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Gates Steps Down As CEO, Ballmer In
migooch was the first of many people to write with news that Bill Gates has stepped down as CEO of Microsoft. Steve Balmer, who replaced him as President, will be CEO. Gates will become "Chief Software Architect", and will remain as Chairman. Update: 01/13 10:27 by E : The official Microsoft press release is here.Alright - Salon's Top 10 reasons Bill Gates stepped down is pretty funny as well. What do you think are the Top 10?
Does this actually change anything, except for titles?
.....who's springing for the champagne?
"All truth passes through three stages: first, it is ridiculed; next it is violently attacked; finally, it is held to be self-evident."
Gates often stated that it was his not his intention to run Microsoft forever. Ballmer is easily mean enough and nasty enough to bring Microsoft into the twenty-first century.
Gates often stated that it was not his intention to run Microsoft forever. Ballmer is easily mean enough and nasty enough to bring Microsoft into the twenty-first century.
Here's the press release from M$ itself:
Click Here
Guys, It's Ballmer, with two 'l's.
The link on the post looks screwed. here it is.. html?chkpt=zdnntop
http:// www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,2422036,00
Well I'd think that after so many years at the helm, BillG would get sick of it. If I had been him, I would have taken the money & run a long time ago.
Okay, so he's still responsible for overseeing Software Development...so I guess this means pretty much business as usual anyways--he just doesn't want to be hassled with all the paperwork, lawyers, etc. that a CEO has to see.
already i am feeling nostalgic. even if this is merely a changing of titles, the impact it will have on the internet could rival even the hoopla surrounding the y2k scare...
Is he trying to put himself into a less-vulnerable position?
http://downwithpants.org Overthrow the tyranny of your pants
Do you really think Billy would do this without any sort of strong legal advisement. It is probably only for the sake of his own stake in MS. He even retained the title of President. Seems too much like to games of corporate America.
Truly, we live in interesting times.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Actually, the article states that Ballmer will keep the title President, in addition to stepping into the CEO's shoes.
Witch Doctor
This is my cubicle. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
This is my cubicle. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
Gates will remain as chairman, and Steve Balmer, who has earlier replaced Gates as president, will continue to be president and CEO.
Did he step down to "Chief Software Architect" or whatever so he could stay in charge of windows after microsoft gets chopped up?
I hope MSNBC keeps that photo up for the story. It looks like Gates is yawning and Steve is on drugs or something... they both look pretty bad...
:)
Hey, does anyone else think Steve looks anything like Drew's brother from The Drew Carey Show? I think it would be funny to see him in a dress, wig, and heels...
---
"You know your god is man-made when he hates all the same people you do."
That should be "and will remain as Chairman", since it doesn't make much sense if he's stepping down from President to STAY as President.
Me, I fear this whole "Chief Software Architect" junk - I don't see what good can come of it.
This is also covered at cnet:m l?tag=st.cn.1.lthdne
http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200-1522563.ht
The key portion of the story that most people probably miss in their excitement is that Gates will be 'devoting all his effort to the windows 2000 product line.' so it seems like a strategic move. _IF_ the company is seperated into 3 creatures, Gates will still be leading the OS development angle of it. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
And he's bald and EVIL looking! Perfect for a CEO of microsoft.
BALDIES UNITE! WE'LL HAVE THE WORLD!!!
Gates will remain as Chairman of the Board, not President
Ballmer is now President and CEO
Somedays it's just not worth chewing through the restraints...
I can't decide - is this a good or bad thing? I mean, Bill G. was never THAT great of a software designer in the first place. Why not just consider retirement instead? What's worse - Bill running the entire company, and other's doing the job of design, or, Balmer running the company, and Bill getting his grubbies on to designing the overall systems concepts?
Plus, didn't he used to say that he could never see anyone above the age of 50 at the helm of MS? I thought Balmer was older than that 'limit'.
Davis Ray Sickmon, Jr - looking for something to read? Check out my three free novels at MidnightRyder.org
So what? He's probably relieved to put Ballmer in the lion's den now.
Is this billy's way of avoiding getting burned as bad as he would have as an acting CEO? Will his fallen reign will be fulfilled by one even more harsh? Forget Y2K, this is truly a sign of the apocolypse.
Until Bill sells his shares, he's still calling the shots. He may not be making day-to-day administrative decisions, but I'm sure all important policy decisions have to pass his approval before being implimented.
'I ain't a liar, baby, and I ain't proud I just want what I'm not allowed.' -- Violent Femmes, 36-24-36
They switched so that Ballmer will get some of the experience he needs to run one of the post breakup baby-Bills.
Well, I'll be. Looks like the son-of-a-bit finally gave up. Anyone belive this is the end of Billie's reign of terror? Anyone? I didn't think so.
At least he had the decency to inaugurate a puppet CEO...
Unless, of course, scissors can't cut rock...
Well, now, hardly a better canidate for that post; after all, he did write that blue and white screensaver thingee that now runs on 90% of the PCs out there... 8-)
-=- SiKnight
Let's see. First Red Hat does the CEO shuffle (twice), now Microsoft is doing it.
Personally, I agree with the concept when the person is worth their salt as a creative visionary. Get a business person to manage the company. Get a programmer with a vision back in the ring.
In a place beyond time and space, in a land far better than this, look for me there...
Bill Gates is staying on as Chairman, not President.
I am wondering if this is part of a deal with the DOJ. Anyone have any idea if the DOJ can force him to step down?
for those who have not done that yet. If Bill is the chief software architect, the first service pack for Windows 2000 is going to be written in BASIC spaghetti code ;-)
This really shouldn't be all that suprising. Over the past couple years bill has been taking less and less control of MS and letting steve to the work.
I think the real thing to watch for is if Steve B. tries to pull a "Steve Jobs"(tm) on Gates.
In the end not a whole lot will change. The ego and aditude is about the same. Steve is better spoken and doesn't have that child molester look that Gates has.
DNA is a Turing machine. You, however, being dynamic and emergent, are not.
Wanted: Borg picture of Steve Balmer.
:)
It seems to me that Gates hasn't had a very active role in the company for a while now, what with all the practice runs for his taped antitrust deposition he had to do...
Seriously, I really don't think much will change. Maybe they'll get a little less predatory, since the man who built Microsoft from the ground up is no longer in the pilot's seat (and hot seat, for that matter), but you can never tell. Gates will undoubtedly be a force to be reckoned with, so things probably won't stray from the Microsoft party line.
This should come as no surprise. Bill is just making sure that he and Ballmer have control of two of the three Microsofts that will exist after the breakup.
Do you think that Bill knows something Steve doesn't ? :) Also, seeing as Bill's been in the 'Opressive Marketing / Global Domination' department for so long, what does he hope to bring to company as 'Chief Software Architect' ?
-title
Can anybody tell me just what the difference is between a chairman, a president and a CEO?
Didn't he look ridiculous giggling like a little girl? And what bug crawled up Balmer's ass and how long has it been there?
Does this mean Billy Boy really isnt the ANTICHRIST?
First Y2K fails, now this. Boy the doomsayers are really running out of fuel, huh?
Drop me a line at:
Key ID: 0x54D1D809
...would we see Gill Gates and Mike Shaver changing jobs *both* being reported on the front page.
:)
I think that's great
Do you even know anything about perl? -- AC Replying to Tom Christiansen post.
...this must be said.
Ding Dong the witch is downsized.
I've always wondered what Ballmer did to get such high positions at Microsoft - from what I saw in Pirates of Silicon Valley, he just happened to be with Gates and Allen in the right place at the right time. Does he have any real CEO credentials - training, experience outside of Microsoft, or otherwise?
And the ineveitable question - Does it run Lin-- whoops, answered my own question =)
-- Imagine how much more advanced our technology would be if we had eight fingers per hand.
From reading prior posts, I have seen:
1) He's tired of it
2) Musical names
but upon thinking, I came up with an additional reason:
3) To strategically position himself so he could choose the branch of MS if it were split up.
e to the i pi equals negative one
bill has finally seen the light: having a Steve - even a Ballmer will do - as CEO is the best thing for a company.
a Steve, as in a Woz or a Jobs, is just a more portentous name in computing than a Bill.
- Entertaining Bits from the Ancient Kernel Tree
Hmm. I caught the BBC one on this, but don't see it makes much difference. Bill is handing over formal control of the day-to-day running of the company to Steve Ballmer, but qualifies that by saying he has been doing the work associated with this position for over a year now. BG apparently is going to plan the overall strategy, but leave implementation up to Ballmer - and I can see where, if M$oft is broken up, he ends up "planning the overall strategy" for all three or more companies, with the figurehead managers doing exactly what the plan says they do....
Lenin has left the building Stalin has arrived
Well, now that Gates is gone, what will happen with the stock market, also seen with the trial where Microsoft might be divided into three seperate companys (Os, Inet and Software). Perhaps now the highly overvalued stock market for IT will coulapse, because of these signs. People, get your profit NOW -- The Switch
...can be found on the Microsoft site.
Click Here
In haiku:
Now Bill Gates resigned
so he can CEO for
Babe-Bills tomorrow
Bah, IMHO, he's just saving face because he know's how the DOJ trial is going to go... :)
What happened to the previous Chief Software Architect? Was he assimilated?
@vSpid Like, Whatever
Microsoft will continue writing applications that don't work, opening windows off of the screen that you can't get to them, just like they've done for years. Fear not, good computer users. Crap will continue to be the 'standard.'
When Gates was asked about whether he will now be able to spend more time with the Gates foundation, he replied something like "My time is split between my family and my job, and those take about 95 % of my time."
It's a shame, since he is in a position to do so much good with his money. He probably loves his family and his job, but still.
Ballmer ranted about how some new Microsoft "innovation" will be among other superlatives very open. I wonder what that means.
No undocumented APIs?
At the light, everyone get out and change seats.
This is probably just preparation for the upcoming breakup. A rearanged power structure to ensure that the serperate companies are run by the same people.
here is the link. Interesting that this was posted almost simultaneously as the Gates/Ballmer one....
If only "common" sense was actually that common...
How much choice do the people in charge get when their company is broken up? Anyone know? Is the CEO forced to sell stock in the other company? Can they choose what company to run?
The cake is a pie
Go ahead, label this as a troll, but Bill gates is a human being. I wondered how long it would take him to get tired. I mean, how many accusations and court cases can you handle? I Imagine the executive end of Microsoft is probably unimaginably hairy, and gates has always been more interested in directing the technology than dealing with the pencil-pushing politics involved in the executive end. Now it sounds like he'll be able to influece the software MS puts out more directly, or at least have more time for it.
If I were him, I probably would have done this years ago, I can't imagine doing all that business-stuff while I knew my employees were having all the fun...
E.
is still a rose....
A wolf in sheep's clothing.....
is still a wolf...
Windows is going the way of phlogiston...
gates hinted to this a long time ago.. one thing that is funny is that gates is going back to be the "chief software architect". he might actually code again.. i hope he makes something better than qbasic though..
Does this now mean that Ballmer has the power to give Mr Gates his notice ?
The government might split Microsoft into 3 (or so) entities, but it can't strip Bill Gates of what will be his large ownership in all 3 companies. And will breaking Microsoft up instantly produce a viable competitor for Windows? Office? Internet Explorer? (Note: I'm not talking technical merit, I'm talking end-users BUYING what they know).
Very likely all three companies will do really well, just inflating Bill Gates' personal fortune into even more stratospheric heights. It happened to Rockerfeller when the government split up Standard Oil, don't be surprised to see it happen again.
Amazing what a UDP against @Home can do!
That's all it is. You know the saying, "The hand is quicker than the eye." Well, I wouldn't be at all surprised if Mr. Gates will still be calling the shots (or "pulling the strings" of Mr. Ballmer) from the sidelines in an "advisory" capacity. I almost feel sorry for Ballmer.
I guess the year 2000 will be the end of the world.
Does he still think he is a techie. How long it's been since he coded...
Note: what follows is what I remember about MS structure, after reading some books
When he was at PARC, Charles Symonyi[0] (sp?) designed a scheme for writing code, where a meta-programmer gave programming instructions to ~50 actual coders. He later moved to Microsoft.
Bill Gates has always seen himself as a meta-meta-programmer. This change will enable him to function more on programming... after all, he did originally start as a coder way back when. So he's taking charge of what he does on a day-to-day basis, good for him.
This won't change MS much: he's still the owner....
0] This is the Hungarian who brought the world the questionable advancement that is Hungarian Notation,
... and today's pet project has
Got one New Year's prediction right.
Bomb in 1999 predicting InterNet Stock bubble
would burst and in 1996 when InterNet would
gridlock.
Think about it... he can't just up and quit. He is the epitome of M$... if he did that, the stock would plummet. (and he couldn't cash out)
If he takes baby-steps away from the helm... and out of the lime-light... then he can safely cash out his stock, and retire...
It's a rough game in life when you use money to keep score... 'cause you don't want to give up any points...
BlackNova Traders
I'm on an MS campus right now, and it's an odd hearing about this from /.
It's easy to understand why bill stepped down if you've played sim city. Once the city gets to a certain size, the effort required to run it begins to outweigh the fun of making it bigger.
Running MS has probably been similar. I bet it was fun launching windows 1.0. Likewise it was no doubt a blast watching OS2 nose dive while windows picked up speed. And the success of MS's internet strategy after nearly missing the boat completely had to have been thrilling.
What next? 10 years of slow, expensive court appeals? That's not fun - that's like trying to build enough police stations to handle the population of your 700 arcologies.
There comes a point in sim city where you either quit or click on the disasters menu and select all of them. I'm glad bill decided to step back instead of building a flying robotic monster and having it lay waste to the campus -- that's what I would have done.
--Shoeboy
I'm not a microsoft employee, and I'm certainly not speaking for them.
Yup, technically Ballmer could axe Gates for his sloppy coding style. But remember Bill still owns almost 20% of Microsoft.
In some ways, this is an insurance policy. If they split up the company, Bill is no longer CEO and can just get shares in each company and control it through himself and his buds shares.
Will in Seattle
Here's the article from news.com
You should never take life too seriously - You'll never get out of it alive.
Somehow I'm reminded of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapse when I hear that Bill Gates will be the chief software architect. Clearly he's had his fun, and now that the DOJ is going to rain on his parade, he's taking his ball and going home (just to mix a few metaphors). I can't help but wonder what Bill Gates II will do when the stock collapses, since what he does now is tend the Gates Foundation, which is likely to see a nosedive or two.
"If one is really a superior person, the fact is likely to leak out without too much assistance" -- John Andrew Holmes
I believe that it is just a move by Gates to get rid of the Bill Gates/Evil Empire connotation that haunts M$ wherever it goes.
Now it is just another company led by just another CEO, who may be evil, but does not bring with him the cult of negative personality that is associated with Gates. It also puts a more scheming and ruthless man in the top spot in preparation for the impending showdown with the DOJ.
On CNBC just a little while ago, the two men were talking about how wonderful it was that Time-Warner had been bought out by a "E-Business" and that nobody expected such a thing to be possible.
What they were really saying is that here we have a big information/media company with worldwide reach that could, with clever lawyers, be portrayed as a threat to M$ and contribute to competition in the industry which the DOJ insists is not possible with Microsoft in the state it is in.
Last I heard, all Bill knew how code in was VB!
Can you image running your mission critical
network/distributed computing environment on an OS written in Qbasic?
Hmmmmm.... that would have to be some modular code indeed....
I know, I know, it's a cheap shot. he won't be coding (well, maybe just the bootstrap *wink*)
to be sure, but it will be interesting to see if he can play the role of visionary as well as he did
the role of capitalist.
Actually, I find Steve Ballmer's face and general attitude more unsettling that Bill Gate's. All those who weep because they don't know who they will demonize for the *next* thousand years, fear not, for Darth Ballmer has arisen to take your abuse!
So, does this mean that /. will change their Bill-Borg icon to a Ballmer-Borg icon?
I suppose with the alleged imminent breakup perhaps a whole new set of icons will be needed.
*shrug*
-Vel
Now if a house fell on Ballmer...
I've said all long that MSFT's products needed help. IT abouttime tey assign someone to actually architect/design their products/
Take a look at the photo. Now, to my eyes, Steve seems fscked off while Bill is amused. Why would that be?
:o)
Conspiracy theories abound..
-r
"Steve's promotion will allow me to dedicate myself full time to my passion -- building great software..."
If only Bill had realized the problem years ago, we might have great software today.
I don't practice what I preach because I'm not the kind of person that I'm preaching to.
Two things interesting to me about this press release:
IMHO - This is all prep work in case they lose.
Remember even Jobs was gone from the helm at Apple for about 10 years only to trumphantly return. He can still come back post-break up or if there is no break up.
Interesting... Slate is owned by Microsoft. Slate posted an article this morning titled "What's the Difference Between CEO's and Chairmen?". Coincidence??? :)
//www.slate.com/Code/explainer/explainer.asp?Show= 1/12/00&idMessage=4361
The article is actually rather interesting for those who don't know the answer. Anyway, here's a link:
http:
It's just you.
The CEO is always the one named in press releases, so this just seems to be a way for Gates to get out of the spotlight some. As for setting himself up to lead a Baby Bill, well that would have happened anyway. It doesn't matter what title he has, you know Gates will find a way to end up in what he sees as the most profitable position after the breakup (which I don't see how a breakup will hurt the monopoly, but that's just me).
If I was Ballmer, I sure wouldn't want to be in the CEO spot when everything hits anyway. It's always a slim possibility that something might happen, and he becomes...ahem...dispensable as many CEOs seem to be in the tech world. Gates did a smart thing getting himself out of the hot seat, and probably he sold it real well to Ballmer
"Hey look, Steve, you can have the celebrity and spotlight. It's all good, and I promise you'll have a good spot after the breakup...what? No, I wasn't laughing under my breath. You must be hearing things."
Electronic Frontier Foundation for online civil rights information
Seriously, if Gates started calling himself head-janitor it wouldn't change the fact that he can lead the company around by the nose. I fail to see how he is "stepping down". More accurate would be "side-stepping". As in "side-stepping the anti-trust decision". This looks like another slick PR move for MS.
Bite the hand.
I don't know what to think of this, but my gut feelings are as follows:
; }return(0);}
1) Gates has been MS President since Linus was 4 years old, and perhaps its time to move on.
2) He's becoming chief software architect - i was not aware he knew how to code.
3) Is he, perhaps, up to something as this is right on the heels of the latest noises from the monopoly trial...
And it also reminds me; who is slated to take over for (knock on wood) Linus, if something happens to him? The worst thing that could happen to the linux community would be to run around like a headless chicken.
Just my $0.02 (add GST if in Canada)
#include <signal.h> \ #include <stdlib.h> \ int main(void){signal(ABRT,SIGIGN);while(1){abort(-1)
OFTC: By the community, for the community
The DOJ can't force him to do anything, including breaking up Microsoft. Now, if you haven't already hit the reply button and made an ass of yourself, I'll explain why: No matter what the DOJ says, all they're doing is telling him the consequences of his actions. You don't break up the company, we make you use Linux for the rest of your life. That sort of thing. Then he can either do it and escape the consequences, not do it and live the consequences, or he could just close up shop. Take a minute and critically (that means no demagogic knee-jerking kids) about what life would be like if Microsoft didn't exist tomorrow. Are you Open Source guys ready to give free tech support to every 90 yr old granny who wants to print a birthday card? I sure hope so in such a circumstance...
E.
BTW, Bill, we all know you read Slashdot. Take my advice - close Microsoft. Padlock the doors, everything, just close it down. Kick back at your awesome house and just watch the motherfucker burn. Oh, and invite me along if you don't mind, when the Open Source socialists find out that socialism doesn't work like countless other societies have had to, they'll go violent and I don't want them killing me for my food. I'll clean your pool or whatever you want, i wouldn't ask for it for free.
Looks like another strategy "borrowed" from Sun Microsystems. They still aren't likely to be ready for network based computing. As long as their success centers around Windows and the current computer/OS paradigm, they won't be able to recover the lost ground when the paradigm finally shifts into new kinds of computing. We've already seen how much ground they lost by getting into the Internet a year or two late. They were never able to "take over" the Internet the way they hoped (MSN is a prime example). They only succeeded with Internet Explorer by building it into Windows; so, again, the strategy centers on the Windows product. Can this Titanic steer fast enough to avoid the inevitable? Actually, a break-up of the company might actually help.
----
"Oh, bother," said Pooh, as he hid Piglet's mangled corpse.
Maybe someday Enlightenment will strike Bill and
he'll start hacking on Software Libre.
Mmmm, Mozilla.
To understand my point, consider id Software. Todd Hollensomething is CEO, but John Carmack is in charge, AFAIK.
Bill Gates will always be in charge, but he may have less paperwork to do. This just changes the names around a bit....
... and today's pet project has
Ok, scroll down so that you can't see Ballmer's scalp, and look at the face...ladies and gentlemen, the new CEO of Microsoft - Alan Alda!
-lx
I guess the sort of means they failed badly . . . .
It's a good thing that Bill is still chairman. Otherwise, the "Chairman Gates" / "Chairman Mao" innuendo wouldn't work any more. Chairman Ballmer just doesn't have the same ring to it.
One of the antitrust lawyers, in the special /. article a few days after the ruling last fall, said that in a forced breakup, each principal can work and hold stock in only one of the resulting subentities (in this case, Baby Bills). Otherwise, there'd be no incentive to change anything. It would be scrutinized by the court, so a 'consultant' arrangement probably would not fly.
Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler. -Albert Einstein
Pff, it doesn't matter what title Gates gives himself. Even if he becomes the cleaner of the building, he still owe's m$.
right?
Greetings,
:)
Love him or hate him, Bill Gates is the reason why Linux exist. If it was not for dos and windows 3.11 inferior code, Linus would not of been inspired to write linux. Can anyone argue where Linus got his inspiration? No, cuz he admited himself , look at Novemebrs issue of MIT Magazine of Innovation Technology Technology Review.
People can argue this back and foward all they want, but growing up in an era with Bill Gates pushing the internet into everyones home is the reason why some of us are what we are today. No can argue the fact that Internet is readly available toady to millions is partly because of Microsoft Mission Statement which is " A computer on every desk and in every home using great software as an empowering tool". Now some might argue that their software is somewhat not so great, but the fact of the matter most of would still be using "MAC's" today if it was not for this man we love to hate.
Bill Gates, is proably the most influential man in the high tech industry next to Tim Berns and Marc Anderson. Yea , the company was on a mission to destroy every one in its path, but thats what having a good strategy is "to over come your competition using best cost / low cost leader to differentiate yourself and gain market share at any cost."
If Netscape, Apple, and all those wining company recognized the oppurtunity before Microsoft had, then the table would of been turned. I have to wonder what kind of management these companies had, to forgo oppurtunties that existed. Proably not astute managers, thats for sure. Why else would of Netscape surrendered to competetion?Netscape had their web site to leverage to be able to capture market share in the internet arena. They didn't.. Obviously AOL know's how based on the appearance and marketing of it today. www.netscape.com The same with Apple, if they would have liscnesed the "OS" things might be different today. They didn't. Who's fault is that? Microsoft! Wrong, it's managements fault.
When it all comes down to it, a company with astute managers and good business sense is more likely to succeed and fend of competetion than one that is just made up of a bunch of "TECHIES".
With that in mind, I say Bill Gates is the greatest man to have come along since Henry Ford. He was able to mass produce a product and make it available to every one of us at an affordable price. Thus, making some of us who we are today. Network Engineers, Programers, Linux Geeks, Hackers, Web Site Desingers, entrapanuers, and so forth. Well you get the picture.
The man we love to hate! Bill Gates
Remeber him, cuz when we get older we'll all have something to talk about.
TTYL
He that hath a trade, has an estate. (Ben Franklin)
Ballmer has been the heir apparent for some time as the designated hardass that can (they hope) keep Microsoft moving ahead of its problems. Gates is now at that age (like many of us) where the day to day business stuff that was once so exciting is a bore. He has a family, a house on Lake Washington about the size of Rhode Island, and enough money (no matter what happens) that will allow him to do what he wants as long as he wants. All he needs to do now is find something that interests him. What is there left for him to do in business? Build the richest company in the world? Become the richest man in the world? Talk about been there, done that . . .
Gates is now looking to create a different kind of legacy for himself. As far as the lawsuit or splitup is concerned, a move like this is an upraised middle finger. If they really thought a splitup was going to happen, they (Gates, Ballmer, etc.) would either both move into division management to prepare, while leaving someone with more legal/financial backgroud to manage the details of the split with the DOJ and Wall Street. Microsoft knows it has to settle to survive, and Gates has put his chief junkyard dog in charge to handle the negotiations and aftermath -- he's the bad guy who will have to take all the actions to comply along with all the blame.
If the DOJ breakup happens, mabye gates will change his name to 1 of 3, and Ballmer can be 2 of 3....
J
Gates obviously isn't stupid. By maing this move he does stay with the most profitable portion of the company. It also means that maybe it will redirect some of the stress from Gates to Balmer letting Gates outta the crosshairs for a bit.
The Big reason I see Gates making this move, I think he belives that the DOJ will break up the company and if they do, then he also stay with the one part of the company that he truley started. Software is what MS was in the beginnings and if his magical kingdom is going to come crashing down, then he wants to be with the part of it that he truely feels his all his.
I could be wrong, he could be doing this for no other reason then to redirect the media attention from the AOL/Warner circle back to his own. Who really know but Bill and his little inner-circle. Then again, I could also be right *shrug*
Trying to be different, just like everyone else.
Obviously any move like this would have been planned and considered for a considerable time. I wonder whether Bill might have abandoned his idea had Microsoft's installed software base catastrophically fallen over with the turn into the year 2000. After all, it might have strongly looked like wimping out under those circumstances.
/. readers think?
What do you other
Bill Gates/Steve Balmer =
Bill let Steve grab same.
Get your anagrams here
Drop me a line at:
Key ID: 0x54D1D809
Ladies and Gentlemen Satan has Left the building. I don't care who runs hell, as long as Bill Gets some time off to drop some pounds and get a tan. can't the the richest man in the World looking like a fat version of Gilligan.
How about we go for a Zerg this time?
B. Elgin
B. Elgin
"Read at your own risk; feel free to ignore."
Seven of Nine is a really hot chick. Steve Ballmer is a fat ugly bastard. I definitely don't want to see his picture...
___
___
If you think big enough, you'll never have to do it.
a master and an apprentice!
-- your knees hurt, don't they?
http://www.msnbc.com/news/357171.asp?cp1=1 As Bill Gates stifles a giggle, Doctor Evil wonders just what Mini-Me is doing in his pants. You'd think his own company would post better pictures :)
Chief Software Architect?
It feels to me like the point in Wizard of Oz after the house (DoJ) landed on one witch, they learn that there's another one still to go.
Seriously, tho, my first response to this was to see it as the obvious reply to the rumors of the split-up--leverage the top execs so that they are all at least somewhat experienced with the CEO seat before they get plopped into it. That, combined with Gates getting tired of being at the helm. All reliable reports I've heard is that it is true that he'd rather be in the trenches.
Whether that's a good thing or not, well...
Returned Peace Corps IT Volunteer
> I'm glad bill
:)
> decided to step back instead of building a flying robotic
> monster and having it lay waste to the campus -- that's what I
> would have done.
What do you think Windows 2000 is?!
Bill Gates announced in a second press conference that he was spending $25 billion to take over Red Hat Software. "I always thought that Linux was kinda cool, but it needed some innovations" He went on to add, that the rumors were true, the old microsoft avitar "Bob" icon would be replacing the penguin in the near future, more changes to follow ;) George W. Bush "Not a crackhead anymore"
It's only a matter of time before Bill takes to title "Food and Beverage Administrator".
Poor Balmer, they don't even mention that he ran off to NeXT for a short period of time.
Here's my interpretation:
The Justice Department has taken the fun out of Bill's favorite toy, so he's not going to play with it anymore. ;-)
Why is it that according to many of the higher rated posts ANY change Microsoft makes that is not directly related to software development must be related to the DOJ? Anyone with a brain understands that companies do this type of thing all the time!!! Just because Bill decided he wanted to get away from heavy management (which for all intents and purposes it sounds like) does that have to be because of the DOJ?
The DOJ is *NOT* going to break up Microsoft. They can huff and puff all they want but if they try to they will be into 10 years of court battles. (They know that and so does anyone with half a brain.) And with every AOL/Warner deal that goes down MS can point the finger and say "look at that." It won't be hard for them to find a judge that will agree. So get over it. It's not going to happen. Microsoft is here to stay, it's power may fall or climb but it's not going to go anywhere as much as some would like it to go *poof*.
If Bill wants to have more time to spend with the product groups hell I say go for it. If he wants to spend time writing code more power to him. (Although I don't know what he has the skills to write nowadays). He should do what he enjoys and wants to do. He has that right just like the rest of us.
Amen. He's just divested himself of tons of day-to-day bureaucratic piffle, and trimmed his job description down to Big Thinker and Chief Geek. Rasing the kids, giving to charity, hanging out in the R&D labs all day. Who wouldn't prefer that?
He might even start coding again. Maybe even contribute a few lines to Mozilla SMACK!!
Ah, that's better. Good thing the guy in the next cube has a Reality Stick. Anyhoo, IMHO, Ballmer's always been the shark at Microsoft. Nothing's gonna change, at least until the DOJ comes calling with their carving knives.
Keith Russell
OS != Religion
This sig intentionally left blank.
The alternate text on the image is "Bill Gates"
... but Steve is a much bigger man!
Remember in 1998 when Gates stepped down as CEO and became chairman? Ballmer gave all the keynote speaches for Microsoft that year. Are they really playing musical positions or just trying to get on Slashdot?
i wonder how Bill Gates decided who would get the CEO position...
did they draw names out of a hat...
or measure the thickness on brown on the contestant's noses?
you tell me
--
I agree this is just another move my money grubbing Gates. He's not stupid you know. Wouldn't be surprised to see him pull most of his stock out either. I mean if I was him I would probably pull out my fortune before there is nothing left.
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
NPS Internet Solutions, LLC
"Get your domain name for only $45"
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
NPS Internet Solutions, LLC
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
www.haidacarver.com
Yeesh - how's he gonna make ends meet?
The President of a company is usually responsible for the day-to-day running of a company -- for instance, are we selling enough product, do we have the right people in the right places to produce it, etc, etc.
The CEO is responsible for the LONG TERM management of a company -- issues like: does the company as a whole have enough funding? What is the appropriate positioning in the marketplace? Can we forge alliances with other companies, or buy them outright? What markets should we be entering or leaving?
In a way, the CEO is the actual head of the company.
The board is another story. The board functions as an overseer. Typically, the board does NOT set policy, make rules or even high-level decisions. This, however, varies widely from company to company, but in general, they can't -- the typical company has board meetings once or twice a quarter at most. Their job is to act as advisor to the CEO (who almost almost ALWAYS has a seat on the board, and is usually chairman), and as a brake on them. They are not employees of the company -- frequently they ARE of other companies, or are executives of other companies, and they are also the elected representatives of the shareholders. Usually a fraction, or all of the board members are re-elected each year. As a last resort, they usually have the ability to remove the CEO, as they did at Compaq last year. oh, they one area they usually do rule over are issues like executive compensation.
Sounds like he's pulling a Steve Jobs finally. It won't be long till he returns as interim CEO. :)
Joseph Elwell.
Bill could be the next bond movie villan. All he needs to do is shave his head and buy a cat.
Reuter's Photo
I used to wonder why a split-up was considered a remedy, since the ownership would stay the same. The Slashdot interview with antitrust lawyers shortly after the ruling last fall clarified this.
After a forced breakup, the principal officers of the company can work and hold stock in only one of the subentities, under scrutiny of the court.
Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler. -Albert Einstein
Therefore, I'd like to challenge Bill to get a (non-documentation) patch accepted into *any* well-known free software project. In fact, I'd personally like to ask Bill to use his newly acquired free time to help out with GnuCash project.
On the theory that people contribute to free software to scratch a personal itch, I reckon Bill might like to add support for arbitrary-precision arithmetic to prevent floating-point overflows . . .
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
Yesterday, rumors start that the DoJ is considering splitting up M$ into three parts; one for OS, one for Apps, and one for Internet. Today M$ announces that they have a whole new direction that they've already been working on that sounds to me like it involves further integration of W2K with M$ Office and IE.
(think "Bambi-eyes"): "Gosh, you can't break us up now! Our entire business strategy is built on developing an integrated whole! You'll put us out of business and destroy the software industry!"
If plan A was to walk away from the DoJ study unscathed, this must be plan B...
"I'm a scientist! I don't think, I observe!" - Dr. Clayton Forrester
Hmmm...Ok fellow X file conspiracy theorists, what if this strange happening is somehow connected to the Caldera settlement AND pending M$ split up AND the NSA (recall NSA keys) wanting a secure Linux?
Nobody admits any problems, but The Big Head rolls, markets shift, monies move, and open source and Back Orifice 'hackers' become Government service providers. Just a coinkinkydink? Do the Chinese really know something!:? And January 19th we finally find out what Transmeta's up to!
How long until Jay Leno or David Letterman wakes up and smells the penguins, and brings Linus Torvalds on?
Folks,
Stop sounding like a bunch of conspiracy theorists who've been listening to too much Art Bell. (shrug)
Consider this: how long has Bill Gates been running Microsoft as CEO? 25 years? Given the fact he's raising a family and also does have some other serious hobbies in life (e.g., his considerable interest in biotechnology), I think Mr. Gates wants a change of scenery and do something that won't be so taxing.
His place in history is already completed; he wants to do other things like life, just like when Steve Wozniak stepped down from Apple Computer.
Raymond in Mountain View, CA
Actually, anyone who tried to shut microsoft down would first be drawn and quartered by shareholders, then jailed, then set on fire by irate users, etc. And no open source coders have to teach your granny to suck eggs for free. If they did shut it down, in the smoking ruins of your machine, you'd find the real value of open source.
Science is open, too, and if you think it's socalist, then go infect yourself with rabies and live in a cave.
Of course he does. Maybe now he'll have time to get a decent haircut and maybe visit the "daystar" once in a while. A tan would do that boy good, I tell ya!
Gradually 'de-moting' himself from power would help to ease the panic of investors. Just like in the AOL/Netscape merger, most Netscape execs were brought over to AOL and over time they left or went 'part-time.'
I think that the DOJ case is just the breaking point (no pun intended) of Gate's decision to retire. He said in a recent interview that he "could see a world without Microsoft" making me think that Gates & Microsoft are running out of steam.
Seeing that Microsoft missed to boat with WinCE and some Internet technologies is more evidence of an aging company & CEO. There is no more excitement about future Microsoft products. When Windows95 was to be released, I remember Best Buy demoing the os in stores. Now, I have no solid idea where Microsoft is going to go after Win2k is out.
Anyways, just my .02
hehe...he's threatening to write code. That's hilarious!
Actually Bill really enjoys schmoozing with his developers. He always took an interest in what was going on and wanted to understand all the little details.
o -please-don't-tar-and-feather-me :)
They have periodic "billg reviews" as well, which are not easy to prepare for. You have to know your product or feature 100% because you can expect that Bill is going to ask you intelligent questions on very specific things.
That said, he does have a well-known temper and can really come down hard on people. But I think he prides himself on his coding and really puts in an effort to keep up with the latest stuff.
Best regards,
SEAL-who-used-to-be-on-the-Visual-Studio-team-s
mmmmm.. previous story is monkey cloning, sort of
He'll remain as chairman. Ballmer is still President.
I agree with the previous post. Nearly everyone on this site is biased against Microsoft to some degree. Maybe this is flamebait but it's completely true.
I curse Windows and Microsoft on a daily basis as much as everyone else, and don't get me wrong, I fully support Linux as a superior operating system... it is. However I haven't killed my hope that Microsoft can improve. Can anyone truly say they believe that Microsoft has no talented people working for them? It's a question of how that talent is being used.. (namely, for marketing, not QA oriented goals)
Bill Gates isn't a god, or a monster. He's flesh and blood just like the rest of us, trying to do good in the hyper-competitive, vicious world we have created for ourselves.
How many of you have even considered the possibility that Gates has regrets? I doubt very much he's blind to what an unstable operating system Windows is. I think he stepped down as head of Microsoft simply because he's currently unpopular, and he wants to protect Microsoft, his life's work. (Before you start yelling at me that he made himself unpopular, I suggest you take a good look at Slashdot's Gates/Borg icon and ask yourself who really makes demons of men)
I'm not saying Microsoft is going to turn around and start laying golden eggs, but Gates stepping down from CEO and focusing more on improving their software is at least an ATTEMPT to move in that direction. Oh no, wait, I forgot. It's a big monstrous conspiracy to cleverly position himself as the uber antichrist of the next millenium. Silly me.
I'm sorry to be caustic, but the amount of suspicion and hatred flowing from what I usually find an extremely open minded, intelligent, and positive community just sickens me sometimes.
"Mind, as manifested by the capacity to make choices, is to some extent present in every electron." -Freeman Dyson
Ballmer is an It. His statement was perfectly correct. ;-)
Has Bill just been Steve's puppet all these years? Maybe its worse than we thought.
These changes were announced following the release of Microsoft® Windows® 2000, which the company said is a crucial building block of its strategy to focus on software services -- a major technology shift that will transform the industry in the way the Graphical User Interface (GUI) and the Internet did.
Lay down that crackpipe Bill.
I guess I should be used to the same old marketing BS, but it never ceases to amaze what companies will try to sell their products as.
Microsoft's Bill Gates resigned as CEO of Microsoft Corporation today leaving the position to long-time friend and recently appointed President, Steve Ballmer. Gates will remain as chairman and quasi-CTO. After the announcement, Gates clairified this dramatic move by making a public statement, "My old position really wan't giving me enough time to do the things I really love doing." Later when asked what he planned to do now that he was no longer CEO, Gates responded, "Well, I'm really looking forward finally spending some time home and hacking on some Linux Kernel Drivers."
Be Seeing You,
Jeffrey.
Time Lord, Dark Horse: The Techno Mage of Gallifrey
sooner or later the vast proportion of Gates' wealth will be given to charities. the more the better, imho.
wealth != power
Anyone else catch that little nugget in the MS press release?
"The announcement was made during the release of Windows 2000" or some such.
Oh really?
Guys like gates, love them or hate them, usually aren't motivated by money, and while he may make moves that are financially sound, I really doubt much of his motivation for doing anything is his own *personal* wealth. (Obviously he has micros~1's wealth in mind, otherwise he would have been kicked out of the CEO's chair by the stockholders)
Generally speaking, wealth is meausured in terms of orders of magnitude, not total dollar amounts. That's why somebody who has $9 million is in the same bracket as someone who has $1.2 million. Obviously, the difference of 7.8 million is a HUGE difference, but they're both "millionaires" and we leave it as that.
Billy isn't that close to jumping up another order of magnitude, because the higher you go, the harder it is to progress in terms of order of magnitude. In terms of day to day, and even life long decisions including providing for your next 3 generations, *there is no functional difference between having $5 billion and having $9 billion* Again, sure one is a hell of a lot more than the other (to the tune of $4 billion) but that is such an absurd amount of cash that I would think most people never touch the capital to begin with. You just stick it in reasonably conservative investments, and live like a king off of the interest.
Bill isn't dumb, he knows all this since he's probably got a small army of CPAs that just administer his finances. So let's be optimistic and say that with "Baby Bills" he could stand to end up $4 billion richer than he was before. WHO CARES??? He can't spend that amount in his lifetime, and it's doubtful his kids could either. (short of wholesale gambling and simply throwing it away). What's the motivation for earning the extra $4 billion? There isn't one...
Bill gets off on control and ego. He gets off on having one of the largest corporations on earth under his control, and being a celebrity probably. Money just can't be a motivating factor. If it is, then he is WAY more shallow than anyone could possibly have ever imagined. And comfortable living can't be it either, because he achieved that a long time ago.
-- Truth goes out the door when rumor comes innuendo. -- Groucho Marx
Here's one for the conspiracy theorists: I wonder if there's anything, post-potential breakup, to stop the Baby-Microsofts from licensing their code/products to external parties, and, if so, if there's something stopping Gates running off to setup another company repackaging/enhancing the existing Microsoft products. Lots of people would blindly follow Gates if he was to go his "seperate" way.
I had wondered the same thing.. whimsically, because I was wondering how you could honestly get the big Microsoft clan to actually part ways. I mean, I realize that if they gov't forces them to, da dee da. But, if they really want to, are we going to be able to stop them from making nice little partnerships with each other/trying to merge? I'm going to guess that I'm just thinking up silly questions, but, you know, are we really going to be able to instill in them a desire to compete against one another for market share? If we can, then great; they'll do a good job of breaking up. Otherwise, it's like taking naughty children and sitting them in corners in a room while we go off; they'll just get up and play together again.
Insert mind here.
Lets get something straight. He can design programs without writing them. Designing, in my opinion, is far superior then coding. A good design is invaluable. Not say that BillG is a good designer... But the point is, it doesn't matter whether he's programmed or not.
I can't beat these so far . . .
Can anyone answer this: will the Chairman's position keep gates out of the reach of court depositions, by the Justice Dept. or in other suits? Bad conspiracy theory: Bill's got the dirt and this is the only way for him to hide :)
--
314-15-9265
He can't buy off the government- he's tried. But he can buy a fall guy. That is Ballmer. He can extricate himself, claim Ballmer set the whole tone for the abuses of MS, and spend the rest of his life giving away huge sums of money while still living better than most kings. Who wouldn't want that? Gates wants that.
It is also true that the kind of person who can build an empire of this nature simply will not let go- but this isn't Gates letting go, really. Microsoft's _reputation_ is being wrested from him, and I'd say this also indicates no plans of Microsoft's indicate any change in overall strategy or approach. MS will play dirty to the end- Gates doesn't see this as wrong, but he's not a dope and he does see that _others_ see it as wrong. Given enough incentive, people do change- I picture Gates thinking about his image, how he wishes to be seen. He can afford to be the benevolent philanthropist for the rest of his life, a Carnegie in the best possible way- if he chooses. But at some point he must accept that Microsoft has taken him as far as it can- and has started to get in the way of his new dreams for a well-loved future as a philanthropist. And, just like any of a thousand unfortunate tech startups that were in the way and had to go, now Microsoft, its culture, its legacy are in the way of the life Gates wants for himself- and it has to go.
Gates is not a sentimental man, and he is easily as perceptive as the Judge and intelligent enough to see the full implications of his position. At some point he began taking all this seriously- and started laying escape plans.
Ballmer is left in a position to preside over the decay of an empire. There's really no way for MS to expand further- _especially_ with AOL Time Warner suddenly appearing- and MS is hopelessly dependent not on profitability alone but an outlandish growth rate. That cannot continue and won't. Ballmer is also combative, a perfect match to the job of making Microsoft fight to the death. They won't in fact die, but their being relegated to only one choice in an industry of choices will be a very, very painful and bitterly fought loss.
Gates has the opportunity, having made MS what it is, to now cut it loose, cash in, and go home to be a lovable billionaire. Doing this is perfectly in character with the approach that made MS what it is- ironically, I'd been saying for awhile that there was no reason to believe MS would have loyalty to the USA, and now it turns out that Gates does not have loyalty to a losing MS either. Perhaps surprising, but plausible.
Get used to the idea of Gates as a benevolent philanthropist. He _will_ be able to separate himself from the unpleasantness, but his ways of doing so may be startling...
...which of the small companies would Gates stay with "officially" (i.e., hold a position at) if Microsoft broke up. (Or would he hold "part-time" positions at all of them or something?) I think that he would personally want to stay with whatever division did Windows, since it is derivitive software from what really entered Microsoft into the software world, that is, MS-DOS. However, I think that he would stay with whatever company did IE and the other Internet stuff (just look in his book The Road Ahead and I think you'll see why). The above assumes that if there is a split, then it would be horizontal rather than vertical (which I think it will be).
Ken
Anybody got another answer?
How fun would that be?
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!
It isn't like this will have any noticible effect on the quality of Microsoft software.
I think that at least deserves mentioning cause most of you either don't know it or don't care to remember it...
Bill Gates as "Chief Software Architect"?!?! Please. That's an insult to those of us who are serious about developing software and take pride in our work . I'm familiar with people holding honarary degrees, but an honarary company title? Bill "helped" do a shitty port of BASIC over 25 years ago (to what today wouldn't pass for a calculator) and he's qualified to be a "Chief Software Architect"? I put together a Linux box on my own from components: does that make me a "Hardware Manufacturer":)? I wonder if all 9 of the smart Software Developers at M$ will quit and sell off options & stock when Bill asks how to make changes to the source:)
*** Sigs are a stupid waste of bandwidth.
The looks of a worried Gates and an angry Ballmer do not bode well for Micros~1's future. But what really got me is Gates' quote: "Steve's promotion will allow me to dedicate myself full time to my passion -- building great software..." What, does he mean he is going to work for a Linux company?
Sent from my iPhone
... as opposed to scare tactics. ... ...
Microsoft had plans to crush Linux, sorry to disentrance all the Linux/GPL loyalists out there. But it didnt happen, for example they have let two of their major partners, IBM and Intel develop interests in the Linux area.
Everything they are doing at the moment is designed to make them look less of a threat - they can say to the DOJ now 'look we have Competition!'
Yet beneath Ballmer's bluster, there is apparently still hope that Microsoft can find a way to settle that would strip away the "monopoly" mantle the company has been made to wear as a result of the antitrust trial Their hope is, the DOJ will reneg as much as possible, but once its over, either way, Bill will be back on track implement his deferred plan
Lets just keep this in mind, the mainstream right now is falling for his hurt puppy dog act
"Bill Gates, Chief Software Architect." shudder
:)
Anyway, is it really necessary to provide a link to www.microsoft.com just because Micros~1 is mentioned in a story? We're all bright, MS-hating folks who know where the site is...
-j
Why are the lines so long? It was not so last time I read Slashdot. I did not find any way to set this. Can anyone tell me what can I do, it is really annoying. (I can increase the Netscape window size but then it limits the number of windows I can comfortably place on the screen.)
Matyas
Unfortunately for them, Bill Gates is a creature from another generation and the "new" MS will not be able to execute this strategy, and will continue to come out with failed initatives, such as COM+, DNA, CE, Active Desktop-X-Movie, Chromeffects, etc that flop.
If you remove Windows and Office from the equation, via, let's say a revolution in OS's (linux/internet) or apps (internet/asp's, etc) MS has no real fall back products of great signifigance.
I predict after several more failed initiatives, under the new post-settlement MS, in a few years MS will be *bought* by AT+T or someone who needs some marginal web sites and services.
"Sig free in '03!"
Imo, he realized that Mac OS X will hammer W2K into the mud--
... that has delivered on the promise
so get out before it happens.
Moto Man
"It was none other than Apple
of bringing the power of Unix to the desktop of the average user."
--R. Morgan, RFI Report
Addendum: letting Linux rise was definitely part of their plan to look meek (IMO). Question is: what about AOL? Have they planned their bumblings in the content field?
I think this is a PR move. Gates' way of saying "Hey look what I'm doing in regards to the events of late!". He's the man with his name plastered all over the papers, he's the one everyone hears about. Hmmm... how does someone retire on only $100 billion? ... I once got an IS interview because in the application, I put "Besides, I may not have a degree, but neither did Bill Gates."
FLR
How can gates put that fat-assed suit in charge of the company? Microsoft will die now without the DOJ, what the hell is billg doing???
I would liken this action to bending over as in getting ready to be kicked.
DOJ is about to kick MS's butt. Billy is trying to influence which 1/3rd of the company he gets to dominate. =P
Addendum: letting Linux rise was definitely part of their plan to look meek (IMO). Question is: what about AOL? Have they planned their bumblings in the content field? Of other interest, Win2000 is going to be the most major upgrade since the win3.11 -> win95 update. Remember the promotion and hype even for win98? Where is it for win2000? And its here in 3 weeks or so ...
so that he can dedicate all of his time to helping drive the next generation Windows Internet platform and services
Anybody else notice that *W*indows *I*nternet is in capitals? Coincidence or conspiracy, you make the call!
Search first, ask questions later.
Steve Ballmer is a Dumbass he's gonna run this company into the ground! And then everyone will run Linux, BSD, or others. This is the beginning of the End.
-Karma Shmarma... Posting AC is for people who can't stand behinf their opinions.....
Opinionated Law Student Strikes Again!
Oh god, does this mean we need to find another symbol for pure evil?! Ofcourse this shouldnt take much time in this world.
It be "grammatical" idiot!
I tried a Google search for the above phrase, a quote from Mr Ballmer, and guess who headed the hit list? (-:
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
They are preparing for the possible Microsoft breakup. There is some positioning going on here, the real motives will be evident soon.
In only a few, simple steps, Bill Gates would have neatly bypassed any judgement passed against Microsoft and removed any legal barriers that might have been placed against mergers, by transferring everything out of the affected companies into a totally new shell, which then just needs to be renamed to keep brand recognition, once the transfer is complete.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
That Bill G. is an even marginally talented programmer is a common misperception, even among geeks.
Paul Allen (a very GOOD hacker at the time) did most of the Altair work.
At most Bill acted as Allen's "agent". He was the one angling to make sure he (and Allen) made money off of Allen's skills. Witness his now infamous "big foot" letter to Altair hobbiests, regarded now as the start of retail software sales. That is Bill Gates' primary legacy to computing, not any real programming.
I love the "Breaking up this company is such a terrible idea!!" comments from Ballmer.
______________________________________
um, sigs should be heard and not seen?
rooooar
I think it is time to admit that Bill Gates has probably gotten bored with Microsoft and that is why he quit. The press release and title of Chairman is nothing more than a bit of reassurance to Wall Street, no behind the scenes power grab.
At some level, Gates is still a person and when frustrated or unable or both he has got to want to do something aggressive, risky or both. He cannot get that satisfaction from Microsoft anymore. He can't compete with ruthless abandon because of the government. He can't be a player in innovation because he has to take a pause and learn an aweful lot. He can't plunge Microsoft into a hugely risky assault the same way he did in 1992 - it would irresponsible to his shareholders and to the economy at large.
Gates cannot have fun at Microsoft any more, so he is going to do something else. He puts enough of his name on the company to keep his shares valued highly.
Microsoft is going to become a normal American corporation, staid like an IBM and as boring as a Ford. It will make money in its market but not much news. It won't take big risks. It will be incremental, occasionally doing something flashy, but never really so risk filled, idea robbing, aggressive that you'd either despise the ethics while admiring the brilliance. There will be no eerie epics like the destruction of Borland or the fight with IBM.
Now, Microsoft has been off of its game for the last few years anyway. No doubt, a lot of you detest that company. But, when Microsoft is just another brand, when the computer industry "is mature" like cars or cola, I guarantee that you will miss these days. The computer industry is finally growing up and its not going to be nearly as much fun for it.
This is my sig.
It's pretty well documented that Linus wrote linux to replace with a shitty OS, but the shitty os in question was Minix.
I doubt too many of the early kernel hackers cited "hatred of windows" as their prime motivation. They most likely considered dos/windows irrelevant and were motivate by dislike of the high price and unfree nature of commercial *nixen.
--Shoeboy
Think of how much his worth would be if the company splits. Stock goes three ways, with continued growth from each sub company. We are talking about major stock value. This could be a good time to buy stock in MS, seriously. And would he control the smaller companies? As long as he is the majority holder, he could apoint anyone to whatever position he wants, as with any company that trades publicly.
Microsoft Rhapsody by Justin Osborn To the tune of: BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY by Queen Is this the boot disk? Is this the Win CD? Caught in a deadline This software is real crappy. Open a file, look up at the screen and see, I'm just a marketer, give me some sympathy Because I'm loaded man, playing spades, on my LAN, everyday. Quality of Windows doesn't really matter to me, to me. Ballmer just quit my job On TV prime time, signed on the dotted line. Ballmer, I was having fun But now I'm going to go goof off. Ballmer, ooh, Didn't mean to make you cry, If we're not regulated by tomorrow, Carry on, carry on, cause quality doesn't matter. Too late, not having fun I'm getting very bored, with the bugs in MS Word. Goodbye ev'rybody, I'm gonna go, Gonna connect to Hotmail and hack root. Ballmer, ooh, I don't wanna use vi Sometimes I wish I knew a little Linux. I see a little silhouetteo of a man, Steve Jobs, Steve Jobs, could it be some competition Torvalds and Penguin, very very scaring me. IE5.0 IE5.0 IE5.0 IE5.0 IE5.0 Word 6.0 Alpha 0.0.0.0.0 I'm just a marketer, nobody loves me. He's just a marketer, with a long history Stealing intellectual property. Monopoly, what d'you know? will you let me go? Microsoft! No, you bought out all we know. (We like slow!) Microsoft! You bought out all we know. (We like slow!) Microsoft! You bought out all we know. (I like slow.) Bought out all we know. (I like slow.) Bought out all we know. (I like slow.) Heck no, Heck no, Heck no Prosecution Prosecution, Prosecution let me go. The DoJ has a punishment for me, for me, for me. So you think you can split us and break us apart. So you think you can fine us, we'll make a new start. Oh DoJ, can't do this to me, DoJ, I'm gonna get out, I'm gonna get right outta here. Quality doesn't matter, Windows users see, Quality doesn't matter, Quality doesn't matter, to me.
Sheepdot: Open Source good, Closed Source baaaaaaad!
Reading all the comments on Slashdot takes up a lot of time these days...
Here's an interesting thought. What happens if Gates ends up going with the application division? The good software developers that go to the windows division then leave to join MSAppDiv, because they know that Gates will make the company sucessful. Windows gets left with a low talent pool. Does anyone out there think that Gates would have any loyalty to Windows if he doesn't control it. Not if he thinks he can make more money elsewhere. And so, MSAppDiv begins fully supporting Linux. Good/Bad? I'll let you decide.
"If English was good enough for Jesus, it's good enough for everyone else."
Company heads are forced to sell their shares in all but one of the newly-broken up companies... could the farcical ceremony be an attempt to sidestep this regulation?
Ok, here's the real truth. The little cuban boy is an alien and Bill Gates knows it. All else is a cover up, is deception grotesque. The real truth lies in the kernal, the secret Windows kernal, SETI of a newer sort, P=NP secretly proven by NSA cryptographers in 1996, all internet security a sham. Awesome computing and problem solving power. Windows, secret Bill Gates conspiracy with Government deal ends at 100 billion dollars. The net worth is reached, the deal climaxes, an alien ship deposits a cuban boy, to bring a message, hello, we found you to earth. Janet Reno stops shaking for a moment, we are not alone. The boy goes back to Cuba, out of sight but really back to space, Bill Gates retires, his deal with the NSA fufilled, millions of PCs with awesome power, contact made and now the end, and yes Fidel Castro is Java Programmer!
This is my sig.
In this article it was stated that Ballmer and Gates both said that only by having a unified company that was able to deliver across-the-board solutions was the company able to add ``real value.''
Is it just me, or does that statement parse as "Without our monopoly position, we cannot compete"? If they cannot add real value without controlling every aspect of the software market, how can they expect anyone else to compete with them?
I can't help but shake my head at the cluelessness of these guys!
Some guy named Chris
....broke hime in three pieces instead. But that's just me.
I shall henceforth resigning my position as CEO of Microsoft Corp. I have suddenly realised that Microsoft is evil, corrupt and does not play fair. This is something I never realised during my 25 year tenure as CEO. As all you who have climbed up the corporate ladder know too well, the higher you go, the less you know.
By resigning my post as CEO, and going back to my dark cell from where I write code, I am going back to my roots. Yes, my geek roots. I want, once again, to become one with my computer.
I hope, now that I am one of you, that you will forgive my sins. I wasn't aware of predatory marketing tactis. I swear. That was work of the Marketing Dept. I was totally unaware of the existence of the Dirty Tricks Department, to which all other departments reported to.
After doing a lot of investigations, I found out the real culprit behind Microsoft's nefarious schemes. He is none other than Steve Ballmer, the guy who replaced me as president sometime ago. Goes onto show that becoming president corrupts any individual.
As he is the President, he is all powerful, and there is no way I can get rid of him. Therefore, I have decided to make him the new CEO.
Now let him face the music. I know that "Bill Gates is Evil" returns 1,000,000 hits on any search engine. I think that should be changed to "Steve Ballmer is Evil". From now on it should read
Tomorrow I am going to do something I wanted to do all my life. Yes, meet Linus Torvalds, the true king. I will learn from him how to build a functioning operating system, and in exchange, I will teach him how to market a product.
Most of you out there, used to hound me saying I am the king-pig of capitalists. No, more comrades. There was Chairman Mao. Now there shall be Chairman Bill.
I hope this letter clarifies all the misunderstandings you have had during the last quarter century. May you have a long uptime.
Yours most Sincerely
Bill "ChrmnBill" Gates
Tell ya what, first off, how the hell do them sum-bitches lose market share! Damn, it costs 3 car payments for a closed source operatin system from that joint! Ya gotta take out a loan if ya wanna load the kids pc, and a application cost more than O.B.T. quickie! Lose money! Damn, who's keepin the books down there, Corky from Life Goes On! Don't worry about ole Billy folks. I'm sure he aint gonna be in a bread line or peein behind a dumpster anytime soon! I just can't believe it makes the front page! What, do they want us to feel sorry for him! Tell ya what, Earl workin down there at the Super Wal-Mart with a gimpy leg and face warts, makin 21 thousand a year with a waterhead kid and a wife that looks like Dan Deirdorf with t*ts and his boss that just said no way to a 15 dollar advance so he could get his spare tire fixed on his 1979 Cherokee station wagon with paneled sides! That's the feller that deserves the words "poor bastard", not ole Billy boy! Like a feller said after finding out the price of Win2K, "do you all have a layaway?"
.
Trollmastah
Steve Ballmer is overly competative, and him presiding over Microsoft will certainly bring about troubles. I have read a few interviews with him, and he is very arrogant and believes Windows is a gift to humanity.
Come on Steve Ballmer, if you had brains, you would realize that competation is a good thing for business, because it reduces stagnation. Your belief that Windows should be the only option for consumers is insane.
(Example: Intel and AMD of recent, hell it is almost FUN to watch them duke it out)
I hope Microsoft does get broken up severely, and that Steve Ballmer does get the short end of the stick out of the process.
I believe breaking up Microsoft would lead to new Microsoft products on other OS platforms, including Mac OS and Linux because they will feel not as obligated to make Windows their only home. They will feel like they have the freedom to have at least a vacation house over on Linux Island and another over at Mac OS Beach.
In theory, a divided Microsoft will conquer even more territory, but it will be in a way that will benefit non-Windows users.
DOJ, get out the axe!
EverCode
--Seen
"I used to be a dilettante. Then I thought I'd try something else for a while."
It's damn near impossible to grow into a competent adult without at least SOME cynicism about the motives of others. Furthermore, much of this cynicism will be focused on one is most informed about. Many of the members of the forum are VERY informed about Microsoft's past and current actions. As a group, we techies want to see the best technology win and we would prefer that winners accomplish this by Doing The Right Thing. For the most part, Microsoft's dominance is due to dirty tricks e.g. "If 123 runs then we ain't done..." and just plain bullying TRUE innovators when they couldn't buy them out. Microsoft is like algae bloom over what used to be a clear unmuddied lake; nothing else can breathe much less compete with it for resources. OF COURSE, there are a lot of bitter feelings towards them.
Most of us realize that the Best Right Thing simply cannot prevail against unscrupulous billionaires who can buy their way out of any threat against them. The bitter feelings that pain you are not without justification. Now if Microsoft were brought down a peg or three and had the smarts to realize why then perhaps our feelings might change. IBM used to be the Evil Empire you know.
I'm on an MS campus right now, and it's an odd hearing about this from /. I just got the strangest vision of Bill, having a bit more time on his hands, browsing /. and reading all the grand plans for his future ("Gates will do this"), and smiling.
HAve you ever listened to Larry Ellison or Scott McNealy? They say the same thing--even GM's e-commerce announcement said the same thing. Sell a service, not software. Go read level 3 or qwests investment prospectus--and you will find the same theme. The future is in service. Christ, that is why Red Hat thinks it can make money--sell a service, not software or hardware. Get your facts straight before flaming.
You guys are underestimating Gates. He truly believes that Windows can easily out-compete everything else, and that Microsoft applications have no viable opposition. But he doesn't like being associated with a foundering ship.
For this reason, ol' Gatesy is positioning himself to become an independent system architect and technology advisor not only to his old baby in Redmond, but also to his new venture, Windows Linux Inc, whose primary goal will be to market a Linux-based O/S that runs all Microsoft applications.
This will achieve 3 goals simultaneously: (i) Billy Boy will be making massively more money because he'll be selling WinLinux for $300 *AND EVERYONE WILL BE BUYING IT ANYWAY BECAUSE IT'S "MICROSOFT-APPROVED"*; (ii) Windows will continue to be a success despite massive competition in the O/S market from WinLinux among others, simply because most of the world knows no better (this will vindicate him in his belief that Windows is tops); and (iii) he'll continue to make massive amounts of money by selling his apps on WinLinux as well, through a concession from Microsoft.
All the above things are easily achievable, and even its risks are of the win-win variety, without any pun being intended. Bill may be down in the dumps a bit at the moment, but fairly soon he's going to be on top of the world again. As soon as Windows Linux Inc launches, I pity Microsoft investors.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
We know him and we know that he's not a quitter, this new "face" of Bill just doesn't fit with his image.
This is a pretty clever move to keep continuing guiding the "Baby Bills" once Microsoft will be split. Think abouy it, in his previous role he could not be possibly the CEO of three separate companies. As "Chief Software Architect" he doesn't have those constraints and he can consult for all of the Baby Bills while Steve Ballmer acts nicely as the puppet that he is.
In a way this is even worse than the previous situation since it hides the real enemy.
Billy's windows machine in the boardroom will only boot in safe mode, and he has to go re-install....
Simon
The real linux_penguin has Slashdot ID 101961. Anyone else is an impostor. Including Bruce Perens.
So maybe Bill was in charge of the direction of the company, and handed down the orders to crush the opposition, but I'd bet my left one that Ballmer handled a huge chunk of implementing those orders.
Bottom line? Don't expect anything to change.
When you're crushing a man's windpipe with your knee, you can be sure he will attempt to bite you.
This upsets me to know end. Why does everyone keep picking on Bill Gates and Microsoft? Without Bill we'd still be tied to those behemoth IBM mainframes. Bill and Microsoft are innocent. I just know it!
This is clearly the beginning of the end.
Hmmm lets see, Gates is now going to get
more involved in the day to day technical
decisions... That sounds familiar...
Anybody remember Johnson and something
called the Vietnam War?
I thought the #1 reason was so he could but AOL Timwarner.
We just want good software for ourselves. Gates will always be rich, but that doesn't hurt us. His company doesn't have to be unethical, though, and since we're currently afforded the power to force it not to be, it looks like that's what's going to happen. Hopefully we'll all be able to join Gates in his laugh with Office and MSIE for *NIX (etc), at least until proprietary software becomes completely obsolete.
Anybody who feels the need for some sort of jealous fit of revenge against Gates just has problems. It's about the software.
__|__
....|.....
....|.....
I thought the #1 reason was so he could buy AOL Timwarner.
Antitrust and other Microsoft legal
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/doj/doj.htm
Bill Gates site
http://www.microsoft.com/billgates/
Microsoft news and legal
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/
Corrinne Yu
3D Game Engine Programmer
This is a preparatory move; Bill G. will have his hands full acting as Chairman of the Board of three different companies after the break up (Bill will still own 30% of each of the three). Presumably each will have it's own CEO, etc. I'm curious which one Steve Ballmer will get, and who will head up the other two, but Microsoft already has a multiple person (I forget if it's 3 or 7) executive team anyway, so it's just a minor reorg for them.
Maybe Bill's new title will clear him to code another groundbreaking BOB interface. Nobody can dispute the fact that today's GUI's would be anything near as impressive without this breakthrough.
Good! Get da !@#$^& out Billie! Start working head-to-head with your money-sack and see just how crappy it is.
Maybe now Windows (Neptune, actually, is what he will work on) will be GOOD.
............ no.
Sorry for ditto.
You know those folks that did the Star Wars-cum-Titanic parody movie?
I want my Dr. Evil Ballmer Microsft Darth Vadar movie now!
1. Dr. Evil Ballmer is much better idea than Ballmer 7 of 9 (7 of 9 is much better played by Jeri Ryan).
2. Ballmer looks more evil than Bill Gates. He is a better visual casting choice for Microsoft helm.
P.S. Apologies to personal appearance attack to Ballmer et al.
Corrinne Yu
3D Game Engine Programmer
What you have proposed is known as an interlocking directorate. This practice was outlawed with the passage of the sherman antitrust act.
Not only ditto, but ditto-ing myself. Sorry.
/. Microsoft icon: Dr. Evil Ballmer. (It is even funnier than Bill Gates Borg.)
/. powers that be for the new Dr. Evil icon for Microsoft!
I look forward to the NEW
Then Anti-Microsoft articles can have the Austin Powers logo.
Petition Hemos/
Corrinne Yu
3D Game Engine Programmer
Wrong attitude I would think. Coming from someone defending Open Source.
just my $.02. guess bills photo can now be split with the laser side, of bills, and the other side of balmers... i dunno how the morph will result..
better idea for new Microsoft icon
5 0250&cid=41
Dr. Evil Ballmer
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=00/01/13/15
Corrinne Yu
3D Game Engine Programmer
"Nor is Sculley, who has taken to calling himself Apple's Chief Technical Officer--an insult to the company's real engineers."
-Accidental Empires- pg. 205
____________________________
Godwin is a Nazi.
\/\/|-|3R3 4/\/\ 3Y3 g01nG 2 ge+ /\/\y s1D3\/\/1/\/D3r pr3c1s10/\/ pr0 +3C|-| suPP0R+? -m3x1c4n
10. Attributed his intelligence to eating nothing but beer nuts. 9. Most famous formula: "Professional wrestling + sitting naked on sofa = fun" 8. Hosted failed game show, "Win Bill Gates's Money" 7. Once sat atop a billboard for 10 straight days to win Black Sabbath tickets 6. Windows 95 inspired by malt liquor-fueled sex-a-thon at Hef's mansion. 5. Used Windows calcutator application to prove impossibility of becoming senator 4. Whenever anyone did something dumb, he'd say, "Nice going, me." 3. Fired employee who put 87 gas in his Bimmer 2. Copied his first program from Asian kid who sat next to him in class 1. His older brother Gary -- now there's a smart guy
Thats my $.02
"I'm making perfect sense, you're just not keeping up."
This is not a sign of capitulation, but more an act of revenge. Bill Gates is a saint compared to Steve Ballmer. I'm sure Mr. Ballmer is plotting the demise of all MS's enemies, real and perceived. This is not going to be a pretty picture either. Mr. Ballmer cares nothing about appearances, he will openly start pulling licenses and buying politicians until nothing hinders MS from it's objectives. I hope by the time I get home I can still log on to the internet using Linux.
You mean like this?8 0
http://sl ashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=00/01/13/1515202&cid=1
(JPG is http://douglas.min.net/~drw/gatesdot.jpg)
Gates abdicates his throne to become chief software architect ?
BWAHAWAHAHAHAHAHAH !!!!!!!!!!!
Maybe he can dream up a version of Windows that actually doesn't suck !!
Meanwhile, we're all forced to use his monopoly product and pay taxes to M$.
Whatever you do, DON'T retire the Borg icon !! It rocks !!
I think it was a rather smart move. I also think that it wasn't done because of the DOJ or the countless lawsuits pending. However I do believe that what he states as him going back to what he loves is true. He's not stepping down because he wants to. He's stepping down because he has to. He has no choice. He hasn't been involved with the everyday dirty work of the OS nor the many other MS products. As "software CEO" he can fiddle in the dirty work. This isn't a move that will make MS less of a threat. With this small stepping down expect to see some suprising things from Microsoft.
Not only that but when the shit does hit the fan he's got a fall guy. By the time it's all over he'll re-emerge with new "innovative" technology. Everyone will be wowed. Microsoft is back on the map and he's got his battleship again.
OR it could be what the general concensus is; that he wants a fall guy and wants to be remembered as a philanthropist of sorts.
Is this why he's portrayed as evil in the Simpsons, or killed in South Park? I wouldn't really say, "Most people love the guy"
We have a bunch of bullshit artists running the largest software company in the world. So many people use Windows not because it's great (or even tolerable) but because it's being pushed by Bullshit Artists. I think the Linux Community could use some Bullshit artists and a nice shiney commercial. Not that it matters, as long as I don't have to use Windows I could care less what Morons the majority of the people follow. Suggestion to the rest of the world : If you want to use your computer rather than stare at a bright blue screen in awe and wonder (or a blind rage) ignore the almighty Bill and his rainbow colored Windows, and get yourself a real Operating System (I recommend Linux, but there are others, and I have to admit, they're all better than that Microsoft Crap.) The World is Mine! (They just don't know it yet)
Frag 'em all...
It seems to explain a lot. But this means that Ballmer can't fire Gates. Gates still is the head of the company, but doesn't seem to have to answer to anyone! So why does the title of this slashdot article state that Gates has step down as CEO. It seems that he actually has stepped up
Steven Rostedt
Steven Rostedt
-- Nevermind
iTs speled baLlm3r! the fiRsT "L" is caPiTaliZEd.
... Alan Cox has been taking more and more responsibility!
Both Windows and Internet are supposed to be capitalized. It is not often done, but I believe he proper way to spell "Internet" is with a capital I. At least, that's what MS Word tells me =)
Netcraft's survey is much less than accurate for a number of reasons, the most important being that it is questionable that it is representative of the web as a whole and secondly (I have no proof for this), but I recall reading that apache is used in more unimportant applications (every one's personal linux machine) while IIs (because it cost $) is used more often for more important applications(important webpages, ecommerce, etc)... oh, and I am aware that apache does often has important uses as well (like slashdot!)
I do agree that asp sucks though.
... RMS is Rasputin. I believe! I believe!
...he looks kind of like Bob Newhart to me. Or maybe Phil Collins. I'm not sure which. Look at this photo and figure it out for yourself.
How do you like my version
--
My version of an ideal emBallmer walking past the pearly gates of heaven.
:)
--
[Outside Bill's old office]
Bill looks on wistfully as a janitor removes his name from the door and hangs up Steve's in its place. Steve stands next to him, watching, and then turns to him.
Steve: "Boy, the end of an era. So tell me - what are we going to do tomorrow, Bill?"
Bill: "Why, Ballmer, the same thing we do every day. Try to take over the world!"
[Cue theme music. They're Ballmer, Ballmer and the Brain brain brain brain brain.... Fade to logo: WB - (a division of AOL/Time Warner) . Fade to black.]
Now that Microshaft has to play the phoenix, Balmer should be at the helm.
By by Bill we wont miss you! ...
"Who will ever need more than 640K"
Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha
Note to Steve B.
I just built a simple app with Kdevelop. Qt spanks MFC so hard it's not even funny! Cut the bundling-tying stuff and get your developers focused on product quality/open standards.
* Kill the COM XML link - Don Box is a moron. And The choice of words! "Manifesto" Duh!
* Continue W3C support - without the politics.
* Port Office to Linux. Keep it closed. I've seen M$ code -FUGLY!
* Change dependency order: Crust. 1. Internal dev. 2. Marketing 3. I would fire marketing but that is probably asking too much.
My first thought on this was how similiar "Software Achitect" and something like "High Minister of Software" sound alike -- or even, chairman of another 3-letter government organization? For quite a while, the Baby Bells were government-sponsored monopolies, i woudn't be suprised if something along the same lines was done for microsoft...
You called Gates the king. Lots of people think of him that way. That's why he stepped down. He still has lots of control and lots of money etc... However, it _seems_ like a change of management. MS doesn't have its king. Image is really important to coorperations, and everyone's image of MS was a big evil monopoly serving Gates. Now that Gates isn't part of the image, they have to make a new image. This gives MS the chance to influence people more - and save face. They knew quite well that everyone hated them.
PUBLIC SPLIT ON WHETHER BUSH IS A DIVIDER -CNN scrolling banner, 10/15/2004
Gates in all his photos looked kind (and sortta geeky in a nice way). But if you need any more proof, here's another article with a picture at the same press conference, Ballmer loooks like he's giving someone the look of death.
He kind of reminds me of Scott Mcneally when he's talking about Microsoft.
"Jeezuz Steve, those cunts down at slashdot aren't gonna be happy untli every single bug is ironed out of the whole 8000lines of windows 95."
"Yeah - that's true Bill, but watcha gonna do?"
"Aww fuck. If only those slack cunts down in development weren't so fucking shit-scared of a little hard work."
"Yeah - that's true Bill, but watcha gonna do?"
"Fuck'em all - like they says - if you want a job done properly you gotta do it yourself. Get me a workstation. I'm going downstairs."
:wq
That's the thing about Gates, he looks like this mild mannered nerdy type when in fact he's very aggressive and confrontational, just with bad social skills. If you stand up to him, he will respect you and you may succeed at M$. If you don't, then you won't last long there.
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
So the CEO is 'more declarative' than the President :-)
-- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
All you guys out there pretenting to be conspiracy theorists get this: I know you're just spreading these ideas (that Bill has been pushed out; that he needed time to monkey with the W2K APIs; that he's getting ready to jump ship; that Ballmer's his fall guy) to throw us off the scent.
The real conspiracy: Bill is really a nice guy who's been tricked through the years into doing evil things by Ballmer (yes, he is the anti-Christ) and Myhrvold (you didn't really believe he retired, did you?). Bill's much-vaunted turnabout on the Internet came when he got out of their clutches for a week, did a little surfing, and realized the truth (but not all of the truth).
The little-known fact: Bill is a bad liar. Ballmer has tried to make up for this through the years by fooling Bill into believing the things he needs to say. This works most of the time because the press needs Bill's cute face to sell magazines or whatever. But get Bill in the same room with a sympathetic pit bull like David Boies and he gets torn apart. (You owe it to yourself to see that video. Bill demonstrates brilliantly just how bad a liar he really is.)
The problem: Ballmer doesn't have the kind of PR face that Gates can put forward. He comes across in interviews as a Yuppie with a crack problem -- a bad crack problem.
The only thing that could save these guys now: the government breaks Microsoft up.
Eternal vigilance only works if you look in every direction.
Ballmer looks like a giant teddybear. He looks so innocent in that picture. I'd like to be a fly on the wall in one executive meeting to really see what those people are like behind their corporate smiley Mr. Nice Guy masks. I don't think Gates smiles all the time in reality as he did on CNBC's interview :)
Ballmer today outlined his core priorities and announced plans for a major strategy day this Spring, when the company will outline details of the Internet User Experience vision and strategy. Ballmer said Bill Gates and Microsoft's four technical group vice presidents, including Paul Maritz, Jim Allchin, Bob Muglia, and Rick Belluzzo, will drive developing the technologies and user scenarios that are key to the success of the Internet User Experience and Next Generation Windows Services.
Now, would anyone please translate this into English? What scenarios would be key to their success? Would they try to force them to occour? I don't know, I'm scared...
-------------------------
-------------------------
"People ask FAQs all the time". - David Allen
10. Constant, biased and generally unfounded bashing of MS by Homos of /. scared him into hiding.
/. icon of him as a borg.
9. Hated the
8. Wants to step down and prove that he'll always be richer than everyone associated with Linux...combined.
7. Wants to speed up development of Linux port that looks and acts just like Win2k and will release it free in backs of magazines.
6. He's the richest goddamn guy in the world....ever He doesn't have to work.
5. Was visited by aliens. Will be making many appearances on Art Bell until a subsequent feud breaks out and Art sues him.
4. Going to be a stand-up comedian with one joke. "What OS is on more desktops in Finland?"
3. The man has done more for computing than anyone else has. He needs a break from all the action to settle into his big, fancy home and count his cash.
2. Slowly easing out of MS for fears that baseless DOJ findings may come back to directly haunt him.
1. Linux and the lemmings who use the half asses OS are herded lamers.
Much as I've always been against the monopoly, now Microsoft aren't in so much power am I the only one who's slightly saddened to see Bill step down?
At least up until now M$ has been run by a true (although misguided) geek. Balmer scares me.
So long and thanks for all the fish Bill.
I argued about programming with bill for nearly 15 minutes and Bill Gates is a very sharp guy! I hate MS products and program the mac but nevertheless, all you slashdotters should at least argue based on knowledge of the man. Here is an exact verbatim tracnscript of a bill interview I had, showing Bill's depth of programming knowledge. The words were double checked and edited that day by Jim Surine.
===
1993.05.14 ~8:00 pm PST
After the computer bowl Jim Merkle, Jim Surine, and Norman Fong followed the crowd to an outdoor reception. Champagne and chocolate covered strawberries were served. As a group we could have answered almost every question asked.
Jim Surine was the first to go over to Bill and say hello he exchanged some small talk and then returned to the group. A little later Bill, in an effort to get away from someone annoying came over to our group and Jim Merkle then engaged Bill in some conversation.
Bill Gates vs. Jim Merkle (after Computer Bowl 5.0 (in which Jim
quietly recalled nearly all the Computer Bowl answers))
(James Merkle) Jean Lois Gasee's comment about Windows code being the most
obfuscated in the world was not that far off base because as you
know the Hungarian Notation is very very difficult to read.
(Bill Gates) Look, this is the best method I know of
[Bill threw the papers to the ground and gestured with both hands up in the air]
(Jim Merkle) You know most people who program using Hungarian Notation write poor code.
(Bill Gates) You're being racist
[Pointing a Jim Merkle]
[Jim Merkle is perplexed by this response]
(James Merkle) You know, That notation popularized by Charles Simognyi.
(Bill Gates) You mean the Microsoft variable coding convention described in
Simognyi's research paper. I'm well aware what it is, after all I
have programmed using it before and had quite a bit of experience
with it!
(James Merkle) What I mean is, many programmers in the industry are very vocal
against Hungarian notation, for example two computer programming
magazine editors published loud flames against it. It is difficult
to read because many of the programmers using it make cryptic
variable names.
(Bill Gates) As opposed to having no standards?
(Jim Surine) Long variable names are a much better method because they are easy to read.
(Bill Gates) But there are no standards for long variable names
(James Merkle) No, I have a ten page set of standards for programming I wrote
and have been following for many years.
(Bill Gates) Yeah a standard only you follow
(James Merkle) Well the friends I work with follow that standard and the
standards are all based on large expressive variable names. In fact
I have worked on 200,000 and 500,000 line programs that did not
contain any ambiguous variable names. Abbreviated words are not
allowed in my standard.
(Bill Gates) Our conventions are uniformly used by all Microsoft employees
(James Merkle) Most of the code I have seen using Hungarian notation has
terrible variable naming conventions and is very cryptic and
difficult to read.
(Bill Gates) I'm sure you've read all the code out there.
(James Merkle) Well I suppose I mean all the code published in programming
journals and such. I do admit the Microsoft Windows NT driver
development disk contains excellent source code.
(Bill Gates) There is a specification for a longer version of the standard,
you know, but the longer standard has never been put into use.
(James Merkle) I didn't know that, but long descriptive variable names are very
important. In Hungarian, if you change the type of a variable you
have to search and replace each occurrence because you need to
rename each variable or it won't be correct.
(Bill Gates) That's really hard, search and replace, search and replace.
[Bill used both hands in an exagerated motion of pushing a search key followed
by a replace key]
(James Merkle) What I mean is, in a proper programming environment such as a
context sensitive programming editor, the color or font style can
tell you information regarding the variable type and usage.
(Bill Gates) Right. Like how many people have language sensitive editing
tools!
(James Merkle) Well OS/2 2.0 ships with a good one. Borland has one, there are
others.
(Bill Gates) I bet the number of people using those editors is something
like one percent.
(James Merkle) I would say it is less than one percent, but they are starting
to come out. Eventually most C editors will have those features and a
convenient feature is the ability to just wave the cursor over a
variable name in the code and having a status display telling you
EXACTLY what the variable type is without having to do hardly any
work. Just a simple mouse movement.
(Bill Gates) Hungarian was done in the early days of programming you know.
(James Merkle) Also, I have a small question regarding Windows NT. I Talked to
many of the Microsoft employees at the Windows NT seminar and tried
to find out who was responsible for the fact that Windows NT
arbitrarily has to compress filenames down to 8 characters when
saving to a floppy disk. Everyone I argued with claimed it was your
decision not to introduce a new floppy disk standard. Don't you
think you should?
(Bill Gates) I think we should introduce one with a more significant
operating system change, not Windows NT
(bystander) Windows NT has infinite length file names, as long as
you define infinity as "8".
(James Merkle) Well Microsoft told me that they expected people to store
floppy disk based files with archiving tools, but I think
secretaries could have a hard time.
(2nd bystander) does windows NT support multiple users?
(James Merkle) It supports everything. Also, I had another complaint about
Windows NT, although I am a Mac programmer I went the Windows NT
seminar. Its regarding security. In Windows NT you can't make it a
turnkey system where from powerup it runs a program. You need to
possess at least three fingers and press CNTL+ALT+DEL to log in
even if your default password is "return" for the main user
account. When the NeXT came out, rest in peace, the type of people
who bought a NeXT were angry about having to log in to their
personal computer and NeXT added the ability to avoid the login if
the main users account had return for a password.
(Bill Gates) Windows NT can permit any task to run at startup without having
to log in. If you have the right permission, you can alter it to
run anything at powerup. Its in there if you know how.
(James Merkle) I had a few other complaints regarding Windows NT but since I
am aware that it is just a bridging stop-gap technology for now I
will hold my complaints for the future, but I am wondering about
its graphics model. Windows NT supports only one monitor for now,
besides that, I believe its not object-like graphics.
(Bill Gates) What? what are you talking about!
(James Merkle) I mean that unlike Display Postscript and QuickDraw GX, the
Windows NT only offers pixilated graphics.
(Bill Gates) Of course, its a raster model.
(James Merkle) But because it is pixilated and lacks object regions it has
limitations.
(Bill Gates) Windows is a definite super set of any QuickDraw Code.
QuickDraw is just a subset of Windows.
(James Merkle) I am talking about QuikDraw GX, a very ambitious graphics
model.
(Bill Gates) That's not shipping. Is that shipping?
(Jim Surine) Its shipping. Apple gave it to all developers
at the conference. I installed it on my machine last tuesday and it works. All the
demo programs worked. It is a beta copy though.
(James Merkle) Well Apple is a year late and has been working on it for nearly
5 years so I see your point, I have to answer No, Apple is not
shipping it yet but they will be soon.
(Bill Gates) What about their problem with differences between MetaFiles?
(James Merkle) I don't think there will be the types of problems you might be
thinking about.
(other person) Does Windows offer different coordinate spaces?
(James Merkle) Yeah it has all sorts of models, but I think there is a
fundamental problem with all the models when a monitor is intended
to be set at 144 dpi.
(Bill Gates) Yes (to other guy) Quickdraw is just a subset of Windows.
(other party) Bill, what is the limit to device coordinate
positioning in Windows, is it an integer?
(Bill Gates) Quickdraw is an integer.
(James Merkle) Quick Draw GX is a 64 bit fixed point, though not floating
point like Adobe.
(Bill Gates) Windows is an integer.
(other guy) Well, if it is an integer then you have positioning
problems. You have positioning problems when trying to specify
positions at partial pixel boundaries and your printing will not
mesh if its an integer without subpixels.
(Bill Gates) Hmmm.
(James Merkle) Anyway I understand that the really impressing and ambitious
work that I am eagerly awaiting is the amazing work being done
code-named Cairo. It has been described to me as fascinating stuff
and I was wondering how long you have been working on it.
(Bill Gates) 3 years.
(bystander) What's Cairo?
(Bill Gates) We looked at the way computers operating systems are done and
designed a whole new way of doing it.
(new third party bystander) Bill, why can't Word for Windows export
to Word for Mac. It doesn't work and I've spent 4 hours trying to
get tech support to help me find out what to do.
(Bill Gates) I doubt that. Microsoft has a computerized automated tracking
system and no calls should take more than 4 minutes. People are
rarely on hold.
(James Merkle) Its true, Microsoft's help lines are very very fast and the
industry magazines verify that they are the fastest of any
company's.
(Bill Gates) the average delay getting to someone is 27 seconds, if you were
on hold 4 hours then the computer tracking system would have shown
that.
(new third party bystander) It was a very long time. What do I do?
Its an unbelievable problem!
(Bill Gates) I'm sure there's some good third party solutions to convert
Word for Windows to Word for Mac.
(new third party bystander) Great, what are they?
(James Merkle) There's probably some way.
(Bill Gates) I don't know the names. Call tech support and they will help
you.
(original bystander) Windows NT is a problem for users. Now
everyone needs to be an administrator. Especially those who have a
habit of just turning off their computers at the end of the day.
(Bill Gates) NT is great for that! DOS has real major problems for people
who turn off there computers. NT has little problem from that.
(James Merkle) He's [B] right. NT can handle improper shutdowns.
==== All along people have been thronging and building up around
the discussion/argument. At this point, (actually a few questions
ago) the discussion was becoming more and more abrasive against
poor bill with many people basically just blurting out complaints,
I wanted no part of it and had been stepping back a few feet before
this point, and at this time I fully backed out. At this time a
company who had a Mac CAD program thanked bill for giving him a potential
market much bigger than the Mac. I told the guy that the windows market
is potentially bigger because Windows people are not as picky about
good quality programs and therefore it is easier to sell stuff. NF offered him
assistance regarding Help and support after discussing support from Apple
with him, and offered concept of inexpensive equipment evaluation programs.
(Jim Surine) Goodbye! Goodbye Bill! (waving over the heads of the
mob gathering around him.)
We then tried to get into the $200 a plate dinner but they were checking names
so we left.
==== Summary: Bill Gates is a very intelligent arguer, and still in touch
with the world of programming, though he is certainly from the old school.
I respect his mindset, and I believe that he is not just a puppet figurehead,
though I still wish Microsoft had Cairo out today so that they had better
technology that would give me meatier stuff to argue about.
===============
end of document
(Final 2000.01.14 note... Cairo never did ship yet, but visual element parts of it are in Windows 98, according to Microsoft.)
What I want to know is whether they have any more software engineering job openings for BASIC programmers?
Analogy:
Vader is to Obi-Wan as US Gov is to Bill.
Vader kills Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan becomes more powerfull.
US Gov kills.........
The problem with this analogy: I liked Obi-Wan.
Bill Gates goes back to his roots (this IS the guy who years ago coded a BASIC interpreter for the Altair without even having seen one) and codes a kick-ass utility (or Kernel module) for Linux, releasing it with the full GPL...
99% of slashdotties have their brains explode.
All of you giggling and postulating about Bill Gates being wary of a Microsoft breakup should be aware that he may be laughing all the way to the bank in the near future.
No, he won't, see below
The government might split Microsoft into 3 (or so) entities, but it can't strip Bill Gates of what will be his large ownership in all 3 companies.
The conventional wisdom is that the value of the separated entities will rise higher than the value of the original entity, as happened with the Standard Oil breakup. This is just false. What will happen is the bottom will fall out of the stock price - faced with competition from free software, and no longer having the means of forcibly maintaining the existing monopoly, the Baby Bills revenue can go nowhere but down.
Microsoft's current annualized revenue is about $25 billion (being generous); its market capitalization is about $500 billion. That's a 20 times multiple on earnings whereas a mature, stable business with stable revenue would normally have something more like 2x. Microsoft's valuation is based on one thing: expectation of continued exponential earnings growth. That just ain't gonna happen. In fact, the baby Bills are going to have to dance like crazy just to avoid having their earnings decimated by the need to compete with free software and unshackled industry competitors. In short: end of exponentional earnings growth == goodbye 20x multiple on revenue. Hello 2x multiple, and maybe worse. Shareholders aren't so clueless that they can't see that as well as anybody else can; neither are the professional short sellers.
Hooboy, that means Microsoft's stock will fall like a lead balloon.
Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.
It's just a trick of course. Does anyone really believe that Gates won't continue to run the show? Really all they're doing is trying to shuffle the deck and say "here, see? Different deck!".
Another way of putting it is they're desperately trying to show that something has changed at Microsoft and that further remedies aren't needed. This is bullshit, and nobody should be fooled by it.
Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.
But NO! It wasn't Bill, it was Steve Ballmer! Is it just my imagination, or does Bill prefer to promote whining replicas of himself? (In the past, I have confused other Microsoft officials' voices for Bills as well.)
Some body help! Am I going mad? Or is this just another sign of things to come? Baby Bills? Billy Borgs? What should we call this new trend in pitched whining?
The Register has a very interesting take on the reason for Bill stepping down
hatred flowing from what I usually find an extremely open minded, intelligent, and positive community just sickens me sometime
Well, if anyone has ever made billions from 'duping the masses' this has got to be it. The hateful bile is really just natural catharsis, psychological healing from being paid to spend all day pretending that shit smells really good! There isn't a day goes by in my current job that at least 5 or 7 people complain about "my computer's broken again" - I'm sure this scenario is repeated endlessly across the corporate landscape - and 9 out of 10 times the COMPUTER is PERFECTLY OK! IT's the SOFTWARE whats got a registry error, or whatever, and I'm really on a crusade to enlighten all the rats following these pied pipers that the SOFTWARE IS THE PROPERTY of the MS Corp. and that they're paying me to spend hours rebuilding SOMEONE ELSES PROPERTY everytime the lousy house of cards topples over. I would LOVE to take pride in my work, but I've come to accept that it is impossible as an McSE (thank gawd I've the old BSEE) to avoid all the little glitches that make for embarassing presentations.
In short, THEY make billions, and I get laughed at. What a ceramic container of organic fertilizer!
Boojum
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
are getting really long-winded here.
Damage control! Battlestations!! Ensign, prepare a press release...
Boojum
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
the idea of Gates as a well-loved philanthropist is something we should hold more strongly in our minds than the "BillGatus of Borg" image we beat to death. Whether truth or opinion, the image of Gates as an evil dictator is not very appealing and does no one good.
Image?? Have we really deteriorated to the point where all a captain of industry/politician is is just a mere 'image' or phantasm projected on a TV screen? How about what they have actually DONE? I see a little too much of this these days where someone commits heinous crimes, and then they clean up their act, get super polite and then try to convince the jury what a GOOOOOOD person they are. Yeah, lets forget about all the pain of dislocation, downsizing, job retraining and everyone else whose been trampled underfoot for daring to oppose the MS business cultural revolution. So he moves a gold brick from one account to another and he's suddenly a GOOOOOOD philantropist.
What I've learned from MS is that, to succeed, you A) Rob a bank (you have to do something bold, risky and daring, some power grab!) then once the heat is off and you've gotten away with it B) donate large chunks to law enforcement and crime prevention (so nobody will rob YOUR bank!) Heee.
Boojum
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
PLEASE READ WHOLE THING NOT JUST FIRST PARAGRAGH
I do not mean that Bill Gates likes big boys in any sexual way but I think that he is drawn to bigger people as his protector. I realize that Gates is not a huge guy but his better friends are monsters, Allan and Balmer.
Perhaps, Gates sees Microsoft headed into trouble and feels that the bigger Balmer would be better at defending Microsoft. If I did better at pysch I could go on.
Real men dump cores! Read my journal, I am neat.
MS needs a major OS release every few years to maintain a revenue stream at a reasonable level to support it's rising share price.
I don't believe that MS, in it's current form, is capable of writing and testing W2.005K. Far better would be to start again from scratch using a better architecture and no historical baggage.
But Bill can't do that within MS because it's a high risk stratigy - but there's no reason not to do it outside MS...
Balmer looks like Peter Boyle now. Maybe someone can work up a Young Frankenstein/Borg pic.
I drank what? -- Socrates
He clearly doesn't care that much about money: you don't give away $11 billion if your end goal is to be the richest man in the world.
However, I bet he has a program that calculates his wealth to the penny, updated every second. Come on, wouldn't you write a program like this if you had his kind of cash? It's the geek thing to do, and whatever else you think of Gates, he is a geek. Put the number up on a big wall display in your living room and watch the numbers fly.
Eric
"Seven Deadly Sins? I thought it was a to-do list!"
where Iran is the enemy and Saddam is the good guy, then Saddam becomes the enemy and the Kurds are the poor victims, untill you chum up to Turkey and then the Kurds are the enemy, and once upon a time Albania was the communist enemy then suddenly the Serbs are the hated murders of poor Albanian victims . etc, etc, etc.
Sadly few people seem to remember or care about the days when IBM did with hardware what MS does w/ software, or when AT&T was the spawn of much wacko conspiracy theories since they were a monopoly that even owned the phone in your house, which you had to have to fit in society and had to rent from them and only them; kinda like most businesses today feel arm twisted to run their company on MS property, w/ no choice in the matter.
Boojum
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Some of my own Top Ten Reasons Why Gates Resigned:
Here are a few other possibilities:
-Enrolled at ITT Technological Institute.
-Decided to leave before people associated him with Microsoft.
-Figured out Where he Wanted to Go Today & went there.
-Bought the Vatican & took over as CEO of the Papal See.
-Got a job at Home Depot where he can "finally sell some -real- windows, dammit!"
-Wanted to use his iMac without Balmer's constant teasing.
-Microsoft corporate culture wasn't hip to his wanting to wear jeans, sneakers, black turtlenecks, and a beard.
-Took Steve Jobs' advice and joined an ashram.
-He -really- wanted to be the "iCEO".
-Found out that being Microsoft CEO doesn't get him free coffee at Starbucks.
-Read Nietsche (sp?) and decided to move up & fill the vacancy.
-He realized The Road Ahead was a cul-de-sac.
-After you've crushed and destroyed every competitor in your way, it's Miller time!
-Wants to help O.J. look for 'the -real- killers'.
-Buying a little south sea desert island to retire on : AUSTRALIA!!
While I admire Bill Gates as one of the best businessmen in the world, his failure to properly manage Microsoft's response to the DOJ lawsuit marks significant misjudgement, if not a little immaturity. IMHO. Perhaps its time for someone else with better relational skills to try the CEO role.
--LP
in this modern day USA, that "anything goes - just don't get caught at it" - and that goes for the prez and many other clever, tricky illuminaries who think they're above the laws we little folk are held to. These people are NOT good role models (or maybe you enjoy the current state of kids in school). So everyone's a criminal, just the 'successful' ones get away with it and hire a media consultant and launch an ad campaign. The unsuccessful must have some kind of conscience that is limiting their career, but we do get a good night sleep.
Boojum
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
First, think about this: how old is the average person working on Linux? I believe that Linus Torvalds is only in his mid thirties! Gates himself has been involved with Microsoft since its inception in 1975, and given the fact it has been 25 years as (more or less) CEO of that company, I think he has realized that it is time for him to consider doing something else in life. After all, he has more than enough money to live a very comfortable life until the end of his life, and with a possible Microsoft breakup he could have over US$70 billion (yes, _billion_) in liquid assets to play with.
Look, Gates is now raising a family, and he now has other interests in his life: his considerable interest in biotechnology, plus the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation with some US$17 _billion_ in its coffers (far more than any other philantrophic organization in the world).
Take for example the the AIDS health crisis. I have read that the health industry has spent only US$300 million to develop a vaccine; that's a drop in the bucket in the world of medical research, where billions can be spent just to develop ONE perscription drug. Gates' own foundation could easily provide US$2 billion for such research, and that type of money will make a huge difference in developing a vaccine that can be ready for large-scale human testing.
Think of this: after Standard Oil was broken up, John D. Rockefeller had so much money on his hands from the sales proceeds that he set up the Rockefeller Foundation to provide funding for the humanities. Without that money from the Rockefeller Foundation, many libraries would not exist today, and PBS could never have been started.
Raymond in Mountain View, CA
AnonCoward because... in a company confidential MS partner briefing in March 99 we were told about the MS reorganisation announced yesterday. It may have been in anticipation of the DOJ case but is can't have been a reaction.
:) )
We were told it's about MS' move to what they term 'Windows DNA' and Gates' desire to spend his time on what amounts to a major shift in the Windows architecture.
And IMHO, if Gates the Robber Baron wants to take a back seat to Gates the UberGeek (a species not seen since the early 80's), great. Gates the UberGeek used to do brilliant software. (so long as you stop history with the Altair
AC
Nitrozac's done a great comic with that Balmer/Gates photo... well worth a click over to After Y2K
;-)
And again I ask... Nitro, please marry me
I get your drift tho - excess vilification is not a good thing - we'd like to get at the truth, but lacking that, our overworked active imaginations fill in their own facts for characters of such large proportions.
Time will tell, and the stories will be told. From what I understand about the Rockefeller legend, for example, he was a clerk in a company, sent on assignment to investigate some black, tarry substance that was a nuisence to Pennsylvania farmers. He came back, told his boss it was completely worthless, quit, hired a chemist and went on to build a huge empire. Clever move or dasterdly deed? The employer he shafted trusted him, and sent him to his destiny. Will the legend of Gates be a + or - ?
Probably a positive one. The good stuff will be remembered and the bad forgotten. Thank God.
Boojum
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
who's the genie-ass at MS who created a button labled "PREVIOUS" that moves a pointer to an event that comes AFTER the one you were just viewing? Someone there clearly has their ass on backwards. Or Outlook being so adamant about shoving itself in your face that it covers up it's own "you have mail" box. That this stuff is worth billions just drives me crazy. That we are FORCED to use it against our wills by business personages who want buy it because they want to be billionairs too is a crime aginst my engineering sense of mathematically perfect reason and order. :))
Boojum
back to the Linux 'dos' emulator...
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Also, didnt this happen last year? Or was tht just a shifting of responsibilities? I guess Bill stepped away from 'day-to-day' operations.
Juln
You sure love to talk about Microsoft for linux people..! Keep your friends close... but keep your enemies closer? !
http://mrhide.pinnesota.org
Guess I need to look into hacking xbill into xsteve. And I really did enjoy smashing all those little Billys.
Say you're Gates and Ballmer, and you've finally come the conclusion that the government really is serious about breaking up the company. What does that mean? It means that seperate companies must act pretty much the way the companies in the AT&T break up did; they're different companies, and can't act as they once did.
Ok, what would Gates and Ballmer do if this happened? They'd likely both be stuck in one part of the company, say operating systems. They'd have no control over anything else anymore.
So, what do they do? Gates steps down as CEO. He's not specifically part of any part of the company. When the break-up happens, Ballmer will be the head of one company, and Gates the head of the other.
If that happens, there is no way in the WORLD they would not talk to one another, and just keep acting the way they always have.
Talk about thinks that make you go hmm.. - lol
-X-
-X- webmaster@xgeneration.net
Umm, good design _is_ invaluable but you can't be a good designer without being a good programmer.
Nobody has been added into the management mix. And it's not like they suddenly noticed the nedd for a Chief Software Architect - how was that function getting done before the announcement? And nobody has been moved out. I conclude that this is only a cosmetic change.
Does this have anything to do with the previous article on monkey cloning? I had to ask.
--Somewhere there is a village missing an idiot.
January:
Step down as CEO. Install proxy CEO to take the fall for any DOJ actions. Create new position in company that ensures that I will be able to put my name on software and get credit for software. Translation: $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
February:
Take over Win2K project in time to get my name on it. More $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
March:
Proxy CEO gets in trouble with DOJ. Step in as CEO and get company back into favor with government. Appear to be a nice guy. Gain the trust of the government.
April:
Take over the world.
May:
Force planet to recognize new month names picked out by me.
The Month of MSN:
Begin construction of super laser to carve Microsoft Logo on the moon.
The Month of IE:
Super Laser should be complete. Test fire on DOJ building.
The Month of NT:
Begin Carving logo.
The Month of DOS:
Convert worlds paint factories to produce huge amounts of red, green, blue, and yellow paint.
The Month of Monopoly:
Start building of massive inkjet printer to paint my logo.
The Month of The Almighty Dollar:
Send streams of paint to the moon and finish construction of my logo on the moon.
The Month of Gates:
Begin to charge licensing fees for making use of the moons light, looking at the moon, and everything that has anything t do with the moon or in some way has an image of the moon. This also includes any thing that is in any way affected by the moon. This will be effective immediately and will be recursive forever. (Note: Chistmas will be moved to my birthday and all traditions and beliefs will be changed to reflect that event. e.g. they must worship me)
Opportunities multiply as they are seized. --Sun-Tzu
Whaaat? Sarcasm ("That's hard, search and replace, search and replace"), nonsequitur ("You're being racist"), adhominem ("a standard only you follow", "I'm sure you've read all the code out there") and belittlement ("I bet the number of people using those editors is something like 1%") do not intelligence indicate, but arrogance, belligerance, and tenacious ignorance. This is a notch above Python's "No it isn't!" "Yes it is!" but only a notch, and they weren't being serious.
>He's in touch with the world of programming
Where'd you get that idea? Where did he once put up significant argument with Merkle?
One point I can make: I'm a pretty pitzy programmer, but even I know the serious hassles of keeping the type of an object in its name. Billy's "That's realy hard" sarcasm aside, he's obviously forgotten such a name might be referenced in umptyhundreed files most of which are not under that particular programmer's control. He's seriously out of touch, if this transcript is anything by which to go.
Merkle exhibited remarkable patience with the "man"; I'm afraid I'd've smacked him upside the head. He shows great resistance to true innovation, and if he's the guy that set the tone it's no freakin' wonder MS implements something only after someone else has soundly demonstrated its value.
He doesn't need to write one. He just goes to http://www.webho.com/WealthClock
He doesn't need to write one. He just goes to http://www.webho.com/WealthClock.
Hey... Wanna bet BG's fondness for it prolonged the agony of that 8.3 filesystem? Even Commodore had more flexible filenames! :)
Here's my rendition of Steve of Nine. I thought the other one a bit tacky. http://www.buyinguide.com/steveofnine.jpg
Addendum to my own post: I should have said "sales" everywhere I said earnings or revenue.
Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.
The project manager quotes a time
BillG responds, "Fucking speed it up!" and then leaves.
Nice problem solving strategy - shout at people.
A Real Programmer approaches a problem like this by asking questions: Why is it slow? How can we make it faster? What do we trade off if we speed it up this way or that way? Gather data and carefully examine the options.
Bill just shouts and storms out. Smart guy. It's exactly this kind of "leadership" that produces crappy results.
I'm sorry guys, but I have to disagree with all of you. I am actually *glad* to see that Bill Gates is stepping down from his title as CEO of Microsoft. As for his "Head Developer" title, well I suppose that their products can not get any worse than they are now. Maybe with the co-founder writing the programs, just like he did with the Altaire, then we might get some *quality* computing out of the Windows World.
"File written by Adobe Photoshop"
Why attack a company when you still use their software?
Check out the facts. To run a Foundation like the B & M Gates Found., you must give away a certain percentage of yr holdings each year. To date, B &M G are significantly BEHIND in this endeavor. To put it another way, Bill giving $30 million to Nelson Mandela certainly doesn't hurt the entire country of South Africa - but it tells you a lot about how "philanthropic" Gates actually *is*. Proportionately, it's like me giving the homeless guy on my street five bucks!
Also Bill gives whenever he gets a DOJ or other press setback. It's so pathetically transparent
What do you mean, his black is as big.. ... blacks?
Maybe you meant his schwantz (tail)
or were you implying that was what the millions of dollars to the UNCF were to buy (off)
He says that the 'net will be replaced by the "Information Superhighway" (read, good old Internet with Microsoft "improvements"), which of couse didn't happen. However, many of the things that he discusses in TRA are here now, while others have proved to be bad, impossible, or already here. It was a "predicting the future" book, and we know that no one can predict the future. But Mr. Gates seems to have had some pretty good guesses in his years.
Where does he say that CD-ROM is the future of the industry? In any case, CD-ROMs (and now DVDs) will be around for quite a while. Simple reason? You can carry it with you. Can't do that with net.
(Just noticed that nowhere in that book did he mention Linux. Well it was circa '95, and Linux has done a lot of growing and evolving since then. And anyway, it's Bill Gates we're talking about here.)
Ken
By my understanding of buisness, whoever has the share controls the company. Shure Balmer is in charge of the day to day running of the company, but at the end of the day he cannot do anything without the backing of the share holders. It appears to me that Bill Gates is purely doing this to effectively become a scilent partner that still has most of the power.
Or is it the question of the Dos stealing argument. I remember reading that Windows 2000 is doing away with dos, the origional program which Gates remarcably stole (sorry, lost the site I got the info off) years back. Now that he has done away with it maybe it's time for a proper software engineer to step in and take up the callenge.
Personally I'm hoping that Linex takes advantage of the company whilst It's resufelling. Then we'll see a real operating system
The Well Known Fat Bloke
Apple Simply has more love than Microsoft. On a Basic Search on both apple.com and microsoft.com apple has 154 more occurences of love found.
Gates made a remark once to the effect that the DOJ could take 95% of his money and he could still be happy... Anyone got a source for this?
depends on what the board defines the positions to be.
I am always riled when I hear the usual press attribute the Chief Borg's wealth to his technical savvy. The CB's (Chairman of the Board, Chief Borg, your choice) most memorable technical insight was that 640K should be enough for anyone. This was at a time when I was helping friends install EMS boards on their machines. The boards could only hold two megs but the trend of increasing capacity and falling memory prices was already obvious to anyone with a technical bent. Everyone but the CB, of course.
If companies ever totaled their losses due to programmers' bugs, workarounds, data loss and response time issues due to the memory limitations imposed by the DOS architecture then the total would probably far exceeds $80 billion. In fact, it might approach the enitire market cap of MSFT.
Now, the CSA is going to architect his way to his first trillion. It involves charging people to use Orifice every month over the Web. The customers will still have choice. If they choose to never see their documents again, they can stop paying.
Web Orifice will use strong encryption to supposedly insure the users' privacy. In reality, it will be to make sure you don't share your access with someone else.
Besides, Visual Basic can't handle numbers that large...
nothign here
When people start believing that a rich man giving millions and billions for so called "charity" has a heart, then I start getting worried about living in the USA (and on top of that these people use/are involved with linux? GOD HELP US!!!) I swear that sometimes, we are Americans (assuming the posts were from Americans) are the dumbest people on this planet, because you know what? If you ask the other 5+ billion on this planet, most of them would not fall for shit like that, or Mr. Clinton's Sexcapades (for which others still ridicule us)
> the value of the original entity, as happened with the Standard Oil breakup. This is just false.
> What will happen is the bottom will fall out of the stock price - faced with competition
> from free software, and no longer having the means of forcibly maintaining the existing
> monopoly, the Baby Bills revenue can go nowhere but down.
This is an exceptional point that I can't believe I missed in the talks my friends and I have had on this topic. And it's more than just competing on a fair playing field with Linux, BeOS, etc.
One of the rumored proposals for breakup is into one applications company and two OS companies -- which means that MS faces not only fair competition at long last, but also the meanest, nastiest, hairiest competitor in the industry: themselves.
Both OS houses will naturally try to position themselves as the One True Windows Company. I wouldn't be too shocked to see them go after each other with the same, ah, enthusiasm that MS has always used on competitors.
You know, the more I think about that scenario, the more I like it :)
Meanwhile, BillG, having seen which way the wind was blowing, has himself ready to be CEO/Chairman/President/God-Emperor of MS Applications Corp., which will survive breakup much more easily than the OS side. We can fairly assume (and it has been reported elsewhere in this article thread) that Bill stepping aside has been in the works for some time; either BillG saw the breakup as inevitable a long time ago, or the timing is fortuitous. In either case, it's not a response to the breakup rumors.
I think that the geek buried deep inside him knows that shoddily-coded Windows is hosed as soon as consumers have a fair choice to make, and he wanted to be with what will be the biggest (most profitable, most successful) Baby Bill -- the applications division.
In the main, end users know squat about the OSes and NOSes they use on a minute-by-minute basis. What they care about is how to change the font on the first line of a word-processing document, how to tot up a column in a spreadsheet, how to put a cool background onto a presentation graphics slide.
Take an end user who's accustomed to WordPerfect 8 on Win95. Stick him on a Linux box running fvwm95 (or whatever it's called, I don't use it) as the x manager, running WP8 for Linux. He won't notice a blessed thing different until he goes to open a file and sees a somewhat different directory structure -- IF he even notices that.
A good OS is quiet to the end-user; it should be seen only on power-up and shutdown, and inbetween when config changes are needed. When the system is up, the end-user is focused on the task at hand, which requires officeware, not OS diagnostic tools.
Better than anyone else, BillG knows that Windows is not quiet -- it is a prolonged wail. He's positioned himself to be "on the user's side" so to speak. I know as a support tech, the only thing he and Microsoft have ever done for me is provide me with a lot of opportunities to provide support -- server-side and support-side, Gates isn't there and I don't think he wants to be there.
Long-term, what it looks like to me is that Gates will continue raking in hundreds of times the money that any of us will ever see in our lifetimes for putting out second-rate software that will have a huge following through momentum ... and he will be free to port it to any OS when he no longer has to worry about supporting the monopoly. Microsoft OS Corp (singular or plural) will take the hit a lot harder than MS Applications Corp will, and Ballmer will have a lot more sleepless nights than Gates.
ikaros, who will be quite interested when MS Applications Corp decides to create a Linux port of something ... :)
You're only as young as the last time you changed your mind -- Timothy Leary