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Bill Gates Speaks Out
neoform writes "The Seattle PI is running an interesting interview with Bill Gates." In the article Gates comments on Vista, Google, and a few other pertinent topics. In an amusing bit of related news, an anonymous reader let us know that CNET is also running an interview with Gates. In the CNET interview Gates gives a very interesting response to one of the interview questions. "CNET: So that would be the philosophical difference between Microsoft and what Google is up to at this point? Gates: Well, we don't know everything they are up to, but we do know their slogan and we disagree with that."
"Well, we don't know everything they are up to, but we do know their slogan and we disagree with that."
From context he's probably not referring to "Don't be evil" -- but seriously, who can turn down a sound bite (sound byte?) like that?
(Google has) this slogan that they are going to organize the world's information. Our slogan is that we are going to give people tools to let them organize the world's information.
The slashdot blurb wants to you to think that gates is disagreeing with the do no evil slogan. Silly decepticons running slashdot.
Nothing like taking a reply to one question completely out of context... So Google is not offering development capabilities yet. Of course, I expect they will. But they're not in that game at all today. In fact, they have this slogan that they are going to organize the world's information. Our slogan is that we are going to give people tools to let them organize the world's information. It's a slightly different approach, based on the platformization of all of our capabilities and not thinking of ourselves as the organizer. So that would be the philosophical difference between Microsoft and what Google is up to at this point? Gates: Well, we don't know everything they are up to, but we do know their slogan and we disagree with that. He was not referring to the "Do no Evil"
What can one say to something so far off the mark?
Trouble making decisions? Just flip for it.
"I'm Feelin Lucky"
They were so cocky about it, they even put it on a button...those bastard!!
"When I am king, you will be first against the wall..."
I mean Bill Gates will always rail reactionary against anything he sees as a threat to his business model. I think the real question is why do we care what he has to say in the first place, he may be a savvy businessman but his days as a heady proponent of technology has long been overshadowed by his more nefarious practices.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
So, and I'm not trying to be a smartass, the same guys whose flagship product can't empty a recycle bin without seizing, are trying to be leaders in speech and video recognition?
Clippy AV: "Hello User/Bear/Shrub, I see you've brought a Hammer/Salmon/Exhaust Manifold. Would you like me to assist you with it?
[No] [Cancel]
If you don't know what AltaVista is (was), get off my lawn.
Better news would have been the 'face off' with Napoleon Dynamite.
Software in general, whether it was from Microsoft or somebody else, was not set up for an environment where all the computers were connected together. So it's not like there was some software that had this security capability and our software did not. As we use the Internet to connect everyone up, then the need to essentially have suspicion and only listen to certain other systems, and if flaws come up to have those updated very quickly, that became a new requirement.
Of course software was set up for networked communication. Most UNIX (including *BSD and Linux) systems since the late 1970s have been network-aware in some form or another. And they have experienced nowhere near the problems that Microsoft's software has.
Now it's intriguing that he's suggesting that it might be necessary to "only listen to certain other systems". That sounds an awful lot like a DRM-style situation for the Internet. Imagine not being able to connect to an FTP server running on Windows, only because you're using Mozilla or the FreeBSD ftp client, and such non-Microsoft products are deemed "insecure".
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
"Software in general, whether it was from Microsoft or somebody else, was not set up for an environment where all the computers were connected together. So it's not like there was some software that had this security capability and our software did not."
So, what was IBM's SNA (Systems Network Architecture)? Chopped liver?
That's right up there with "I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees."
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
He meant to say as Office gor Bloated and I got Richer...
slashdot is becoming more like a cheap tabloid everyday - making up sensational headlines from sentences in articles used out of context to sell their news to the readers. whatever happened to fair, unbiased news for the nerds? are the editors listening?
OK, we all know Gates is the biggest douchebag in Silicon Valley, but who would win in a fight: Larry Paige & Sergey Brin vs. Gates & Ballmer?
I'm fairly certain Paige would thoroughly pound Gates into the floor; but Ballmer is really freakin' scary. That one I'm not so sure of. I'm picturing Ballmer being able to take out both Paige and Brin at the same time.
Then again, Ballmer having Gates as a tag team partner would actually be a hinderence, so I'm thinking Paige and Brin would just barely be able to People's Elbow his ass into submission.
IGB: More fun than eating oatmeal!
Well, we don't know everything they are up to, but we do know their slogan and we disagree with that.
char* slogan = "Don't Be Evil";
char* corporateSlogan;
if(corporateID == GOOGLE)
corporateSlogan = slogan;
else if(corporateID == MICROSOFT)
corporateSlogan = &(slogan[6]);
This isnt a troll (I swear), but perhaps they are finally competing because they cant buy the competition?
You cant buy an open source project (at least not to stop it), and Apple is going to do its own thing regardless of MS (this is how it has always been).
MS bought Visio and plenty of other apps. I if an open source project created an office productivity application, would MS suddenly have their own version out soon?
Microsoft doesn't want cool features and creativity. They want money.
More accurately, they want to continue to be on top and also to be in control. They have money, in fact so much money that they often don't know what to do with it. Like the 30 billion in cash that they had last year and were trying to figure out what to do with.
Competition doesn't make money. Competition drives down profit margins and increases the amount of work required for success.
Or, in MS's case, real competition (such as the threat posed from Linux and OS X) gives them a slap in the face and makes them realize that its sink or swim time again. If they don't get their shit together, they are going to go on the steady slope down to the bottom of the lake.
Conversely, operating a monopoly allows you to slap premium prices on shoddy products and rake in the cash, as long as you are adept at keeping the government off your back.
Which is exactly why people should think before giving in to a shiny new feature. In ANY product. You may be helping yourself in the short run, but in the long run taking the easy way out will lead to difficulties 3, 5, 10 and 20 years from now.
Is it any coincidence that Microsoft is releasing this shiny new version of Office and also considering the subscription based pricing? I don't think so. They know exactly what they are doing.
"There are some zealots that think there should be no software jobs, that we should all, like, cut hair during the day and write code at night."
Either he just doesn't get it, or he's refusing to acknowledge what open source software (and the GPL) really is. Software development *is* services... It's professional services. Work you get paid for. Work you pay someone else to do. Open source spurs innovation because it both allows you to stand on someone elses shoulders and forces you to make your shoulders available to someone else.
That OSS developers cut hair for a living to support their "habit" is ridiculous. Would you let a slashdot member cut *your* hair?
I am not interested in articles about life extension advancements.
be lawful evil.
"Waste not one watt!" - CZ
At any point in our history, we've had competitors who were better at doing something. Novell was the best at file servers. Lotus was the best at spreadsheets. WordPerfect was the best at word processing.
So its not just me. Even the Founder knows they suck (comparatively)
Right now, because of the breadth of what we do, we have that in many areas. Nokia is way ahead of us in phones; we're closing the gap. Sony is ahead of us in video games. We're just on the verge of something (the Xbox 360) that will help us close the gap there. In Web search, Google is the far-away leader. Big honeymoon for them. Even if they do "me, too" type stuff, people think, "wow." nd Apple in music has done a fantastic job.
We interupt this Bill Gates Honesty Break to bring you the following.
In those areas where somebody else has done well, that's great. We'll match what they do, we'll bring new things to it, do it better and integrate it in with other things. And so it's very healthy for the consumer. We see that in search, we see it in music. It's not new at all that that's out there
Translation: We make inferior products, bundle them, make exclusive deals, failing all else we buy the competitor and bury/integrate their product.
OSGGFG - Open Source Gamers Guide to Free Games
Ok, he's right there ... if this quote was from like 1962. Before there was teh webbs, before there was teh netz, before there was teh Microsoft, before there was teh UNIX, there was an operating system that was designed from the ground-up to incorporate advanced/enhanced security features (relative to the times), and it was called Multics.
Unix has been established as a legitimate operating system since the 1970's. I guess you could say the "C" version would be the birthday of modern Unix, so we're talking 1973. Was Bill Gates out of grammar school yet at this point?
Native TCP/IP support was built into the kernel in the early 1980's, a few years. http://www.computerhope.com/unix/xenix.htm">Micros oft itself created a Unix port, and it probably doesn't surprise any of us that SCO ended up with it. The similarities between how SCO and MS behave in the industry and market aren't totally coincidence.
So, Bill, you HAD a network-ready and relatively secure operating system 25 goddam years ago. And you're saying that it's just now that anybody cares about networking, communications, or information security? Security has been a concern since the fucking 1960's, and your own friggen company had a Unix build.
Jesus H. I normally don't jump on the bash-Microsoft bandwagon and often grapple with some of YOU Slashdot turds for doing so, but if this isn't a bunch of merry sunshine blown up the collective asses of industry journalism, I don't know what is.
"I have never won a debate with an ignorant person." -Ali ibn Abi Talib
Corporations have a legal mandate to make money. It doesn't mean they can do no good, just that they are opposed to good deeds if they result in the haemorraging of cash.
Personally, I'm a big fan of the work Google do (at the moment at least). Just don't expect them to honestly set out inspirational visions for their future.
"And despite what a lot of people will think on the surface (whoa look at how cool Microsoft has made Office 12), it is really Apple, Linux and the Open Source competition that has made Microsoft get its ass in gear."
Not to mention AOL (which consistently beat MSN throughout the dial-up era)*, Palm (held off Microsoft for several years in the PDA market), Nokia (fending off Smartphone via Symbian), TiVo (mopped the floor with UltimateTV - leading to Windows Media Center improved annually), Adobe's PDF format, Sun's Java, and Sony (Playstation2). And Google thrashing Microsoft in search.
While Apple's Mac OS X is forcing improvements with Windows, its in the other media areas that Apple is thrashing Microsoft interests consistently. The cablecos and satellite companies have settled on Apple supported H.264 as the HD codec of choice over Windows Media. The Windows Media codec may be eliminated from the Blu-Ray format before its market debut, and as it stands, H.264 is also supported with the HD-DVD format. The Microsoft supported DVD+R spec did not trump the Apple backed DVD-R format and now combo drives are the norm. And Apple's iPod/iTunes support of Dolby's AAC audio codec has seriously frakked up Microsoft's WMA format dominating the MP3 player market.
If Corporate America ever is successfully persuaded to switch to Linux or OS X and open source application suite software, Microsoft will be toast...and I don't mean that application by Roxio either.
*Forgot to mention how AOL's AIM (and AIM supporters like iChat) is still more popular than MSN Messenger.
"Right now, somewhere in this world, Scott Baio is plowing a woman he doesn't love," - Peter Griffin, *Family Guy*
I'm a microsoft employee that is thankful for the pragmatically positive effect that competitors have had on us.
When i started at MS, we were getting our lunch eaten in security/reliability issues compared to linux.. (which frnakly sucks at security and reliabilty compared to some other UNIX variants) We had customers tell us "you get your sh@#$ straight or we're jumping ship". They had heard, experienced, or both, that they could get better uptime and fewer successful attacks from other platforms.
That's what we needed - the execs heard that we had a competitive threat, so there was executive support to let the really brilliant guys push through huge expensive work on reliability, correctness, security, maintainability, etc. In the past, enough customers were willing to pay for something like Win95 that we only had to make something as good as Win95 (which i never used, btw, as i had given up PC's for Solaris/SPARC by that time..)
Today, nothing can leave Microsoft without the "security gurus" giving their stamp of approval. (i.e. the guys like Michael Howard). There's a formalized process, a list of stuff to check for, all threat models are reveiwed, we have a bunch of internal tools that look for known-uglies in code bases..
None of this existed 5 years ago and today it's mandatory for all shipping products.
Obviously there's more work to do on security and reliability, but today we have the corporate willpower to dump a lot of investment at these problems, and the results are encouraging - Server 2003 has very few issued critical udpates compared to past MS products, and even compared to some distributinos of linux.
The other thing we're finding is that for lots of things, F/OSS people can clone our stuff (UI, feature set) in less time than we can design, write, test, and ship it. Outlook's 11th version is what's out in the market place right now, but something like Evolution (which let's be honest, is about as blatant an outlook clone as you can make without the underlying technologies _also_ being Microsoft stuff) is only a few years old and is functional for a good number of scenarios.
Freeware clones/reimplementations benefit from the UI, the feature set, the "flow", the architecture, and most importantly, the MISTAKES that we've made, so that F/OSS teams can deliver a reasonably functional app that works reasonably well in a very short amount of time.
We definitely know about Eclipse and what it does. People on the inside ask "why would i use VS instead of Eclipse?" and its up to us to make sure there's a good answer.
So yes, i think most microsoft employees understand and even appreciate that competition makes us work better, and that alot of that competition today is Apple, F/OSS, and Google.
My opinions are my own, and do not necessarily represent those of my employer.
Google's mission is to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful.
"Don't be evil" is one of 10 statements of their philosophy. I can't find anywhere that Google itself states that it is their slogan. But I guess you can have a lot of slogans.
Software sucks. Open Source sucks less.