Slashdot Mirror
Bill Gates Is Coming To A College Near You
Xyn writes "Microsoft chairman and chief software architect Bill Gates visited UW-Madison today as part of his 2005 College Tour, designed to promote greater youth involvement in technology careers. Gates discussed "The Impact and Opportunity of Technology: Why Computer Science? Why Now?" at a student forum."
I mean, why not MIT, etc, as his top five schools to visit? (No offense to any Wisconsiners out there, my Cheesehead suitemate will doubtlessly exact revenge on me for you)
Anyways, wouldn't high schools be an even better choice? I mean, I feel that if I'm in college, I'm either already studying Computer Science, or not. I mean, maybe you could convert engineering students from other disciplines, but most college students with a major in mind would be harder to get to switch. I think he'd do better at the high school level, esp. around junior level, when he can influence the people to apply to schools with a CompSci bent, or convince them to take CompSci as a high school senior.
Just my four cents. I found two extra in a vending machine, which doesn't even take pennies (stupid drunks)
What is left to study in Computer Science? What algorithms are still out there waiting to be uncovered?
In just a short 100 years since people really started thinking seriously about computation, the whole science has progressed to the point that it is a well-understood field (well, maybe not to freshmen). These days, it is more a matter of rehashing and recombining already existing theories and algorithms to come up with interesting implementations. However, the implementations are of non-computer science related ideas rather than pure CS.
We know the best ways to implement loops, data structures, sorting algorithms, searching algorithms, and optimizations. So what we do is just find new ways of putting these together to solve our computing problems. But that isn't science, that's engineering. It's technology.
CS as a field of study is a dead end, unfortunately. The real progress to be seen in the future is not in the science of algorithms, but in the application of the existing corpus to our needs. This requires dreamers, not people who know the nuts and bolts.
So Bill Gates is wrong. CS is not a necessary field. It is necessary to understand the concepts behind CS, but as a strict field of study, it is very lacking. For those who want pure theory, Math is a better field of study. And for those that want to do something with computers, CE or EE is a better way to go.
Jesus saved me from my past. He can save you as well.
- Get a job.
- Make a job.
You can do both. To get a job, you may have to move. To make a job, You may have to work. There are good ideas out there.With that said, Good luck. These are not like the 80's or 90's were.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
So, a guy who famously became the richest person in the world by skipping college and leaving a technical career in favour of business is now trying to persuade people to go to college and study technology?
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
Come work in computer science, boys and girls! Why? Because you'll have an opportunity to experience first-hand the effect of offer and demand on the job market, when we at MS will lobby for an increase of H1B -- the ones for 2006 are already allocated.
Because since the industry is mostly managed by lawyers and MBA, not engineers, you in the tech field will never compete with us lawyers and sons of lawyers for these coveted positions of execs who get a raise at the same time techies are laid off.
Because in spite of all Bill Gates' public wailing for attracting talent, he spits on tech talent, and so do most CEOs. The only "talent" he cares really about is execs, especially sales and marketing execs. That's talent. Design? Programming? Architecture? A commodity at best. A cost to be outsourced.
And you wonder why there is such a decrease in engineering and science students? Of course they want to work in finance and law. Do you think they are stupid?
--
Mad science! Robots! Underwear! Cute girls! Full comic online! http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/
There is still a lot of interesting work going on in CS and will continue to be for some time. CS is a relatively new scientific field. There will be no shortage of new work to be done for a long time.
You could make the same argument about math. After all haven't Newton, Gauss, Lagrange, Leibnitz, et al already discovered everything there is to know hundreds of years ago? Is math a dead end field too? No, but math is basically the same way today as you are describing CS. It's combining and reevaluating what we already know in new ways, but there are completely new things still being discovered, as with CS. Read some of the ACM journals and you will find some interesting stuff (if you're into CS).
Funny, but to be fair to Gates, all indications are that he was a hell of a programmer individually.
... ok, most of the time), but he was apparently a hell of a programmer back in the day.
The software his company produces may suck (at times
Video for Online Dating Profiles
Maybe I could suck his dick when he shows up at my college, and get some of his millions as a return favor. Give me a break, there have been plenty of rich men ever since creation of life, the only people we remember now are like Aristotle, Plato, Socrates, Newton. Just because Bill Gates is the richest man now does not mean that he would be remembered by anyone even 50 years from now.
No Black or White only shades of Gray
You're right, the world doesn't remember fabulously successful and rich people.
For example, I have no idea who Louis the XIV or King Solomon were.
No matter what your opinion of him, if the Richest Man in the world suddenly showed up in your Computer Science class as a guest speaker, that would be mindblowing.
Why? No, really - why? Can he give useful advice on your chosen profession? Of course not, he's not a developer, he hasn't been for decades. Can he tell you how to get rich? Again, no, the breaks he got were a combination of accident and illegal actions. Can he tell you what the upcoming trends are? Well would you trust insight from a guy who thought the Internet would just go away?
Just because a guy's got a lot of money, it doesn't mean he's worth listening to.
"So, I'm in school longer, and will have to do more work, but will get paid the same or less... why is technology a good thing again?" Theoretically technology makes the things you desire cheaper, so you don't need more money. The average American today lives more comfortably than kings of the past. In actuallity it isn't about having a comfortable life or any of that crap; it is about power and/or having more money than your neighbor.
--
WHO ATE MY BREAKFAST PANTS?
That is why you fail. Seek understanding, and you will find enlightenment.
If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
Personally, I don't think there would be much substance in college dropout's talk on software engineering. His career is the ultimate proof - all software MS ever created was largely driven with a single thing in mind - how to lock in the world and make everybody else's software obsolete.
Now, if he decided to speak about how to become extremely successful in business that would be another story.
If I had been in the class, I would have asked Bill the following:
And if Microsoft had competition in their marketplace? Would Windows be better or worse. Blaming the user for the flaws in Windows is an appalling argument. How the hell would a user know that their web browser could download malicious software silently. That idiotic functionality is built-in to IE and it shouldn't be. It's always the same arguments from MS apologists: it's the user's fault (but it's supposed to be easy to use); it's buggy drivers (so what's the HAL for?); oh you're just a communist et al.
Apple don't have a monopoly on online music, there are plenty of others about that you can use. However with even basic clerical jobs needing computer literacy and just about everything only running on Windows what other supplier can I go to? Linux is great but I can't run everything I want to on it. Apple might be cool but I'm not buying another computer for it. *BSD? Same problem as Linux.
People buy Windows because there's nothing else, due to the illegal (as declared in both US and EU courts) abuse of their monopoly position, and because it comes preloaded on their PCs. If there were alternatives that were practical Microsoft's only business advantage would melt away.
Does a Christian soccer team even need a goalkeeper?
Funny, but to be fair to Gates, all indications are that he was a hell of a programmer individually.
You base this bold statement on which facts, exactly?
The only software that wikipedia attributes to Gates personally was the Altair BASIC interpreter, and even that was co-authored with Paul Allen.
So, where are your "indications" ?
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
The advancement of technology will lead to its own death. Man's capacity to master the complexities is not limited but he is stretched too thin that it consumes a large part of his productive life. Furthermore the fruits of its rewards does not serve man's needs -- his happiness. Therefore he will abandon his pursuit for technology, or it does not strike his interests to pursue a goal that does not serve his peace and the peace of mankind, mainly for these:
1) it is increasingly being used to harm mankind
2) it encroaches into his privacy, leaving him caged like a paranoid animal
3) even when used in peacetime, the war waged on the business circles is likened to war -- the hostility have devastating effect on the frail morale of an average human
4) touting its capability, hostile competition only promotes creativity of a kind that pushes man over the edge -- where the surviving few have little chance to live and tell
5) overt technology saps the human soul, making him spiritually dead
Geeks out there, SPEAK UP!
If that's what he really said, then he is missing one biiiig point - Learning computer science alone is not going to help you. You need to use computers as a tool to enhance your work on whatever feild you got your degree on. Just because we have computers and it can do simulations doesn't mean we don't need mechanics or doctors.
-ItsME
You're right, the world doesn't remember fabulously successful and rich people.
For example, I have no idea who Louis the XIV or King Solomon were
Not that I particularly disagree with you - but the Louis 14th was remembered mostly for expanding French territory and Solomon mostly for his wisdom and building the Temple of Jerusalem.
Both were undoubtedly wealthy - but are remembered primarily for things other then wealth.
My pics.
He wrote a fairly decent Basic interpreter back in the late 70s. I used it. It didn't suck. And that's pretty much the sum total of his programming output. By modern software engineering standards, the guy couldn't program his way out of a paper bag. He may be a genius at megalomaniacal business, but a programmer Gates isn't.
I'm inclined to believe that Bill Gates was a sharp programmer back in the late 1970's and early 1980's from what I've read.
Not to mention that he has a talent for reading legalese (Dad was a lawyer) that typically turns off many programmers. That talent was instrumental in his company's ascendency; people didn't expect a computer nerd to pay attention to contract language and he was able to attack and defend his interests the better due to his opponents underestimating his ability.
But what I (and I suspect many other programmers here) are curious about is to see actual examples of code Bill Gates has written. Someone's code tells a lot about them, in the same way that written language in general is emblematic of the author, his personality, outlook on life, etc.
So, I'd like to see examples of Bill Gates' code, just out of historical curiousity.
Or is it still closed source after a quarter of a century?
"Provided by the management for your protection."
Bill Gates was an undergraduate in the Math department before he dropped out, you might want to get your facts straight.
Zigbee Central: A Zigbee weblog
In Germany (where I live) employees' wages were nicely rising along with the overall productivity until about 1990. Since the beginning of the 90s, however, raises in wages barely compensate the inflation.
I believe that the productivity gains in Germany achieved since 1990 has been invested into the development of the eastern part of the country. Perhaps this is the economic equivalent of the amount of energy needed to change states of matter. When ice turns to liquid water, it takes a lot of energy to do the process. The temperature of the water doesn't change as it absorbs much heat.
Perhaps when the eastern part of Germany leaves completely the Dr behind and becomes equal in wealth and productivity to the western parts, the wages of all Germans will rise again in league with productivity.
Well of course he gives away a percentage of his money to produce exactly the post you just submitted. I said nothing about how good a guy is Gates, or what he does with his money, or anything else except his corporate recruitment marketing (and that he's relatively uncool). I didn't even really criticize anything about Gates - I just pointed out that he's struggling to compete with Linux's appeal to the developers who are essential to his corporate strategy. To which I get a response about how much money he gives away. Which has nothing to do with anything I said. But it does give you, and legions like you, something to say, in irrelevant response to pointing out a Microsoft weakness. It's a canard, a red herring, but it satisfies many people like you who are Microsoft partisans. The quality of their product, their monopoly role, the nature of the industry they now define, the security landscape they've created for everyone in the world: why consider any of that, when Gates has bought so much goodwill with the extra $billions he's peeled off his monopoly bankroll?
So Gates is a great philanthropist. His corporation has created vast irreverible damage to my industry. He should get out of the software business, and go full-time giving away money. He seems to like it, and he's got enough to give it away for the rest of his presumably long life. I wish him well in those future endeavors.
--
make install -not war