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Do we have to worry about Notch?

Victor Frankl said:
“To draw an analogy: a man's suffering is similar to the behavior of a gas. If a certain quantity of gas is pumped into an empty chamber, it will fill the chamber completely and evenly, no matter how big the chamber. Thus suffering completely fills the human soul and conscious mind, no matter whether the suffering is great or little. Therefore the "size" of human suffering is absolutely relative.”
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No sense in tearing a guy down or competing over the amount or type of suffering or trying to belittle people who suffer in ways that aren't particularly dramatic or horrifying.

Live and let live. Care about people. Stop with the biting and bickering. It's just the internet, guys.
 
Hupsel said:
Money is always good but there are some conditions where money is completely useless, like some forms of cancer and depression. Sure, you can use it to seek good doctors and so on, but sometimes it wont help a lot, otherwise Steve Jobs and Robin Williams would still be alive. Some mental conditions like anxiety and panic attacks don't even have a cure yet so even with all the money in the world you wont be able to run from it, just lower the effects.

We don't know if Notch suffers from depression, so it's really hard to judge whats going on. One person can be the happiest of all and an incredible cool guy in front of the cameras or in front of a group of friends and when he is alone he can just feel completely miserable.
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Didn't Steve Jobs ignore his doctors' advice initially? That certainly didn't improve his chances of survival...
 
Never understood his decision to move to one of the more shallow places on this planet. The celebs don't respect a full fledged nerd and many of your new found buddies love your money and lifestyle, not much else. Notch himself seems oblivious to this fact and I have a hard time feeling sorry for him when he posted those "wipe my tears with money " memes. Rather arrogant, no matter how tired you are of complainers. He was well respected within a community but I do understand why he pulled out of the business.

He should have gotten a place somewhere more down to earth and kept in touch with his real friends and taken it one step at a time with his new life, not outbidding Beyonce for one of the more talked about real estate affairs last year.

Good luck Notch, take two steps back, spend more time with your Real friends, involve yourself in charities and leave LA.
 
My god I can't believe how many ignorant people there are here. The idea that money makes you happy is complete bullshit.

Just because you believe that it will solve all your current problems doesn't mean that it will and it sure as heck doesn't mean that there won't be new ones due to it.

Seriously, on a message board where people bitch about videogames on a regular basis, I hardly think anyone here has any right to be claiming first world problems on Notch. I would love for people to apply the same logic to themselves the next time they are creating the billionth thread complaining about Ubisoft or something.
 
charlequin said:
I mean, personal improvement is hard. A large portion of all people never manage it to any significant degree. You need to change how you think, break all your daily habits, inure yourself to pain and embarrassment for the long-term good, and take lots of risks that each individually are downright terrifying. Once you set out on that path it's still a long, long road to bear any fruit.

(Also, finding a good therapist is incredibly difficult, and a bad one might actually be worse than nothing.)
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And a therapist might have monetary goals in mind than your well-being.

It's...a fucked situation. I've thought about if I was in a situation like that, how people around me would react. I know for sure my family would ask me for money, and it's like...well how far do you go? Do you give your family some money, hoping they won't hate you for it not being 'enough'? Do you move cities, hope to not be recognized? People who start talking to you, are they talking to you because they find you interesting or because they hope to get something out of you? Every person you meet after the fact, you have to keep a distance to because you don't know if they're being sincere or for their own interests. And that includes family. I understand why Notch had a 'breakdown' of sorts on Twitter. He probably has little to no people to sincerely talk with. He probably can't find someone to talk with as 'Notch', because in the back of his mind there will always be that whisper of 'They only care because you have money'. And maybe it isn't true. But more often times than not, it probably is true.

It's a fucked situation. If I won the lotto, I know that I would go into isolation for a while until it cools down and probably try to get a name change. It's why I'm content not being 'rich'. For Notch....he's a presence on social media. It's not easy for him to disappear. His photo is all over on google, he's known by millions world wide...and he was never raised in the spotlight, so he probably doesn't have alot of ways of dealing with it.

It's a catch 22 for Notch. And I feel legitimately bad for him.
 
Scientist Supreme! said:
You know that's not the only issue, right?
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it kinda seems the source of his problems though,at least from his posts.

look,I'm not saying that since he's rich he can't have personal problems,but since getting rid of money isn't actually that difficult as much as making them..if he think he has to go back to a more modest lifestyle,he has many ways to do so
 
John Kowalski said:
Relentless business types with no regard for personal space and a penchant for buying properties rather than building them i wager.
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God damn you, Microsoft. They rustled his cattle, ruined his crops, and forced him to sell his farm at a loss all just to build that damned highway. Fucking relentless business types.
 
Come to Australia, spend some time travelling the states (including Tasmania), go to the Outback for a spell. Realise that life is fleeting, and precious.

Heck just move here, change your name, get a regular part time job, study etc. and learn, improve and push yourself again.

Oh, and take yourself off social media.
 
If he was that unhappy about suddenly being unfathomably rich, he could just give it all away and start over.

There is literally a 100% chance he won't.

This is why I can't take rich people problems seriously, because at the end of the day they'll still choose to be rich. No newly rich person ever chooses to go be poor again.
 
EviLore said:
Money gives you security and convenience and opportunity. Solving these particular problems can lift a huge burden from you and your family, yes, and it's something most of us dream of our entire lives. Complaining about being in those circumstances, having billions of dollars when you're young and healthy and can do anything, seems to be triggering a lot of resentment here. The ultimate first world problem, right? Someone like Kanye West tries to open a dialogue about how awful the paparazzi are to him and other celebrities, and hundreds of thousands of people talk shit because, "he has money, he signed up for this lifestyle, he has it better than everyone else, fuck you and deal with it."

Well, no, he doesn't have it better than everyone else in all of the ways that matter to most human beings. He doesn't necessarily have it as good as some random working class family, if they have contentment and fulfillment and he doesn't. What do you think mansions and parties and supercars and jetsetting and bottles of Ace of Spades poured into your mouth by hot girls actually get you? A bunch of fleeting highs that are more and more meaningless over time and create more and more problems over time, but become difficult to detach yourself from. Like a drug addict's.

Actually getting that dream of the big check can make you directionless in a way that is difficult to escape from, because we live in a world dominated by capitalist motivations and the pursuit of money is now meaningless for you in every way. You can't be that hungry kid with a startup idea anymore. Now you're more like a retroactive trust fund kid in a perpetual existential crisis any time you're not distracting yourself with your escapist lifestyle.

Coming into money can make you question the authenticity of all of your interactions with other people. "Why does this person want to be friends with or be in a relationship with me? What's their real agenda? I can't decide what I reveal to someone else and when I reveal it anymore because everyone will always know who I am and what I have, or will as soon as they google my name." You'll second-guess sincere people and fake people alike. All of a sudden most of the people from earlier in his life might start asking for money or acting like fanboys or proposing business ventures, and Notch will have to cope with losing a lot of the things that mattered more than money, and have to carefully vet every person he lets into his life in a way that matters.

Notch isn't some hot movie star, either. He's an internet nerd, like all of you. Why is he talking about his problems on Twitter instead of manning up and dealing with it in private and sparing us his wipingtearswithhundreddollarbills.gif? Because Notch always talked directly and publicly to the internet community, part of his real social circle and the people he identified with, because that's what we all grew up doing. But now that he has Fuck You money, he's just getting a lot of fuck yous back, because no one identifies or empathizes with his situation.

Notch is not saying anything offensive or worthy of derision. He's just having trouble with a massive lifestyle change and talking to the internet about it like he always has, and probably now realizing that he can't do that anymore. Yep, with those billions of dollars he has all sorts of convenient avenues to pursue to find himself, really amazing potential avenues, but that doesn't change the fact that he's lost himself and has to work through it. He'll probably recognize after today's reactions that most of you are no longer people he can talk to on the level now, and hopefully keep his problems to himself, for better or worse.

There's something to be learned here, and it's not that Notch is a dick with no perspective whining for pity and attention about his bullshit first world problems. It's that you don't necessarily have that much reason to envy the lifestyles you may envy in the celebrity/wealth obsessed pop culture.

Leo on the yacht with the dozen supermodels might very well be quietly wishing for true love and earnest companionship in between doing lines and flipping coins about which one to stick it in next. We'll never know one way or another because he's not a gaming nerd who talks about his problems on internet message boards. I can only imagine the salt.
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This post is like a light in the darkness. Thank you.
 
Stimpack said:
God damn you, Microsoft. They rustled his cattle, ruined his crops, and forced him to sell his farm at a loss all just to build that damned highway. Fucking relentless business types.
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Well i don't think he's talking about the rest of his team, do you? I mean maybe but that would be even more depressing.
 
John Kowalski said:
Well i don't think he's talking about the rest of his team, do you? I mean maybe but that would be even more depressing.
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I don't know the specifics, but usually when an "asshole" forces you to do something, you aren't getting rich in the process. I'd assume he is indeed referring to Microsoft, but again I don't know the specifics.
 
I get that there are absurdly disconnected rich people in the world. I get it. I don't like them as much as anyone else. But if we're all honest with our selves Notch is not that kind of person. Even though he has more money than I'll ever see in my entire life multiplied by 100 I do feel bad for him. He always seemed like a nice down to earth kind of person and money doesn't seemed to have changed that.

EviLore said:
Money gives you security and convenience and opportunity. Solving these particular problems can lift a huge burden from you and your family, yes, and it's something most of us dream of our entire lives. Complaining about being in those circumstances, having billions of dollars when you're young and healthy and can do anything, seems to be triggering a lot of resentment here. The ultimate first world problem, right? Someone like Kanye West tries to open a dialogue about how awful the paparazzi are to him and other celebrities, and hundreds of thousands of people talk shit because, "he has money, he signed up for this lifestyle, he has it better than everyone else, fuck you and deal with it."

Well, no, he doesn't have it better than everyone else in all of the ways that matter to most human beings. He doesn't necessarily have it as good as some random working class family, if they have contentment and fulfillment and he doesn't. What do you think mansions and parties and supercars and jetsetting and bottles of Ace of Spades poured into your mouth by hot girls actually get you? A bunch of fleeting highs that are more and more meaningless over time and create more and more problems over time, but become difficult to detach yourself from. Like a drug addict's.

Actually getting that dream of the big check can make you directionless in a way that is difficult to escape from, because we live in a world dominated by capitalist motivations and the pursuit of money is now meaningless for you in every way. You can't be that hungry kid with a startup idea anymore. Now you're more like a retroactive trust fund kid in a perpetual existential crisis any time you're not distracting yourself with your escapist lifestyle.

Coming into money can make you question the authenticity of all of your interactions with other people. "Why does this person want to be friends with or be in a relationship with me? What's their real agenda? I can't decide what I reveal to someone else and when I reveal it anymore because everyone will always know who I am and what I have, or will as soon as they google my name." You'll second-guess sincere people and fake people alike. All of a sudden most of the people from earlier in his life might start asking for money or acting like fanboys or proposing business ventures, and Notch will have to cope with losing a lot of the things that mattered more than money, and have to carefully vet every person he lets into his life in a way that matters.

Notch isn't some hot movie star, either. He's an internet nerd, like all of you. Why is he talking about his problems on Twitter instead of manning up and dealing with it in private and sparing us his wipingtearswithhundreddollarbills.gif? Because Notch always talked directly and publicly to the internet community, part of his real social circle and the people he identified with, because that's what we all grew up doing. But now that he has Fuck You money, he's just getting a lot of fuck yous back, because no one identifies or empathizes with his situation.

Notch is not saying anything offensive or worthy of derision. He's just having trouble with a massive lifestyle change and talking to the internet about it like he always has, and probably now realizing that he can't do that anymore. Yep, with those billions of dollars he has all sorts of convenient avenues to pursue to find himself, really amazing potential avenues, but that doesn't change the fact that he's lost himself and has to work through it. He'll probably recognize after today's reactions that most of you are no longer people he can talk to on the level now, and hopefully keep his problems to himself, for better or worse.

There's something to be learned here, and it's not that Notch is a dick with no perspective whining for pity and attention about his bullshit first world problems. It's that you don't necessarily have that much reason to envy the lifestyles you may envy in the celebrity/wealth obsessed pop culture.

Leo on the yacht with the dozen supermodels might very well be quietly wishing for true love and earnest companionship in between doing lines and flipping coins about which one to stick it in next. We'll never know one way or another because he's not a gaming nerd who talks about his problems on internet message boards. I can only imagine the salt.
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This is a perfect post.
 
lostcauz said:
I know he gave bonuses from his own pockets but that equates to £153,600 to each person, really, that is being cheap.
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A lot of shitty insensitive comments n this thread but this one is just funny.

You'd hate him all the same if he'd given nothing to anyone, because fuck it, that's his golden parachute. 150 grand is a lot of free money.

Hate the guy because he's too smart and bores too easily, and the status he's acquired is driving him out of his comfort zone.

Hate, hate, hate.
 
Unknown Soldier said:
If he was that unhappy about suddenly being unfathomably rich, he could just give it all away and start over.

There is literally a 100% chance he won't.

This is why I can't take rich people problems seriously, because at the end of the day they'll still choose to be rich. No newly rich person ever chooses to go be poor again.
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No one chooses to be poor because it sucks ass and depression hits at all economic levels.

No rich people would choose to become poor again because no one would choose to be poor no where. Being poor means more shit to pay, from housing to food, less oportunities in this wild ass world. This world talks money and everyone knows it.

Well, I hope he gets some help. Last thing he needs is going further into depression and taking his own life.
 
Seems to me he lost most, if not all, of his friends due to poor choices and, being an introvert and a billionaire, have a hard time building new, genuine relationships.

That's a genuine problem, but I don't think the lifestyle he's having is the appropriate way to solve it. Plenty of rich people have modest lifestyles, and it's not like everybody in the world knows who he is. Try to meet some new people, do some social activities a normal person would. I know it's not easy to an introvert person, but that has nothing to do with his money. If he's willing to let go of the shallow way of life he appears to be having, he should be fine. I hope he does.
 
efyu_lemonardo said:
Didn't Steve Jobs ignore his doctors' advice initially? That certainly didn't improve his chances of survival...
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Indeed he did. He spent a long time trying to use "natural" solutions, including going to a psychic.

While you can obviously never say these things for sure, there's a reasonable chance that he would be alive right now if he'd seriously looked into treatment early on. The type of cancer he had has a decent survival rate.

Fwiw, all of this comes from the Steve Jobs bio, which I read several years ago.
 
Sounds like he just needs a focus. He's struggling because he's super wealthy and could basically have anything he wants money wise. He needs a goal or a direction or just something to occupy himself with. Money doesn't always give you fulfillment in life, and from the look of those tweets that is exactly what he needs.
 
I wish it was possible for Notch to attend a game jam in costume, similar to how celebrities sneak around on convention floors in disguise. I just really want to see him making games again.
 
If you gave me a billion dollars tomorrow it would do nothing for my anxiety, social issues, past regrets and estrangements, body issues etc.

I'd love to have it, and since I'm happy now I'm sure I would be more happy with money (because I have none), but I'm sure I could easily suffer bad times again despite that money. I just hope that unlike Notch I'd realise how badly that would play on a public forum and not post about it.
 
Finale Fireworker said:
I thought this thread got locked by Modbot. What happened?
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Evilore posted a very good post. And I guess the fact that the thread showed up in OT and well...it's something that needed to be discussed. If anything that much is apparent from some disgusting reactions in this thread who are in disbelief that a billionaire can have a shitty life.
 
In this thread people think rich people shouldn't suffer from mental health problems and are entitled assholes if they dare reach out.
 
MikeDip said:
Your outlook on things is mindboggling
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I should clarify as my comment came across more vitriolic than I intended.

To put it simply: I am familiar with clinical depression. This is the reason I am unable to remain neutral to these types of topics. This is also the reason why I am extremely bothered by social media attention-seekers using "lol i'm soooo depressed" as a way to get people posting on their walls. To see people exploiting something that destroys lives for attention sickens me.

To me, the initial post read as a humble-brag: "check out my awesome parties, I'm soo depressed so please continue to talk about me on the internet". It looks like he just wanted to show off and be the center of attention for a little while. If not, why post on a public page?

I don't know if this is true. I don't know the guy. Obviously I can't say whether or not he needs professional assistance. I also cannot say for certain if he's pulling a stunt for attention.

I'm going to step out of this thread. Anything anybody could say about this topic is purely conjecture.
 
Seriously notch, you knew what you were doing when you took the deal. You got a cut, and you signed the papers yourself. You weren't normal the second you made it big with Minecraft and your definitely not normal now.

Of course, you could always donate all the money you have and go back to normalcy, but it seems twitter angsting is better for you.

Hey, you could buy yourself a shrink or 10 as well if you want.
 
I'm not that shocked. Despite his success before, during and after Minecraft he always gave off weird vibes in interviews and his interaction with the community which I associated with depression, anxiety, loneliness etc.

At least he has the time and financial backing, by that I mean not adding additional worries like bills or debt, to one day deal with these issues.
 
My heart goes out to him. Speaking from experience, having significant depression sucks, regardless of money and privilege.
 
chaobreaker said:
Come on, people. Money can't cure depression.
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It can pay for a really good therapist though. CBT. The problem is, for that to work, you still have to want to get better.

It seems Notch has no loved one in his life to keep him sane, to keep his thoughts positive. Experiences are better shared. And he's at that point where whoever he meets, he struggles to trust in case they're just after him for the wrong reasons.

It's therefore no surprise he's struggling. He sounds lonely. Surrounded by lots of people, but still lonely. I get that, but I'm sure he'll pull through. He's clearly a creative chap, he needs to try and get himself creating again, tough as it may be with a head full of negative thoughts spurred on by the current depression.
 
NeonBlack said:
But is he willing to ditch the bank account and start back at square one?
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Unknown Soldier said:
If he was that unhappy about suddenly being unfathomably rich, he could just give it all away and start over.
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NeonBlack said:
He's complaining about how his wealth is ruining his life. If he does feel that way he has the option to get away from it.
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Inuhanyou said:
Of course, you could always donate all the money you have and go back to normalcy, but it seems twitter angsting is better for you.
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People, this isn't how you clinically solve depression. For God's sakes, stop spouting your crappy armchair psychology.
 
Unknown Soldier said:
If he was that unhappy about suddenly being unfathomably rich, he could just give it all away and start over.

There is literally a 100% chance he won't.

This is why I can't take rich people problems seriously, because at the end of the day they'll still choose to be rich. No newly rich person ever chooses to go be poor again.
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This is stupid. Obviously that's not the only reason. Money helps but it isn't everything. If he gave it all away he'd still be depressed (if he is) and poor. Come on people. Think it through.
 
orthodoxy1095 said:
People, this isn't how you clinically solve depression. For God's sakes, stop spouting your crappy armchair psychology.
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I've suffered from depression and anxiety my whole life, so i'm well aware of the issues it can bring and how hard it is to get out of the cycle.

With that being said, he did put a lot of the pressure and his current situation on himself by prioritizing certain things and making the wrong choices about his lifestyle.

I can't say i feel empathy for someone who decidedly throws themselves into the brick wall continuously even knowing their trigger.

He has the resources to get himself help, so saying other people should reach out to him and make him feel better is quite nonsensical from his postings. He expected his colleagues to get in contact with him to make him feel like he wasn't abandoned? But they have no obligation to comfort him or attempt to make contact with him, so that expectation is nonsensical. Don't blame other people.
 
Oh some of these responses are just amazing.
"Why doesn't he just give away all of his money and start from scratch?"
Are you fucking serious THAT'S NOT HOW LIFE WORKS.
 
Dude has a crap ton of money. Just travel the world or something. That's what's I'd do.

No one said you have to throw elaborate parties with a bunch of famous people when you get rich. Fuck that just do what makes you happy.
 
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