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Microsoft Near Deal to Buy Minecraft Maker Mojang

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Re: Microsoft Near Deal to Buy Minecraft Maker Mojang

#131

Post by ekianjo »

javert wrote: post #92
berns wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Helping others. There is no limit to that.

I bet Bill Gates has a hard time finding enough qualified people to wisely manage the money he is giving away. For example, if he has someone in charge of spending money on medical research, don't you think there is a point (a few billion) where they just don't know what else to spend money on? I mean, there are only so many medical researchers in the whole world. Of course you can always just throw money away/at peo…

> I bet Bill Gates has a hard time finding enough qualified people to wisely manage the money he is giving away.

That's hardly surprising. Managing money is investing, and wise investment requires a lot of skills, market information, and connections. There's only so many good investors out there.

Re: Microsoft Near Deal to Buy Minecraft Maker Mojang

#133

Post by drzaiusapelord »

math0ne wrote: post #94

As an avid minecrafter since the early days I can't help but see this as a good thing. The mod community is what has made mc what it is, but it gets no support from the developers. Minecraft has been so wildly profitable but the company is set up in a way which Mojang the developers get a tiny portion of the profits to re-invest in development. Notch essentially diverts all the money into his own pocket while leaving…

Agreed. This could be a win-win situation for both minecraft and MS. I have a short writeup here:

http://nothingjustworks.com/why-ms-would-want-minecraft-and-...

Re: Microsoft Near Deal to Buy Minecraft Maker Mojang

#134

Post by knodi »

georgemcbay wrote: post #33
Mandatum wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it fair to say that once you achieve "FU money", numbers start to lose their value? I can't imagine being able to say "no" to something like that. Although likely for something like Minecraft, it'd be stock options/cash mix.

I don't have any "FU money", but it seems very likely to me that once you have that sort of money, there are only a couple of reasons to run it up any further: 1) You have "Big Plans" that need funding (eg. Elon Musk) 2) Running up the numbers as a life gamification to "beat" your peers, or just because you can't stop chasing yourself, like one of those freak beast weightlifters that looks like a space monster but is…

The thing is money is the best drug known to man. One you get big numbers you never want it to stop. You just keep fighting for bigger and bigger numbers.

Re: Microsoft Near Deal to Buy Minecraft Maker Mojang

#135

Post by jmcqk6 »

Fizzer wrote: post #36
mindstab wrote: post #19

I don't get it. Mojang already made "all the money" from selling minecraft and are largely maintaining it now. I haven't heard if they even have any new games on the way? The space one was cancelled. What exactly is MS possibly getting that could be worth $2B?

Most likely a free-to-play Minecraft 2 that's loaded with microtransactions. Or retro-fitting microtransactions into the existing Minecraft.

They could probably do this pretty successfully following the tf2 model, where they bring in community contributions, but also pay the community contributors royalties.

Re: Microsoft Near Deal to Buy Minecraft Maker Mojang

#136

Post by berns »

javert wrote: post #92
berns wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Helping others. There is no limit to that.

I bet Bill Gates has a hard time finding enough qualified people to wisely manage the money he is giving away. For example, if he has someone in charge of spending money on medical research, don't you think there is a point (a few billion) where they just don't know what else to spend money on? I mean, there are only so many medical researchers in the whole world. Of course you can always just throw money away/at peo…

> Of course you can always just throw money away/at people, but it won't do any good. "Give a man a fish" vs. "teach a man to fish."

Yes, throwing fish at the poorest is the right thing to do. Malnourished children grow with diminished intellectual capacity. Then it is too late to teach them to fish.

Re: Microsoft Near Deal to Buy Minecraft Maker Mojang

#137

Post by simoncion »

makomk wrote: post #127
jwn wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for making me realize I'm not the only crotchety old bastard who bitches and moans about this! My kids are old enough to play Minecraft but too young to understand how to install mods. Speaking of that, I've looked into the mod making scene and it's rather disgusting. Mojang really dropped the ball by not having an official way to write mods/plugins. Instead we get a horrible client side mod environment (Mi…

Bukkit's dead now anyway. The entire development team decided to call it quits due to legal uncertainty and general exhaustion, then Mojang announced that they weren't allowed to do that because Bukkit was actually owned by Mojang and had a special deal which meant there were no legal issues, contradicting what they'd told people who asked privately. Then one of the main developers got pissed about the fact that he'd…

> This didn't stop Mojang from arguing that he had no legal right to do so, though. They're really keen on the whole free labour thing.

My read on the situation is this:

0) Bukkit people reverse-engineer MC code. MC code is non-GPL'd.

1) Bukkit people release RE'd MC code under GPL.

In order for the Bukkit folks to be able to relicense their code, they would have had to add a couple of steps, and rewrite step one:

0.25) Bukkit folks write a spec from the RE'd MC code.

0.75) Bukkit folks hand that spec to an unrelated third party who then implements that spec without any other input from Bukkit.

1) That third party releases their work under the GPL.

Re: Microsoft Near Deal to Buy Minecraft Maker Mojang

#138

Post by fafner »

math0ne wrote: post #94

As an avid minecrafter since the early days I can't help but see this as a good thing. The mod community is what has made mc what it is, but it gets no support from the developers. Minecraft has been so wildly profitable but the company is set up in a way which Mojang the developers get a tiny portion of the profits to re-invest in development. Notch essentially diverts all the money into his own pocket while leaving…

Well if Microsoft gets the rights to it we all know what will likely happen: It will be made exclusive for the XBox. Maybe not immediately but eventually.

Re: Microsoft Near Deal to Buy Minecraft Maker Mojang

#140

Post by TrevorJ »

otakucode wrote: post #120
Houshalter wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much would taxes take out of it though? An offer of 2 billion dollars is not equivalent to getting 2 billion in your bank account.

When you are dealing in billions, you don't pay taxes.

Oh come on. Not even gonna bother to ask you to back that up.
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