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Bill Gates Gives $20M to CMU for New Building
touretzky writes "Carnegie Mellon University announced on Tuesday that The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation had donated $20 million toward the cost of a new building to be called the "Gates Center for Computer Science". Some faculty have suggested that in acknowledgment of Mr. Gates' profound influence on the computer software industry, the building should be painted bright blue."
Even when he tries to do something nice, he gets flamed. The man just donated 20 million to the school. give him a break
Now I like BSOD jokes as much as the next person but seriously I think that's one area we can atleast applaud Microsoft at. It's really quite a rare date (or an indication of hardware failure) to see a BSOD in Windows XP. Now those damned security issues on the other hand...
On slashdot someone will complain that this charitable act is just an attempt to push his company's products on college students and the mods will make it +5 insightful.
Mathematics is made of 50 percent formulas, 50 percent proofs, and 50 percent imagination.
If it was a real donation it would be more discretely done (eg. name it after a famous person other than Gates and perhaps put up a small plaque saying it was funded by Gate foundation).
Engineering is the art of compromise.
You mean like the Gates Foundation (http://www.gatesfoundation.org/default.htm)r e he basically gave away almost 1.2 billion last year? Is half a billion for education plus half a billion for world health enough?
whe
He wants the campus to build a $50M building with it. Sound like a math problem? yeah. His money is appreciated, but he's asking the campus to build more than he's willing to support, which is mildly questionable.
Even better, though, the proposed location for the new building is on top of this really shitty excuse for a building that looks like a few mobile homes shoved up against eachother and is generally an eyesore. In the artist's rendering of the plans, it apppears to be styled like many of the more nice looking new and old campus buildings (Green roof, light colored brick, etc) which is definitely a good thing. CMU has some pretty buildings, but it also has some impressive eyesores. Good to see one of them go away.
Also consider that Microsoft is the #1 employer of CS grads from CMU. This school's students and expertise have served him well, so I'm glad to see that he's willing to give something back.
I was looking into going to CMU for their esteemed Computer Science program, but now I just hope they wont let this influence their set of courses, breadth of experience, or heterogeneous computer labs...
Real programmers can write assembly code in any language. -- Larry Wall
I'll give you a Score:1, Interesting when you post your own 1040 return, with all charitable contributions itemized, to this thread.
Until then, STFU.
How about the $6Billion (not an exageration) he gave to help fight diseases in developing countries. I wouldbe willing to bet the kids dying of malaria and AIDs in Africa would find the living situation in Cleaveland quite nice.
WTF? The guy give 20 million, and folks get upset because it doesn't go to THEIR charity of choice. Sigh...
This could have gone back into the Microsoft Warchest... would that have been a better option?
It appears Bill has truly acted altruistically here.
This does not fit our general characterizations of the man.
How can we reconcile this seeming incongruity? By adopting the following reasoning: "$20 million for a building?! People on this planet are still starving to death! The ego!"
It's funny what can be accomplished with money. You can just pay to cover up your dirty deeds.
...on the computer software industry, it should have robust barriers to entry.
One mathematics professor lamented that money buys anything -- including undeserved honors. He commented that Stanford University might as well name the building after "Donald Trump" since he is a billionaire.
Your mathematics professor should take a refresher course in logic. Bill Gates paid for most of the building. Donald Trump didn't. See the difference?
In any case, as long as you have a shiny nice new building on Bill's dime, who gives a crap what it is called? I never gave a second thought to the names on the buildings at my university even though many were named after robberbarons significantly more sinister than Bill Gates has ever been in their day and within their own respective markets.
As far as I am concerned, he is an unethical shmuck who bears principal responsibility for the suicide of Gary Kildall
That's funny, I always thought Gary Kildall bore principal responsibility for his own suicide. Isn't that what suicide is?
Giving away money doesn't make you better if it comes from illegal or otherwise immoral activities.
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
I can't stand people who bash Bill and his foundation. Sure bash Microsoft if you must, but why the foundation?
Yes he is mega rich but he still doesn't have to give the money away does he?
I am sure he could find other ways to get rid of the money. Instead he is doing some good.
His foundation has practically wiped our Malaria in third world countries.
I suppose he did that for advertising as well??
No I am not a MS support, Linux is my vehicle of choice, but I am man enough to applaud someone doing good for the community.
Would be nice if some of the wallies posted here could do the same.
Yeah I know, fat chance of that.
Games Programmer And Designer
I totally agree. In fact, it was downright despicable to give the campus only $20 MILLION dollars out of the $50 million needed to actually complete the structure. He should just go back to campus, apologize for his rudeness, rip up the check he gave to the college and go home and write a letter of apology for his rudeness.
Who cares if he's really rich? If he gave away $20 million every day, he wouldn't be for very long, would he? No matter how you look at it, $20 million is a LOT of money.
I am sometimes absolutely appalled by the unappreciative nature of some people.
Microsoft presentation is standing-room only.
Reminds me of the crusty old Republican grandpa that attended all the Democrat conventions. His reason? "Just ta keep ma disgust afresh"
Attendence does not imply support. I'd probably attend such presentations. Anyway, like all good universities CMU supports a variety of viewpoints, not the mono-culture that M$ would like to impose.
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It's wrong that an intellectual property creator should not be rewarded for their work.
It's equally wrong that an IP creator should be rewarded too many times for the one piece of work, for exactly the same reasons.
Reform IP law and stop the M$/RIAA abuse.
It does if your a kid dying of malaria in a third world country you moron (yes bill spends millions helping kids like this).
I suppose if you were sure a kid you would say "no can't accept your life saving gift, let me die".
Yeah right, sure you would.
Not that I agree with what your saying about it being illegal anyway.
Essentially sir, you are full of it.
Games Programmer And Designer
Unbelievable. People like you really live in a world of fantasy. 'illegal and immoral'? Do you really have this image of Bill Gates with a monocle, a tophat, and a cigar maniacally laughing and amusing himself with the cries of the poor? It's bizarre, detached-from-reality viewpoints such as yours that will keep honest, rational reform from ever happening.
I'm not sure what is the big deal about taking down the penguin.
It wasn't an act to destroy the creativity of students or supress their free speech rights, it was the janitors taking down something that was put up in an act of intellectual masturbation by a bunch of college students who apparantly had too much time on their hands.
If someone donated $20 million to your school, you'd probably go a bit out of your way to make sure they feel welcome. That includes taking down ads for / mascots of their competitors.
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John D. Rockerfeller Jr. (John D.'s son) was the guy who actually spent a great deal of the money, and the one who had a passion for it; John D. had one passion -- the Standard Oil business. It took a generation for people to forget the Rockerfeller name stood for vicious anti-competitive trusts which left human wreckage in its wake, and turn the Rockerfeller name into one that meant philanthropy. Gates is managing that within a generation, although he did not have to start out in the public relations hole John D. did. Gates, however vilified he is by the slashdot crowd, has been more a hero to the average American. America once despised its capitalist masters. Now we lionize them.
The Rockerfellers did not follow Carnegie's lead. Carnegie took a lot of criticism for his rather shameless self-promotion. Rockerfeller had a strict religious upbringing and considered giving a duty, one that was its own reward, and was not meant for glorifying oneself. You'll see Gates memorial this-or-that here and there, but for the most part, it doesn't look like Bill Gates is interested in having lots of things named after him.
History will be very forgiving to Bill Gates. People today think anti-trust legislation is some sort of government power trip to stifle progress, not a vital safeguard that restrained some of the most brutal machinery of captialism ever unleashed. Rockerfeller was shunned and vilified by the presidents and other politicians of his day, and now he's considered a great benefactor to mankind. How much more is Gates going to be remembered as the great success story who gave his money for the good of others? Any blemishes on his character will be easily waved away as jealous competitors, not anyone with a serious grief.
Another interesting note: the guy that John D. first hired to be his chief for philanthropy was named Frederick Gates.
So he is giving a tiny percentage of the money he made using the most slimy and despicable methods known to mankind. I'm not impressed and I suspect his maker will not be either.
If a drug dealer game money to local schools would he be a saint? While we are at it Osama Bin Laden built lots of orphanages and schools too.
"Now I have not checked this, but I suspect the charitable donations from every Linux distro CEO combined would fall well short of this."
In terms of absolute dollars yes, in terms of percentages I bet they gave more.
evil is as evil does
Sorry, but Gary Kildall's inability to make his appointment with IBM and successfully sell his product is what - in addition to Gary's direct actions - caused his suicide.
Truth is - Gates is a better businessman. He sold an inferior product (than CP/M) to IBM, and built an empire out of it.
Yep - there's no denying the fact that microsoft's only strong suit has been marketing - the products ALWAYS suck - except for the ROM in the Tandy Model 102 - the last thing Gates wrote.
Hey, I don't like Gates's products, and I don't like his business style, but this is America, where monopolies and cronyism with politicians is the way you do business - if you don't like it, vote 3rd party - because *any* third party - be them conservative libertarians or reform party members or liberal greens or communist commies are going to clean the stench of corporate controlled politicians.
As far as I am concerned, he is an unethical shmuck who bears principal responsibility for the suicide of Gary Kildall. Search on "Gary Kildall" if you do not know who he is.
I had no idea as to who Gary Kildall was. I did a quick search and found out. The cause of death is not clear tho, but nowhere it says it was suicide.
Now, I believe you have your reasons to blame Gates for Kildall's death, but in my own humble opinion, nobody is responsible for someone else's suicide. If you take the decision to kill yourself, no external factor is to blame.
As for "honoring" him by naming the building after him, well, he is paying for it. If the donation comes with strings attached and Stanford doesn't like it, they can always turn him down.
He might be a college dropout with little knowledge of CS, but he *is* doing something for the field: he is donating resources, just like the person who doesn't know anything about medicine, but donates money for a new hospital wing, or simply gives blood. You contribute with what you can.
(yes, I know Gates isn't probably doing it out of the goodness of his heart... he is getting publicity for it, but does it really matters so long as the job gets done?)
No sig
I guess the tought of a top CS building being named for the top software companies top employee doesn't really rankle me that much.
I'm not a Gates fan but him donating money, even for PR reasons, helps more than a bunch of geeks who bitches that more needs to be done for the poor, yet blows all their discretionary on toys.
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Quite impressive numbers you have here...
6 /Nov9 6/ladonpr.asp
But do these numbers represent hard cold cash, (and NOT 1B of Microsoft software)? And, if it is cash, then is spending tied by any chance to purchase of industry standard software made by a certain company in Redmond?
This is not unheard of: e.g
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/199
(1.1M donation to be spent on PCs and software)
Bill Gates has given a load of cash away in one year. That is alot of money. More importantly he gave it to organizations that save peoples lives not to plant foundations or animal rights groups. The money he has given has saved probably thousands of lives. Regardless of how you feel about his business tactics, his history is far more saintly than any drug dealer is mentioned in replies. You cannot compare how he runs a business to an individual who deliberately gives people chemicals that literally destroy both mind and body. I am not saying I am thrilled about how he has run Microsoft from beginning to present, but what he has done is far less evil than the compared scum of the earth. Think how you want, but it is a twisted reality. I commend the man for what he has given, because he didn't have too. No one twisted his arm. Taxes are a flash in the pan compared to his billions. For once can't someone who is anti-microsoft just clap you hands for some good they do.
No, his point is computer science buildings should be named after men who given computer science more than they have taken from it. Men who did the research to advance the field. While I admire Bill Gates for his charitable work, I don't think he himself has contributed much to the field of computer science. If the building was for a Business School, by all means name him after Bill Gates.
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One is born into aristocracy, but mediocrity can only be achieved through hard work.
A lot of drug king pins in Colombia do a helluva charitable work actually, some are almost revered as heros. If you ignore how they got the money to begin with, then yeah... they are great people. It is how they got the money they are using to do charitable work that is the issue.
Yes, I believe that was the joke. Congratulations. ;)
Saying that external factors cannot affect a person's decision to commit suicide doesn't seem reasonable. It's the same as saying that external factors cannot affect us at all, for any reason. Even if I did the evil things above, I certainly wouldn't be entirely to blame for his suicide (after all, he pulled the trigger, or took the pill, leapt off the bridge, whatever), but if I set up circumstances to the point where he felt like he had no way out, I would be at least partly culpable, by any reasonable moral standard. (I don't know if I could be held legally liable, in a criminal sense, although I probably could be successfully sued in civil court for wrongful death, or somesuch, assuming that his family could provide evidence).
I don't think that responsibility is always (or even usually) as simple as "one person is completely responsible for this." If a person commits a crime, and if external circumstances can affect that, then that person is still ultimately responsible, but it doesn't mean that we should relieve him of any responsibility and let him off scot-free, NOR does it mean that we should blame him entirely and not take a hard look at what society is doing that might encourage him to be criminal.
This really is getting off-topic; maybe I'll write a journal entry about it.
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
Uh... hate to break it to you, but most campuses name buildings after whoever fronts the cash, not after anyone "inspiring". I find it particularly ironic that this interchange was sparked as a result of discussions at Stanford, which is named for Leland Stanford: not an academic luminary, but a man who made a lot of money in railroads and used that moeny to endow a college.
dont be naive or stupid
I remember the time when Mr Billy was the only mega-corp billionaire that never donated a thing to charity.
I kept repeating that again and again in forums. Then maybe their marketting team listened. And then started first donating Winblows "software" to school (great marketting).
MS software is ludicrously expensive to purchase in the 3rd world. No wonder they are all going linux.
And donating money to America's AIDS research. Wow how generous. AIDS treatment drugs are too ridiculously expensive to the 3rd world - despite being cheap to produce. Let's put a price on death shall we? So no wonder countries like Brazil are producing cheaper clones (instead of $99 per pill you have $0.99!).
So don't be such down right thick, there are people who are rich and succesfull philantropist - who don't get villified as such.
If someone is shady - the truth will show. Come on we live in the 21sth century. All false heroes will be exposed.
For me naivity of people the worse evil of all. It made Hitler powerful.
Slashdot needs to revise the moderation system to allow scores higher than 5. Too large a number of the 5:Funny or 5:Interesting posts are not nearly as deserved of their scores as the parent above are. There truly needs to be a next level, above the simply cutesy posts.
Might I direct you here: Bill Gates: Killing Africans for Profit and P.R., by Greg Palast
The short summary is he cost them more because of IP laws than he gave back.
-Colin
"So he is giving a tiny percentage of the money he made using the most slimy and despicable methods known to mankind."
Uh, I'd put drug dealing and stringing my enemies up by their balls (physically, not a metaphor) as the most despicable methods known to mankind.
Gates is a businessman. A total pain in the ass, but still a businessman. I could see if the guy truly did immoral stuff (like kill thousands of people) to get his money, but he just ran a (monopolistic) business. You have an incredible crude sense of proportion.
At last, somone with a brain and intact moral centre posting in this topic.
The American religion is ca$h, and it is sickening and revolting to see how many people say "If you pay for it your neame goes there". None of them understand merit, none of them understand what bestowing an honor means - they are base, money worshipping people, and it is this same ideology that fueles the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq.
It is really disheartening to read those words from people who are otherwise capabable of understanding things that are very complex. It implies that no matter how smart you are, you can still be as thick as shit when it comes to ethics. This is not right, since ethics are built on logical constructs, so geeks on the whole should really be more ethical than ordinary folk.
Turns out they are just as dumb.
What the fuck are you talking about? My Windows XP workstation has at least a month of uptime. I have Visual fucking Studio sessions that have been running for far, far longer than two days.
Am I dead yet?
"Yep - there's no denying the fact that microsoft's only strong suit has been marketing - the products ALWAYS suck"
Maybe Windows 'sucked', but at least it sucked in such a way that millions of non-computer geeks were able to pick it up and use it comfortably. Is it so hard to acknowledge the idea that Microsoft's focus on the end user experience actually had something to do with their success?
"Derp de derp."
As much as I am a Linux/open-source advocate, and do not like how Microsoft does its business today, I have a few things to point out about Microsoft and Bill Gates.
1. How much of KDE and Gnome (now be honest) and any other "popular" window manager for X is trying to mimick the better parts of MS Windows (the only way to take the market is to emulate it, and make it work better)?
2. Gates and Microsoft, as much as people don't want to admit, drove the PC into the mainstream use for end-user consumers. Microsoft followed others such as DEC, Sun, etc., and had something that ran on hardware of the day for academic and commercial reasons, and then took a leap (albeit Apple was already there in small representation, and Xerox just didn't market their workstation as effectively as MS did), and voila! They made a new market of people who found the usefulness of a computer at home.
3. Being an avid gamer (in my copious amounts of spare time *grin*), I need to ask this question. Since Bill Gates didn't complete college, you're saying he doesn't know much about computer science, and therefore he really can't contribute to the field. Take John Carmack, as an example. He dropped out of college after 2 semesters. He is the person that video card manufacturers worship in the hopes he uses their architecture to pioneer the next-generation of gaming. Is he someone you'd also consider not contributing to the advance of the computer science world?
If anything, Gates drove a company that put computer science on the map. There were many before him, and MANY after him, but he really can be credited to be behind the machine that made PC's mainstream. Please put your personal bias aside when posting about things like this. I'm sure if Carmack were to donate money to a college to buy a building, people would think that would just be damn cool, not a hypocrisy to computer science.
Most of the money will go on the Windows licenses, so Microsoft will get the money back soon enough.
;).
This sort of circular stuff could be a good way to launder money
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Simon
If that's what he meant, maybe he should have said that instead.
The meaning of his statement seemed clear enough to me. But, then, mathematics professors assume a certain minimal degree of intelligence on the part of their audience. As you demonstrate, that requirement isn't necessarily satisfied by everyone in their audience.
Why, because an unknown mathematician and an anonymous coward say so?
He was restating an idea expressed by someone else. It is up to you to make up your mind whether you agree with that idea.
Yes, difficult as that may be to believe, even you yourself have the potential for independent thought; try exercising it for a change.
Apple ][ plus VisiCalc and, later, IBM plus Lotus 1-2-3 got microcomputers onto every desktop.
Personally I would find it appropriate for a business school to have a Gates building, but as much damage as Bill has done to the entire computing industry and even computing science, I'd have to say the name of the building is entirely inappropriate. He and his company have caused (and are still causing) far too much damage to computer science and to the economy.
Better to name it after someone or something else. What's next the Osama Bin Laden building for Womens Studies?
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
i think you're a bit off on the charitable work part yourself - or at least a bit too cynical. Gates has been giving away money since he got it to a laundry list of charitable causes, including his own. that his contributions have grown since the antitrust battle began is of little consequence - the wealth from which this charity comes has grown with it. last year he and his wife gave away more than half of their entire net worth; just over 23 billion dollars went to charity. last month, he gave away the entirety of his $3 billion share of the $75 billion shareholder payout.
i think there's a point where you have to really look past the cynical fog and think, you know, he probably could have stopped at a couple billion if he just wanted the brownie points.
Didn't you see the jokes?
The Belinda gates Foundation has started many, many projects for AIDS in africa and India, projects which have nothihng to do with capturing market share, or Windows (tm). Hundreds of lives have been saved, thousands have benefitted through his fundings of their education, etc.
I listened to Gates talk once (PBS I think) about the work the foundation does. A focus area is preventable childhood diseases in the third world. What he doesn't consider is now that the lives of all these children have been saved, what kind of life are they going to lead? He doesn't talk about providing potable water for the millions of lives saved. Is it moral to save a life so it can suffer a more horrible death? Don't even think that I'm saying that those children shouldn't be saved. I'm saying that Bill's actions are at best short-sighted.
his ruthlesness is only in his business and does NOT extent to real world.
But what he does extends into the real world. He controls a company that has been found guilty of illegal actions. What he does well, is market (via any means) crappy software.
perhaps a donation to the FSF would clear the cynical fog ;-)
i dunno, i'm pretty sure the world is better off with him putting all of the money into social charities that deal with famine and disease than free software.
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
Columbus didn't build the ships or man the sails or oars. He just acquired the funding and led the expeditions. He has an entire holiday named after him.
Bill Gates does a similar job. By just about everyone's recconing, he points Microsoft in the direction he thinks it should go and the people under him make it happen. That's leadership. For that reason, and the fact that Windows is in use on 80%-90% + or the worlds personal computers, he absolutely deserves credit as one of the most influential information technology leaders ever.
Put another way, if he gets blamed for Windows problems without having coded them, shouldn't he also get credit for it's successes?
TW