Minecraft makers Markus "Notch" Persson and Jens Bergensten are among Time magazine's 100 most influential people of 2013. They're lumped together, actually, so each one is half of an influential person.
(Note that Minecraft didn't make Time's list of the 100 greatest video games, published in November 2012. Maybe that will be different next time around?)
Nonetheless, Persson and Bergensten's write-up by Maxis founder and game thoughts-haver Will Wright makes a solid case for their status as Titans, a category which includes musician/entrepreneur/Beyonce's main squeeze Jay-Z and SpaceX founder Elon Musk.
"In scripted games, everybody experiences the same thing--they’re all rescuing the same princess," Wright wrote. "In Minecraft you use your imagination to create whatever you want. It might be a story, it might be a machine, it might be some interesting place where you can go and play. But whatever it is, it’s a reflection of you and your intention and your creativity."
Wright said Minecraft, which has a huge community of modders and tinkerers of all ages around the world, is a clear landmark on the path to teaching kids to code.
