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Former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates, speaking on a Thursday-night CNBC program, is noted to have complimented Steve Jobs on his return to Apple, crediting him for effectively saving the company. Gates was on TV as part of a "Keeping America Great" town hall event, paired with billionaire investor Warren Buffett. One audience member asked Gates' opinion of Jobs, specifically in regards to the latter's contributions as a CEO.
"Well, he's done a fantastic job," said Gates. "Apple is in a bit of a different business where they make hardware and software together. But when Steve was coming back to Apple, which was actually through an acquisition of NeXT that he ran, Apple was in very tough shape. In fact, most likely it wasn't going to survive."
Each fall as part of Microsoft's charitable giving campaign, people at the company donate products, services and experiences for their fellow employees to bid on. The item that typically fetches the highest bid is a tour of Gates' Lake Washington home for the winner and a small group of friends, guided by Gates, with appetizers at the end.
Last year, in the middle of the economic meltdown, the winning bid was $8,600. This year, with things starting to rebound, the bidding rose to $35,000. No word on who was willing to pay that much, but presumably it wasn't a junior tester.
"Can you imagine?" Scott said of the winning bid for the Gates tour. "We're encouraging Bill to donate that item again next year."
Continue at Techflash
Bill Gates spent his 54th birthday last week at a U2 concert in Vancouver, B.C. -- not unlike any ordinary guy in his mid-50s, celebrating the passing of another year by watching one of his favorite old bands with his wife by his side. Then again, not every guy gets to hear Bono marking the occasion by leading the stadium in song.
That's what happened last week during the band's BC Place concert. Bono paused at one point to talk about Gates' support for the ONE campaign and Project RED, also alluding to his impact on society.
"Without him, and without his business, we just wouldn't be where we are today. It's his birthday today. Bill Gates is in the house," Bono said, before leading the cheering crowd in a rendition of "Happy Birthday."
More and Video at TechFlash: Bono's Birthday Gift to Bill Gates
I read those 1979 stories all last week, and it put me in a nostalgic mood, so wanted to offer my own memory to add to the collection.
In 1979, Microsoft had 13 employees, most of whom appear in that famous picture that provides indisputable proof that your average computer geek from the late 1970s was not exactly on the cutting edge of fashion. We started the year by moving from Albuquerque back to Bellevue, just across the lake from Seattle. By the end of the year we'd doubled in size to 28 employees. Even though we were doing pretty well, I was still kind of terrified by the rapid pace of hiring and worried that the bottom could fall out at any time.
What made me feel a little more confident was that 1979 was the year we began to sense that BASIC was right on the verge of becoming the standard language for microcomputers. We knew this could be the catalyst that would unlock the potential of the PC to democratize computing and create the right conditions for an explosion in programs and applications that would lead to really rapid growth of the PC market.
Full Story At Source
Net Worth: $40.0 bilFortune: self made
Software visionary regains title as the world's richest man despite losing $18 billion in the past 12 months. Stepped down from day-to-day duties at Microsoft last summer to devote his talents and riches to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Organization's assets were $30 billion in January; annual letter lauds endowment manager Michael Larson for limiting last year's losses to 20%. Gates decided to increase donations in 2009 to $3.8 billion, up 15% from 2008. Dedicated to fighting hunger in developing countries, improving education in America's high schools and developing vaccines against malaria, tuberculosis and AIDS. Appointed Microsoft Office veteran Jeffrey Raikes chief exec of Gates Foundation in September. Gates remains Microsoft chairman. Sells shares each quarter, redeploys proceeds via investment vehicle Cascade; more than half of fortune invested outside Microsoft. Stock down 45% in past 12 months. "Creative capitalist" wants companies to match profitmaking with doing good. More on William Gates III
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Microsoft founder Bill Gates has banned iPods and iPhones from his household, the software billionaire's wife, Melinda, has revealed.
The rivalry between Microsoft and Apple, and Gates and Apple founder Steve Jobs, is legendary, but the pair have made valiant efforts to conceal any animosity. A rare public appearance together at a conference in 2007 was described by journalists as a "love fest".
But behind the scenes, Apple is the forbidden fruit in Microsoft quarters.
"There are very few things that are on the banned list in our household. But iPods and iPhones are two things we don't get for our kids," Melinda Gates said in a recent interview with Vogue.
But the rule has evidently been difficult to follow for Gates now that the Apple wundergadgets are the talk of the town.
"Every now and then I look at my friends and say, 'Ooh, I wouldn't mind having that iPhone,' " she said.
Melinda Gates, 44, is the co-founder of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the world's largest philanthropic organisation with about $US35 billion in assets. The Vogue interview centred on her efforts to enhance global health care and to reduce extreme poverty.
The couple have three children, Jennifer, 12, Rory, 9 and Phoebe, 6.
Microsoft chairman Bill Gates has released a swarm of mosquitoes into an audience at a technology and design conference in California.
High profile members of online networking service Twitter reported the incident on Wednesday (US time), which reportedly occurred during Gates's talk on malaria eradication, a cause the entrepreneur is pushing through his philanthropic foundation.
"Bill Gates just released mosquitos into the audience at TED and said 'Not only poor people should experience this'," Facebook manager Dave Morin wrote on Twitter.
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has rolled out its first round of grants in a much-publicized effort to double the number of low-income students who earn a postsecondary degree or credential by age 26—an increase of about 250,000 graduates each year. The grants total $69 million to more than 20 organizations that include policy organizations, training and research organization and social and education institutions (See story, right). Foundation officials said the awards reflect the foundation’s commitment to use data to shape its investments by building on existing successful programs and policies, tapping innovation in areas where there has been limited success and, over the longer term, bringing the most promising practices to scale. Several of the projects will focus on community college students.
This is a big announcement for Indian Students. Bill Gates - Founder & Chairman of Microsoft Corporation today at IIT, Delhi announced the launch of Microsoft DreamSpark™ for India. Microsoft DreamSpark™ makes professional-level developer and design software available to students in India for FREE. These are the same software used in the industry, so ones the Students starts using them , they will make easy transition ones they step out of college.
The software is available online at: http://www.dreamsparkindia.com
...............Full Story At Source
Just months after his Microsoft farewell, Bill Gates is quietly creating a new company -- complete with high-tech office space, a cryptic name and even its own trademark.Public documents describe the new Gates entity -- bgC3 LLC -- as a “think tank.” It’s housed within a Kirkland office that the Microsoft co-founder established on his own after leaving his day-to-day executive role at the company this summer. Is this Bill Gates’ next big business? A Gates insider gives an emphatic no -- saying it’s not a commercial venture but rather a vehicle to coordinate the software mogul’s work on his business and philanthropic endeavors. However, bgC3 will also oversee Gates’ personal pursuit of breakthrough ideas in science and technology. The insider said the goal isn’t necessarily to create new companies, although ideas could be passed along to Microsoft, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation -- or others – as it makes sense.Whatever the ultimate role of the company, the circumstances surrounding its creation provide a behind-the-scenes glimpse into the new era of Gates’ life.State records show that the company, originally called Carillon Holdings, was established in March 2008. It formally changed its name to bgC3 in early July, 10 days after Gates left his full-time job at the company he built into an industry giant. He remains Microsoft’s chairman and continues to work part-time on projects.
Bill Gates has been awarded the first Einstein Award from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the American Friends of the Hebrew University (AFHU).
"The Einstein Award represents the creation of a continuum of great minds and was inspired by the legacy of Albert Einstein, a founding father of our university who wrought a profound revolution in human understanding of our world," said Professor Menachem Magidor, president of the Hebrew University.
"Bill Gates is a most worthy recipient. Like Einstein, he is a leader whose actions stem from the knowledge that human progress includes alleviating human suffering."
Gates will be honoured at a gala dinner in New York in December. Proceeds will help to fund plant and animal science research at the Hebrew University's Robert H. Smith Faculty of Agricultural, Food and Environmental Quality Sciences in Israel.
Gates recently stood down from Microsoft to concentrate on the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation which supports development work in more than 100 countries.
Jim Lynch from ExtremeTech wrote a rant collumn about Bill Gates leaving Microsoft, here are some parts:
Gates' operating system products were second-rate copies of more elegant, stable, and technologically superior products such as Mac OS, Linux, and Unix. Gates' retirement will be remembered as the beginning of the end for Microsoft.
And it's not coming a moment too soon. So much damage has been done by Gates and Microsoft that it will take the computing world years to finally escape their grasp.
....
It seems that some writers have been bamboozled by Gates' "charitable" foundation and have decided to give him a free pass for his past sins.
Well that's certainly not going to happen in this column. Gates' predatory behavior, sheer ruthlessness and willingness to leverage his office and desktop OS monopolies to destroy his competitors has to be noted in any assessment of his career. He made the choice to behave that way for his own financial gain and for the accumulation of power and market share for his company.
...
Remember everybody, Bill Gates is who you all have to thank for Windows and all the misery and unhappiness it has brought to your lives.
Bill Gates doesn't want to be remembered for what he truly is: A robber baron and convicted monopolist. So he's deploying his ill-gotten billions as he prepares to buy-off as many people as possible to create an alternative view of himself in history.
He hopes that future generations will hear his name and think "wow, what a great guy he helped so many people with his money." Gates prays that they will forget the employees who worked for companies like Netscape who lost their jobs and he hopes that the pain and hell that he has put ordinary computer users through for so long with Windows will also be forgotten
Bill Gates is no fool. He sees the hand-writing on the wall and he knows it's time for him to go and let the blame for Microsoft's decline and eventual demise fall on Ballmer's shoulders. Who better to use as a scapegoat than the clueless and often embarrassing buffoon Ballmer?
When the history of Microsoft and its place in the industry is written, Gates doesn't want to have his tenure there linked with the decline of the company. He wants to be remembered as the guy who grew Microsoft and made it "innovative" (well don't get me started on Gates' silly claims about Microsoft being innovative, that could be its own separate column about how absurd a claim it is).
Full Rant at source
Also read the comments in his Microsoft IIS powered forum
Employees Welcome Gates (00:22)Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer introduces Chairman Bill Gates at the Employee Town Hall. June 27, 2008Download: Zune-quality (.wmv) | Broadcast-quality (.mpeg)
Gates - Starting Microsoft (00:17)Bill Gates describes how he and co-founder Paul Allen started Microsoft with the dream that software would be important one day. Download: Zune-quality (.wmv) | Broadcast-quality (.mpeg)
Ballmer - Microsoft Vision (00:21)CEO Steve Ballmer describes Bill’s vision of a computer on every desk and in every home. Download: Zune-quality (.wmv) | Broadcast-quality (.mpeg)
Gates - Microsoft Leadership (00:51)Gates describes the opportunities ahead for Microsoft’s leadership.Download: Zune-quality (.wmv) | Broadcast-quality (.mpeg)
Ballmer - Microsoft Culture (00:37)Steve Ballmer talks about how Bill Gates has instilled a culture of intensity, tenacity and passion at Microsoft. Download: Zune-quality (.wmv) | Broadcast-quality (.mpeg)
Ballmer - Changing the World (01:14)Steve Ballmer thanks Bill Gates for the opportunities Microsoft employees have to change the world and realize their true potential. Download: Zune-quality (.wmv) | Broadcast-quality (.mpeg)
Gates - The people he worked with (02:04)Bill Gates describes what has made working at Microsoft so special to him: smart people, making an impact in the world and having fun every day. Download: Zune-quality (.wmv) | Broadcast-quality (.mpeg)
On June 27, 2008, Bill Gates transitions from his day-to-day role at Microsoft to focus more time on his work with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Gates will remain Microsoft’s chairman and will be involved in select projects based on direction from Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer and the leadership team. Watch the video and hear from his friends, family and Microsoft leaders about Gates’ amazing journey — from coding BASIC for the Altair 8800 to leading the world’s largest software company.
Bill Gates Looks Into the Future of the PCUSA Today, June 25, 2008
Ballmer Heads New Age of Microsoft LeadersSeattle Post-Intelligencer, June 24, 2008
Q&A: Bill Gates UnfilteredForbes.com, June 23, 2008
Microsoft Braced for Post-Gates EraFinancial Times, June 20, 2008
Pair Picked to be Brains Behind MicrosoftFinancial Times, June 20, 2008
Transcript: Steve Ballmer of MicrosoftFinancial Times, June 20, 2008
Gates Without Microsoft; Microsoft Without GatesFortune, June 20, 2008