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Minecraft is one of the greatest launchpads of all time for young entrepreneurs. Many people don’t know about the opportunity it presents for kids who want to create things online.
Here’s how it shaped the last decade of my life…
Here’s how it shaped the last decade of my life…
I grew up in Maryland but moved to Utah when I was 13, about 9 years ago. Around this time I found Minecraft and started inviting friends over to build a world, but after moving, had to figure out how we could still play. This led me to create my first multiplayer server.
I had to learn how to start a server, port forward, and give my IP to my friends back home. It was running 24/7 on my parent’s 4GB iMac. (they wondered why it started getting slow)
We used Mumble to talk, and actually got to see each other in the game for the first time.
We used Mumble to talk, and actually got to see each other in the game for the first time.
I quickly discovered that you could add plugins to the server that added more features, like waypoints we could teleport to and shops so we could trade.
I went over to YouTube, took Java tutorials, and learned how to develop my own plugins to add things I thought would be cool.
I went over to YouTube, took Java tutorials, and learned how to develop my own plugins to add things I thought would be cool.
Later on, I decided to bring more people on to see what I had made, and opened it up to the public. I had to learn how to advertise, manage a community, and learned some hard lessons on trusting people online.
One day, one of my community members sent me a $20 donation to help run the server. It was the first time I ever made money online, and it was an incredible feeling. His username was “MarkAndDave” (real name Trey, oddly enough) and he has no idea how impactful that was to me.
A light bulb went off in my head. I created ranks that people could buy to get more features on the server, and my humble community turned into a business. A few months later I was making thousands every month, at 14 years old, by playing a game.
I kept growing, learning, and trying new things. I built close to 100 servers with different themes, ideas, and worlds. Some of which with @connorhollasch who is now the CTO at @branch_gg many years later.
I knew what I wanted to do. My success led me to drop out of high school before finishing freshman year, which is still the best decision I ever made. I gave myself years of learning and real experience that I would have never gotten staying in school.
I had to learn how to build websites for my servers, create promotional videos, retain players, host special events, network, manage linux machines, organize my finances, and much much more, all before turning 15.
My hunger for entrepreneurship continued to grow, and I went from running Minecraft servers to hosting them, creating a platform for other people to start servers. I hosted thousands of servers across 6 data centers all over the world.
My biggest competitors at the time were @MattSalsamendi & @SuitJames from MCProHosting who, later on, ended up creating and selling Beam (now Mixer) to Microsoft. I’ve always looked up to them and consider them friends!
The skills I learned from Minecraft led to me create website development companies, cloud computing companies, games of my own, and hundreds of projects in-between. Along this journey I met (my now co-founder) @daytonmills who sold his own Minecraft company around the same time.
With every problem I solve and every project I make, I know what to do because I had worked on something similar over the past decade in Minecraft. What @notch and the team at Mojang created, even being one of the most popular games of all time, is still underrated.
My story is one of many, alongside huge successes like @Simon_Hypixel / @Noxywoxy and the team at @Hypixel, going from Minecraft redstone builds to a Riot Games acquisition. Seeing so many people in the space go on to accomplish great things has been amazing to witness.
After raising our $1.5M seed at @branch_gg from investors like @shl, @naval, @CindyBiSV, @hunterwalk, @joshbuckley, @jbrowder1, @ani_pai, @YousifAstar, @eugenemarinelli, @Scottbelsky, @defaultalive, & @edcohen55, I’m humbled by my journey and owe a lot to Minecraft.
TLDR: Buy your kid Minecraft.
