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Minecraft Creator Markus 'Notch' Persson Eradicated From Splash Text (arstechnica.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Microsoft has removed a trio of references to Markus "Notch" Persson, the creator of Minecraft, from the game's opening menu screen. Random messages known as "splash text" are printed in yellow on this screen, and they used to include "Made by Notch!", "The Work of Notch", and "110813!" (a reference to the day Persson got married), but now all three mentions are gone. Notch is still included in the game's credits, but the change means that Minecraft players will no longer be randomly referenced.

Persson first released the blocky building game in 2009. Five years later, after the game had become a global smash hit, he sold his company Mojang to Microsoft for $2.5 billion, giving Redmond ownership of Minecraft. The references to Notch have remained a feature until their removal in this latest patch. They're reported to have been removed both from the original Java edition played on PCs and the legacy console edition used on PlayStation 4. No official rationale has been offered for the change, but Persson has become something of a polarizing figure on Twitter...

116 of 342 comments (clear)

  1. RedPill by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Microsoft doesn't want to continue to weather the based red-pilled notch in a predominantly blue-pilled society any longer.

    1. Re:RedPill by jawtheshark · · Score: 2

      predominantly blue-pilled society

      ... but is that actually so? Talk to people privately, talk to them behind closed doors and see what they really think. You'll be surprised.

      It is not because the media tells us that "blue pill" is the right way, that the average person actually swallows it.

      --
      Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
    2. Re:RedPill by Opportunist · · Score: 1

      Anyone able to translate for people who're not interested enough to understand jargon nor follow the life of some game creator?

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    3. Re:RedPill by GrandCow · · Score: 2, Informative

      Anyone able to translate for people who're not interested enough to understand jargon nor follow the life of some game creator?



      Notch has some incredibly stupid personal ideas about society, backed up by reading a subforum on reddit that is filled with shitty people and creating an echo chamber of "I deserve to get laid by women" instead of treating women like normal human beings. This shitty thinking extends to white nationalism as well, because SURPRISE: most of them are sheltered white young males with little to no empathy, claiming there is a conspiracy against white people and they have to get ready for an upcoming race war.

      They use The Matrix as a way to show that they are informed of the "real world" and believe these shitty ideas, aka taking the red pill and seeing how deep the rabbit hole goes.
      --
      "Well kids, you tried your best, and you failed. The lesson is, never try." -Homer Simpson
    4. Re:RedPill by Cederic · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Yeah, MGTOW are totally into.. wait, it's in their name. They're into not raping women, even by modern feminist doctrine that all sex is rape.

      What misogynists, denying basic participation in rape culture to women.

    5. Re:RedPill by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      Uhm, there are millions of Africans moving to India.
      You probably don't think the surrounding countries took the largest wave of the Syrian refugee crisis either.

      As for the "Africans" in the US they didn't exactly go there by choice.
      White people "invited" them forcefully.

    6. Re:RedPill by Cederic · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Marcus has such extreme financial security that he no longer needs to worry about whether he upsets people.

      This means that he speaks his mind openly and his views transgress the politically correct viewpoints expected of public figures on social media.

      Notably he calls out what he perceives to be silliness and lies when people attack the industry he's helped shape on the topics such as sexism, racism, professional ethics or daring to actually suggest that certain business practices are damaging to customers.

      That upsets the echo chambers.

    7. Re:RedPill by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I don't participate in these forums so cannot comment on that but wiki has an article on him where it says that he was criticized for statements like: 'it is ok to be white' and support for 'heterosexual pride day. All things that show his white privilege. Come to think of it he is probably guilty of many other thought crimes. You should just go on with this nonsense and see where it all gets us. Let us hope the marxists so prevalent in modern academia and media will not cause massive slaughter typical of this ideology. As for pills you take - I am not sure how relevant that is here. Go to a doctor to find out if you take proper one.

    8. Re:RedPill by Cmdln+Daco · · Score: 1

      The red/blue mapping the media uses in US politics used to be switched regularly, because the colors themselves are meaningless.

      Whoops, the colors are meaningless either way. It's Goldman Sachs versus Free Market capitalism.

    9. Re:RedPill by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1, Informative

      Actually there are different kinds of MGTOW, some of whom do have relations with women.

      Modern feminism is sex-positive, you are thinking of one radical feminist who didn't actually think men and women should stop having sex, decades ago.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    10. Re: RedPill by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Imagine if more than 50% believed it

      That would be crazy, you would end up with Trump as prez and Brexit in Europe

      That could never happen...

    11. Re:RedPill by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      What he says is bog standard right wing PC & right wing SJW language.

    12. Re:RedPill by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1, Informative

      Do you know what TERF stands or? The "R" is for "radical", as in not part of the mainstream movement.

      Of course not all feminists are sex-positive, which is how it should be. It's not a church, it's a body of work and a philosophy that many choose to follow and of course there will be a diverse range of views in it.

      That doesn't make your statement any less false though.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    13. Re:RedPill by squiggleslash · · Score: 3, Informative

      Red Pill is a term used by the "Manosphere" ("MRAs", Incels, etc) to describe their version of the world, which is a reference to an old, classic, movie from decades ago called The Matrix whereby the hero takes a "red pill" and suddenly finds out that the world is fake. MRAs believe that there's no sexism against women, and in fact women secretly rule the world, something in conflict with the view most people have of the world.

      Basically the GP is saying that Notch is a bit of an MRA/alt-righter these days, which is more or less correct.

      Microsoft, being a corporate entity that doesn't want the secret conspiracy of Hispanic Black Jewish Muslim One-legged Lesbians that really runs the world to close them down (or alternatively doesn't want people in general to think they have polarizing political views) is putting some distance between them and Notch with this change. And that's fine, Notch knew that he was losing creative control of Minecraft when he sold it, and knows that Microsoft is unlikely to want to associate with him if he posts "unpopular" political comments all the time.

      --
      You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
    14. Re:RedPill by GameboyRMH · · Score: 2

      Notch has deplorable views, MS wants to minimize its association with said views.

      https://www.dailydot.com/irl/m...

      HTH

      --
      "When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
    15. Re:RedPill by jythie · · Score: 1

      yet when you got into MGTOW spaces, pretty much all they talk about is women and how much they want sex. MGTOW only ever seem to complain about women daring to exist in their world for anything other than sex.

    16. Re:RedPill by jythie · · Score: 2

      Eh, I would not really call that a modern infection, but an old slowly dieing one. The sex negative branch of feminism has bit by bit fading and has been for decades. It just keeps getting more and more focus by anti-feminists. But within feminism it is next to extinct.

    17. Re: RedPill by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Then you sex-positive feminazis should work hard to deplatform the VERY vocal sex-negative feminazis. They're giving you a bad (even worse, that is) reputation.

    18. Re:RedPill by elrous0 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Do you know what TERF stands or? The "R" is for "radical", as in not part of the mainstream movement.

      I would hardly call Martina Navratilova a "radical." Until about 5 minutes ago, she was considered a popular mainstream lesbian, a moderate feminist, and a darling of the LGBTQ community. Now suddenly, she's being called a Nazi-transphobe "radical" for daring to suggest that boys have a penis and girls have a vagina.

      --
      SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
    19. Re:RedPill by elrous0 · · Score: 2, Informative

      Anyone able to translate for people who're not interested enough to understand jargon nor follow the life of some game creator?

      Translation: He had the temerity to actually publicly admit that he voted for Donald Trump instead of Her Divine Holiness, which makes him racist-sexist-homophobic-puppie-kicking-worse-than-Hitler.

      --
      SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
    20. Re:RedPill by elrous0 · · Score: 1

      Oh yeah, the Chinese are famous for their love of Africans.

      --
      SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
    21. Re:RedPill by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      Always bringing Nazis into it...

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    22. Re:RedPill by elrous0 · · Score: 1

      Always bringing Nazis into it...

      LOL, it's your side who goes there, not us.

      --
      SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
    23. Re:RedPill by Opportunist · · Score: 1

      So ... just the usual internet kindergarden bickering. Gotcha.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    24. Re:RedPill by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      I dunno, it sure does seem like you are the one bringing it up most of the time, along with the "straight white male" trope that's in your signature right now. You seem kinda obsessed.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    25. Re:RedPill by lgw · · Score: 1

      Do you know what TERF stands or? The "R" is for "radical", as in not part of the mainstream movement.

      You know the term itself is new, and derogatory, right? It's what they got called when they were thrown out. As I said, they are no longer part of the mainstream movement because they were thrown out. Their views were perfectly mainstream 10 years ago.

      Of course not all feminists are sex-positive, which is how it should be. It's not a church,

      You do know that most churches are sex-positive, right? Just "within marriage". Which is how it should be, it's not like a church is a progressive movement where no disagreement is tolerated.

      That doesn't make your statement any less false though.

      What statement? That there are sex-negative feminists? Who condemn pornography, sex workers, and all that sort of thing? Of course there are. Or did you mean something else?

      --
      Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
    26. Re:RedPill by lgw · · Score: 1

      Drink! Amimojo pulls from alt-right playbook! This one's where he switches topics and trying to control the conversation.

      Dude. C'mon. Even on Slashdot there have to be limits. You can't go around encouraging people to play the Amimojo drinking game - people will die of alcohol poisoning!

      --
      Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
    27. Re: RedPill by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Non-chinese are always and forever second class citizens in China.

      We Americans are the Borg. You will be assimilated. Your genetic and cultural distinctiveness will be added to our own.

      We are not perfect. But we sure as fuck don't care what color you are or where your parents were born.

      Come, be one of us. Be an American. But you can't go back, you're an American now. Welcome!

    28. Re:RedPill by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1, Troll

      Only if you think opposing racism and sexism is bad... And by the way you say "I presume" it kinda sounds like you do.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    29. Re:RedPill by serviscope_minor · · Score: 2

      Nah just the double standards I'd expect from you.

      Any non trivial group will have an extremist. You don't like feminists so you essentially paint the extremists as representatives of the whole. But you identify as right wing yet you don't paint the extremists as representative of you.

      Just another blowhard with double standards.

      What you'll most likely do now is excuse me of something random (because SJW or some such nonsense) and then utterly fall to present any evidence for it.

      --
      SJW n. One who posts facts.
    30. Re:RedPill by serviscope_minor · · Score: 2

      Red Pill is a term used by the "Manosphere" ("MRAs", Incels, etc) to describe their version of the world, which is a reference to an old, classic, movie from decades ago called The Matrix whereby the hero takes a "red pill" and suddenly finds out that the world is fake.

      The ironic thing is that a big part of it is that the identity forced on you by your surroundings is fake and instead identity comes from within. This is the compete antithesis of what red pillers seem to believe.

      Re watching the matrix 15 years later knowing the directors are both trans made some of the themes that were always there a lot more obvious.

      --
      SJW n. One who posts facts.
    31. Re:RedPill by serviscope_minor · · Score: 1

      Your guy won the election. Why are you so incredibly sore about it?

      --
      SJW n. One who posts facts.
    32. Re:RedPill by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      MRAs believe that there's no sexism against women

      Some do. Most don't.

      and in fact women secretly rule the world

      Of course they do. Most of what men do is for women. Look at how celibate bachelors live compared to the general population. Look at how single women live. Now look at how both of them live together. It is women that get their way, not men.

      In the modern words of some of the greatest contemporary western sophists "Life ain't nothing but bitches and money." Even the most misogynist bastards of N.W.A admit that all they do is for women or to acquire the means to get women.

      Most modern male movements are equivalent to "Yeah, feminism worked out pretty well for women. How about we try that too and start taking care of ourselves first?" Naturally people who benefit from the status quo must brand them as the modern equivalent of witches to be burned.

    33. Re:RedPill by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I must be old, because I have absolutely no idea what this conversation is about. Now I know what regular folks feel like when I start rattling off tech acronyms.

    34. Re:RedPill by Actually,+I+do+RTFA · · Score: 2

      He had the temerity to actually publicly admit that he voted for Donald Trump

      I hope he didn't. He's not a US citizen.

      --
      Your ad here. Ask me how!
    35. Re: RedPill by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Everyone thumping their chests against bigotry tends to be a bigot.

      Trump gets roughly a quarter of Americans to vote for him? AMERICANS want a wall!

      Hillary gets roughly a quarter of Americans to vote for her? AMERICANS want dudes who look like ladies in girls' locker rooms!

      That's just the most obvious bigotry of identity politics.

      Your average American if they even bothered showing up at the polls (nearly half eligible didn't) voted based on party rather than fringe issues.

      Your average gamer doesn't care one way or another if Notch is in splash text or if Final Fantasy won't have bouncing bunny boy cocks.

      Your average American is busy raising a family and figuring out what to make for dinner, not reeeeing over the patriarchy or complaining about child custody.

      Fringe bigots, however, always insist they're the majority - the o my truth there is that they are the majority of screeching whiners.

      But back to the topic at hand: Microsoft is ditching Notch from splash text not because zomg erryone; they're doing it because it will avoid a media screechfest while at the same time... the majority of people don't give a fuck either way.

    36. Re:RedPill by squiggleslash · · Score: 1, Insightful

      They were like this in 2004 as well. They're always bitching, even when, as they were for 2017-2018, running all three branches of government.

      These are just not nice people, as you can also tell from their attitudes towards family separations. If they're not denying it's happening, or claiming Obama did it too, they're making up excuses and blaming the people fleeing terror.

      --
      You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
    37. Re:RedPill by SuricouRaven · · Score: 1

      "Punch a commie. The only good commie is the one your fist is connecting with right this second. As soon as you're no longer in contact, they are bad again. Help them be good. " - Notch.

      "How anyone is still on the left now that they're advocating infanticide and claim walls don't work is a mystery to me." - Notch

    38. Re:RedPill by lgw · · Score: 2, Interesting

      OK, WTF Slashdot - the politics has gotten nuts. This needs to stop.

      The statement "some feminists are sex-negative", true or false, is not trolling.

      There is no fucking mod choice on Slashdot for "fact that, if true, makes my political position look bad". OK, I lie, there is: the "Interesting" mod.

      If we don't stop this modding-by-politics shit, we will become Digg. And, dammit, we're better than that.

      --
      Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
    39. Re:RedPill by elrous0 · · Score: 1

      I'm pretty sure the punch a commie remark was a parody of the Left's infamous "punch a Nazi" meme.

      But I'm going to throw out a radical idea here and advocate that it's not okay to go around punching either one.

      --
      SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
    40. Re:RedPill by Cederic · · Score: 1

      Well, the email I just received tells me that the two posts I made in this discussion this morning have since received 22 moderations between them, split broadly equal. They're both currently sat at +2 Interesting.

      It's an insane level of moderation, especially for two relatively innocuous posts. Oh well.

    41. Re:RedPill by SuricouRaven · · Score: 1

      Commie, nazi... either way, not something that a multinational mega-corp wants to be seen endorsing.

    42. Re:RedPill by mapkinase · · Score: 1

      we will become Digg

      Or any other Web2.0 platform (see, I can also use anachronistic name drops)

      --
      I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
    43. Re: RedPill by muridae · · Score: 1

      Modern feminists do work to critique and counter the arguments of the anti-sex, anti-sexworker feminists of old. The problem is with boys who think "femnazi" is a form of address; who seem willing to ignore modern feminists and focus only on the stuff from twenty years ago that they can nit-pick to prove their points.

    44. Re:RedPill by lgw · · Score: 1

      Marriage is the proven recipe for keeping a community going across generations. There may be other ways that work, but most clever ideas haven't worked out.

      I agree, in modern society there's not really anything in it for the man. Seems like a problem to be solved, if you ask me.

      --
      Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
  2. He got paid by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So it's ok if they do whatever they want with the game. They own it. He's still in the credits and they're not trying to say he didn't make it so... This isn't much of a story. For $2.5 billion you can take my name off my birth certificate, I wouldn't care.

    1. Re:He got paid by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      You could say they used a notch filter.

  3. Totalitarians don't like notch by Kohath · · Score: 1, Troll

    This is my favorite tweet:

    https://mobile.twitter.com/not...

    I wonder if Microsoft is in CYA mode or full totalitarian true believer mode?

    1. Re:Totalitarians don't like notch by Hands+of+Blue · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Presumably they've just decided that referencing Notch any more than they are legally-obligated to will bring them more problems than benefits.

      So, yeah, CYA mode.

      There are going to be a lot of people saying that Microsoft are "pandering to snowflakes" (or whatever the current jargon is) but any time a company "takes a step for more inclusivity" or the like it's only ever been about optics.
      They've never really cared about anyone's cause—save their own.

    2. Re:Totalitarians don't like notch by Kohath · · Score: 1

      If it was google, there would be no question. Everyone knows they are true believers.

    3. Re:Totalitarians don't like notch by serviscope_minor · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Seems unremarkable to me. What secifically are you referring to?

      --
      SJW n. One who posts facts.
    4. Re:Totalitarians don't like notch by Kohath · · Score: 1

      "Totalitarians" (by which I assume they mean "People who are against concentration camps, stealing the children of desperate people, against people being executed because they're the wrong "race", against women being excluded from employment, etc")

      This is exactly guilt-by-association. If you’re against censorship and guilt-by-association (definition: people being declared guilty of whatever random thing regardless of the fact that they didn't do that thing) then squiggleslash (and the hate movement squiggleslash is advancing) says you love concentration camps.

      The squiggleslash message is: you will obey

      If you ever want to make your own decisions or think your own thoughts in the future, you should reject censorship and guilt-by-association and other similar totalitarian tactics.

    5. Re:Totalitarians don't like notch by serviscope_minor · · Score: 1

      Seriously why the heck is this modded troll? I presume because I'm not blindly agreeing with the parent, but I've still literally no idea what I even should be agreeing to.

      Maybe it's because its referencing some meme I'm not familiar with or perhaps there's some context I am missing due to Twitter's aggressively poor user interface.

      --
      SJW n. One who posts facts.
    6. Re:Totalitarians don't like notch by serviscope_minor · · Score: 2

      You have an over developed sense of something. All I see is someone correcting someone else about their net worth. If that's your favorite tweet then you have an incredibly dull sense of humor.

      This doesn't seem to be sticking it to anyone particularly hard.

      Seriously why on earth do you think this is such a marvelous tweet.

      --
      SJW n. One who posts facts.
    7. Re:Totalitarians don't like notch by squiggleslash · · Score: 1

      The squiggleslash message is: you will obey

      And I'm the one being modded troll?

      What the hell is wrong with you?

      --
      You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
  4. Splash Text by phantomfive · · Score: 1

    The worst Splash Text I've seen there is one that proudly declared, "Open Source!" Considering the history behind it, I nearly reached through the screen and stabbed Microsoft.

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    1. Re:Splash Text by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      The worst Splash Text I've seen there is one that proudly declared, "Open Source!" Considering the history behind it, I nearly reached through the screen and stabbed Microsoft.

      That was added way back in Indev long before release, and before microsoft bought them.
      It was completely a notch/mojang 'joke'

      But you'll be happy to know that before release 1.0 the "open source!" message was changed to "closed source!"

      If you open the minecraft JAR there is a 'texts' folder in the assets and a 'splashes.txt' file with all the messages. You can see for yourself it isn't there anymore.

      Also worth noting, microsoft manages the day to day work on the bedrock edition of minecraft, the one in c++ or c# or whatever, that's on the consoles and labeled win10 only for windows.
      Mojang still manages day to day for the java edition, and mainly answers to microsoft as one would expect from a parent/child company relationship.

    2. Re:Splash Text by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Notch based his prototype of Minecraft on leaked source code from Infiniminer -- another block-based mining game, by lone indie Zachtronics, with similar fluid / lava mechanics, but with a combat focus and trampolines. So, technically, Minecraft should have been open source the whole time...

      Buy a Zachtronics game if you do or do not like Minecraft, he's made a cool hacking game recently slashdaugters might like.

  5. Who cares? by Gravis+Zero · · Score: 1

    Seriously, does anyone here actually care? If so, why do you care? Do you feel his compensation insufficient for the game?

    --
    Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
  6. News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by UnknownSoldier · · Score: 5, Informative

    I love Minecraft but Why is this even news??

    Founders leave their companies all the time. Is the company under some "moral obligation" to keep a reference to the founder for all perpetuity??

    He's still listed in the credits, so who gives a fuck if his name has been removed from the Splash page?

    Is Bill Gates listed in the credits for Windows, Excel, Word, etc?

    --
    The Lie of Judaism: God commanded his children to kill one another.

    1. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      "Is the company under some "moral obligation" to keep a reference to the founder for all perpetuity??"
      Yes, ask Sid Meier.

    2. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by fenrif · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I love Minecraft but Why is this even news??

      Because it's part of a wider and very worrying trend of tech companies deciding to expunge people from the record for wrongthink.

    3. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Notch is a bit beyond just having unpopular opinions.
      He needs some serious psychiatric help and it is probably too late now. He could have used it years ago.
      From what I have heard he was a bit "off" even before he started Minecraft but it has really started to show the last few years.

      That guy is a nutcase.

    4. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by slack_justyb · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Because it's part of a wider and very worrying trend of tech companies deciding to expunge people from the record

      Oh buddy do I have news for you. None of this is new. Like not even this century new. Companies just vanishing you from all code is pretty par at least since I've been programming (~ late 70s).

      wrongthink

      Have you read some of his tweets? I mean it's not really important, but have you read some of his tweets? I could maybe understand if he's apologetic about some of them, but nah, he seems totally fine with some choice racial slurs. That being said, he's totally free to say what he wants but Microsoft is free to do whatever they want with the code they bought from him for ~$1B. Do remember he sold his company lock, stock, and barrel to Microsoft so, I think that kind of entitles them to vanish his ass if they so wish it. I think they were leaving it in just to be nice, but ya know, push come to shove. Either way, dude got his money and ran. Now he's on Twitter whining about "injustice". Maybe he's making a pitch to be noticed again? Maybe not. I won't pretend to know what his motives are or if he's truly lost his ever loving mind from all the money (because he does bring up the fact that he's a billionaire quite often on Twitter). It's Microsoft's code, Notch can kick rocks and go say whatever he wants to say. Microsoft still gets to do whatever they want with their code. That's what it means when you completely sell out.

    5. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You use the word "wrongthink" like you've read Orwell but, if you have, you've clearly got no fucking idea what he was on about.

      1984 is scary because the party is controlling everything you do and changing society so that you can't think any other way.

      This is a company ditching an association with someone they don't think fits their brand.

      No-one is controlling what Notch is doing. He *literally* sold his right to control what happens to Minecraft.

      It's kind of the opposite of what you're suggesting. Everyone involved in this story is exercising their freedom. Notch is still free to say whatever it is he says on Twitter (I don't follow him so I've no idea what it is). MS is still free to say (or not to say) whatever it wants on its software.

    6. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by religionofpeas · · Score: 1

      For $2.5 billion, I'll gladly let Microsoft remove my name from the splash screen.

    7. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by houghi · · Score: 1

      If Google gives me 2.5 billion, they can remove me from the Internet.

      --
      Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
    8. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Yea Freeze Peach! We should be like NZ and throw people in prison for sharing stuff we don't like. Then just wipe everything about them off the internet. Like they never existed.If you don't want to live in that society, you're a deplorable racist.

    9. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by JeffSh · · Score: 4, Insightful

      i dont think its about expunging.

      Minecraft was sold in 2014, so that is 5 years ago. The continued references to Notch as "The Creator" is more and more offensive to the TEAM behind Minecraft today. Notch was responsible for the early days of Minecraft, but we are approaching the break-even point between Notch's cumulative time and the Mojang team's cumulative time.

      It's an appropriate point to begin to define Notch's contributions appropriately in context of the total time of Minecrafts existence.

    10. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by Kohath · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Wrongthink is exactly the right term.

      We should ask ourselves:

      Is there any evidence Notch mistreated anyone based on their membership in a 'protected status' group? Any evidence at all? Who was mistreated? What was the date and time? What action did Notch take against this person? What indicates his motive in this incident?

      Do any of the people complaining about Notch answer any of these questions?

      Should someone who didn’t do anything to hurt anyone be considered guilty?

      Notch brought joy to like half a billion people. What did Notch's detractors ever do for anyone?

    11. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I love Minecraft but Why is this even news??

      Because it's part of a wider and very worrying trend of tech companies deciding to expunge people from the record for wrongthink.

      I worry more about the wider and very worrying trend of tin-foil nutters deciding to eviscerate companies based on assumptions.

      You know, like you're doing right now.

      He's still (rightfully) listed in the credits. It's been years since MS purchased his company. They're under no obligation to maintain "splash" silliness, and could have removed it on day one if they felt like it. It's their fucking product.

      Not sure why we have to assume the worst here. Would you care to provide any proof to back up your claim that he was expunged for "wrongthink"? One would think if they wanted to actually sever ties with him for that reason, he wouldn't be referenced or credited anywhere in their product.

    12. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      Because it's part of a wider and very worrying trend of tech companies deciding to expunge people from the record for wrongthink.

      Or maybe they paid $2.5bn for not having to give credit to some dude they no longer care about. .... nah must be some wrongthink conspiracy.

    13. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Oh buddy do I have news for you. None of this is new. Like not even this century new. Companies just vanishing you from all code is pretty par at least since I've been programming (~ late 70s).

      Granted, although the word "trend" doesn't necessarily mean "new"; it does imply some degree of an increase, though.

      Have you read some of his tweets? I mean it's not really important, but have you read some of his tweets? I could maybe understand if he's apologetic about some of them, but nah, he seems totally fine with some choice racial slurs.

      So? You're just reinforcing the point that it's okay because it's wrongthink. There's a reason whitewashing history is bad: it creates the false impression that leaders, creators, etc are some sort of perfect being above fault, even gross human fault of almost unimaginable scale. It makes it harder to argue that this time when it happens it's not an aberration of human nature or history but the norm. It also just simply warps the narrative of human history which even if it had no negative effect seems like a bad thing. So, no, I don't understand at all how that's some sort of justification.

      That being said, he's totally free to say what he wants but Microsoft is free to do whatever they want with the code they bought from him for ~$1B. Do remember he sold his company lock, stock, and barrel to Microsoft so, I think that kind of entitles them to vanish his ass if they so wish it. I think they were leaving it in just to be nice, but ya know, push come to shove. Either way, dude got his money and ran.

      There's no real argument against this, but if notch went the other way and some very anti-racist, anti-sexist, etc and pushed hard against tech companies in general that'd also be news. Why? Because people give a shit what people with money say, especially when other people with money seem to go against them. That's the fundamental dynamic being discussed. If that were not the perspective, we'd all ignore notch and MS alike and the splash screen would both likely never have been changed and likley no one would have noticed.

      Now he's on Twitter whining about "injustice". Maybe he's making a pitch to be noticed again? Maybe not. I won't pretend to know what his motives are or if he's truly lost his ever loving mind from all the money (because he does bring up the fact that he's a billionaire quite often on Twitter). It's Microsoft's code, Notch can kick rocks and go say whatever he wants to say. Microsoft still gets to do whatever they want with their code. That's what it means when you completely sell out.

      Apparently selling out doesn't stop people from following you on Twitter. Perhaps it's because people tend to be vultures who circle around such people or are sycophants who think they can learn from such masters of "gaming" the system. Regardless, if the goal was to fundamentally move towards making people ignore notch more, it failed at least in the short term. In the long term, who knows. Honestly, I don't care what notch's personal opinion is on most subjects just like most people shouldn't care what mine are. I do care if he were to actually start working on new projects because then that functional aspect would matter.

    14. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I now understand why your parents hate you.

    15. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by nitehawk214 · · Score: 1

      For 2.5 billion, Microsoft can expunge me all they want.

      (That is some fetish thing, right?)

      --
      I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
    16. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Founders leave their companies all the time. Is the company under some "moral obligation" to keep a reference to the founder for all perpetuity??

      It's just a reminder that Notch is a liar. He promised that he would open source Minecraft when he was done with it. Instead, he sold it to Microsoft. I, for one, bought Minecraft while that promise was still on its webpages.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    17. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I find what's going on less 1984 and more Fahrenheit 451. Unfortunately, Fahrenheit 451 is a fair bit more subtle and the average person tends not to get it. It's also rather more insidious.

    18. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by Actually,+I+do+RTFA · · Score: 2

      Notch brought joy to like half a billion people

      Why is that relevant. Do we give passes on behavior just because of other behavior that's good? What's next, "person X saved 20 children from drowning, so here's a gift certificate for 2 free murders?"

      --
      Your ad here. Ask me how!
    19. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by Kohath · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Why is that relevant. Do we give passes on behavior ...

      What behavior, specifically, are you talking about? What was the date and time of this behavior? How many people were injured?

      Details please. Because if this is just general totalitarian bitching about someone taking offense instead of being cool, then you're damn right Notch should "get a pass" for someone's (opportunistically) hurt feelings for all the millions of people's lives he made a little bit better.

    20. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by Actually,+I+do+RTFA · · Score: 1

      I honestly don't know what the fuck Notch did. I know that people are upset with him. I also know that you aren't really weighing whether Notch should "get a pass", it's that you don't feel what he's been accused of is important. Which, depending on what he did, may be a defensible position, but has nothing to do with his experience as a game designer.

      --
      Your ad here. Ask me how!
    21. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by mapkinase · · Score: 1

      1984 is scary because the party is controlling everything

      Right and since the book was written by a New Age prophet (see what I did here, he did not live in the time of New Age), everything must be and only be in the way he wrote.

      Corporations are not very different from totalitarian states and at some point become indistinguishable.

      That's why they need to be regulated, that's why if you love free speech you must love the government that does not allow this sort of thing. Remember another Marx saying that government is nothing but a gang of armed people. What he did not say is that one gang is always better than many. That's the only way to maintain order.

      And government must stand up for people who are fired for their belief from companies exactly the same way it has laws for people being persecuted by government for their beliefs.

      Free speech does not mean anything when you limit it as "freedom from being persecuted by government".

      --
      I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
    22. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by mapkinase · · Score: 1

      You are a hateful commie piece of shit. Get lost, asshole.

      --
      I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
    23. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      Strawmanning /and/ gaslighting? I've outdone myself.

      I find it hard to see how Notch is a victim though. He sold the game to Microsoft, willingly giving up control of it. And with 3.7 million followers and a billion in the bank he doesn't seemed to have suffered much.

      "Mild irritation" isn't much of a qualification for victimhood.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    24. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by Highdude702 · · Score: 1

      If Microsoft gave me even 1 billion, they could use me as the fall guy for all their shitty security and should be illegal business practices. Hell I'll even volunteer to go to prison for a year or so!

    25. Re:News for nobody. Shit that doesn't matter. by UnknownSoldier · · Score: 2

      > That's a pretty priceless strawman, given that while Bill Gates may have a lot of micromanagement tendencies, he wasn't chiefly responsible for a lot of what made Windows, Excel, Word, etc.

      *Facepalm*

      1. Joel says otherwise

      "I don't know, you guys," Bill said, "Is anyone really looking into all the details of how to do this? Like, all those date and time functions. Excel has so many date and time functions. Is Basic going to have the same functions? Will they all work the same way?"

      "Yes," I said, "except for January and February, 1900."

      "OK. Well, good work," said Bill. He took his marked up copy of the specand left.

      :

        Bill Gates was amazingly technical. He understood Variants, and COM objects, and IDispatch and why Automation is different than vtables and why this might lead to dual interfaces. He worried about date functions. He didnâ(TM)t meddle in software if he trusted the people who were working on it, but you couldnâ(TM)t bullshit him for a minute because he was a programmer. A real, actual, programmer.

      2. Bill Gates personally reviewed every line of code for the first 5 years

      During Microsoft's early years, all employees had broad responsibility for the company's business. Gates oversaw the business details, but continued to write code as well. In the first five years, he personally reviewed every line of code the company shipped, and often rewrote parts of it as he saw fit.

      :

      He finally retired as chief software architect in June 2008,

      Do you actually have ANY clue what a Chief Software Architect (also called CTO Chief Technical Officer) means?

      3. Who co-founded and RAN MS again??? The buck started and stopped with him. He would make announcements of what MS was working on next and would announce when they were ready. While he may have only written a small percentage of the code in the later years he was either directly or indirectly responsible for everything MS did, especially buying software companies and slapping their own MS label on it. Gee, go figure. From the same article previously linked:

      He met regularly with Microsoft's senior managers and program managers, and was reportedly verbally pugnacious, berating managers for perceived holes in their business strategies that placed the company's long-term interests at risk.

      The point is Bill wasn't some clueless company president. He was VERY much hands on. Especially in the early years.

      This has got to be a new low on /. I'm defending the guy and I hate his business practices! LOL.

  7. Re:Well... by Jarwulf · · Score: 5, Insightful

    'little shit'= having a different opinion than me.

  8. Re:For all those bayying about whacking the racist by Jarwulf · · Score: 1

    X company erases Y creator from the splash screen because he supports SSM but he's still in the credits. SD: SCREEECH

  9. Re:I don't like him because he's dabbling by Kohath · · Score: 5, Insightful

    in white supremacist rhetoric and memes

    Totalitarians like to proclaim guilt-by-association, just like that. Regardless of truth, they proclaim guilt. And if anyone questions them for proclaiming guilt, that makes the questioner guilty too.

  10. Re: Well... by Jarwulf · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The police gun down whoever's in the way. Its not a racial thing, its a militarized society thing. If it was Asians predominantly around wherever crime and police tend to hang around, they'd be gunned down in similar numbers. Men are gunned down far more than women, yet you'd never admit that as a sign that society favors women. Plenty of whites get gunned down, the other day a white man was shot for playing with a garden hose and nobody cried for him.

  11. Re:I don't like him because he's dabbling by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    a broader call for working class unity.

    That is an aryan brotherhood meme, whether you realize it or not.

  12. Re:I don't like him because he's dabbling by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    The "Southern Strategy" is a typical Democrat myth - as even the New York Times admits.

    Just look at the fact that the South continued to be run by Democrats for almost 40 years after your supposed switch by racist voters. It must have been one hell of a strategy if it took more than an entire generation to work...

  13. Re:Break up Microsoft again before it's too late. by Narcocide · · Score: 2

    They never actually went through with breaking them up the last time, and it is definitely too late now.

  14. Re:I don't like him because he's dabbling by The+Evil+Atheist · · Score: 3, Informative

    That article was discussing another publication which called it a myth. The NYTimes itself did not call it a myth.

    --
    Those who do not learn from commit history are doomed to regress it.
  15. everybody chill out by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Microsoft paid 2 billion dollars for this game, they can do that.

    1. Re:everybody chill out by Just+A+Gigolo · · Score: 1

      Notch got over 2 billion dollars on the deal, he can say what the eff he wants on the twitter since outrage mobs cannot touch him.

  16. Are you sure? by franzrogar · · Score: 1

    For $2.5 billion you can take my name off my birth certificate, I wouldn't care.

    Are you sure? Mr. "The Artist Previously Known as 'Anonymous Coward'"

  17. Re: Well... by hvidstue · · Score: 1

    Actually that is not true in every part of the world. Imagine if there existed a way to change the way the police works in your society, wouldn't that be wonderful?

  18. Re:I don't like him because he's dabbling by Cederic · · Score: 1

    I don't tend to follow Notch and never really enjoyed Minecraft either, but out of curiousity, which rhetoric and memes do you feel he's dabbling in that are white supremacist?

    I'm so sick of watching angry white men get taken advantage of while also being dragged down with them.

    I would ask 'dragged down with who?' because it's not clear from your post, but instead I'm going to laugh at you dabbling in what is clearly white supremacist rhetoric, whether you realise it or not.

    Oops.

  19. Re:I don't like him because he's dabbling by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    He uses white supremacist rhetoric like "It's Ok to be white"

  20. Re:I don't like him because he's dabbling by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    You're implying it's not okay to be white. That makes you a racist.

  21. Re: Well... by lgw · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Blacks account for 31% of police murder, despite being 13% of the population.

    But they're a much greater percentage of "police encounters". People tend to have confrontations with the police in crime-ridden areas. That is not racist per se and more than explains your statistic. You can argue that there's some racist reason that black neighborhoods have more crime, of course.

    --
    Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
  22. Re: Well... by phlinn · · Score: 5, Interesting

    No, not per capita. Per violent criminal, possibly, depending on which stats you use. We don't have good statistics on police shootings OR violent crime rates though. Using numbers from the NCVS for 2012-2015 and The Guardian's list of police shootings in 2015-2016
    . 4,847,887 total violent crimes with a perp group of pers with a single known race.
    1,324,270 violent crimes committed by blacks.
    2,557,910 violent crimes committed by whites.
    307 + 266 = 573 Blacks shot by cops, rate is .00043
    584 + 574 = 1158 whites, rate is .00045

    Those rates are close enough that I'd say the police are fairly even handed in their brutality, and mostly aren't gun happy. Not even 1 in a thousand violent criminals get shot. Unfortunately, numbers over 3 years shouldn't be directly combined with numbers for 2 years of which only one overlaps, but that's what I've got. 2015 alone has roughtly the same, while 2016 is wildly different. I used to use an older measure of violent crime, because prior to 2017 the last time violent crimes by race were included in the NCVS was 2006 IIRC.

    I could go to the UCR, but then I have to limit it to homicides to get race of offender, and relative homicide rates did NOT track relative violent crime rates the last time I checked. The latter is measured by victim surveys, the former is for crimes where the victim obviously can't answer. That doesn't even get into simpson's paradox issues, where certain areas have different crime rates and shooting rates, and it's possible for the overall trend to be magnified OR reversed in every jurisdiction. And of course the fact that counting crimes does not count criminals, since one person can victimize multiple people. And not all violent crimes are the same.

    --
    "Pulling together is the aim of despotism and tyranny! Free men pull in all sorts of directions" -- Havelock Vetinari
  23. Re: Well... by thegarbz · · Score: 1

    The police gun down whoever's in the way. Its not a racial thing

    And yet somehow you're far more likely to be gunned down as a black man than as a white man for a 100% identical interaction with police.

  24. Re: Well... by elrous0 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    We can all agree, cops are fucking murderers.

    No, we most certainly can't all agree with that. The vast majority of cops are decent people just trying to do their jobs. Every day they have to deal with some of the shittiest human beings on the planet, so that the rest of us don't have to. And most of them--despite getting regularly beaten, spit on, attacked, screamed at, and threatened by said shitty human beings--will never murder anyone in their entire careers.

    You try being a cop for a while and see if YOU can maintain that level of professionalism, loudmouth. It's always easy to play armchair quarterback on every police shooting when you're not the one having to go out there and put YOUR life on the line every single day, isn't it?

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
  25. Re: Well... by Bradac_55 · · Score: 1

    Only a AC would site vox like it's some sort of real information site.

  26. Re:I don't like him because he's dabbling by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Is that seriously the distinction you are going for?
    What next? "The New York Times doesn't have a mouth, therefore it can't 'say' anything."?

    Additionally, I notice you can't rebut the fact that actual historical research has shown that there was no "Southern Strategy" switch of racists from the Democrat party to the Republicans. Attempting to distract from the entire point of the post by making trivial semantic quibbles does not make your position look good.

  27. Re:I don't like him because he's dabbling by Kohath · · Score: 1

    There's blood in the water and the frenzy is on and you're trying to argue against it with words.

  28. Re: Well... by Kohath · · Score: 1

    Even if they aren't murdering people, they're still treating us all like cattle to be milked for traffic fines.

    And there's no accountability most of the time when police mistreat non-police.

    The us vs. them mentality towards non-police needs to end if police want to be supported by the public in the future. Go back to "protect and serve" the public. Protecting and serving police interests only isn't going to work out in the future.

  29. Tim Stack by Cill · · Score: 1

    I'm heart broken it wasn't a Son of the Beach Reference this whole time.

    Kimberlee Clark: Notch, you think there's a connection?
    Notch Johnson: No, but there may be a link.

    --
    "Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana."
    1. Re:Tim Stack by ItsJustAPseudonym · · Score: 1

      "Come to Malibu Adjacent, and you'll swear you didn't know it wasn't Malibu."

  30. Re: Well... by bgrahambo · · Score: 1

    I just needed to log on to say THANK YOU, that is an amazing set of statistics you put together. To see those numbers spelled out for two races, and see that the police shooting rate is the same makes me happy. Of course it'd be nice if the police shooting rate was zero, but maybe we don't have to have race riots if everyone realized that we're being shot at the same rate by the police.

  31. Re:I don't like him because he's dabbling by SuricouRaven · · Score: 1

    I can't actually find any white supremacist tweets by him mentioned. Crude, yes. Transphobic, certainly. Politically extreme, I would say, given that he accuses 'the left' of promoting infanticide and appears to advocate for violence against them, though he later claimed that one was a joke. But no white supremacy that I can find. He's deleted a lot of tweets though, so I'm going on news coverage.

  32. Re:I don't like him because he's dabbling by Cederic · · Score: 1

    Surely he was merely being sardonic. Nobody would be stupid enough to interpret "It's ok to be white" as supremacist rhetoric. Would they?

  33. Re: Well... by mapkinase · · Score: 1

    Shut up, niggah. You should be taken your broadband welfare.

    --
    I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
  34. Re: Well... by Kohath · · Score: 1

    Happens all the time. Someone has proof the police did something wrong, nothing happens. Zero accountability most of the time.