinda see him as his own Jobs-Woz combo. I may be misreading him.
huhtenberg 12y ago
I really like Notch and I really like how having all that money didn't seem to change him. The sale is interesting news, but seeing him go through it with integrity is even more interesting.
80ProofPudding 12y ago
Good for you, Notch. You made something awesome, got rich doing it, and stayed a mensch throughout.
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jonifico 12y ago
While I do see his point in saying Minecraft has become too big for him, he might also be backing out a bit from a responsibility that could bring a fascinating challenge. But then again, he doesn't see himself as a true developer. Hope he finds a way to fulfill himself apart from spending billions of dollars.
- Mikeb85 12y ago
  He'll probably just hire someone smarter than him to invest his billion dollars. Heck, even an index fund or super conservative portfolio of dividend stocks would earn him enough to never work again, and maintain a pretty awesome lifestyle...
jacquesm 12y ago
> I don’t see myself as a real game developer. I make games because it’s fun, and because I love games and I love to program, but I don’t make games with the intention of them becoming huge hits, and I don’t try to change the world. I think that's the essence of being a real game developer. It's sad that Notch feels this way, I think the majority of old school games guys and girls were just like that. Since it's become a big business with huge studios and ridiculous budgets the market has been spoiled. But Notch/Mojang and team have shown that there is still a place for great indie games and bootstrappers. And I actually believe him that this deal is not about the money. Projects like these can become albatrosses.
- JoeAltmaier 12y ago
  Preposterous. If it wasn't about the money, could have gone open-source at any time with the same effect/relief. Of course its about the $2B
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  - ntaso 12y ago
    As an indie developer with a normal lifestyle, it probably doesn't matter if you have 10 million in the bank or much, much more. So, it's unlikely to be about the money.
  - jacquesm 12y ago
    Note that he's speaking for himself and that he's not the only founder.
  - vasilipupkin 12y ago
    he is not an earthworm with one brain cell. Of course, on some level it's about the money to a degree, but I think it's also true that it's not just about the money. It's both about the money and not about the money
  - tbastos 12y ago
    Just because money isn't a priority for you, it doesn't mean you'll refuse it. He got the best of both worlds by letting other people run the business to focus on what he really wanted (indie dev). Believe me, it's MUCH easier to be creative and work on indie projects when you don't have to worry about your bills and your future...
gamesurgeon 12y ago
"I’m not an entrepreneur. I’m not a CEO. I’m a nerdy computer programmer who likes to have opinions on Twitter...If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately." I have the utmost respect for notch after reading that.
- Tepix 12y ago
  I think it's sad to write something like that (abandoning something as soon as it seems to gain traction). Isn't that what games are about? Writing great games that a lot of people love to play and talk about? And in the case of Minecraft, hack and mod in unimaginable ways?
  - gknoy 12y ago
    Perhaps the joy he derives comes not from the popularity or world-changingness, but rather from the process of creation, or the problems that he gets to solve in interesting ways. I don't think he'll ever be at a loss for creativity. If he spends the rest of his days streaming (or not streaming!) him coding random small games, or tinkering on a renderer that is never used, I expect that he'll be happy and feel fulfilled.
- izolate 12y ago
  Same. He's my type of hacker. The best type.
- varkson 12y ago
  I don't like his attitude in the public eye but at least he's self aware and not afraid to say it. That does take courage.
tbrock 12y ago
"If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately." He seems to have an awful attitude for a guy who just made a billion dollars and gets to spend the rest of his life doing exactly what he wants.
- _xzu 12y ago
  Why? As said in the message he doesn't want to be responsible for handling big successes. So this seems to be very healthy attitude. Hopefully he will open source his next big thing so community might be able to keep it alive.
- DanBC 12y ago
  He is saying "I made a mistake; I have learnt from that mistake and will try to avoid making the same mistake in future". That's a fucking great attitude and is -to me at least- much better than "I made minecraft and I'm awesome and the success of Minecraft has nothing to do with luck but is totally all those decisions I made because I'm brilliant" which is the kind of thing we hear from a bunch of other devs.
  - tbrock 12y ago
    Good point, agreed. I think abandoning is a little much though. I guess it would have rubbed me differently if he had said I'll make it open source or hand it off to other developers earlier, etc.
    - DanBC 12y ago
      He did hand it off to other developers. He was still gettin hate for stuff those other people were doing. I kind of wish that mental health support was better and that he'd had some kind of mentoring to help him deal with it. Perhaps that's a startup idea: support with all the hate and bullshit that comes your way when you're a public figure. More expensive service would include rapid rebuttal service to quash lies and myth.
      - 12y ago
petercooper 12y ago
I think there are some interesting parallels with J K Rowling. If he releases anything now, it's big news (even Cliffhorse). He might have to start "writing" under a pseudonym just to get any sense of doing something fresh without intense public scrutiny.
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- adregan 12y ago
  I think it's pretty well known that JK Rowling is a woman. Also, she has recently written some books under the pen name "Robert Galbraith". Edit: I see above that the poster was referring to Notch. Just a simple case of an unclear antecedent (and being unfamiliar with Notch's and Rowling's recently releases ;) )
  - drzaiusapelord 12y ago
    Interesting note, if an author uses a pseudonym of a different gender, its appropriate to use that gender of the pseudonym. I find it weird that James Tiptree, Jr. is still a "he" when we've known for decades it was Alice Bradley Sheldon's pen name. In fact, Tiptree, not Sheldon, has been inducted into the science fiction hall of fame, which is even weirder.
    - bshimmin 12y ago
      I don't think I've ever met anyone - in real life or in the UK educational system, anyway - who referred to George Eliot as being a "he" without instantly being corrected.
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  - petercooper 12y ago
    I'm saying that he (as in, notch) has parallels to her. Cliffhorse is a game notch wrote, and Rowling already has written under a pseudonym.
netcraft 12y ago
> It’s not about the money. It’s about my sanity. This does make the most sense, in looking at everything hes said in the past. Sounds like MS had the right offer at the right time.
chernevik 12y ago
This is why we can't have nice things. I don't know much about Minecraft or whatever issue Notch is referring to in his post. But I'm always struck by how quickly people snap to emotional argument and response, without thinking about the other side of the question, without thinking about how their response will be read or felt by others. The first step in any dialogue is trying to understand why the other side has said or done what they have, and how that might seem reasonable and right to them. Without that, how do we have any hope of learning anything, or moving to any actual agreement? And yet 98% of what I read presumes that any disagreement must be ignorant, stupid or evil. I understand many of the reasons why people talk this way, and yes, it's hard to avoid it. But we now have more communication amongst ourselves than at any other time in human history. Maybe it's time to start thinking hard about how each of us can communicate better. Wouldn't it be great if we could get to a community where some idiosyncratic dude could write a monster hit without feeling himself battered for reasons he can't understand?
- madeofpalk 12y ago
  I think it's just simpler than that. The impression I got was not that he left because of hate he was getting, but just because Minecraft got really popular and turned into something much bigger than he expected. It sounds like he doesn't want to be a part of anything that big - he just wants to have fun hacking on games.
  - arcatek 12y ago
    I would guess that the EULA shitstorm has been the last straw.
- watwut 12y ago
  The hate weeks ago was about money, basically. Part of EULA that disallowed servers to earn money, but was often ignored. Mojang clarified that that part of EULA is indeed meant as written. People do not tend to be understanding when it comes to loosing money they wanted/expected. Moreover, I suspect that managing Minecraft is a lot about merchandize selling, cons organization, making deals with lego and everyone else who want to produce themed items and so on. Not necessary what you want to deal with if you consider yourself gamemaker or programmer.
krelian 12y ago
This whole Minecraft thing has been very interesting to follow. I tried the game a few times and it's not really for me but everything around Notch's story is interesting (I bet their going to make a movie about this at some point). Not everyone can be an entrepreneur and I feel that in this case (on a different scale of course), we basically watched a plausible version of how Apple could have gotten started if there was only a Wozniak but no Jobs. I'm sure there are many here that dream of having their idea be a huge success but aren't really interested in becoming the next Bill Gates or Zuckerberg. They just want to cash out so that they can have their financial freedom and then go out of the limelight and back to doing the same things they enjoy but without having to constantly worry about job security and putting food on the table. Notch achieved this in the most spectacular way possible and I think he handled it perfectly.
- tst 12y ago
  I think the analogy to Wozniak is great. I remember an article some months ago in which he basically said the same: He wants to tinker and hack. I remember watching some parts of notch's livestreams. I loved the enthusiasm he had. He was a bit like a young boy, trying things, throwing some away, creating games. I'm happy for his decision.
  - snlacks 12y ago
    It's unfortunate that all our greed and crazy fandom keep scaring the great minds away from continuing to push us all forward.
    - paulhauggis 12y ago
      I think it's less the greed and crazy fandom and more a new generation of people that feel they are entitled to everything and anything they want and if they don't get it, start an online witch hunt. There are numerous examples of this in the past 6 months and in Notch's case, it happened with EULA and 3rd party server support. A community that supports this sort of behavior wouldn't have my support either. I don't blame him.
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- jacquesm 12y ago
  He's already invested many years of his life into mojang, why do you think you are in a position to tell him what to do with his money? Markus is 100% free to do whatever the hell he wants with his money and you nor anybody else should place conditions on or make demands on him.
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    - jacquesm 12y ago
      > pearjuice 10 minutes ago: > Go to bed, Markus. Are you seriously suggesting I'm a sockpuppet for Markus Persson?
- jkubicek 12y ago
  That's silly. If someone said they hated their house, they wanted to move out and it wasn't about the money, would you demand that they give the house away for free?
ianstallings 12y ago
He reminds me of Steve Wozniak a little bit. He's disconnected from the scene and it's refreshing in every way. Good luck to him.
rafaqueque 12y ago
It's not always about money, as he said. Classy move by Notch. Respect.
nXqd 12y ago
this is so awesome that he can make things that he loves. Become super rich with it, but still staying who he is. This kind of achievement is incredibly hard. Thanks for great work !
archildress 12y ago
At the opposite end of the spectrum of the startup CEO who's intent on cashing out for fame is Notch, who sold to remove himself from the center of attention. I think we all believe we could handle the spotlight and the attention and fame that comes with it. But until we're faced with it, we'll never know. All the best to Notch and thanks for a game that brought many people many hours of happiness and shared experiences.
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joshfinnie 12y ago
This is super sad. I never want to read the following from a programmer: As soon as this deal is finalized, I will leave Mojang and go back to doing Ludum Dares and small web experiments. If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately. I feel for anyone who has felt such stress to want to kill anything that they are working on that gains traction...
- xarien 12y ago
  It's actually quite inspiring. He's essentially saying that he's chasing curiosity instead of profits. A lot of us would love to be able to do that. For many of us, it's why we got into programming or engineering in the first place...
  - MadManE 12y ago
    How is that inspiring? To me, it's incredibly depressing. It's basically saying that he will aim to make mediocre (or terrible) things now that he has more money than he needs. This means that unless I win the lottery of life, I am condemned to doing what I'm doing and if I actually do succeed in what I'm doing, I'll never want to touch anything like it again. Edit: Sorry that I inadvertently insulted one of your heroes. I realize that I'm incredibly lucky already because I have food/water/shelter/etc. But "gaining perspective" seems like code to me for "I've given up, so you should too".
    - arrrg 12y ago
      Terrible or mediocre for whom? The audience? He clearly states he is doing this for himself, so let him be the judge of that.
    - serve_yay 12y ago
      Hmm, I think notch's life is interesting but I doubt the wisdom of trying to learn lessons from it. At any rate I dunno that he is necessarily aiming to make mediocre things so much as not explicitly aiming to make popular things. Good work can come out of such a mindset, he just won't be the one to steward it to popularity.
craigching 12y ago
I'm really happy for Notch as long as he's happy. To me, the most disappointing thing about this is that the story becomes more complex. I loved telling my kids "this was created and developed by one person in his spare time." That's not been true for awhile now I realize, but it was fun telling my kids that. I guess I can figure out a different way to convey reality, but it's more complex when they say "but isn't it from Microsoft?" Anyway Notch, good luck to you and I love you too! You really gave us something great and no matter what you do going forward, you can't take back what you've given!
antirez 12y ago
He should not give a fuck about random people on the internet, but just about opinions of the few he knows in one way or the other and respect. I understand this is more complex to do than to say, but still, how to have fun working in the current IT development scene without this crucial step, especially for a famous person like him?
- burkaman 12y ago
  Don't run a company. You cannot run any kind of business without caring what people think and are saying about you.
  - jacquesm 12y ago
    You actually can and and you probably shouldn't. And Antirez: please do continue ;). See also: Henry Ford, horses and cars.
  - antirez 12y ago
    You can get a "general feeling" about your customers without actually feeling responsible/bad about the individual opinion of each of your users. Actually IMHO it is probably not possible to run a company caring in depth about everyone of your users. Of course there is from time to time this totally stranger that may send you a well argued / fact-supported opinion that may ring some bell, and this is great when happens, but here I believe we are talking about "Notch you suck because of the TOS change!" or similar toned messages.
tosh 12y ago
Looking forward to more Dart programming streams. I think more and more people should stream like Notch does. It is incredibly entertaining and educating to watch how people write code similar to how people play games. A great learning opportunity. Different format compared to prepared talks and tutorials. I wish there was a list of people with programming streams that I can just tune in.
sergiotapia 12y ago
"It's not about the money (BECAUSE I HAVE TWO BILLION OF THEM!)." Haha, and who can blame Notch, I wouldn't work a day in my life and become a full time carpenter for the rest of my life.
- masklinn 12y ago
  He already had "fuck you money" before that deal, it's not like he needed the deal for that.
- talmand 12y ago
  Reminds me of the scene in The Aviator where the Hepburn family obviously can care less about money to the point of obnoxiousness, and state they don't discuss it. Hughes responds with "That's because you have it."
hyperliner 12y ago
This is really a sad statement about the evil "consumers." It does not happen only to simple nerdy game developers. It happens to everybody who does something huge. It happens to small business owners. Then, people "tell them" that they "must" raise the wages of their employees, without ever having created a small business. It happens to activists. Then, people "tell" them they "must" support this other cause, when those activists simply want to change a small part of the world that they care about. It bothers me the most when it happens to presidents. (Pres. Bush, Pres. Obama, depending on your political inclinations). Just simple guys asked to carry the weight of a nation just because they were at the right time, the right place, did the right things, a few mistakes, wanted to change the world a little, and worked really hard. Maybe all of us who instead of sweating are going for the ride should simply enjoy the game. Just put a few blocks on the game, build a small tiny house, put a glass window, a small bed in there with the tiny cool candle on the wall (my favorite block in Minecraft), and stare out the window. And watch for creepers. But leave these folks alone to do what we did not do, and let them enjoy a reward for their hard work.
scottjad 12y ago
The other day there was a post about some Doom map viewer Notch had written in Dart. One of the top comments said something along the lines of "This is why we all need to be rich, so we can work on stuff like this." I thought the comment was so sad because honestly, almost no one is going to benefit from a mostly broken Doom map viewer in Dart that's abandoned after a few days. Same with the numerous games he's started (often with no idea where he's going) and abandoned after a few hours/days. Don't get me wrong, I like watching his coding stream as much as the next person, but compare that to the millions of people who benefitted from the sustained and focused effort on Minecraft. Notch says: > If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately. So sad. Imagine if Jobs/the PayPal guys/etc had taken this approach after their initial succcess. Now I'm all for people being free to do what they want and only this guy owns his life and no one is entitled to have him work for them (hat tip Ayn Rand), and obviously this guy has had a bigger impact on the world than I have, but I tend to agree with Immanuel Kant (and Jesus) that we all have a duty to develop and use our talents in a way that benefits humanity and not just indulge ourselves in idle amusement once we're comfortable. And to be honest, this probably applies more to me than to Notch. From "Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals": > A third finds in himself a talent which with the help of some culture might make him a useful man in many respects. But he finds himself in comfortable circumstances and prefers to indulge in pleasure rather than to take pains in enlarging and improving his happy natural capacities. He asks, however, whether his maxim of neglect of his natural gifts, besides agreeing with his inclination to indulgence, agrees also with what is called duty. He sees then that a system of nature could indeed subsist with such a universal law although men ... should let their talents rest and resolve to devote their lives merely to idleness, amusement, and propagation of their species- in a word, to enjoyment; but he cannot possibly will that this should be a universal law of nature, or be implanted in us as such by a natural instinct. For, as a rational being, he necessarily wills that his faculties be developed, since they serve him and have been given him, for all sorts of possible purposes.
- nightski 12y ago
  Minecraft was grown out of the way Notch works. What you are suggesting is impossible. No one, not even Steve Jobs sits down and says "My life mission is to benefit humanity". This is because we really do not know which efforts will have the largest impact on humanity. You could waste a lifetime trying to make a better battery - but it might never happen. Or you could hack around on a game and watch it explode and impact millions of lives around the world. In my opinion the important part is that you are doing something meaningful to you as an individual. If it ends up exploding and benefiting humanity all the better. But the world would be so much better off if we just had everyone doing this.
mentos 12y ago
I would love to see him consider investing in other video game projects. There is a game 10x better than Minecraft out there somewhere and he has the money to find it.
LeicaLatte 12y ago
Say Facebook had acquired Minecraft I believe Notch might have had a chance at continuing at Mojang. But Microsoft's history with killing talent is legendary (Nokia, Rare, etc) and there was no question of him taking a chance with them.
- barnumdee 12y ago
  No, he probably wouldn't have sold it to begin with if they were the only ones buying. Notch specifically said he wouldn't create a Minecraft version for the Oculus Rift after the Facebook purchase because he found it 'creepy'.
- _random_ 12y ago
  Yeah, Nokia was sooo thriving.
willvarfar 12y ago
For the interested, Notch didn't enter the current Ludum Dare but thousands of mortal coders did, and they'd love you to go play their games! http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/
- dmpk2k 12y ago
  Unrelated, but maybe he did enter, under a different pseudonym; it's what I'd do in his shoes.
  - SunShiranui 12y ago
    He wanted to enter but didn't manage to get any ideas for his game.
- shurcooL 12y ago
  If only there was an OnLive-like roulette-like way going from one game to another without download and install times, that'd be neat.
  - Udo 12y ago
    If you participated, the rating UI kind of works like that. You can just stick to browser-based games (which is more than 50% of all entries).
- AndyKelley 12y ago
  That includes me! http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-30/?action=preview&uid=24697 http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-30/?action=preview... It's a multiplayer html5 game, so drag a friend into it with you :-)
melvinmt 12y ago
There was once a businessman who was sitting by the beach in a small Brazilian village. As he sat, he saw a Brazilian fisherman rowing a small boat towards the shore having caught quite few big fish. The businessman was impressed and asked the fisherman, “How long does it take you to catch so many fish?” The fisherman replied, “Oh, just a short while.” “Then why don’t you stay longer at sea and catch even more?” The businessman was astonished. “This is enough to feed my whole family,” the fisherman said. The businessman then asked, “So, what do you do for the rest of the day?” The fisherman replied, “Well, I usually wake up early in the morning, go out to sea and catch a few fish, then go back and play with my kids. In the afternoon, I take a nap with my wife, and evening comes, I join my buddies in the village for a drink — we play guitar, sing and dance throughout the night.” The businessman offered a suggestion to the fisherman. “I am a PhD in business management. I could help you to become a more successful person. From now on, you should spend more time at sea and try to catch as many fish as possible. When you have saved enough money, you could buy a bigger boat and catch even more fish. Soon you will be able to afford to buy more boats, set up your own company, your own production plant for canned food and distribution network. By then, you will have moved out of this village and to Sao Paulo, where you can set up HQ to manage your other branches.” The fisherman continues, “And after that?” The businessman laughs heartily, “After that, you can live like a king in your own house, and when the time is right, you can go public and float your shares in the Stock Exchange, and you will be rich.” The fisherman asks, “And after that?” The businessman says, “After that, you can finally retire, you can move to a house by the fishing village, wake up early in the morning, catch a few fish, then return home to play with kids, have a nice afternoon nap with your wife, and when evening comes, you can join your buddies for a drink, play the guitar, sing and dance throughout the night!” The fisherman was puzzled, “Isn’t that what I am doing now?” http://paulocoelhoblog.com/2010/09/08/the-fisherman-and-the-businessman/ http://paulocoelhoblog.com/2010/09/08/the-fisherman-and-the-...
- raldi 12y ago
  And then the fisherman got a horrible toothache and there was nothing he could do about it. A few years later, overfishing led to near-depletion of the local supply, and new restrictions were implemented on fishing licenses. The fisherman was unable to afford one, and yet he had no other means of supporting his family. By the end of the decade his wife and children were begging on the street. Meanwhile, the businessman was getting a massage at a ski resort in Switzerland.
debt 12y ago
Kind of reminds me of something Richard Feynman said: "Then I had another thought: Physics disgusts me a little bit now, but I used to enjoy doing physics. Why did I enjoy it? I used to play with it. I used to do whatever I felt like doing - it didn't have to do with whether it was important for the development of nuclear physics, but whether it was interesting and amusing for me to play with. When I was in high school, I'd see water running out of a faucet growing narrower, and wonder if I could figure out what determines that curve. I found it was rather easy to do. I didn't have to do it; it wasn't important for the future of science; somebody else had already done it. That didn't make any difference. I'd invent things and play with things for my own entertainment." I think we should take serious stock not only in what Notch is saying here but also his overall success: if you get off making ephemeral photo-sharing apps or a Salesforce clone then keep on trucking otherwise you should ask yourself why you're doing it in the first place. Are your little projects a ton of fun to work on? Notch makes an all around good argument for pursuing your passion.
alexvr 12y ago
I hope he puts that money to good use.
nperez 12y ago
As someone who took my lifelong fascination and turned it into a "job", I respect the hell out of this. Granted, not everyone is financially capable of just coding small experiments and getting by, but that's where the magic is.
ErikRogneby 12y ago
This was the hardest line to read: "If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately." I hope when he says "abandon" he means upload it on github with an MIT license. Seriously though, what a horrible thing to be fearful of creating something that people might like.
- tcfunk 12y ago
  Yeah that was the line that caught my attention, too. I hope that fear will subside somewhat with time out of the spotlight (if indeed he manages to get out of it in the first place).
pingwing 12y ago
I don't blame the guy and now he has plenty of money to do what he wants and not deal with the bullshit. Corporate America sucks. it is a horrible "culture". Not everyone wants fame, fortune maybe, but not fame.
cmdrfred 12y ago
I love ya notch, you inspired me. Games don't have to have a story, great graphics, or even a point. They have to be fun. After years of being a gamer, Minecraft is the only game I come back to. I will buy anything you have for sale.
- chris_mahan 12y ago
  Minecraft's my favorite game, and my son's. We also both like Dune2. He's 9. (I'm not :)
  - cmdrfred 12y ago
    I just checked out Dune2, looks good thanks for the recommendation.
    - chris_mahan 12y ago
      Watch out for the big harkonnen missile on the maps with the castle. Enjoy!
      - ido 12y ago
        It's quite hard getting over the interface these days. Surprisingly enough Warcraft 1 is still very playable.
        chris_mahan 12y ago
        Ya dune2 is dos based. Once you get used to it, though, it'll be very enjoyable. You can't rely on the Fremen unless you have 5+castles and send them all at once. Watch out or you'll run out of spice and won't be able to repair your missile launchers.
        msh 12y ago
        I tried playing dune2 again, it was still a good game but it was so annoying that you could only select one unit at a time.
JacobEdelman 12y ago
Notch has done it. By leaving mojang he can no longer be blamed for any major disasters and has already achieved a place of honor in nerd communities. And now he does what every nerd dreams of doing but isn't sure they can do, leaving their company once it gets to big so they can just go and code. By specifically stating he doesn't want to be a huge symbol for the nerd community he has permanently affixed himself as one.
diltonm 12y ago
Marcus has earned the right to do what he wishes, enjoy life instead of stressing. Best wishes to him and continued success to Mojang!
lubujackson 12y ago
Notch seems like the closest thing to a modern day Woz, at least in his "doing it for the fun" approach. I wish him well in the future!
lnanek2 12y ago
Too bad, his claim that he isn't a developer and just wants to have fun playing and tinker makes him sound a lot like the famous Miyamoto from the StarFox development stories. Miyamoto apparently often played with many different implementations, making the programmers throw out a lot of work, but this was done to find something fun. Notch now had the money and organization to do that without worrying about having to push out a release. I wonder if his descent into writing useless things like Doom map viewers is just sort of chickening out. It's fun and easy to write for him maybe, no stress, but completely meaningless for the industry.
mcguire 12y ago
"If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately." That is a very nice option to have.
corbinpage 12y ago
Instead of pulling a Wozniak, why not pull a Sergey Brin? Use the incredible resources you gained from your first success to finance all the cool side-projects you ever dreamed of? Notch could start any web experiment he wanted, and when he got bored, pass it along to an army of coders to refine and finish.
- AVTizzle 12y ago
  Great point. He can still do that though, he's walking away a rich man.
jokoon 12y ago
He sounds depressed and frustrated. All I see is bad emotions in all that. With all the money he has, he could at least try to share or expand his passion in some way. It's true that he's lucky, you sense the modesty, that he doesn't want to be perceived as talented. But even if that's true, he could at least try a little bit more. I mean he seems content with his work, but if I had such fame, at least I'd try to use it and approach game companies to negotiate deals, and share his vision of gaming. Hasn't he ever tried to lead some team and get in touch with programmers he likes to do something ? Can't individuals like him hire a manager to do the job and project his vision into something ? I mean aren't there decent people able to know when there's potential, and solve the relational stuff ? I mean you can't be modest like that all the time. at some point it's grumpiness, not modesty. I wish there were businessmen able to notice those modest, hard working loners and just get small companies working with them. Not even companies, just small teams and projects. Some coaching. I wonder what's Carmack's story. I'd love to hear about the work stories of those guys, or maybe hear them talk about work politics. Of course they don't want to, because they might be made fun of, but meh.
- ProAm 12y ago
  It's his life he can do what he wants.
  - elwell 12y ago
    That's obvious, but it's often helpful to hear what other people think you should do with your life. That's true humility, and it can get you out of depression. Not saying I necessarily agree with GP though.
- deleted 12y ago
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- peterwwillis 12y ago
  Are you aware of how presumptive and insulting it is to speculate about someone else's life and tell them how they should be living?
theflubba 12y ago
Notch is an idiot. He should just ignore what people say on the internet, stop taking things so personally, and work on a new idea. There's nothing stopping him but himself.
- seanflyon 12y ago
  > stop taking things so personally, and work on a new idea. There's nothing stopping him but himself. There is nothing stopping him at all; that is exactly what he is doing.
31reasons 12y ago
Flappybird situation at a much bigger sale ( I mean scale)
chubot 12y ago
This may be a weird reference, but what comes to mind is John Frusciante leaving Red Hot Chili Peppers at the height of their fame. He quit in the middle of the tour after Blood Sugar Sex Magik, after they became unexpectedly huge. He just wanted to make music and play in small clubs. And he went back to playing guitar by himself and making solo albums. (Also heroin use, but that's a different story). And he rejoined in '98 or so, had 3 huge hit records, and then left again a few years ago. He made a few more solo albums and experimented with electronic music. Some people are not cut out for fame. The intrinsic joy of what they do is even more powerful than fame.
- benihana 12y ago
  Really enjoyed his work with ataxia
- SuperKlaus 12y ago
  Kurt Cobain comes to mind, too.
- erikb 12y ago
  I would say most people aren't cut out to get hate from millions of people for stuff they didn't do, and that's basically what being public comes to.
Nib 12y ago
It's the end of an era... This may be the last time a post from Notch makes it to HN Frontpage... We all know what's gonna happen next, microsft is gonna try to messup with the game, and, somehow, it'll end up dead... RIP Minecraft
- jacquesm 12y ago
  On the contrary, I expect plenty of posts from Notch to make it to the HN frontpage.
  - Nib 12y ago
    I suppose that you haven't read the letter he wrote(the link, the parent of this comment), he clearly says that I'll abandon anything if it gains traction... So, maybe this is it...
    - jacquesm 12y ago
      Plenty of stuff on the front page is merely 'interesting' and will never gain traction.
im3w1l 12y ago
I bought Minecraft pretty late in the game, but I really liked it. It's a great work. I'm glad for your exit, even though I realize that you quit on a sad note. I wish you joy in your future endeavors.
tdicola 12y ago
I can't help but think this deal is going to have the exact opposite effect on Notch as he intended. Now everyone knows he's a billionaire and people will come crawling out of the woodwork to try and get something from him. Also parts of the Minecraft community will be pretty upset about the decision, and if a year from now things go sour and Minecraft isn't what it used to be then people will be even more upset with him. I dunno, if he wanted to get away from it all why not just leave? No need to sell the company for billions. Give his ownership to the other founders and walk away.
- adventured 12y ago
  Fine points, but he's not likely to be a billionaire. He's a part of owner. Throw in the 30% Sweden tax on the sale, he's more likely to land around $600m to $700m (including previous income realized from Mojang). He's close to being a billionaire.
  - supersystem 12y ago
    He owned about 70%.
  - neohaven 12y ago
    He had money before the deal. Notch is solidly a billionaire.
noonespecial 12y ago
He's doing the only thing that makes a repeat of Minecraft possible. If he stayed "on" and tried to make "the next big thing" as part of a Mircosoft team there would be no chance. Going straight up _why is about the only way he might create another important work. I'd lay even odds.
sgtnasty 12y ago
Then why didnt he just open source it? That question deserves to be answered by Notch. I watched my kids grow up on Minecraft, and how I led them to learning technology, enabling their future. Minecraft is more than just a game, and really the users own it, it's not Notch's anymore.
e3pi 12y ago
`luden dare' There is a latin root word that means 'play', `have fun'. There is a philosophy and a religion whose names are coined off this word. Perhaps `ludens'? Hesse's Glasperlenspiel -Glass Bead Game? Learning about notch here this morning, I see a master living this reality regardless of philosophy or religion nonsense or the noisy crowds. He `got game'.
deleted 12y ago
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phlakaton 12y ago
Something in a novel I just read last night comes back into my head: "I reflected bitterly that I had walked away from people I had known and cared about to avoid the very situation I was now in with comparative strangers. I wondered if there was any way to live amongst other people and refuse to be harnessed by their expectations and dependencies." (Robin Hobb) If there's sadness I see in Notch's story, it's only that Notch appears to see and define his public persona in such a negative light. I wish he could see his contributions and influence on fellow hackers as a beautiful thing. But I totally understand and support his intent to find a new playground, free of expectations, regardless of his success on previous playgrounds. I hope that Notch finds the happiness that he seeks. (I also hope his comment about abandoning his next project on the first sign of success was more tongue-in-cheek than it came off...)
dasmithii 12y ago
- "If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately." These words describe how I've been feeling since the beginning of this year, when I first became a self-described programmer. Before then, I loved playing around with little toy projects, but I never considered myself as a programmer. Instead, I was a regular kid who programmed sometimes. After realizing that, over some time, I had gained some real skills, I felt obligated to make use of them. It was no longer a playful activity, I put a burden on my own shoulders that my programs had to be significant or important to others in some way. This sense of importance ruined programming for me. Though self-imposed, the homework-effect took over and I lost interest right away. I'm sure many of you code for a defined purpose, whether it be profit or world effect. But for me, my computer is a toy.
grellas 12y ago
Why should someone self-immolate in the name of a cause to which he disclaims being a leader when he has a chance to sell his for-profit business on optimal terms with no strings and with an immediate ticket to full independence free of the headaches of having to bear entrepreneurial and ideological burdens that he felt himself unfit to carry? The question answers itself. There is no earthly reason why he should have. None whatever. Of course, the price of being a cult figure is many who follow you do not really care who you are but care a great deal about who they think you are. If you are a vital symbol for the cause, then all that you do must conform to the symbol or you become a betrayer, a hypocrite, or both. And that is unforgivable. And so we arrive at the world of caricature where symbols rule the day, even at the expense of facts. Buck and kick all you want, there is no winning in that world once you fail to conform. That, I think, is the point of this piece. In effect, it says: "You have made me larger than life. Well, I'm not. I am who I am and I love what I do. If you have made me out to be something more, I can't help that. I am just like the rest of you. No more and no less. If you want me to shape my life by what you think, you will be disappointed. I will shape my own life regardless of your expectations." Who knows if this really is betrayal or hypocrisy? Usually the reality is much more complex than the caricatures make it out to be but no one really knows except those directly connected with the events. As for me, I have no ideological axe to grind and can simply stand back and say, as many people likely feel, "that is one helluva ride for one so young to make."
beauzero 12y ago
Good for you. When it's not fun anymore...it's just not fun anymore.
dsego 12y ago
He could've given a share to Zachary Barth. Just saying.
GigabyteCoin 12y ago
>If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately. This reminds me of the unwanted flappy-bird fame. What a strange idea for an entrepreneurial mind to read.
hyp0 12y ago
I love Notch. But since I don't know him, it's for what he represents; how he's handled success, knowing his values and acting on them. Poor guy can't help being a symbol - a bit like Life of Brian
god_bless_texas 12y ago
I'm sorry, but did notch go on reddit and indicate that Minecraft sold for 2.5B. That bastard.
- naiyt 12y ago
  Huh? What are you talking about? This is his Reddit account: https://www.reddit.com/user/xnotch https://www.reddit.com/user/xnotch Three comments since the announcement that have nothing to do with the money.
ryan-allen 12y ago
I say good luck to him I say. Everyone has the right to make their own choices, and I hope he has a good time post-mojang. A lot of people have thoroughly enjoyed Minecraft, it's a true phenomenon. Hopefully Microsoft do a good job keeping it going (and more importantly, improving it, of which I suspect they'll do a pretty ace job).
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jackvalentine 12y ago
The only real response I feel is appropriate: "Fair enough. Have fun with what you're going to do in the future."
seanv 12y ago
i can respect that, can't argue with honesty.
AnonJ 12y ago
I think what people dislike about this statement is how downbeat and escapist he sounds. > If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately. Frankly I can't think of anybody who would be glad to hear such a almost childish and impetus irresponsible statement. Not to mention from the mouth of somebody who created so many wonderful things altogether.

1252 points by UnfalseDesign 12y ago

The HN effect... A pastebin http://pastebin.com/n1qTeikM http://pastebin.com/n1qTeikM from https://twitter.com/notch/status/511508557200498688 https://twitter.com/notch/status/511508557200498688

sp332 12y ago
Wow... 15,000 views in 10 minutes!
Kiro 12y ago
The HN effect is real but pretty sure it's just a tiny factor in this case.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

blueskin_ 12y ago

Site is massively overloaded. Text: http://pastebin.com/GLuR7T9t http://pastebin.com/GLuR7T9t archive.today: https://archive.today/KKNNA https://archive.today/KKNNA

jere 12y ago

>As soon as this deal is finalized, I will leave Mojang and go back to doing Ludum Dares and small web experiments. It has always amazed me how down to earth Notch is. Now, he's going to be a billionaire doing little game jams. It's hard to believe and quite awesome. It's like Bruce Wayne deciding to spend the rest of his life playing with legos.

jo_ 12y ago
I never considered Bruce Wayne much of a tinkerer. More like Tony Stark playing with Legos.
- TeMPOraL 12y ago
  Or just more like Tony Stark from IM1/IM2 movies, period. He has a lot of money, but he basically outsourced every day-to-day company decision making somewhere else (up to making his secretary a CEO) just so that he could do what he really loves, i.e. high-tech tinkering and saving the day (and drunk parties).
- rubenv 12y ago
  Tony Stark? You mean Elon Musk, right?
  - Tyrannosaurs 12y ago
    Or Steve Jobs. There was a school of thought that the only reason that Steve Jobs liked being CEO of Apple was so that he could build the products he wanted, how he wanted, without anyone else telling him what he could and couldn't do. He basically created a role where he was a Product Manager with near unlimited resources who didn't have to answer to anyone else.
aeturnum 12y ago
>It's like Bruce Wayne deciding to spend the rest of his life playing with legos. I like this image. Bruce Wayne's character in batman is always thinking big. He tries to push things in the direction he thinks is right. The idea that someone would have all the power and decide to play with toys makes me worry about the rest of us. I would like to see people like Notch (creative, thoughtful people) having a say in what the future holds. However, it seems inevitable that after a certain point, you have to choose between living the life you want or ceeding at least some of your time to the whims of the masses of the public. Someone else mentioned Jobs and Wozniak - Notch feels like Wozniak and Mojang has no Jobs. How can we keep the Wozniaks and Notchs of the world involved in making decisions in a way that keeps them happy? We don't want to have to choose between scale and creativity.
- simonh 12y ago
  > I would like to see people like Notch (creative, thoughtful people) having a say in what the future holds. I don't. I have absolutely nothing against Notch, in fact I have the deepest respect for the guy as a hacker and as a person with, clearly, a lot of personal integrity. However he says quite clearly himself he's just interested in tinkering. Minecraft wasn't a deeply though out, perfectly executed, planned exercise in mass market game publishing. It was an entirely accidental result of pretty much randomly hacking ideas together. He had absolutely no idea what the future held for Minecraft when he produced it. Expecting him to have any deep insights into 'what the future holds' is projecting attributes and expectations on to him that I don't think he'd welcome.
  - TeMPOraL 12y ago
    > It was an entirely accidental result of pretty much randomly hacking ideas together. He had absolutely no idea what the future held for Minecraft when he produced it. That the game became a financial success is indeed somewhat accidental. But that the game was fun was certainly not. Since Notch was "just tinkering", he optimized for a fun and interesting game, not for a profitable game. I think this is the distinction aeturnum had in mind and I agree with him. We need Notches, Wozniaks and Musks to have more say in where the future goes, because they care primarily about the problems they're solving, and not about the money they're getting.
Cthulhu_ 12y ago
It's like a guy that got lucky and rich and never has to work a day in his life anymore retiring early and doing what he likes to do. I'll be honest, I'm bitter and jealous, :(
- dvirsky 12y ago
  He comes across as a great guy, that made something great - so it seems that he deserves this, so why be bitter about it? Sure, I envy his success and would like to make something great that will leave its mark on the world, too. I haven't, yet, but if anything, I'm inspired - and been so way before he sold his company.
- angersock 12y ago
  Well, at least you're honest.
GFK_of_xmaspast 12y ago
"It's like Bruce Wayne deciding to spend the rest of his life playing with legos." Better than dressing up in a gimp suit, and liable to get fewer people killed.
CatMtKing 12y ago
I think that's exactly why he's not going to get what he wants. He's not going to have a normal life with the comforting blanket of anonymity again.

UnfalseDesign 12y ago

Full text of post until the site becomes less overloaded: ------------------ I don’t see myself as a real game developer. I make games because it’s fun, and because I love games and I love to program, but I don’t make games with the intention of them becoming huge hits, and I don’t try to change the world. Minecraft certainly became a huge hit, and people are telling me it’s changed games. I never meant for it to do either. It’s certainly flattering, and to gradually get thrust into some kind of public spotlight is interesting. A relatively long time ago, I decided to step down from Minecraft development. Jens was the perfect person to take over leading it, and I wanted to try to do new things. At first, I failed by trying to make something big again, but since I decided to just stick to small prototypes and interesting challenges, I’ve had so much fun with work. I wasn’t exactly sure how I fit into Mojang where people did actual work, but since people said I was important for the culture, I stayed. I was at home with a bad cold a couple of weeks ago when the internet exploded with hate against me over some kind of EULA situation that I had nothing to do with. I was confused. I didn’t understand. I tweeted this in frustration. Later on, I watched the This is Phil Fish video on YouTube and started to realize I didn’t have the connection to my fans I thought I had. I’ve become a symbol. I don’t want to be a symbol, responsible for something huge that I don’t understand, that I don’t want to work on, that keeps coming back to me. I’m not an entrepreneur. I’m not a CEO. I’m a nerdy computer programmer who likes to have opinions on Twitter. As soon as this deal is finalized, I will leave Mojang and go back to doing Ludum Dares and small web experiments. If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately. Considering the public image of me already is a bit skewed, I don’t expect to get away from negative comments by doing this, but at least now I won’t feel a responsibility to read them. I’m aware this goes against a lot of what I’ve said in public. I have no good response to that. I’m also aware a lot of you were using me as a symbol of some perceived struggle. I’m not. I’m a person, and I’m right there struggling with you. I love you. All of you. Thank you for turning Minecraft into what it has become, but there are too many of you, and I can’t be responsible for something this big. In one sense, it belongs to Microsoft now. In a much bigger sense, it’s belonged to all of you for a long time, and that will never change. It’s not about the money. It’s about my sanity.

marktangotango 12y ago

bilalhusain 12y ago

Heartbreaking to read what we do to people.

DanBC 12y ago
I feel very great sadness for Notch. I really hope he finds fun and joy. I am immensely grateful to him (and the rest of Mojang) for Minecraft.
crusso 12y ago
It's sad that there are so many griefers and haters out there, but there are worse problems to have than being wildly successful. I pity what people do to society in general with their self-destructive attitudes. We all suffer as a result when we drive people like Notch out of positions of leadership. You see the same in politics where the truly good and earnest people are also the ones with a conscience and too much self-respect to submit themselves to the abuse of public office.
at-fates-hands 12y ago
Only heartbreaking in the sense this is the new reality for many people. If you ever gain some semblance of popularity, everything you say and do is over analyzed. From your Twitter feeds, your work, your public comments, everything. Notch just secured the best thing he could have. Now he has the money to do what he wants and not be at the forefront of what he created. Something I'm sure he's been wanting to do for a long time. Just like he said, he gets to step back into the shadows, where he's more comfortable, out of the limelight and content to do what he really wants to do. I can only imagine what we'd be writing had he opted out say a year ago, before MS bought his company. What would we be saying then?
gadders 12y ago
Well, there are a lot of dicks online, but I think twitter rage-storms or whatever seem to affect some people a lot more deeply than others.
- _delirium 12y ago
  The people who deal with it best I think are sort of the aloof types. They may not even read their own Twitter feed, delegating it to a social-media staffer. Notch has the problem that he uses it as a personal account and is on it regularly, so he reads comments @directed at him, tries to reply to them, etc. He also has a public email address that he reads, and it sounds like people send weird/angry emails to that, too, so it ends up going beyond just Twitter. I could see getting annoyed if people were constantly emailing me in that manner.

iamleppert 12y ago

He should donate some of that money to some good causes if he's really a simple man like he says he is. Of course he doesn't have to do anything, and fully deserves to take the money and run, and build some giant evil castle or something.

voltagex_ 12y ago
I see this all the time on HN, I'm probably guilty of saying it myself sometimes too. Why should he donate $X?

adriancooney 12y ago

Wow, Notch is a pretty amazing guy. It's clear he just loves to make games. The post reminds me of Dong Nguyen/Flappy Bird situation. Let the man be.

andyhmltn 12y ago
Now you mention it, it's actually really similar isn't it? I've been following him since I originally bought my alpha version of minecraft and he's always seemed to be the way he portray's himself in this article. A nice genuine guy that just loves hacking away at things.

seymour7 12y ago

Google cache: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fnotch.net%2F2014%2F09%2Fim-leaving-mojang%2F http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Ahttp%...

Nickoladze 12y ago

Basically "I was successful once, it was awful". Sometimes I wish he would have just stuck with Minecraft as the only developer and stayed away from the spotlight. Plenty of very popular game creators have done so (Icefrog, Toady One). I really enjoyed the times back when Minecraft was just getting popular and you could tell Notch was adding features that he genuinely enjoyed (Redstone update, for instance). Then he started up a giant company and started assuming responsibility for things like server admins charging money, when he should have sat back and let people do what they want.

drzaiusapelord 12y ago
>Basically "I was successful once, it was awful". This seems to be a theme. The guy who had the frontpage the other day, flappy bird, etc. Must be nice to have the cash entitlements to "keep it real." I can't blame him, I think money just becomes arbitrary numbers after a certain point. Minecraft has probably grown to a point where its just only going to get smaller in the future and in a few years be a fun little nostalgia piece for the tweens today who will be in college, the same way we dusted off the NES when I was in college. Obviously, there's something about the nerdy personality that wants none of this, but it really makes me wonder about guys like Gates or Carmack or Zuckerberg or Jobs who thrive in these environments. Are they the rare ones or are guys like Notch the outliers?
- georgemcbay 12y ago
  I don't know that I'd lump Carmack in with the rest of your list. Yes, he is quite financially successful from id, but he never stopped being, first and foremost, a coder who will sometimes just disappear for a few weeks to separate himself from the world and get coding done. I wouldn't list Jobs either for almost the opposite reason in that while he had a huge impact on the tech industry, he was always a "suit" (even if he didn't wear one).
  - drzaiusapelord 12y ago
    Good point, but he always came off as a hard-ass to me who liked to get into arguments and thrive on stress. I kinda see him as his own Jobs-Woz combo. I may be misreading him.

huhtenberg 12y ago

I really like Notch and I really like how having all that money didn't seem to change him. The sale is interesting news, but seeing him go through it with integrity is even more interesting.

80ProofPudding 12y ago

Good for you, Notch. You made something awesome, got rich doing it, and stayed a mensch throughout.

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jonifico 12y ago

While I do see his point in saying Minecraft has become too big for him, he might also be backing out a bit from a responsibility that could bring a fascinating challenge. But then again, he doesn't see himself as a true developer. Hope he finds a way to fulfill himself apart from spending billions of dollars.

Mikeb85 12y ago
He'll probably just hire someone smarter than him to invest his billion dollars. Heck, even an index fund or super conservative portfolio of dividend stocks would earn him enough to never work again, and maintain a pretty awesome lifestyle...

jacquesm 12y ago

> I don’t see myself as a real game developer. I make games because it’s fun, and because I love games and I love to program, but I don’t make games with the intention of them becoming huge hits, and I don’t try to change the world. I think that's the essence of being a real game developer. It's sad that Notch feels this way, I think the majority of old school games guys and girls were just like that. Since it's become a big business with huge studios and ridiculous budgets the market has been spoiled. But Notch/Mojang and team have shown that there is still a place for great indie games and bootstrappers. And I actually believe him that this deal is not about the money. Projects like these can become albatrosses.

JoeAltmaier 12y ago
Preposterous. If it wasn't about the money, could have gone open-source at any time with the same effect/relief. Of course its about the $2B
- deleted 12y ago
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- ntaso 12y ago
  As an indie developer with a normal lifestyle, it probably doesn't matter if you have 10 million in the bank or much, much more. So, it's unlikely to be about the money.
- jacquesm 12y ago
  Note that he's speaking for himself and that he's not the only founder.
- vasilipupkin 12y ago
  he is not an earthworm with one brain cell. Of course, on some level it's about the money to a degree, but I think it's also true that it's not just about the money. It's both about the money and not about the money
- tbastos 12y ago
  Just because money isn't a priority for you, it doesn't mean you'll refuse it. He got the best of both worlds by letting other people run the business to focus on what he really wanted (indie dev). Believe me, it's MUCH easier to be creative and work on indie projects when you don't have to worry about your bills and your future...

gamesurgeon 12y ago

"I’m not an entrepreneur. I’m not a CEO. I’m a nerdy computer programmer who likes to have opinions on Twitter...If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately." I have the utmost respect for notch after reading that.

Tepix 12y ago
I think it's sad to write something like that (abandoning something as soon as it seems to gain traction). Isn't that what games are about? Writing great games that a lot of people love to play and talk about? And in the case of Minecraft, hack and mod in unimaginable ways?
- gknoy 12y ago
  Perhaps the joy he derives comes not from the popularity or world-changingness, but rather from the process of creation, or the problems that he gets to solve in interesting ways. I don't think he'll ever be at a loss for creativity. If he spends the rest of his days streaming (or not streaming!) him coding random small games, or tinkering on a renderer that is never used, I expect that he'll be happy and feel fulfilled.
izolate 12y ago
Same. He's my type of hacker. The best type.
varkson 12y ago
I don't like his attitude in the public eye but at least he's self aware and not afraid to say it. That does take courage.

tbrock 12y ago

"If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately." He seems to have an awful attitude for a guy who just made a billion dollars and gets to spend the rest of his life doing exactly what he wants.

_xzu 12y ago
Why? As said in the message he doesn't want to be responsible for handling big successes. So this seems to be very healthy attitude. Hopefully he will open source his next big thing so community might be able to keep it alive.
DanBC 12y ago
He is saying "I made a mistake; I have learnt from that mistake and will try to avoid making the same mistake in future". That's a fucking great attitude and is -to me at least- much better than "I made minecraft and I'm awesome and the success of Minecraft has nothing to do with luck but is totally all those decisions I made because I'm brilliant" which is the kind of thing we hear from a bunch of other devs.
- tbrock 12y ago
  Good point, agreed. I think abandoning is a little much though. I guess it would have rubbed me differently if he had said I'll make it open source or hand it off to other developers earlier, etc.
  - DanBC 12y ago
    He did hand it off to other developers. He was still gettin hate for stuff those other people were doing. I kind of wish that mental health support was better and that he'd had some kind of mentoring to help him deal with it. Perhaps that's a startup idea: support with all the hate and bullshit that comes your way when you're a public figure. More expensive service would include rapid rebuttal service to quash lies and myth.
    - 12y ago

petercooper 12y ago

I think there are some interesting parallels with J K Rowling. If he releases anything now, it's big news (even Cliffhorse). He might have to start "writing" under a pseudonym just to get any sense of doing something fresh without intense public scrutiny.

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adregan 12y ago
I think it's pretty well known that JK Rowling is a woman. Also, she has recently written some books under the pen name "Robert Galbraith". Edit: I see above that the poster was referring to Notch. Just a simple case of an unclear antecedent (and being unfamiliar with Notch's and Rowling's recently releases ;) )
- drzaiusapelord 12y ago
  Interesting note, if an author uses a pseudonym of a different gender, its appropriate to use that gender of the pseudonym. I find it weird that James Tiptree, Jr. is still a "he" when we've known for decades it was Alice Bradley Sheldon's pen name. In fact, Tiptree, not Sheldon, has been inducted into the science fiction hall of fame, which is even weirder.
  - bshimmin 12y ago
    I don't think I've ever met anyone - in real life or in the UK educational system, anyway - who referred to George Eliot as being a "he" without instantly being corrected.
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- petercooper 12y ago
  I'm saying that he (as in, notch) has parallels to her. Cliffhorse is a game notch wrote, and Rowling already has written under a pseudonym.

netcraft 12y ago

> It’s not about the money. It’s about my sanity. This does make the most sense, in looking at everything hes said in the past. Sounds like MS had the right offer at the right time.

chernevik 12y ago

This is why we can't have nice things. I don't know much about Minecraft or whatever issue Notch is referring to in his post. But I'm always struck by how quickly people snap to emotional argument and response, without thinking about the other side of the question, without thinking about how their response will be read or felt by others. The first step in any dialogue is trying to understand why the other side has said or done what they have, and how that might seem reasonable and right to them. Without that, how do we have any hope of learning anything, or moving to any actual agreement? And yet 98% of what I read presumes that any disagreement must be ignorant, stupid or evil. I understand many of the reasons why people talk this way, and yes, it's hard to avoid it. But we now have more communication amongst ourselves than at any other time in human history. Maybe it's time to start thinking hard about how each of us can communicate better. Wouldn't it be great if we could get to a community where some idiosyncratic dude could write a monster hit without feeling himself battered for reasons he can't understand?

madeofpalk 12y ago
I think it's just simpler than that. The impression I got was not that he left because of hate he was getting, but just because Minecraft got really popular and turned into something much bigger than he expected. It sounds like he doesn't want to be a part of anything that big - he just wants to have fun hacking on games.
- arcatek 12y ago
  I would guess that the EULA shitstorm has been the last straw.
watwut 12y ago
The hate weeks ago was about money, basically. Part of EULA that disallowed servers to earn money, but was often ignored. Mojang clarified that that part of EULA is indeed meant as written. People do not tend to be understanding when it comes to loosing money they wanted/expected. Moreover, I suspect that managing Minecraft is a lot about merchandize selling, cons organization, making deals with lego and everyone else who want to produce themed items and so on. Not necessary what you want to deal with if you consider yourself gamemaker or programmer.

krelian 12y ago

This whole Minecraft thing has been very interesting to follow. I tried the game a few times and it's not really for me but everything around Notch's story is interesting (I bet their going to make a movie about this at some point). Not everyone can be an entrepreneur and I feel that in this case (on a different scale of course), we basically watched a plausible version of how Apple could have gotten started if there was only a Wozniak but no Jobs. I'm sure there are many here that dream of having their idea be a huge success but aren't really interested in becoming the next Bill Gates or Zuckerberg. They just want to cash out so that they can have their financial freedom and then go out of the limelight and back to doing the same things they enjoy but without having to constantly worry about job security and putting food on the table. Notch achieved this in the most spectacular way possible and I think he handled it perfectly.

tst 12y ago
I think the analogy to Wozniak is great. I remember an article some months ago in which he basically said the same: He wants to tinker and hack. I remember watching some parts of notch's livestreams. I loved the enthusiasm he had. He was a bit like a young boy, trying things, throwing some away, creating games. I'm happy for his decision.
- snlacks 12y ago
  It's unfortunate that all our greed and crazy fandom keep scaring the great minds away from continuing to push us all forward.
  - paulhauggis 12y ago
    I think it's less the greed and crazy fandom and more a new generation of people that feel they are entitled to everything and anything they want and if they don't get it, start an online witch hunt. There are numerous examples of this in the past 6 months and in Notch's case, it happened with EULA and 3rd party server support. A community that supports this sort of behavior wouldn't have my support either. I don't blame him.

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jacquesm 12y ago
He's already invested many years of his life into mojang, why do you think you are in a position to tell him what to do with his money? Markus is 100% free to do whatever the hell he wants with his money and you nor anybody else should place conditions on or make demands on him.
- deleted 12y ago
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  - jacquesm 12y ago
    > pearjuice 10 minutes ago: > Go to bed, Markus. Are you seriously suggesting I'm a sockpuppet for Markus Persson?
jkubicek 12y ago
That's silly. If someone said they hated their house, they wanted to move out and it wasn't about the money, would you demand that they give the house away for free?

ianstallings 12y ago

He reminds me of Steve Wozniak a little bit. He's disconnected from the scene and it's refreshing in every way. Good luck to him.

rafaqueque 12y ago

It's not always about money, as he said. Classy move by Notch. Respect.

nXqd 12y ago

this is so awesome that he can make things that he loves. Become super rich with it, but still staying who he is. This kind of achievement is incredibly hard. Thanks for great work !

archildress 12y ago

At the opposite end of the spectrum of the startup CEO who's intent on cashing out for fame is Notch, who sold to remove himself from the center of attention. I think we all believe we could handle the spotlight and the attention and fame that comes with it. But until we're faced with it, we'll never know. All the best to Notch and thanks for a game that brought many people many hours of happiness and shared experiences.

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joshfinnie 12y ago

This is super sad. I never want to read the following from a programmer: As soon as this deal is finalized, I will leave Mojang and go back to doing Ludum Dares and small web experiments. If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately. I feel for anyone who has felt such stress to want to kill anything that they are working on that gains traction...

xarien 12y ago
It's actually quite inspiring. He's essentially saying that he's chasing curiosity instead of profits. A lot of us would love to be able to do that. For many of us, it's why we got into programming or engineering in the first place...
- MadManE 12y ago
  How is that inspiring? To me, it's incredibly depressing. It's basically saying that he will aim to make mediocre (or terrible) things now that he has more money than he needs. This means that unless I win the lottery of life, I am condemned to doing what I'm doing and if I actually do succeed in what I'm doing, I'll never want to touch anything like it again. Edit: Sorry that I inadvertently insulted one of your heroes. I realize that I'm incredibly lucky already because I have food/water/shelter/etc. But "gaining perspective" seems like code to me for "I've given up, so you should too".
  - arrrg 12y ago
    Terrible or mediocre for whom? The audience? He clearly states he is doing this for himself, so let him be the judge of that.
  - serve_yay 12y ago
    Hmm, I think notch's life is interesting but I doubt the wisdom of trying to learn lessons from it. At any rate I dunno that he is necessarily aiming to make mediocre things so much as not explicitly aiming to make popular things. Good work can come out of such a mindset, he just won't be the one to steward it to popularity.

craigching 12y ago

I'm really happy for Notch as long as he's happy. To me, the most disappointing thing about this is that the story becomes more complex. I loved telling my kids "this was created and developed by one person in his spare time." That's not been true for awhile now I realize, but it was fun telling my kids that. I guess I can figure out a different way to convey reality, but it's more complex when they say "but isn't it from Microsoft?" Anyway Notch, good luck to you and I love you too! You really gave us something great and no matter what you do going forward, you can't take back what you've given!

antirez 12y ago

He should not give a fuck about random people on the internet, but just about opinions of the few he knows in one way or the other and respect. I understand this is more complex to do than to say, but still, how to have fun working in the current IT development scene without this crucial step, especially for a famous person like him?

burkaman 12y ago
Don't run a company. You cannot run any kind of business without caring what people think and are saying about you.
- jacquesm 12y ago
  You actually can and and you probably shouldn't. And Antirez: please do continue ;). See also: Henry Ford, horses and cars.
- antirez 12y ago
  You can get a "general feeling" about your customers without actually feeling responsible/bad about the individual opinion of each of your users. Actually IMHO it is probably not possible to run a company caring in depth about everyone of your users. Of course there is from time to time this totally stranger that may send you a well argued / fact-supported opinion that may ring some bell, and this is great when happens, but here I believe we are talking about "Notch you suck because of the TOS change!" or similar toned messages.

tosh 12y ago

Looking forward to more Dart programming streams. I think more and more people should stream like Notch does. It is incredibly entertaining and educating to watch how people write code similar to how people play games. A great learning opportunity. Different format compared to prepared talks and tutorials. I wish there was a list of people with programming streams that I can just tune in.

sergiotapia 12y ago

"It's not about the money (BECAUSE I HAVE TWO BILLION OF THEM!)." Haha, and who can blame Notch, I wouldn't work a day in my life and become a full time carpenter for the rest of my life.

masklinn 12y ago
He already had "fuck you money" before that deal, it's not like he needed the deal for that.
talmand 12y ago
Reminds me of the scene in The Aviator where the Hepburn family obviously can care less about money to the point of obnoxiousness, and state they don't discuss it. Hughes responds with "That's because you have it."

hyperliner 12y ago

This is really a sad statement about the evil "consumers." It does not happen only to simple nerdy game developers. It happens to everybody who does something huge. It happens to small business owners. Then, people "tell them" that they "must" raise the wages of their employees, without ever having created a small business. It happens to activists. Then, people "tell" them they "must" support this other cause, when those activists simply want to change a small part of the world that they care about. It bothers me the most when it happens to presidents. (Pres. Bush, Pres. Obama, depending on your political inclinations). Just simple guys asked to carry the weight of a nation just because they were at the right time, the right place, did the right things, a few mistakes, wanted to change the world a little, and worked really hard. Maybe all of us who instead of sweating are going for the ride should simply enjoy the game. Just put a few blocks on the game, build a small tiny house, put a glass window, a small bed in there with the tiny cool candle on the wall (my favorite block in Minecraft), and stare out the window. And watch for creepers. But leave these folks alone to do what we did not do, and let them enjoy a reward for their hard work.

scottjad 12y ago

The other day there was a post about some Doom map viewer Notch had written in Dart. One of the top comments said something along the lines of "This is why we all need to be rich, so we can work on stuff like this." I thought the comment was so sad because honestly, almost no one is going to benefit from a mostly broken Doom map viewer in Dart that's abandoned after a few days. Same with the numerous games he's started (often with no idea where he's going) and abandoned after a few hours/days. Don't get me wrong, I like watching his coding stream as much as the next person, but compare that to the millions of people who benefitted from the sustained and focused effort on Minecraft. Notch says: > If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately. So sad. Imagine if Jobs/the PayPal guys/etc had taken this approach after their initial succcess. Now I'm all for people being free to do what they want and only this guy owns his life and no one is entitled to have him work for them (hat tip Ayn Rand), and obviously this guy has had a bigger impact on the world than I have, but I tend to agree with Immanuel Kant (and Jesus) that we all have a duty to develop and use our talents in a way that benefits humanity and not just indulge ourselves in idle amusement once we're comfortable. And to be honest, this probably applies more to me than to Notch. From "Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals": > A third finds in himself a talent which with the help of some culture might make him a useful man in many respects. But he finds himself in comfortable circumstances and prefers to indulge in pleasure rather than to take pains in enlarging and improving his happy natural capacities. He asks, however, whether his maxim of neglect of his natural gifts, besides agreeing with his inclination to indulgence, agrees also with what is called duty. He sees then that a system of nature could indeed subsist with such a universal law although men ... should let their talents rest and resolve to devote their lives merely to idleness, amusement, and propagation of their species- in a word, to enjoyment; but he cannot possibly will that this should be a universal law of nature, or be implanted in us as such by a natural instinct. For, as a rational being, he necessarily wills that his faculties be developed, since they serve him and have been given him, for all sorts of possible purposes.

nightski 12y ago
Minecraft was grown out of the way Notch works. What you are suggesting is impossible. No one, not even Steve Jobs sits down and says "My life mission is to benefit humanity". This is because we really do not know which efforts will have the largest impact on humanity. You could waste a lifetime trying to make a better battery - but it might never happen. Or you could hack around on a game and watch it explode and impact millions of lives around the world. In my opinion the important part is that you are doing something meaningful to you as an individual. If it ends up exploding and benefiting humanity all the better. But the world would be so much better off if we just had everyone doing this.

mentos 12y ago

I would love to see him consider investing in other video game projects. There is a game 10x better than Minecraft out there somewhere and he has the money to find it.

LeicaLatte 12y ago

Say Facebook had acquired Minecraft I believe Notch might have had a chance at continuing at Mojang. But Microsoft's history with killing talent is legendary (Nokia, Rare, etc) and there was no question of him taking a chance with them.

barnumdee 12y ago
No, he probably wouldn't have sold it to begin with if they were the only ones buying. Notch specifically said he wouldn't create a Minecraft version for the Oculus Rift after the Facebook purchase because he found it 'creepy'.
_random_ 12y ago
Yeah, Nokia was sooo thriving.

willvarfar 12y ago

For the interested, Notch didn't enter the current Ludum Dare but thousands of mortal coders did, and they'd love you to go play their games! http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/

dmpk2k 12y ago
Unrelated, but maybe he did enter, under a different pseudonym; it's what I'd do in his shoes.
- SunShiranui 12y ago
  He wanted to enter but didn't manage to get any ideas for his game.
shurcooL 12y ago
If only there was an OnLive-like roulette-like way going from one game to another without download and install times, that'd be neat.
- Udo 12y ago
  If you participated, the rating UI kind of works like that. You can just stick to browser-based games (which is more than 50% of all entries).
AndyKelley 12y ago
That includes me! http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-30/?action=preview&uid=24697 http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-30/?action=preview... It's a multiplayer html5 game, so drag a friend into it with you :-)

melvinmt 12y ago

There was once a businessman who was sitting by the beach in a small Brazilian village. As he sat, he saw a Brazilian fisherman rowing a small boat towards the shore having caught quite few big fish. The businessman was impressed and asked the fisherman, “How long does it take you to catch so many fish?” The fisherman replied, “Oh, just a short while.” “Then why don’t you stay longer at sea and catch even more?” The businessman was astonished. “This is enough to feed my whole family,” the fisherman said. The businessman then asked, “So, what do you do for the rest of the day?” The fisherman replied, “Well, I usually wake up early in the morning, go out to sea and catch a few fish, then go back and play with my kids. In the afternoon, I take a nap with my wife, and evening comes, I join my buddies in the village for a drink — we play guitar, sing and dance throughout the night.” The businessman offered a suggestion to the fisherman. “I am a PhD in business management. I could help you to become a more successful person. From now on, you should spend more time at sea and try to catch as many fish as possible. When you have saved enough money, you could buy a bigger boat and catch even more fish. Soon you will be able to afford to buy more boats, set up your own company, your own production plant for canned food and distribution network. By then, you will have moved out of this village and to Sao Paulo, where you can set up HQ to manage your other branches.” The fisherman continues, “And after that?” The businessman laughs heartily, “After that, you can live like a king in your own house, and when the time is right, you can go public and float your shares in the Stock Exchange, and you will be rich.” The fisherman asks, “And after that?” The businessman says, “After that, you can finally retire, you can move to a house by the fishing village, wake up early in the morning, catch a few fish, then return home to play with kids, have a nice afternoon nap with your wife, and when evening comes, you can join your buddies for a drink, play the guitar, sing and dance throughout the night!” The fisherman was puzzled, “Isn’t that what I am doing now?” http://paulocoelhoblog.com/2010/09/08/the-fisherman-and-the-businessman/ http://paulocoelhoblog.com/2010/09/08/the-fisherman-and-the-...

raldi 12y ago
And then the fisherman got a horrible toothache and there was nothing he could do about it. A few years later, overfishing led to near-depletion of the local supply, and new restrictions were implemented on fishing licenses. The fisherman was unable to afford one, and yet he had no other means of supporting his family. By the end of the decade his wife and children were begging on the street. Meanwhile, the businessman was getting a massage at a ski resort in Switzerland.

debt 12y ago

Kind of reminds me of something Richard Feynman said: "Then I had another thought: Physics disgusts me a little bit now, but I used to enjoy doing physics. Why did I enjoy it? I used to play with it. I used to do whatever I felt like doing - it didn't have to do with whether it was important for the development of nuclear physics, but whether it was interesting and amusing for me to play with. When I was in high school, I'd see water running out of a faucet growing narrower, and wonder if I could figure out what determines that curve. I found it was rather easy to do. I didn't have to do it; it wasn't important for the future of science; somebody else had already done it. That didn't make any difference. I'd invent things and play with things for my own entertainment." I think we should take serious stock not only in what Notch is saying here but also his overall success: if you get off making ephemeral photo-sharing apps or a Salesforce clone then keep on trucking otherwise you should ask yourself why you're doing it in the first place. Are your little projects a ton of fun to work on? Notch makes an all around good argument for pursuing your passion.

alexvr 12y ago

I hope he puts that money to good use.

nperez 12y ago

As someone who took my lifelong fascination and turned it into a "job", I respect the hell out of this. Granted, not everyone is financially capable of just coding small experiments and getting by, but that's where the magic is.

ErikRogneby 12y ago

This was the hardest line to read: "If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately." I hope when he says "abandon" he means upload it on github with an MIT license. Seriously though, what a horrible thing to be fearful of creating something that people might like.

tcfunk 12y ago
Yeah that was the line that caught my attention, too. I hope that fear will subside somewhat with time out of the spotlight (if indeed he manages to get out of it in the first place).

pingwing 12y ago

I don't blame the guy and now he has plenty of money to do what he wants and not deal with the bullshit. Corporate America sucks. it is a horrible "culture". Not everyone wants fame, fortune maybe, but not fame.

cmdrfred 12y ago

I love ya notch, you inspired me. Games don't have to have a story, great graphics, or even a point. They have to be fun. After years of being a gamer, Minecraft is the only game I come back to. I will buy anything you have for sale.

chris_mahan 12y ago
Minecraft's my favorite game, and my son's. We also both like Dune2. He's 9. (I'm not :)
- cmdrfred 12y ago
  I just checked out Dune2, looks good thanks for the recommendation.
  - chris_mahan 12y ago
    Watch out for the big harkonnen missile on the maps with the castle. Enjoy!
    - ido 12y ago
      It's quite hard getting over the interface these days. Surprisingly enough Warcraft 1 is still very playable.
      - chris_mahan 12y ago
        Ya dune2 is dos based. Once you get used to it, though, it'll be very enjoyable. You can't rely on the Fremen unless you have 5+castles and send them all at once. Watch out or you'll run out of spice and won't be able to repair your missile launchers.
        msh 12y ago
        I tried playing dune2 again, it was still a good game but it was so annoying that you could only select one unit at a time.

JacobEdelman 12y ago

Notch has done it. By leaving mojang he can no longer be blamed for any major disasters and has already achieved a place of honor in nerd communities. And now he does what every nerd dreams of doing but isn't sure they can do, leaving their company once it gets to big so they can just go and code. By specifically stating he doesn't want to be a huge symbol for the nerd community he has permanently affixed himself as one.

diltonm 12y ago

Marcus has earned the right to do what he wishes, enjoy life instead of stressing. Best wishes to him and continued success to Mojang!

lubujackson 12y ago

Notch seems like the closest thing to a modern day Woz, at least in his "doing it for the fun" approach. I wish him well in the future!

lnanek2 12y ago

Too bad, his claim that he isn't a developer and just wants to have fun playing and tinker makes him sound a lot like the famous Miyamoto from the StarFox development stories. Miyamoto apparently often played with many different implementations, making the programmers throw out a lot of work, but this was done to find something fun. Notch now had the money and organization to do that without worrying about having to push out a release. I wonder if his descent into writing useless things like Doom map viewers is just sort of chickening out. It's fun and easy to write for him maybe, no stress, but completely meaningless for the industry.

mcguire 12y ago

"If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately." That is a very nice option to have.

corbinpage 12y ago

Instead of pulling a Wozniak, why not pull a Sergey Brin? Use the incredible resources you gained from your first success to finance all the cool side-projects you ever dreamed of? Notch could start any web experiment he wanted, and when he got bored, pass it along to an army of coders to refine and finish.

AVTizzle 12y ago
Great point. He can still do that though, he's walking away a rich man.

jokoon 12y ago

He sounds depressed and frustrated. All I see is bad emotions in all that. With all the money he has, he could at least try to share or expand his passion in some way. It's true that he's lucky, you sense the modesty, that he doesn't want to be perceived as talented. But even if that's true, he could at least try a little bit more. I mean he seems content with his work, but if I had such fame, at least I'd try to use it and approach game companies to negotiate deals, and share his vision of gaming. Hasn't he ever tried to lead some team and get in touch with programmers he likes to do something ? Can't individuals like him hire a manager to do the job and project his vision into something ? I mean aren't there decent people able to know when there's potential, and solve the relational stuff ? I mean you can't be modest like that all the time. at some point it's grumpiness, not modesty. I wish there were businessmen able to notice those modest, hard working loners and just get small companies working with them. Not even companies, just small teams and projects. Some coaching. I wonder what's Carmack's story. I'd love to hear about the work stories of those guys, or maybe hear them talk about work politics. Of course they don't want to, because they might be made fun of, but meh.

ProAm 12y ago
It's his life he can do what he wants.
- elwell 12y ago
  That's obvious, but it's often helpful to hear what other people think you should do with your life. That's true humility, and it can get you out of depression. Not saying I necessarily agree with GP though.
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peterwwillis 12y ago
Are you aware of how presumptive and insulting it is to speculate about someone else's life and tell them how they should be living?

theflubba 12y ago

Notch is an idiot. He should just ignore what people say on the internet, stop taking things so personally, and work on a new idea. There's nothing stopping him but himself.

seanflyon 12y ago
> stop taking things so personally, and work on a new idea. There's nothing stopping him but himself. There is nothing stopping him at all; that is exactly what he is doing.

31reasons 12y ago

Flappybird situation at a much bigger sale ( I mean scale)

chubot 12y ago

This may be a weird reference, but what comes to mind is John Frusciante leaving Red Hot Chili Peppers at the height of their fame. He quit in the middle of the tour after Blood Sugar Sex Magik, after they became unexpectedly huge. He just wanted to make music and play in small clubs. And he went back to playing guitar by himself and making solo albums. (Also heroin use, but that's a different story). And he rejoined in '98 or so, had 3 huge hit records, and then left again a few years ago. He made a few more solo albums and experimented with electronic music. Some people are not cut out for fame. The intrinsic joy of what they do is even more powerful than fame.

benihana 12y ago
Really enjoyed his work with ataxia
SuperKlaus 12y ago
Kurt Cobain comes to mind, too.
erikb 12y ago
I would say most people aren't cut out to get hate from millions of people for stuff they didn't do, and that's basically what being public comes to.

Nib 12y ago

It's the end of an era... This may be the last time a post from Notch makes it to HN Frontpage... We all know what's gonna happen next, microsft is gonna try to messup with the game, and, somehow, it'll end up dead... RIP Minecraft

jacquesm 12y ago
On the contrary, I expect plenty of posts from Notch to make it to the HN frontpage.
- Nib 12y ago
  I suppose that you haven't read the letter he wrote(the link, the parent of this comment), he clearly says that I'll abandon anything if it gains traction... So, maybe this is it...
  - jacquesm 12y ago
    Plenty of stuff on the front page is merely 'interesting' and will never gain traction.

im3w1l 12y ago

I bought Minecraft pretty late in the game, but I really liked it. It's a great work. I'm glad for your exit, even though I realize that you quit on a sad note. I wish you joy in your future endeavors.

tdicola 12y ago

I can't help but think this deal is going to have the exact opposite effect on Notch as he intended. Now everyone knows he's a billionaire and people will come crawling out of the woodwork to try and get something from him. Also parts of the Minecraft community will be pretty upset about the decision, and if a year from now things go sour and Minecraft isn't what it used to be then people will be even more upset with him. I dunno, if he wanted to get away from it all why not just leave? No need to sell the company for billions. Give his ownership to the other founders and walk away.

adventured 12y ago
Fine points, but he's not likely to be a billionaire. He's a part of owner. Throw in the 30% Sweden tax on the sale, he's more likely to land around $600m to $700m (including previous income realized from Mojang). He's close to being a billionaire.
- supersystem 12y ago
  He owned about 70%.
- neohaven 12y ago
  He had money before the deal. Notch is solidly a billionaire.

noonespecial 12y ago

He's doing the only thing that makes a repeat of Minecraft possible. If he stayed "on" and tried to make "the next big thing" as part of a Mircosoft team there would be no chance. Going straight up _why is about the only way he might create another important work. I'd lay even odds.

sgtnasty 12y ago

Then why didnt he just open source it? That question deserves to be answered by Notch. I watched my kids grow up on Minecraft, and how I led them to learning technology, enabling their future. Minecraft is more than just a game, and really the users own it, it's not Notch's anymore.

e3pi 12y ago

`luden dare' There is a latin root word that means 'play', `have fun'. There is a philosophy and a religion whose names are coined off this word. Perhaps `ludens'? Hesse's Glasperlenspiel -Glass Bead Game? Learning about notch here this morning, I see a master living this reality regardless of philosophy or religion nonsense or the noisy crowds. He `got game'.

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phlakaton 12y ago

Something in a novel I just read last night comes back into my head: "I reflected bitterly that I had walked away from people I had known and cared about to avoid the very situation I was now in with comparative strangers. I wondered if there was any way to live amongst other people and refuse to be harnessed by their expectations and dependencies." (Robin Hobb) If there's sadness I see in Notch's story, it's only that Notch appears to see and define his public persona in such a negative light. I wish he could see his contributions and influence on fellow hackers as a beautiful thing. But I totally understand and support his intent to find a new playground, free of expectations, regardless of his success on previous playgrounds. I hope that Notch finds the happiness that he seeks. (I also hope his comment about abandoning his next project on the first sign of success was more tongue-in-cheek than it came off...)

dasmithii 12y ago

- "If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately." These words describe how I've been feeling since the beginning of this year, when I first became a self-described programmer. Before then, I loved playing around with little toy projects, but I never considered myself as a programmer. Instead, I was a regular kid who programmed sometimes. After realizing that, over some time, I had gained some real skills, I felt obligated to make use of them. It was no longer a playful activity, I put a burden on my own shoulders that my programs had to be significant or important to others in some way. This sense of importance ruined programming for me. Though self-imposed, the homework-effect took over and I lost interest right away. I'm sure many of you code for a defined purpose, whether it be profit or world effect. But for me, my computer is a toy.

grellas 12y ago

Why should someone self-immolate in the name of a cause to which he disclaims being a leader when he has a chance to sell his for-profit business on optimal terms with no strings and with an immediate ticket to full independence free of the headaches of having to bear entrepreneurial and ideological burdens that he felt himself unfit to carry? The question answers itself. There is no earthly reason why he should have. None whatever. Of course, the price of being a cult figure is many who follow you do not really care who you are but care a great deal about who they think you are. If you are a vital symbol for the cause, then all that you do must conform to the symbol or you become a betrayer, a hypocrite, or both. And that is unforgivable. And so we arrive at the world of caricature where symbols rule the day, even at the expense of facts. Buck and kick all you want, there is no winning in that world once you fail to conform. That, I think, is the point of this piece. In effect, it says: "You have made me larger than life. Well, I'm not. I am who I am and I love what I do. If you have made me out to be something more, I can't help that. I am just like the rest of you. No more and no less. If you want me to shape my life by what you think, you will be disappointed. I will shape my own life regardless of your expectations." Who knows if this really is betrayal or hypocrisy? Usually the reality is much more complex than the caricatures make it out to be but no one really knows except those directly connected with the events. As for me, I have no ideological axe to grind and can simply stand back and say, as many people likely feel, "that is one helluva ride for one so young to make."

beauzero 12y ago

Good for you. When it's not fun anymore...it's just not fun anymore.

dsego 12y ago

He could've given a share to Zachary Barth. Just saying.

GigabyteCoin 12y ago

>If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately. This reminds me of the unwanted flappy-bird fame. What a strange idea for an entrepreneurial mind to read.

hyp0 12y ago

I love Notch. But since I don't know him, it's for what he represents; how he's handled success, knowing his values and acting on them. Poor guy can't help being a symbol - a bit like Life of Brian

god_bless_texas 12y ago

I'm sorry, but did notch go on reddit and indicate that Minecraft sold for 2.5B. That bastard.

naiyt 12y ago
Huh? What are you talking about? This is his Reddit account: https://www.reddit.com/user/xnotch https://www.reddit.com/user/xnotch Three comments since the announcement that have nothing to do with the money.

ryan-allen 12y ago

I say good luck to him I say. Everyone has the right to make their own choices, and I hope he has a good time post-mojang. A lot of people have thoroughly enjoyed Minecraft, it's a true phenomenon. Hopefully Microsoft do a good job keeping it going (and more importantly, improving it, of which I suspect they'll do a pretty ace job).

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jackvalentine 12y ago

The only real response I feel is appropriate: "Fair enough. Have fun with what you're going to do in the future."

seanv 12y ago

i can respect that, can't argue with honesty.

AnonJ 12y ago

I think what people dislike about this statement is how downbeat and escapist he sounds. > If I ever accidentally make something that seems to gain traction, I’ll probably abandon it immediately. Frankly I can't think of anybody who would be glad to hear such a almost childish and impetus irresponsible statement. Not to mention from the mouth of somebody who created so many wonderful things altogether.