Why Microsoft bought Minecraft
"Yes. It's Minecraft all the way down."
When a senior Microsoft executive saw the amazing virtual computers that have been assembled within the Minecraft environment, he instantly realized that, in principle, Windows itself could run be on a virtual block-based computer built within Minecraft.
At first, he naturally assumed that Windows would run very slowly on a virtual Minecraft CPU, but such concerns about speed and performance are never really considered to be a showstopper at Microsoft. So he allowed himself to continue his thoughts.
Then, suddenly, it dawned on him that he could employ infinite recursion so that the Minecraft executable itself could also be run on its very own self-same Minecraft virtual machine; the block-based CPU merely needed to be multithreading compatible.
Clearly this brilliant concept is deep into Fields Medal territory. With one fell swoop of genius, the physical hardware is no longer required. Everything runs on the new multithreading Minecraft virtual machine, including the Minecraft virtual machine itself.
Yes. It's Minecraft all the way down.
Then, amazingly, it's trivial to type in whatever clock speed you want. There are no longer any physical limits. Performance is unlimited. And Intel hardware is no longer required.
So Microsoft will own the world. See? The upsides are unlimited.
But apparently they're still working on it. Rumours say that it should be working and released shortly.
You may find this explanation to be completely unbelievable, but I've found no better explanation for the question:
Why on Earth would Microsoft spend billions of dollars to buy Minecraft?
Therefore this must be precisely what has happened.
Q.E.D.