8 The Correspondent Entertainment December 12, 2014 ‘Minecraft’ server strikes gold
Sophomore student rakes in profit with online game Nate Horne
his success at such a young age, he has created the opportunity to live a life people Typically, “Minecraft” dream of. is a video game that stu“I’ve always kind of just dents play for fun, but for wanted to be my own person, sophomore Alex Wojnarski, never wanted to work a steit’s much more than that. reotype 9 a.m.-5 p.m. job. I’ve When Wojnarski was in the always just started my own eighth grade, he began exthings and I’ve always seem perimenting with creating to be successful at it. I have no “Minecraft” servers, or a viridea what I’ll be in the future, tual area for players to play for now I’m more focused online with other people. on what I am doing now,” “At first it was very small Wojnarski said. with barely anyone playing Wojnarski’s success is deepit, but over time as I added er than the material benefits of more things and earned creating a multi-million dolmore money, it became into lar business. “I’m always mosomething much bigger. tivated by the fact that tens of Now, I run one of the biggest thousands of people play what companies in the ‘Minecraft’ • Eric Czarnota I have created. Also, there’s business,” Wojnarski said. ojnarski checks the website of his “Minecraft” server. As of October 10, been many people who have His game profits by play“Minecraft” has sold 60 million copies across all platforms, making it one played my games and have ers who join his server and of the best selling games of all time. thanked me personally bemake in-game purchases cause it’s changed their lives. I like new items and abilities. munity, and the rewards are even ments, servers in a datacenter, proappreciate the fact that people may When there are thousands of more incredible. tection, my employees, and more. be having family issues, deprespeople playing his server every day, Before expenses, including tax- I’m always making many investsion, school issues, and my game there’s hundreds of purchases com- es and other necessary payments, ments for my company and always serves as a way for these people to ing in daily. Wojnarski makes an estimated one spending to make it bigger and betbe happier without having to worry Running a “Minecraft” server million dollars a year. ter. All other money gets put aside too much about the bad things,” isn’t all fun and games though, as “It’s very stressful having to bal- as my own revenue, and currently Wojnarski said. Wojnarski spends the majority of ance school and my business, and I’m just focused on saving it to use Wojnarski’s newest project is his time away from school and oth- sometimes it does get me that I for my future companies and projalso on “Minecraft” and by looking er activities trying to improve his may not be earning this much in ects,” Wojnarski said. at his past success, it is heading tobusiness. a couple years down the road. I “For now I’m working on many wards another popular game. “Currently I have about 70 em- can’t guarantee that the business I more projects to release on ‘Mine“So currently my most successful ployees, 60 of which are volun- open later will be successful, but I craft,’ however school is one of the game is ‘Desteria’ , which is more of tary and only do work to help will try everything I can. I like to major factors that prevents me a game focused on ages 12 and up. the [‘Minecraft’] community. My worry more about what is going on from working at my highest posHowever, I’m working on a huge most important co-workers are the now, not several years later.” said sible level,” Wojnarski said. new project called ‘Mineteria’ that’s people on my management team, Wojnarski. Once ‘Minecraft’ starts losing more focused on younger kids, ages which consists of four people, and It takes money to make mon- popularity in a couple of years, I’ll six to 12. My next project ‘Minetemy developers which work to cre- ey though, and Wojnarski has most likely move on and use the ate more content in the game. The dealt with his money successfully money I have made to create new ria’ is going to be about a huge virpeople with these positions earn enough to have the Chicago Tri- businesses and other projects,” said tual world where players can make hotels, club rooms, houses, become an actual salary through my com- bune even want to feature him in Wojnarski. pany,” said Wojnarski. their newspaper. Wojnarski was never interested a DJ, make friends, and just have Wojnarski is completing tasks “I spend money on advertise- in the average life-style, and with fun,” Wojnarski said. unheard of in the high school com-
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‘Creative Writing Day’ allows for out-of-classroom experience
Mili Pandya
Students from the creative writing classes ventured to Forest View last Friday to participate in a district-wide “Creative Writing Day.” While often times students go on field trips for more of an entertainment purpose, this day was dedicated to learning about and improving students’ writing. While the trip was educational, it wasn’t the same as a typical school day. Students began the day by hearing a moving prose from Bill Leece, a former English teacher at Rolling Meadows. “He had a dream that we writers would be the new rock stars and sports stars and how he saw our names on the backs of jerseys
instead of athletes,” senior Danielle Sychowski said. Students then attended two different workshops of their choice, ranging from poetry, prose, drama, and even song writing. These hourlong workshops enabled students to learn, write, and share. The writers were able to focus their attention on what they chose and improve with the help of a teacher from the district. “The teachers who ran the sessions worked through our writing step-by-step and told us ways to improve our writing,” senior Alex Nowak said, “It was more challenging to write something to go along with the music during the song writing one, but it was a lot of fun.” “It [song writing] was something totally different than what you can learn in creative writing,” Sychows-
ki said. The day concluded with an “open mic,” where students could share work either written that day or written previously. “My favorite part was the open mic at the end because it was cool to hear other people’s poems as well as read my own,” Sychowski said. For senior Marina Reiss, the “open mic” was a unique opportunity to share a more personal piece of writing in front of an audience, that for the majority, she didn’t know. “It was about my sister and how she died, so talking in front of everyone I got very anxious,” Reiss said. “It was kind of difficult. I’ve read in public before but because that poem was so personal to me and I was sharing with a bunch of people who were my age, it was very difficult and my voice was shaking, too.“ “Sometimes, I wish I practiced a little more before I went up there, but it was still altogether a lot of fun.”
Despite the nerves, one field trip proved to be an unforgettable experience for Reiss. “It was an amazing experience, and I will never regret going up there and saying it [the poem],” Reiss said.
Visit for: • Wojnarski’s “Minecraft” website •Creative writing pieces •Artwork by Emily Murman