Mojang Selling Out

[owsf2000]

That subject probably says it a bit more harsher than I really intend it but no matter how I try to word it, it's all the same.

Apparently Microsoft is close to closing a deal to buy Mojang for 2 billion.

Apparently this has been in the works for a few weeks now. That's long enough to cover the whole bukkit shakedown and the GPL DMCAing going on for bukkit to help ensure it comes to a halt. I wonder if these guys knew about the deal... And I wonder if that's the main reason for the sudden intention for Mojang to start enforcing the eula.

So I guess I'll make a few predictions.

1. Minecraft popularity will likely begin a headlong crash.

2. There will probably be a move away from java into windows-specific programs.

3. I will start to become more productive again as my interest in the game starts to dwindle with the loss of bukkit plugins and a large, diverse plugin/mod community.

In all honesty I see a major clampdown on all mods and plugins in the future.

Regardless of their other games, Mojang is basically Minecraft. They're shooting themselves in the foot in the long run (Some ACs on Slashdot appear to be claiming to be on the inside, thus posting as AC, and seem to indicate that the devs are basically being let go when this goes through. Something about Microsoft not being interested in amateur indie java programmers.)

Oh well. 2 Billion for Notch and a couple others. I hope Notch plans on retirement because I honestly don't think he'll be able to repeat this kind of success or even produce anything to hold a candle to it.

Comments

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

Just about the only good thing I can say about this is: "At least it's not EA that's buying them." But then, that's kind of like saying it's better for someone to piss up your nose than to shit up it. The end result will essentially be identical, i.e. the death of Mojang and the destruction/whoring out of Minecraft into a soulless husk of its former self, so when all is said and done it really won't matter either way, I guess.

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

"If Microsoft Buys Mojang, Notch is 'Unlikely' to Remain at Company" (http://nichegamer.net/2014/09/if-microsoft-buys-mojang-notch-is-unlikely-to-remain-at-company/)

I wonder if that's because he'd be leaving of his own accord, or because they'd be kicking him to the curb.

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

So yeah, right after I found that, I found this (http://www.pcgamer.com/2014/09/10/notch-approached-microsoft-about-rumored-mojang-buyout-says-bloomberg/).

Fuck Notch forever, if that's true.

As someone in the comments under that speculated, this could also explain Notch's about face on the whole "Facebook buys Occulus for $2 Billion" thing. (http://www.pcgamer.com/2014/08/18/notch-is-over-being-upset-minecraft-on-oculus-rift-may-happen-after-all/)

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

Got into a drunk argument with @Bopogamel (https://twitter.com/Bopogamel) about at what price I would sell out, and @PoiPoiChen (https://twitter.com/PoiPoiChen) got a bit worried.

— Markus Persson (@notch) December 18, 2012 (https://twitter.com/notch/status/281139274051633154)

Anyway, my price is two billion dollars. Give me two billion dollars, and I'll endorse your crap.

— Markus Persson (@notch) December 18, 2012 (https://twitter.com/notch/status/281139739304800256)

[owsf2000.livejournal.com]

As the article in your other reply mentions, it looks like he's leaving on his own. I'd presume his staying around at all will basically be in the deal to make sure the new owners know how things use to be run before they go change and ruin everything.

I honestly don't know what makes people cash out on a $100M/year company when they're making millions themselves. I should really develop an awesome must have game, get it to go viral among the population, make hundreds of millions of dollars... just to see if I'd be tempted to sell out as well.

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

A semi-interesting little anecdote: The other day, when I was in town doing some shopping with my mom, I checked the book section in K-Mart and saw some of these things (http://minecraft.gamepedia.com/Minecraft_Books) sitting on the shelf. First time I'd ever seen them, or even knew of their existence. My initial reaction was "Why the hell would anyone pay $8 a pop for a book about how to play Minecraft when they can just look any of that shit up on the wiki for free? Does Mojang really need the money so much that they're willing to essentially scam little kids (or the Internet-illiterate parents of little kids) out of money like this?" I really never expected Mojang would go the route of releasing a lame "strategy guide" (and not just one, but a whole series of them, for $8 a piece) for their game like so many of the AAA-games out there.

Well... fast forward to now... it's not so surprising in retrospect. Maybe they did "need" the money so much, after all.

Anyway, I now think, as you do, that pretty much all of the recent news to come out about Mojang (their sudden interest in enforcing the EULA, the, at the time, seemingly petty and buttmad attitude of the bukkit guys about it [and I wonder if those guys knew this MS deal was in the works all along, which could be part of the reason why they were reacting as they were in the first place]) was all just a prelude to this news about them being bought by Microsoft.

Essentially, if I wasn't already mostly done with Minecraft anyway even before all of this, I certainly would be now. I'll just say the same thing that I said when BioWare got bought by EA (http://kane-magus.livejournal.com/160419.html): "This won't end well, mark my words."

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

In any case, I expect a Notch blog (http://notch.net/) post to come relatively soon, in which I predict he will do either one of two things. He'll either be super conciliatory and faux apologetic, hemming and hawing about how this is actually somehow a good thing. Or he'll just straight up don the black hat entirely and tell everyone to fuck right off, he's got his. At this point, I'm honestly not sure which will be more likely.

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

Heh, with Mojang being bought by Microsoft, they certainly are a whole lot closer to being "literally worse than EA" than they were when that currently topmost blog post (http://notch.net/2014/06/literally-worse-than-ea/) was written. I don't think Microsoft is worse than EA. I do think Microsoft is roughly a lateral equivalent to EA, though. So... not "literally worse than EA" but "literally about the same as EA," I guess.

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

Holy shit. From that same blog post:

"Mojang does not exist to make as much money as possible for the owners. As the majority shareholder, I’d know. Every time a big money making deal comes up that would make a lot of money, it’s of course very tempting, but at the end of the day we choose to do what either makes the most sense for our products, or the things that seem like fun for us at Mojang."

Ha ha ha, man, I'd forgotten that he'd said that. Wow. How the winds have changed three short months later.

[owsf2000.livejournal.com]

Fun thing is, iirc, it was a short "few" months ago when Notch approached Microsoft to begin this whole buy out. Wonder if he said that before or after emailing Microsoft.

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

Yeah, so it's probably less him changing his mind and more him being a hypocritical asshole all along.

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

Okay, so I was wrong. His newest blog post is about something completely unrelated (http://notch.net/2014/09/doom/) to the Microsoft thing. With the timing of this post, though, I still see it as little more than him saying "See?! I'm still a game developer! I'm still making games! Sort of! I haven't sold out! Not really! Don't hate me!" without even mentioning any of that. There's still a high likelihood that he'll eventually make one or the other posts I predicted above, though.

"I’ve been streaming most of the development on hitbox.tv. There’s a a friendly and reasonably regular crowd of people hanging out there watching me work, and I feel like moving on to a new project might be letting them down. Hopefully at least some of them are more interested in the journey I take than the product of that work. If I do move on to something new, I’m sure someone with more patience than me to see things through can take over the project." (emphasis mine)

Translation: "Sort of like how selling Mojang to Microsoft, which I'm not going to mention at all in this post even though it's obviously going to be the thing that everyone is expecting me to talk about, is letting a whole lot more people down, but I hope those people also stick with me anyway because my journey is more important than the product of my work. Other people will handle Mojang and Minecraft while I'm off enjoying my $2B."

Riiiiight. ¬_¬

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

Ah, there (http://notch.net/2014/09/im-leaving-mojang/) is the response I was expecting. I see he mostly decided to go with the "boo hoo hoo you guys are so mean I'm taking my ball and going home" (http://kane-magus.livejournal.com/602143.html) route.

I still don't understand why he had to flush his game and company down the toilet in the process, though. Well, you know, aside from the $2,000,000,000, of course.

[kane-magus.livejournal.com]

And here (https://mojang.com/2014/09/yes-were-being-bought-by-microsoft/) are Mojang's "official" reasons for why they sold out to Microsoft. I don't even care enough anymore to make an actual post about this.