[SteveC]

As someone who actually runs a Minecraft server and has developed several mini games and around 50 plugins, I'd like to clarify a few things to people who aren't involved in Minecraft.

* Minecraft is pretty expensive to host. The top servers are paying tens of thousands a month in hosting. Only a few servers make enough to cover wages. Most just barely scrape by. DDOS protection is pretty much essential to any server over a certain size, which increases costs significantly.

* Most Minecraft servers are no longer vanilla Minecraft servers. The Minecraft server software is pretty bad in both functionality and performance. Most servers use Craftbukkit or Spigot, which has a plugin API (Spigot is a patched version of Craftbukkit with mostly performance fixes). Craftbukkit is open source, but is a legally gray area as it contains the decompiled code from the Mojang server. There is an API for writing plugins called Bukkit which is totally separate from the craftbukkit server implementation.

* The large servers have tried to work with Mojang to get a set of rules they can work with. Mojang listened to them and actually added clauses prohibiting some of the things they said they needed to even have a chance of this working for them.

* While Mojang claim their EULA never allowed servers to make money, their first one actually did. They've also granted written permission to some servers. Last year they had a panel at Minecon were top server owners actually talked about how their server makes money. Despite what their EULA says, Mojang has been basically telling servers it was fine to monetize up until now.

* Their new terms force servers to remove perks that have already been sold to players. Many server owners are objecting to this as it forces them to "steal" things that players have bought.

* Bungeecord is a proxy system that allows players to switch between multiple servers without logging out. The Minecraft clients multiplayer server list support has barely improved since Alpha. Mojang's new EULA treats a bungeecord proxy as a single server. This means that although they allow owners to charge players to access a server, it's pretty much impossible to do without inconveniencing players.

* The Minecraft network protocol is not patented. A number of open source server implementations exist which do no use any Mojang code. Since these changes have been announced these projects have become much more active with disgruntled developers starting to contribute. It is believed that the EULA cannot legally be enforced on these servers, although one Mojang developer made a statement to the contrary.

* No final draft for the new EULA has actually be made available, but a date for compliance has already been set. 1st August 2014.

* Mojang released their Realms hosting service worldwide just before making these changes, prompting many to accuse them of trying to eliminate the competition. However, they could simply stop releasing their server software if that was their intention, so most people don't believe this to be true.

[arrrg]

So it’s expensive and hard. So what? Doesn’t mean scummy play to win bullshit is something to be proud of, especially when targeting children.

I mean, what Mojang now permits I consider just barely ethically acceptable. Do know that these pay to win schemes are extremely disgusting and that you are far from behaving ethically if you use them. If you can live with that …

The legal discussion is kind of boring to me in that context, since it seems so obvious that the behaviour of many server owners is so disgusting. I’m happy that Mojang is trying to crack down on that and I hope they don’t fail. Maybe they will, but that doesn’t change anything about how wrong these pay to win schemes are.

[unethical_ban]

So what? So it's incredibly hard to even enforce what Mojang says they're targeting, and in trying to do so, they're spooking a ton of legitimate developers and server owners.

The real question is how children are spending hundreds of dollars online without parental consent.

[angersock]

When you've added enough patches, operations, and hardware to the initial game, I think it's totally reasonable to be able to charge for that. Mojang should just sell a license of the server software (perhaps with better patches, yeah?) to resellers, ala cPanel or what have you.

They basically have this one-trick-pony which is now effectively maintained by the community at zero cost to them--no wonder they're being silly.

EDIT: Somebody should just release an extendable open-source clone of the game, with art assets, and just force their hand.

[Alupis]

There is really no "play to win" in Minecraft, because there is no "winning". You just keep doing things until you get bored and stop playing.

As someone who can run my own server for myself and a few friends (and have on multiple occasions), I don't see how allowing servers to charge for some things is bad... don't want to pay for access to an item -- go play someplace else or host your own.

[wtbob]

What's scummy about a server owner giving me a nice starting house in return for a payment? What's scummy about a server owner giving me /feed or /fly in return for payment?

There's nothing deceptive; there's nothing unfair about offering a free server with perks (anyone is free to pay or do without). I'm an adult, and I choose how to spend my disposable income.

[epsylon]

    * Their new terms force servers to remove perks that have already been sold to players. Many server owners are objecting to this as it forces them to "steal" things that players have bought.

The servers don't have to remove the perks, they just have to give them to everyone.

What's pretty clear in all this is that Notch does not want Minecraft to become some kind of pay-to-win game (which would inevitably damage the reputation of the game). I think he is absolutely right to stand by this. He also has stated numerous times on Twitter that Mojang doesn't care about server admins getting money for the service (if anything to pay for the hosting costs), as long as any gameplay modification that is distributed is available for all players without paying.

[Avenger42]

> The servers don't have to remove the perks, they just have to give them to everyone.

Either way, I imagine you get a bit of an uproar - either you're giving things away for free that you sold before, so the people who bought them are upset and want their money back; or you steal the items back so no one can have them, so the people who bought them are upset and want their money back.

[Siecje]

If you don't want to pay for things you can play on a different server. You don't have to buy things but if it is worth it for you then you should have the option.

[elfcard]

Can you cite the claims you make, like the original EULA, and correspondence which said it was okay to monetize gameplay? Otherwise, I have to disregard this comment. You may be right, but without those pieces of information, I have to defer to the post by the founder which could have legal ramifications if proved false.

[owsla]

>The top servers are paying tens of thousands a month in hosting.

Are you just speculating? This seems extremely high. I've hosted a couple Minecraft servers and even with a mild constant population (~30) it wasn't even breaking 100/mo.

>DDOS protection is pretty much essential to any server over a certain size, which increases costs significantly.

I've had many dedicated servers in my day, and this has never been the case. Not sure where you're getting this data from.

[unethical_ban]

To point 1, Minecraft chews memory and processor for breakfast. I understand that some of the larger server have thousands of players logged in simultaneously over huge areas in a minecraft world, so I can imagine 4-5 digit hosting bills.

To point 2, you're hosting a server with lots of attention, one that is DDoS friendly, and you've got the eyes of lots of young technical people. In the world of one-click DDoS, I don't doubt it can pose an issue quickly.