Billionaire video game creator learns wealth does not equal happiness

It's the dream of any startup founder. You make something people love, become wildly rich and then sell your company for billions. That's what every startup in Silicon Valley is trying to do. But after you do that, what comes next?

Markus Persson, who created the video game Minecraft, is revealing things aren't always as they seem. He sold Minecraft to Microsoft for $2.5 billion a year ago. He's now finding that the meaning of life has nothing to do with all the things that he thought it would.

Listen to Glenn's commentary below.

Below is a rush transcript of this segment, it might contain errors.

GLENN: It's the dream of any start-up founder. You make something that people just love, and you wind up wildly, wildly rich. And you sell the company for billions. That's what every start-up in Silicon Valley is trying to do. But after you do that, what comes next?

The guy who was the founder and the creator of Minecraft is revealing that things aren't always as they seem. He sold Minecraft to Microsoft for 2.5 billion years ago -- a year -- a year ago. Sorry, $2.5 billion a year ago.

PAT: There you go. That's a lot.

STU: Wow. Jeez.

PAT: That's a lot. But, I mean, that game is an unbelievable cultural phenomenon.

STU: Everywhere.

JEFFY: Yes, it is.

STU: Every kid in America I think owns it. Is that true?

PAT: Every kid. I think so. Pretty much every kid in America. And if they're not playing it, they want to.

STU: Yeah, and what is it? You're just building things with blocks, essentially.

PAT: I guess. I guess.

GLENN: It's basically virtual Legos. It's virtual Legos.

JEFFY: Yeah.

STU: Okay.

GLENN: But then you can chase people around in the land that you've created. You know, it's all kinds of different things. But it's a virtual world.

STU: Can you run over hookers? I just want to make sure that that's part of the game --

GLENN: No, you can't run over hookers.

STU: Aw, jeez.

GLENN: So he was living the high life. It looked like he was having a blast. $2.5 billion. What would you do with $2.5 billion, Pat?

PAT: I'd probably -- I'd donate most of it to charity.

GLENN: Shut up.

STU: All lives matter. That's where I would -- Nazarene Fund.

PAT: Yeah. I would get a house.

GLENN: That's the first thing he did.

PAT: I mean, I have a house. But I would get a bigger house.

GLENN: He bought a 70 million-dollar house.

PAT: I don't know if I would get a 70 million-dollar house.

GLENN: You should see this house.

PAT: I bet it's nice.

GLENN: It is. It's on the hills of Beverly Hills, and it is unbelievable. I'll post the link to the real estate video that they --

PAT: Does it say the square footage?

GLENN: No. But it has a movie theater in it. It has an infinity pool. It came all furnished. It is unbelievable. Sixteen-car garage that actually has elevators.

PAT: Nice. Jeez.

GLENN: In the place where there's a wall of -- in the candy room. Okay. There's a place where it's a bar and a wall of candy. And on one of the walls is behind glass, the garage. And it -- the picture of it shows a Veyron on a turntable.

PAT: Oh, my gosh.

GLENN: So the garage is actually behind glass in the downstairs, and it's got a Veyron.

PAT: And then he has a Bugatti Veyron, which is a $2 million car.

GLENN: Yeah, it's unbelievable. Okay. So here is a guy who has everything. And he earned it.

PAT: And did he go from poor or middle class to just wild wealth like that?

GLENN: I don't know.

PAT: Is that the one step to wild wealth?

GLENN: Wild wealth. I mean, you could have $250 million and then suddenly have 2.5 billion and it's a totally different world.

PAT: Yeah.

GLENN: So here's the latest string of tweets from him. Now listen to this, this just came out August 29th. Over the weekend. The problem with getting everything -- the problem with getting everything is you run out of reasons to keep trying. And human interaction becomes impossible due to imbalance.

Later: Hanging out with a bunch of friends and partying with famous people. Able to do whatever I want, and I've never felt more isolated.

In Sweden, I'll sit around and wait for my friends with jobs and families to have time just to do stuff, just watching my reflection in the monitor.

Next tweet: When we sold the company, the biggest effort went to making sure the employees got taken care of, and now they all hate me.

Next tweet: Found a great girl. She's afraid of me and my lifestyle. She went with a normal person instead.

I would Musk and try to save the world, but that just exposes me to the same types of people that made me sell Minecraft again.

Here's a guy who has absolutely everything and has created something great, who sounds a little suicidal, quite honestly. He's now finding that the meaning of life has nothing to do with all the things that he thought it would.

There was a New Zealand art director that -- his name is Linds Redding. He was one of the great guys of ads. I mean, he really created apparently a lot of stuff. And everybody was trying to get him -- ask him about ads and how things go.

He wrote towards the end -- he just had esophagus cancer. And it was inoperable. And he just passed away. But he wrote something before he died.

It turns out, I didn't actually like my old nearly as much as I thought I did.

This is what he wrote after he was diagnosed.

I know this now because occasionally I catch up with my old colleagues and work mates. They fall over each other to enthusiastic show me the latest project they're working on. They ask me my opinion. Proudly show off their technical prowess. I find myself glazing over, but politely listen as they brag about who has had the least sleep and the most takeaway food.

I haven't seen my wife since January. I can't feel my legs anymore. I think I have scurvy, but another three weeks, and we'll be done. It's got to be done, and then the client is going on holiday. What do you think?

What do I think? I think you're all mad. I think you're all deranged. So disengaged from reality, it's not even funny. It's a commercial. Nobody really gives a crap. This has come as quite a shock to me, I can tell you.

I think I've come to the conclusion that my whole life has been a bit of a con, a scam, an elaborate hoax. Countless late nights and weekends, holidays, birthdays, school recitals, anniversary dinners, were willingly sacrificed at the altar of some intangible, but indefinitely worthy higher cause.

If that were true, maybe it would be worth it in the long-run. But that's the con. Convincing myself -- convincing myself there was nowhere I'd rather be was just a copying mechanism. I can see that now. It wasn't important. It wasn't of any consequence at all. How could it be? We're just shifting product, our product, and the client's. Just meeting the quota. Feeding the beast.

The beast. Was it worth it? Of course not. It turns out, it was all just advertising.

The top five things that people regret when they die: I wish I let myself be happier.

Most people don't realize, until the end, that happiness is a choice. This is what we're trying to get across to you with all lives matter and never again is now. It's a choice. You can be angry. You can -- you can scream for vengeance. Or you can choose peace. You can choose love. You can choose happiness. You can choose unity. But it is our choice in the end. Choose light or darkness, life or death.

Number four, I wish I would have stayed in touch with my friends. In people's dying weeks, they usually try to track down old friends. They become so caught up in their own lives, we've all been so busy, that we lose track of people.

Number three, I wish I had the courage to express my feelings. Most people don't realize until the end of their life that they've been cowards their whole lives. They just wanted to keep peace with others. We're all told this in society. Don't bring up religion. Don't bring up politics. Don't bring up anything. Just make peace. Just don't argue.

And so most of us shut our mouths and don't make an impact. Most of us shut our mouths and we don't speak our true feelings. People at hospice say, every male patient they nurse always says, I wish I wouldn't have worked so hard.

POLL: Should Universities allow pro-Hamas protests?

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Just one day after Hamas’s surprise attack on Israel, which left over 1,400 people Israelis dead, 34 different student groups from Harvard University wrote a joint statement pinning the blame of Hamas' terrorist attack on Israel. In the following days after publishing this callous statement, these students staged a walkout and rallied in support of the Palestinians. As Glenn has discussed, this is not an isolated event, and campuses across the country have hosted similar rallies where antisemitic jargon like "we don't want no Jew state" and "globalize the intifada" is freely spewed.

Should Universities allow pro-Hamas protests?

While the Universities have not officially backed any of these rallies or student groups that organized them, they haven't stopped them either, which raises the question: should they? On one hand, these are American students in American Universities, who are protected by the First Amendment. On the other hand, history tells us how dangerous antisemitism is if left unchecked; and what of the rights of Jewish students to be safe on the campuses they pay to attend? Let us know what you think in the poll below:

Should Universities allow pro-Hamas protests? 

Would you feel safe if your child attended a University that allowed pro-Hamas protests?

 Should Universities allow pro-Israel protests?

Is pro-Hamas rhetoric protected by the First Amendment?

POLL: What do YOU think Israel should do about Gaza?

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Should Israel take over Gaza after defeating Hamas? This contentious historical question has resurfaced amid Israel's retaliatory airstrikes in Gaza following Hamas' terror attacks, which resulted in the greatest death of Jews since the Holocaust. Biden and the global elites have warned Israel against occupation of the Palestinian territory. When asked on 60 Minutes if he would support the Israeli occupation of Gaza, Biden said, “I think it would be a big mistake.” Today Glenn responded to Biden’s answer: “I don't think it's a mistake to occupy."

This has been a long-standing, polarizing issue that is now more relevant than ever, and we want to hear YOUR thoughts. Let us know in the poll below:

Would you support an Israeli occupation of Gaza?

Do you think the Israeli airstrikes in Gaza are justified?

Do you think a two-state solution is still possible?

Funding IRAN?! Here are the TOP 5 reasons Joe Biden should be IMPEACHED

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On September 12th, the House announced an official impeachment inquiry into Joe Biden with allegations of abuse of power, obstruction, and corruption. Naturally, the media quickly jumped to the President’s aid claiming that “there is no evidence to support these claims” and that the whole affair is a witch hunt.

If you’ve been listening to Glenn, you know that this is simply not the case. Biden has been committing impeachment-worthy deeds before he even stepped foot into the Oval Office—there’s no shortage of evidence to justify this inquiry. Here are 5 scathing reasons why Biden should be impeached:

He was responsible for the Afghanistan withdrawal disaster.

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The Biden administration began with the US's disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan. Under his watch, Biden left thousands of US citizens and allies stranded in the Taliban's hostile regime. Countless Afghan allies have been murdered by the Taliban due to the Biden administration's negligence.

He was involved with Hunter Biden's illicit foreign business dealings.

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There is clear evidence that Joe Biden was more than aware of his son Hunter's foreign business dealings. From suspicious money laundering through the Biden family's accounts to Joe's involvement with important business meetings within Hunter's company, there is mounting evidence to warrant an impeachment inquiry.

He lied about his involvement with Hunter's business dealings.

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Not only did Biden involve himself with his son's less-than-legal foreign business ventures, but he lied to the American people about it too, claiming he had NO KNOWLEDGE of what was going on.

He failed to protect the Southern border, and actively made it worse.

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Biden singlehandedly turned the Southern border into the worst illegal immigration crisis in US history. He reversed many policies set in place by the Trump administration, resulting in 2.3 million illegal immigrants flooding into the US under his watch, a historic high.

He sent IRAN AND HAMAS BILLIONS OF DOLLARS.

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Biden reversed the Trump-era policy that halted all funds going into Iran. The Wall Street Journal revealed the smoking-gun evidence proving that Iran trained AND funded Hamas before its gruesome terror attacks against Israel. Moreover, shortly before the attacks, the Biden administration unfroze $6 BILLION dollars of Iran's assets as a part of a prisoner swap. On top of this, Biden resumed $200 million worth of "humanitarian aid" to Gaza that Trump had ended—because the money was being used to buy weapons for Hamas.

Top 5 economic milestones that show HOW BAD Bidenomics has made the economy

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From groceries to house prices, everything seems to get more expensive, and you can thank Biden for that. Glenn recently exposed the truth about 'Bidenomics' and the havoc it has wrought on the American economy. Here are five economic milestones during the Biden administration that expose the glaring track record of "Bidenomics:"

In July 2022, the inflation rate hit 9.1 percent, a 40-year record high.

In June 2022, gas hit an all time record high of $5 a gallon for the national average.

61 percent of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck as of this September.

Interest rates reached a 15-year high at 5.25 percent and are still increasing.

Americans have $1 trillion in collective credit card debt, in part due to food/staple pieces being very high.