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Gates, Jobs, Torvalds: Who is Most Important?
Ian Wilson writes "silicon.com has launched its latest Agenda Setters poll which puts together a list of the top 50 people influencing tech. I remember Slashdot carried last year's poll - which was won by Steve Jobs. The full top 50 includes many of the usual suspects. Last year's winner Steve Jobs has slipped down to second place, but perhaps most interesting is the fact that the panel of judges couldn't separate Linus Torvalds and Bill Gates - they are tied in seventh place."
... the most interesting thing is that #1 is a guy from the BBC. As they look to digitise their content, the BBC is carving itself a really nice niche on the Web -- a World Service for the 21 century.
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[This is possibly more 'yro' than 'it' but the consequences are truly scary for the UK if this man gets his way]
Look at number 5 - David Blunkett. This man makes all other (previously thought to be totalitarian) Home Secretaries in the UK look positively liberal. To recount:
Sure he's an agenda-setter, but Vlad the impaler had an agenda. It didn't make it a good agenda, unless you happened to be Vlad himself...
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Larry Page and Sergey Brin? Granted, they may not be as high as a lot of the other people on the list, but they should be on it. How many other companies are having as big of an impact on the Internet as Google? Not many.
You have enemies? Good. That means you've stood up for something, sometime in your life. --Winston Churchill
...but perhaps most interesting is the fact that the panel of judges couldn't separate Linus Torvalds and Bill Gates - they are tied in seventh place.
Is there any difference between the two men? Don't they both more or less control an operating system that is freely distributable, freely modifiable, strongly based on standards, with rock solid performance?
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I am the customer.
I am the most important...
I disagree about Steve just filling a role. When Steve left Apple, Apple started to suffer. It wasn't until Steve returned in '97 that the 'new Apple' really started to kick ass.
I've got more mod points and GMail invi
It disgraceful that Britney Spears didn't even make the top 50 this year. Without her, I don't think Google would ever get any searches.
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Well, there was GNU before there was Linux. Maybe it wouldn't be as popular, but there would be OSS. Thank Richard Stallman for that.
Please, please, this post isn't meant to start a flamewar of Richard Stallman vs. Linus Torvalds, I'm just saying OSS would probably exist without Linus.
If you're talking about who's been most influential in holding back computing by about 10 years.. I believe Mr Gates wins hands down.
Before I get modded down to oblivion (or up, this is slashdot), look at where the real innovations come from; it isn't Microsoft, unless you count the small companies that it assimilates once they come up with something promising.
An example: with the iPod, Apple is setting a new standard for mp3 players, and there's healthy competition. What is Microsoft setting the standard in? (apart from it's own standards..)
I don't think Mr Gates can be considered influential, next to others who are actually shaping rather than strangling the industry. My opinion, YMMV etc.
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"Linus is much more important than Bill Gates!"
Why?
I'd say Gates is more important. Mostly because if Gates died tomorrow, it would affect the economy a lot more than if Linus died tomorrow. Plus, Gates has given more to charitable organizations than Linus will ever make in his life.
Whom do I prefer? Linus. Whom do I think is a nicer guy, and a better tech? Linus. Who is more important to a larger percent of the population? Gates.
Where ever you are, whoever you are, thank you.
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I asked everybody in my house a question
"who is more important, bill gates or linus torvalds"
bill was the winner because none of the people knew "the other guy".
It's more than clear bill has had more influence in our world at this moment than linus has (though linux/oss might influence the world to new business models, but thats tomorrow and maybe)
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Jobs - Still visionary, still a good business man, still leading his company. Apple definitely won't be the same without him. Apple is what it is today because of him. Most importantly, he's Steve Jobs - of Apple. People listen to him.
Torvalds - Still visionary, still a good coder. Still has influence over Linux kernel, but not so much as he used to. Linux will continue without Linus. Linux is what it is because he started it and gave it to the community.
Gates - Bill Gates and Microsoft are no longer synonymous. The culture at Microsoft won't notice when Bill is gone. The only thing significant about Bill now is his bank account. Microsoft is what it is today because of lawyers, marketing, more lawyers, other people in MS, and even more lawyers. Bill Gates hasn't been relevant to Microsoft for some time.
I'm going to go back in my box and will think within the limits of my box: MS Sucks Linux Good I read too much Slashdot.
You simply could not be more wrong in your statement. If it weren't for Linus, the OSS movement would now stick to a free OS based either on 386BSD or GNU/Hurd - or some combination of these. Everything would look pretty similar to the real world as we know it.
Bill's case is far from obvious - if it wasn't him in particular, his place would be most likely taken by Gary Kildall. The history of personal computing would look entirely different, as Kildall was far from being a monopolist egomaniac like Gates and Ballmer. Kildall's company, Digital Research, could easily be the Microsoft of the 8-bit computers. Their system was just _the_ system for 8-bit machines, but Kildall did not try to use his advantage as a vehicle for building monopolist empire. Quite contrary, he was sticking to the principle that the company that makes OS should not take part in the application market. That's actually how Microsoft has found its niche - as a key vendor of the CP/M applications. So if it wasn't Bill, CP/M-86 would be the MS-DOS, and GEM Desktop would be Microsoft Windows - but there would be NO equivalent of Internet Explorer, Microsoft Outlook or Microsoft Office, and that would be probably good news (we would have various competing office suites instead).
The case of Steve Jobs is even more obvious - Apple with Steve and Apple without Steve (1985-1997) are just different companies. No Steve - no iPod. Period.
This story is just reattributed to Vlad. It was originally a story about Hatto II of Mainz, who was Archbishop there between 968 and 970 (those dates are provable facts). He also was said to have invited all poor in his diocesy to a huge meal, and he also commanded the doors to be closed and the hall to be burned down.
But when the hall sunk to ashes, a big tribe of mice broke out of the ruins and started to hunt Archbishop Hatto. He tried to have the mice squashed, killed, blocked, nothing helped. So he fled out of Mainz down the Rhine. Near the town of Bingen he asked a ferryman to row him over to a small island with a fortified tower built on it. He ran into the tower and blocked the door. But the mice, being millions of them, were swimming through the waters of the Rhine, reaching the island, entering the tower and eating Archbishop Hatto.
The tower at the island near Bingen can still be visited, it's called the Maeuseturm (lit.: Mice Tower) since then. For further references check a short descripton of the site. Other sources attribute the story to Archbishop Hatto I, a predecessor of Hatto II.