“On Monday, we had the honor of meeting with Bill Gates to discuss MIX06, IE, DHTML, AJAX, Compatibility, Office 12, and also gain insight into where he surfs on the web. He also shares with us where and how software can make the world a better place.” ArsTechnica analyzes the interview.
The word, “honor”, in that context made me turn my head and spit.
Now, what would you ask Bill Gates if you had 17 minutes to interview him? 😉
A donation..? 🙂
Now, what would you ask Bill Gates if you had 17 minutes to interview him? 😉
Me: Could I have some money?
Bill : No
Me: Please ?
Bill : No
Me: Pretty please
Bill: No
Me: Pretty please with sugar on top ?
Bill: No!
Me: Pretty please with sugar on top and a cherry ?
Etc … for 17 minutes
If I promise to ship a dozen PC’s running Windows XP to malaria victims in Africa and call it charity–could I have some money PLEASE?
It’s like finding bag of diamonds in the middle of the dessert Water has more value than diamonds there, unless you have water.
Now, what would you ask Bill Gates if you had 17 minutes to interview him? 😉
If a train leaves Seattle traveling east at 60mph and at the same time a train leaves New York traveling west at 55mph then…oh, forget it, can I just have some money?
I expect that as a software developer, he must somewhere deep down at least, feel that same geeky excitement the rest of us do from the type of stuff that’s available and being worked on in the open source community. So if he were someone other than Bill Gates for a day (or week, or month, etc), what software that’s available today would he use and what would he like to develop (without the restrictions of heading a company, or being tied to MS)?
He just seems like a software guy to me rather than a business guy (even if he happens to be good at that), and I just wonder how much he personally feels restrained by how large his company is.
The problem of course is that one answer only shows him being loyal to his company, and the other destroys the credibility of the company.
I guess it’s more of a “something you’d ask when you meet them in Heaven” type question (meant very generically, not to say that Bill will or won’t get to Heaven .
“When you go to sleep at night, do you ever dream of all the lives you’ve wrecked by your ruinous, pilfering business practices? Or do you chuckle when you recall firing the cannons at a small company with a decent product that you didn’t think of first, then loot the hulk?”
“In the interests of stage acting, how exactly do you keep a straight face when you claim Microsoft has secured Windows? Or that Linux has a higher TCO than Microsoft’s software suites?”
Edited 2006-02-17 17:19
Would you like to play a game?
/end Wargames movie reference
While I won’t spit. I must admit that the word honor was bit mis-used. I would reserve words like honor for people like Mother Teresa, Gandhi, etc.
Willy is a modern software baron.
While I won’t spit. I must admit that the word honor was bit mis-used. I would reserve words like honor for people like Mother Teresa, Gandhi, etc.
Willy is a modern software baron.
Actually he’s a software knight ( http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3428673.stm ) You can tell because he still wears glasses instead of sporting a monocle and a mustache.
As you can see, different people have their different perceptions of who they consider honorable or not.. So why are you complaining about his assuming that yours would be more appropriate?
As an example, i would find it an honor when meeting an old friend of mine.. i couldn’t give 2 cents on mother terresa. And before someone shouts at me, that has NOTHING to do with what she did/didn’t do.. she really did help alot in this world.. Its just going back to the first point.. different ppl have different oppinions on who is honorable and who is not, regardless of what or how much they did, so i suggest we all show a bit of respect.
I would say the same thing about Gandhi, although many people love and respect him, and some find him attention seeking, you could read his book “My Experiment with truth” and be a judge. He was human, he had his faults too, lets not make a god out of him please.
I have the book. I understand his humanity. I understand what he did to shake off an an un-just system.
I would have like just to meet him but he was murdered well before I was born.
You should not find it ironic that a north american would hold a man such as Mr. Gandhi in such high honor and pursue a version of Truth/Force locally.
I don’t find it ironic, actually I think you are entitled to your opinion about Gandhi and I am entitled to mine, so I am going to refrain from saying anything against Gandhi.
Just one thing I would like to say, if Gandhi were an American or you were an Indian, your opinion would have been a little different to say the least.
Edited 2006-02-18 00:24