Wait, is Microsoft tempting kids away from Chrome with Minecraft money?

techradar.com:

Microsoft is well known for shoving products like its Edge web browser and Bing search engine under our noses at every given opportunity. But some folks are only just discovering that the software giant is happy to pay users to use its services, for example, offering Minecraft ‘Minecoins’ to users who make the switch – a marketing tactic that appears to set its sights on a younger audience.

Getting paid to use Edge or Bing isn’t a new thing – Microsoft Rewards have been offered for a few years now and reward users with points for using the products for an extended duration of time. 

Right now, the Microsoft Rewards website(opens in new tab) states that you can earn five points per search on Bing, and these points can then be exchanged for other rewards such as gift cards or vouchers for various retailers like Starbucks or Amazon.

This isn’t even the first time Microsoft has attempted to use gaming to entice Windows 10 and Windows 11 users to jump ship, as points can be exchanged for Xbox gift cards, Game Pass Ultimate and even other in-game currencies such as Roblox's ‘Robux’, and its worth mentioning that Microsoft rewards have been offering Minecraft related content for a while.

Reddit user u/TrueTech0 posted a screengrab of a marketing box onto the PCMR forum showing that, in this instance, you’ll be rewarded with 330 Minecoins if you join the rewards program and use Bing on the Edge browser for five days.

These ‘Minecoins’ are used to buy custom content on the Minecraft Marketplace, but only if you use the Bedrock version of the game. For Java users, you can mod the game for free with online downloads, something that Bedrock users can’t do, but Bedrock does have a few advantages – namely raytracing capabilities and lower