You are confusing purpose (what GPL intends to accomplish) with methods (how the GPL attempts to accomplish it's purpose); “draconian” described the latter and your description of the former does not, even if true, contradict it.
My guess is Notch, like many developers, was put off by the "viral" licensing [0] of the GPL.
One of the things GPL does is take away many of the developer's rights. It's a protection for code, not for it's creators - and the latter is what most licenses try to protect.