For two decades, Bill Gates has used his Comdex keynote speech to mark out his vision for technologies from the Internet to XML. This year he used the bully pulpit to make it clear that the industry is at one of its perennial crossroads. CNET News.com caught up with the Microsoft co-founder and chairman earlier this week to talk about the leadup to his “seamless computing” speech.
Bill Gates: Unplugged
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Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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‘Unplugged’ – I like that.
“But with IBM pushing Linux, isn’t there customer interest because they can offer a wider solution?
What do you mean by “wider?” Wider in terms of being more expensive? Wider in terms of the number of consultants required? What’s wider mean in this case?”
Bill gets almost irate with the interviewer about this “wider” statement. Just answer the question Bill and stop trying to dance around the fact that there is more than Windows at the server end.
Did you actually read the article?
Bill Gates said, “The key reason I picked the theme of seamless computing……………………”.
I say, “You can have seamless computing if you use only the software from one company.” Thats easy. And that would be fine if Microsoft knew EVERYTHING. But they don’t. They missed the INTERNET!!!!!!!
They destoyed Netscape with their monopoly power once they understood how powerful the Internet was going to be! Remember they did not invent the browser and don’t even produce a very good.
What else are they missing and will they miss???????? The world can’t afford Microsoft!!!!!!
remind anyone of “Synapse” from the (horrible) movie Antitrust?
At the semantic level, we actually now have standards. That’s been a holy grail for over 20 years. People spent a lot of time futzing around getting the bits to flow between machines and now that we have that, you think, “Well I can point a browser at any Web site. Why can’t I do a query about all the sellers?” The reason you can’t is because that’s at a higher semantic level than just how to put the stuff on the screen. And it’s far more complex. Only Web services give us a foundation for us to do that, so in a sense, a lot of the dreams of the ’90s, like true e- commerce, had to wait for this industry standard infrastructure and the tools to be put in place.
At the semantic level we have standards? *What* standards? XML is going for syntatic interoperability/standards, not semantic standards. It’s very very very different.
Is he anyway talking about Semantic Web? Because, if he is, it isn’t so simple as he points; it’ll still take a lot of years/work till we get to those “dreams of the ’90s” (which is the Semantic Web, IMHO).
Victor.
Billy G does make a good point in that Linux is only a Kernel, Windows is more of a complete platform. Of course MS isn’t worried about the Linux kernel, it’s worried about Open Source Software as a whole.
The MS advantage is that there is no bickering like you see among the X11 or desktop manager OSS people. There is just one standard, one vision and one leader.
He mentions that most of the hardware issues have been resolved, no more IRQ conflicts, etc. The remaining big problems are with software structure and interoperability, OSS will always lag a little bit behind in that department because of its nature.
The great thing here is that Bill appears to have though a lot about what the customer wants ever since he had to prove why it’s better than Linux. Even if Linux doesn’t take the lead in the next few years it’s raising the bar across the board.
Bill Gates is not a computing genius – he happened to be in the right place at the right time. Had IBM been able to license CP/M (their preferred choice) it is unlikely Microsoft would have ever got beyond its humble beginnings.
Bill Gates is far more like J.D Rockefeller than Thomas Edison. He has very little vision, isn’t a great intellectual but he is a hyper-competitive businessman.
Linux–which is only a kernel–is not where the interesting stuff is going on nowadays.
Why must people continue to play these semantic games? Yes, Linux is a kernel, and Linux is used in reference to the operating systems using the Linux kernel. “Windows are only a glass hole, allowing view to the outside.” But wait! Windows is an operating system too! It gets even more complicated! A window is also a generic term in reference to an object in a graphical user interface.
No way! The same word means three things!?
Yes, my friends; welcome to the world of homonyms.
Beyond that, does anyone else think Bill Gates sounds more like a marketing agent than anything else? Everything he says in this article is full of quasi-technical gibberish. To his credit, he only said “innovate” twice, which is the techno-marketing word of the year.
By 2010, Microsoft is going to be rocked back on its heels.
In another few months, Microsoft will no longer be able to use the Windows Data Espionage Network to screw all their competitors.
The world vs. Microsoft. I have no doubt who is going to win. And win big.
Bill Gates on Linux:
“It’s the primary operating system we’ll be competing against.”
How far we have come. The biggest mistake people make about Linux based OSs is to assume flaws with it are inherent to the open source process and can never be fixed. Bill Gates, however, is no fool.
He is not looking at Linux at this moment, which, though I personally find works fine, I don’t consider is ready for every user yet. He is looking at Linux in 3-4 years time when it will be competing with Microsoft products as a very valid alternative.
It also appears that he is moderating his views on Linux. No longer as a puppy, a virus or a toy, he now sees it as a competitor, and one that the only way to compete with will be by trying to produce a genuinely better product.
“Bill Gates is far more like J.D Rockefeller than Thomas Edison.”
Read your history Thomas Edison was whole lot like J.D. Rockefeller. You would have never heard of Edison if he hadn’t have been.
Read your history Thomas Edison was whole lot like J.D. Rockefeller. You would have never heard of Edison if he hadn’t have been.
Perhaps you ought to read *your* history a little better. Edison was constantly on the brink of bankrupcy until after the invention of the light bulb. He was constantly struggling to develop new inventions to keep Menlo Park in business, but absolutely refused to fire any of his employees there because he cared too much about them and their families.
J.D. Rockefeller made his fortune by undercutting his competators by selling his oil at a loss because he had the financial backing of the Rothschilds, one of the world’s largest financial consortiums. When this wasn’t enough to eliminate his competators, he resorted to burning down their oil refineries.
Now, exactly how are these two similar?
I find that this is a good interview with Mr. Gates. I think he is honest in what he believes is the right thing for his company.
And frankly, after having bashed on MS product for so long, I’m starting to see that they have really improved and that their newest products really shine!
“Perhaps you ought to read *your* history a little better.”
I have. Read a little further. Read about AC vs. DC current. Tesla. The electric chair execution movie. Read about what Edison did to competitors.
No one ever accused Bill Gates of mistreating his employees. He has made alot of millionaires.
Why do people keep stating that B.G. keeps making people millionaires. Ok… he did that back in the 80’s to maybe the 90’s. How many people are millionaires because of gates in say 95-2003?
I dont really care for Gates’ vision of the future…. Hide the problems with a pretty interface and all is better… Sorry I dont think so…
I never said he is making people millionaires. I said has made alot of millionaires. But if you think about it, I bet he still has a few employees crossing that threshold every so often.
Hold up guys.
Check the lawsuits against MS from ‘temp’ workers.
Many employees are never given a chance to become wealthy.
>we actually now have standards.
we == Microsoft && we !== “rest of the world” ??
>That’s been a holy grail for
>over 20 years. People spent a lot of time futzing around
>getting the bits to flow between machines and now that we
>have that, you think, “Well I can point a browser at any Web
>site. Why can’t I do a query about all the sellers?”
This guy really amazes me..If there is any company in the world that is trying to break, destroy and deny ALL standards it is Microsoft. Now he is talking like they are innovative regarding standards? Is anyone taking this guy serious other than his shareholders and employees off course? They are killing XML at this moment…pfff
M$ loves standards, as long as they control every aspect of ’em. If they’re not the ‘creators’ they appropriate it anyway anyhow. They pay a few fines, repackage it… release it, and get us to pay for the standard over and over. They’re dying for software subcription services (which initially will be available w/ the xBox… you, what a plan, get xBoxes in the homes of the unwitting, plant it there, and then get a monthly subscription service that will service all our computer needs. What ever they tell us it is.
sorry to rant
Jb
It’s funny to see the enemy of interoperability and open standards suddenly waking up to the barriers it creates.
This is the company that is in the best position to choose good standards to exchange data and instead, creates proprietary standards that it only shares with chosen “partners”. And now Bill wants seamless computing ? That can only mean “one provider only” computing.
About Linux, it is good to see that the guy doesn’t quite understand what’s going on there. But it is a good reminder that Linux companies are vulnerable to untrue claims like “there is plenty of incompatible linux versions out there” and should address it as a matter of extreme urgency because although it is not the case, it’s hard to argue that it doesn’t look true
>>And that would be fine if Microsoft knew EVERYTHING. But they don’t. They missed the INTERNET!!!!!!! <<
Msft was also very late in all the following:
1) Personal computing – MS-DOS years behind Apple II.
2) 32-bit OS – Xenix, UNIX for x86 a decade before NT.
3) GUI OS – almost a decade behind Apple Macintosh.
4) PC Apps – WordStar, WordPerfect, Lotus, dBase, all there years before msft.
>> 2) 32-bit OS – Xenix, UNIX for x86 a decade before NT.
strange… i thought Microsoft wrote Xenix.
Not being a fan of BG myself, i would have to agree that he HAS made a few millionaires. Not only his employees, but al the people making money selling MS software, consultancy, …
Thanks to MS, IT is now at the level it is (everyone knows what a pc/internet/mail is, even grandma). If it weren’t for MS a lot less people would be online for the .com boom, a lot less (regular) people would be online to make a purchase, …
MS did a lot of bad things (as well as good), but it HAS ENABLED a lot of people to make A LOT OF MONEY in IT
it is really disgusting to know that there still are people out there who thinnk M$ is the reason behind the broad adoption of internet etc..
had it been a different company, especially dr. dos cp/m etc.. it would have been more, and better!!
IBM was responsible for corporates buying pcs.. not M$
and compaq was responsible for making them more affordable ;
M$ used unfair practices to kick others out of competition.
compare an analogy. your gas company has a deal with the county that if they choose only that compnay, each installation will cost 80% less than if bought seperately as part of a competitive environment. And also if your company provides such pathetic service that an economy thrives around it based onrepairs, and medical care to victims of bad installations and funeral services because more ppl die .. doesnt mean it is a good thing
well all the repairmen and funeral homes would have been millionaires, but is that exactly what you had in mind?
i dont think so!!
>Thanks to MS, IT is now at the level it is (everyone knows >what a pc/internet/mail is, even grandma). If it weren’t for
>MS a lot less people would be online for the .com boom, a lot
>less (regular) people would be online to make a purchase, …
Granted, MS was one of the only company even interested in end user computing for a long time. Sun, Ibm and HP were all too busy selling servers with mind blowing margins whilst MS was taking on the lower margin (and mind blowing volumes), emerging PC market.
Had SUN and the like improved CDE to the level Gnome and KDE have now reached and proposed cheaper unix desktops (or improved X terminals) in the same time Microsoft was doing windows 3.1 , then I think that a lot of companies would have expanded their unix investment to the desktop instead of going windows.
But I think that MS has actually slowed down the rate of adoption of the PC because it has been so unstable and not so user friendly for so long that a lot of people were actually reluctant to use them, because they thought (quite rightly) that they would break something. Every geek has help friends and familly that were unable to solve their own problems, because they simply didn’t dare. MS has made a lot of people unconfortable with PC. Things would have been a lot different if they had learned on a system never crashing and on which they couldn’t break anything.
Microsoft has made people a lot of money…?
Hello?
Ever wonder where that magic money came from? Other people. Every dollar Microsoft “made” for one person it took from another. Even ignoring that, do you think there is anything near a proportional distribution of this wealth? Bill Gates, a multi-billionaire, has made many millionaires? So? What is your point?
Giving away a meager 200 – 300 million, he could easily make a few hundred millionaires. How does that make him a better person? How does that make Microsoft a more ethical company?
Answer: It doesn’t.
You can not say that Bill is a bad person. He donates much more than any other person in the upper class. He has the Gates foundation which does a lot of work in AIDs research and such.
Gates gives back to the community whether you want to believe it or not.
If I was Bill… (since he be the richest man, he and his desendants do not need more money)
I’d leave MS, and do what I want! If he digs business, start another company from semi-scratch… A good challenge would be to see if he can start up a company that can rip his ol’company. Now that would be a challenge.
Jb
“But I think that MS has actually slowed down the rate of adoption of the PC because it has been so unstable and not so user friendly for so long that a lot of people were actually reluctant to use them, because they thought (quite rightly) that they would break something. Every geek has help friends and familly that were unable to solve their own problems, because they simply didn’t dare. MS has made a lot of people unconfortable with PC. Things would have been a lot different if they had learned on a system never crashing and on which they couldn’t break anything. ”
very good point taken.
A multi-billionaire throwing money at charities helps sure. It improves his business image, makes him look like a really caring guy. But the reality is the millions he donates are less significant to him than just a thousand dollars to a person with a wage in the real world.
Maybe he does actually care, but do you see him in Africa helping physically helping out people less fortunate than himself (i.e. Angelina Jolie)? No, he seemingly blindly throws money at a random charity at his convenience. This isn’t “good”, it is a typical Capitalist act in attempts to hide the reality, a disturbingly unequal distribution of wealth.
He’s still a billionaire, so he can’t be giving as much as he should be. This is entirely off topic, but throwing money at charities doesn’t make someone a “good” person. It just shows they have more money than they should. Donating millions to charity is trivial to him.
It’s all relative, and you should think on those terms. What is of value to Bill Gates? Time, at least. How much of that has he donated to charity, besides his much publicized press conferences with oversized check donations? I doubt very much.
I’m not saying he is evil or anything silly like that, just that being wealthy and donating an insignificant amount of money (for him) doesn’t make him good.
The difference between Gates and Jolie is Jolie doesn’t actually have a 24/7 job, she is an actress, she can go off and do whatever she wants for the most part, Gates is the chief software architect at one of the biggest tech companies in the world.
It isn’t just tiny millions he gives away, he spends a good deal of his life dealing with the Gates foundation and such. There is more to life than money.
Also, his billions that he is worth is not very liquidic. He has investments and such which is not the same as being worth billions in cash.
Guys, Jolie only got into what she got into AFTER she got involved with the movie. We all should volunteer (I do with Amnesty International). The rewards are far greater than you can imagine…
Bill could afford to take his lifetime (and yours, mine too) off… Jolie cannot, she’s gotta work, and makin’ movies consumes MORE than 8-hours a day…
let’s get back to the topic… Busy Lil’Billie Bee
“How far we have come.”
Indeed. For being one of the newest kids on the block amongst Oses and without corporate backing most of its existence, it sure has come a long way.
Bill Gates on Linux:
“It’s the primary operating system we’ll be competing against.”
“Linux–which is only a kernel–is not where the interesting stuff is going on nowadays.”
A kernel or an OS, make up your mind! I also wanted to say Bill Gates is just an idiot who lucked out, not an innovator or marketing genius, and people need to realize this.
Next time someone says “Linux is not ready for the desktop”, please remember what Bill Gates himself said:
— snip —
Right. But now they’re pushing Linux for the desktop.
“People have had Linux on the desktop for a long time. It’s not a substantial share of what’s going on at the desktop.”
— snip —
Follow the link if you don’t believe me. Bill Gates himself points that Linux on the desktop has been a reality “for a long time”…
It’s getting easier and easier to understand why Windows is such a lousy layer of software. One of the things that is becoming quite clear at this point is that BG does not really understand software or hardware very well, and never has. It is, in other words, becoming quite clear that one of the most significant reasons Windows sucks as bad as it does is that it is not a very good vision which has not been executed particularly well. There are many good visions in software and hardware, and those which have been executed well form the foundations of what works well in the modern world. For all his money, BG cannot conclusively demonstrate that this is true of his role in Microsoft’s products & services.
Innovation is important; I’ve got this free innovation called Proxomitron that filters out bandwidth clogging garbage made possible by non-free innovations from M$.
> You can not say that Bill is a bad person. He donates much
> more than any other person in the upper class. He has the
> Gates foundation which does a lot of work in AIDs research
> and such.
>
> Gates gives back to the community whether you want to >believe it or not.
The Gates Foundation earns more in intrest each year then it gives out in grants.
I believe he moved his money in there at around the same time the first anti-trust charges came up.. but basicaly it’s just another one of the few profitable products of Microsoft.
Until MS start fixing bugs rather than implementing new features, they’ll never be “perfect”.
Windows 2003 has the same bugs from Windows 2000, that I was hoping would be fixed.
I wish there were more articles like this….
I wish there were more articles like this….
“Indeed. For being one of the newest kids on the block amongst Oses and without corporate backing most of its existence, it sure has come a long way.”
Isn’t the Linux kernel acctually about the same age as the NT kernel?
“I also wanted to say Bill Gates is just an idiot who lucked out, not an innovator or marketing genius, and people need to realize this.”
As Bill Gates himself would have said:”that’s the stupidest thing I ever heard”
People don’t give Bill enough credit for what he has created: the world’s largest software company in what is perhaps the most competetive industry on the planet. Yes Bill has used some underhanded tactics to get there but the fact is that he has won (at least up till now). If he weren’t as smart as he has, he would have been out of business in 1975.