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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 think he wants kids to grow up to replace Ballmer and NOT waste money on broken chairs.
Everyone line up with the shiny bits to welcome Bill! Now... aim....
Why Computer Science? Why Now?
Because we need people with more skill to fix up all your shit Bill.
What did the liberal arts major say to the compsci major?
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>"Would you like fries with that order, sir?"
This sig is neither interesting, nor humorous. Including meta-humor.
I was going to attend CS 480 tomorrow, but now I just don't know if it's worth the possibility of seeing the Evil One in person.
On vit, on code et puis on meurt.
...He and Booger immediately started training to win their place as Delta Delta Deltas.
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.
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)
If you're sad you missed out on the opening dates, don't worry, there's a few more to come:
Wednesday: University of Michigan and University of Wisconsin.
Thursday: University of Waterloo and Columbia University.
Friday: Princeton University and Howard University.
Found the dates on Kevin Schofield's blog, thanks!
I've read about him doing these college talks several times in the near past. My guess is the video would show something similar to what he's been saying. Something about how they need more CompSci majors, especially with some kind of business masters type skills for project management assignments. I've *heard* that these project management jobs are tougher to outsource than the straight technical stuff but I'm not sure how much I believe it.
Does he mention at all that he dropped out of post secondary?
/\/\icro/\/\uncher
The intro programming class he crashed, CS 302, teaches OOP using Java.
I don't know about you, but at my college he would have been laughed out of the room... Plus, I really doubt he would show up in any of my CS classes this semester, Unix and System's Security.
Bill Gates has been making himself a bit more high profile in the education movement so this is no surprise really. Back in February, he went to a conference with governers from the 50 states to discuss education:
"America's high schools are obsolete..." - Bill Gates
Though I am not a Bill Gates fan, he has a valid point, and more importantly, he has the power & money to actually do something about it beyond just talk. While I have little doubt that he wouldn't mind expanding MS's market share, I do not think Gates is disingenuous in his efforts. Anything/anyone that advocates a good look at our public education is a good thing (and I dont mean talking about vouchers), so lets not let the anti-MS attitudes overwhelm the basic good that can come out of his efforts.
"What can a thoughtful man hope for mankind on Earth, given the experience of the past million years? Nothing." -Bokonon
Bill Gates was at the University of Michigan in the morning. He pushed the XBox360, and grabbed the wrong controller for the demo.
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.
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.
I suppose Ikea DOES use computers a fair bit...
It's NOT a conspiracy... it's a plot.
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).
We all knew he was coming, but his schedule was very much secret, and aimed at undergraduates. I hadn't even heard about the drop into the 302 class until now, and I know the guy that was teaching the class. Most of us had to watch a remote feed of the later talk, which I missed the beginning of, but the Q&A was better than most CEOs I've heard talk. Yes, a chunk of his presentation was "Look at the great products Microsoft is about to release" (XBox, Treo phone, etc). Funny thing is that he didn't mention Vista until someone specifically asked him about it.
Anyway, the basic message he was trying to get across, in my opinion, was that no matter what you do these days, technology is going to play a role, so it would be advantageous to embrace it. Technology is becoming ubiquitous in the home. Most sciences rely on some sort of software for simulation or analysis. Traditional blue collar jobs are disappearing because they are being automated. Therefore, if you want a job in the future, you're going to need a better education than you could get away with in the past.
I kind of left with the impression of.. "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?" Frankly though, you can watch the presentation in a few days.
So much ignorance these days. CS is much more than simply structures and algorithms. In fact, What I find funny is that the vast majority of new companies that deal with high tech are routinely by CS or CE/EE. Think about the shear number of high tech companies that have been successful. Amazon? Google? Redhat? Yahoo? Who developed each of these? CSers. It is the CSers who come up with paradigm shifts, not just rehashed ideas of others. The internet bust was made up of all sorts of business ppl who fleaced stock holders. What value did they bring to the company? No new software. No new hardware. Just bankruptcy while they either laughed to the bank or to jail.
The CS comes up with loads of new ideas and the vast majority need years to come to fruition. MS (heavy CSers) took 15 years to take on IBM and the mainframe. Linux is now the fastest growing server systems, and it appears to quietly be moving on to the desktop (in spite of what MS/IDG/Gartner/Yankee/etc say, OSS esp Linux is moving on to corporate desktops). How much of the OSS world is CSers? a lot. In fact, I would bet the vast majority is (combined with some CISers and EEs).
CSers will be around for a LONG time to come,and will be very important. In fact, just as engineering is applied physics, CS is nothing but applied math.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
If you think Bill Gates going to college is interesting, you might want to watch Bill Gates Goes to College, a movie staring BillG and Napoleon Dynamite, everyone's favorite antihero. Totally hilarious...
Napoleon: "I've got like, computer hacking skills, probably the best I know of."
Bill: "I don't think so."
MS plugs aside, it's really great, and watching Napoleon pull a roller-skating Bill from his totally sweet bike is well worth it. Enjoy =D
...and was greated with this http://weblogs.asp.net/ajuneja/archive/2004/02/25/ 80113.aspx
Microsoft depends on recruiting young developers more than on any other population segment it reaches - market, purchasers, legislators, investors, whoever. All that crazy-ass "developers developers developers developers, developers developers developers developers" ranting comes from the heart over there. But Microsoft has lost the zeitgeist in that segment - Linux got it. Otherwise, Linux's tiny market share, especially among normals, would never justify the amount of software developed for it by multi-platform vendors.
Gates is out there trying to keep Microsoft looking cool to their most important audience. Too bad he's easily outcooled by an expat Finn and a cartoon penguin.
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make install -not war
I attended the event this afternoon, and overall found it to be interesting, particularly the Q&A session. Gates' response to a question concerning Microsoft potentially collaborating with Google was entertaining. :)
Other moments of note:
A short starring Bill Gates and Jon Heder (of Napolean Dynamite) was shown, which I found to be surprisingly hilarious..
"Where do you want to go today?"
"Wherever I feel like going, gosh..."
XBOX 360s were on-hand, but should have been demoed by a gamer rather than Bill himself; seeing him attempt to fumble through and explain the menu systems was more painful than informative, and seeing him try to take a corner successfully in Project Gotham Racing 3 was humorous, to say the least. :)
If you happen to be there. Ask him lots of questions. Let's get something on the record. Here are some I can think of. Make up your own.
Could Microsoft ever open its code and make more money from support than developement?
What's up with Microsoft and Linux? Seems like you guys have the same goal of wanting to write geat software for the benefit of everyone. Why not collaborate?
Microsoft was recently sued by 20 states and found guilty of violatling the Clayton and Sherman anti trust acts. What have you done to rectify that?
It's still not possible to buy an MS-free computer from many vendords. Why? Will you personally pledge you will put no pressure on an vendors to sell "microsoft only" systems.
Just keep asking questions. We want to know.
Anyone involved with the music programs at the remaining colleges on the tour should organize pep bands to greet him with the Imperial March.
What is left to study in Computer Science? What algorithms are still out there waiting to be uncovered?
I guess you haven't seen the ten problems, huh?
For starters, if you take any integer, and if it is divisible by two divide it, but otherwise multiply it by three and add one, what happens? Do you eventually reach 1 and stop for all integers, and can you prove it one way or the other? The 3n+1 problem is unsolved. So are several complexity problems, including where exactly factoring large integers fits in the complexity heirarchy. Quantum computing will provide a new medium for designing new algorithms. AI isn't exactly solved either.
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.
Most of the "dreamers" tend to choose the wrong algorithms and data structures because they know nothing of the theory, not to mention too many "dreamers" who think they will solve some hard problem in CS without knowing that they've already been proved intractible or NP hard.
We still don't know if P=NP for Turing's sake!
someone can bean him with a pie again! Thats about the best picture of him.
If he came by my university, UC Santa Cruz, I think he would not be verbally attacked. Not in an abusive way, but I think the professors might ask him questions that make him look stupid. The School of Engineering here is almost entirely Unix based and almost all (or all, I'm not sure) the professors in the School of Engineering run some flavor of *nix (Linux, BSD, Solaris, Mac OS X). I remember worrying about having to use windows for my CS major when I got here, and quickly learned that you do not need anything windows. In fact, having windows just means you need to use cygwin or putty, instead of using an OS that does all that stuff natively. I think if Bill were to come here, he might regret it as many of the professors here have relatively high reputations in the CS research community and are very anti-Microsoft.
From the first day of my Operating Systems class:
(This is all from memory from six months ago)
"How many of you use a Unix based OS?"
about 2/3 of the class raises their hands
"How many of you use Windows?"
the remaining 1/3 raises their hands
"I hope to change that by the end of this quarter."
-Daryl Long
I hope that most universities are like mine. I could not understand how a professor of Computer Science could actually use Windows. To me, it just does not compute. In that case, Bill better choose his route carefully. Hey! Thats probably why chose to go to Wisconsin of all places (It was one of those sad places they use Windows maybe)!
When will you stop beating your wife?
How many chairs does Ballmer go through in a month?
You've said "the Chinese fucked us" to Kai Fu Lee, what exactly did you mean by that?
What do you think about outsourcing?
About 2 years ago he lectured in a southern Calif university. I was there (on the outside) as part of a demonstration against H1B's and outsourcing. One of his suited handlers came up to a demonstrator and claimed more H1B's were needed for the "tech shortage". He was talking to an unemployed techie. Gotta love suits. They have their own reality.
Table-ized A.I.
The tickets for his visit to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign sold out quickly too. But his talk was remarkably dull, the questioners were inarticulate (even the one person who tried to raise a FLOSS argument against Gates), and the hall was nowhere near filled. After asking around, I learned that Gates basically told the University he wanted to address the students; he essentially invited himself over. UIUC, being a large source of Microsoft employees, was perfectly willing to continue their relationship with Microsoft and promote his talk heavily. The local media didn't ask any questions (such as how he became so wealthy), nor did they refrain from expressing their unexamined adulation of money.
What would have been far more interesting (particularly considering these are ostensibly educational facilities) would have been to have a response talk from someone at the FSF that was promoted with equal vigor and University backing, and broadcast on University television just as Gates' talk was. When Brad Kuhn came to visit not that long after Gates' visit, Kuhn's talk was also sparsely attended nor was it carried on University television. But thanks to a UIUC group (Free Software Society) you can download it and hear what he had to say (http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/audio/audio.html#FS S04). Kuhn's talk was far more substantive than Gates' graphics demo.
Perhaps Gates will take the opportunity to again call free software "unamerican" or a "cancer" as Microsoft reps have done on previous visits to campuses and in other tours. Then the follow-the-leader coverage of his visit will have something interesting to quote and an excuse to ask why free software matters. But I'm not holding my breath for the local media or the Universities that let him give his job pitch to supply a more thorough examination of how we got where we are.
Digital Citizen
Well, for starters, nobody has even figured out whether or not P == NP yet. Sure, most people strongly believe P != NP, but nobody really knows for sure.
Kinda along those same lines, cryptography is built on the idea that certain tasks can be computationally infeasible to one group of people (eavesdroppers) but feasible and practical for the people who want to securely exchange information. We have stumbled on some algorithms that seem to fit this in practice, but according to what I understand, there is not really a cryptosystem out there for which anyone can supply proof that the computations that look hard actually are hard. For example, if I recall correctly, RSA's security rests on the idea that it is computationally very tough to factor a product of two very large prime numbers. But we don't know that there isn't an efficient algorithm for doing this. All we know is that we aren't yet aware of one.
There are other active areas of research. For instance, right now "managed code" systems like Java and .Net are in their infancy.
Computers have only just recently become
fast enough that it is practical to consider
switching to just-in-time compilation, and
the thing is, there are optimizations that
can be done when compiling at runtime that
can't be done when compiling before runtime.
(For example, you can use real profiling
data to automatically
create code that is most efficient for
the actual workload.) So there are bound to be
a lot of techniques to be discovered in this
area.
And there are other potential areas of research as well. We are already starting to see dual-core processors because it's looking to be hard to increase processor speed in conventional ways. We could probably use some research on how to do parallelism in other ways, possibly even going beyond dual-core machines or even beyond Von Neumann machines. If we ever feel compelled to do that, let me tell you, there will be a whole bunch of research needed in programming languages all over again, because imperative languages mirror the architecture we are using now but won't be suitable for an architecture that lends itself to automatically taking advantage of parallelism.
Finally, keep in mind where physics thought it was after Newton. It seemed that classical mechanics explained just about everything pretty well. Until Einstein came along and blew it all out of the water. For all we know, something like that could happen with computer science. Although it might be 100 years...
One thing that I noticed in my two years of college now is that Microsoft is *very active*, always coming to CS orientation classes to give talks (UIC alums working at MS), giving talks to the CS college, actively looking for interns two times a year, actively partecipating in job fairs.
Kudos to them. They realize that if they want future talent, they need to sell the idea of working for MS as early as possible. Why don't I see Apple, Sun, IBM doing this?
"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?
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:
> In an attempt to steer this back to what I was originally saying, it wasn't the nitty gritty details of the JVM that made it what it is (no, I don't mean a hulking mass of slop), but rather it was the fact that someone was sitting in their office at Sun and mused about having the ability to run the same binary code on any architecture.
t ion
Try Xerox Parc, where Smalltalk was from. Try p-code. There are a lot of pre-Java (and even pre-Sun) portable systems which don't require recompiles to run across different architectures.
>Computers have only just recently become fast enough that it is practical to consider switching to just-in-time compilation
Again, various Smalltalk implementations have been doing that for quite a long time. From http://www.answers.com/topic/just-in-time-compila
"Dynamic translation was pioneered by the commercial Smalltalk implementation currently known as VisualWorks, in the early 1980s. Currently it is also used by most implementations of the Java virtual machine."
Most of the things people consider "new" about Java are either from Smalltalk, or predate it. Garbage collection was invented with Lisp, in the 50s...
> Your Newton reference is very apt, and I may have been a little quick to declare the end of CS. However while I don't really think that CS itself will stop growing, I don't think that it is as important to engineers in the field as a good creative background would be, nor to those wishing to study it as a pure science as a good mathematics-based curriculum would be.
CS is not a supremely useful field of study at the undergraduate level (most aren't), and won't make anyone a good programmer; nor will it suffice to give someone a good grasp of theory. I'd take it over a "creative" liberal-arts education for someone interested in the field, although there are obviously non-CS graduates who can run circles around many who graduate from CS. CS isn't a pure science, in any way, and a lot of parts of it use math quite lightly, so I fail to understand why you say a good math-based curriculum would be important to those who would study it as a "pure science".
In those pictures, Bill Gates looks entirely too much like most of my other university professors.
You mean the borg-bill picture? What sort of uni do you go to?!! ;)
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?
I believe he was originally planning to do a talk on business , but the university board had thought it too similar to Prof. D Vader's lectures on people skills
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
I have a few questions for Bill,
1) Should a society defend it self against monopolies. If so how?
2) Should children be raised with the thechnologie from one company?
3) What is worse, people using pirated windows or people using linux?
4) Should technology be accesable to everyone or only those who can afford?
5) What is more important, money or a social society?
6) How can we learn operating systems without the source?
Are the answers from Microsoft different than your own? If sow why?
200GB/2TB $7.95 Coupon: SAVE90DOLLAR
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
Indeed, why? When you can learn something useful, like bricklaying, and earn as much or more with less effort?
What about pie detectors? :)
http://www.bitstorm.org/gates/
It is interesting to note that the security Gates has here in Waterloo is far greater than that of the Canadian prime minister who visited the day before.
Adventure City Tours
I think you are hitting the nail on the head. As someone who has been programming since I was 12 (I am 32 now) I believe that the shift will be more towards domain specific programming. For instance my graduate degree is actually in Medicinal Chemistry. However I work as a computational chemist were a large portion of my time is spent writing code in Linux. Along those same lines I am currently in the process of co-founding a scientific software company. I think it would be almost impossible for someone trained in CS alone to pursue this route. why? Mainly because anyone with enough drive and ambition can learn the "principles and best practices" of software design. However the same can't be said about a field like medicinal chemistry. There is a certain amount of LAB time and experience in the field that is required to do this. I am also seeing a similar trend in Informatics.
A lot of trained CS people believe that they have some GOD given right to the understanding of CS algorithms and data structures. While I would never argue that outsiders will not know CS to the same level that a PhD in the field would. I would however argue that many scientists are well versed in proper algorithms and data structures....in fact it is pretty much a requirement to writing exactly code in the Sciences.
Outside of science I still see a lot of need for computer literacy. There really is no reason why everyone shouldn't have the basic understanding of how to program a computer just like we all have a basic understanding of a math.
So in essence I think that we need to start integrating CS more into the the current curriculum's. Perhaps it should be treated more like a second language. You know everyone takes 1-2 years worth of CS classes.
Just my two cents
what?
"What else can CS give us?"
Hemorrhoids from sitting on or asses for 30+ years parked in front of a monitor, but definitely not dates.
Free MS-Linux preview CDs to all attendees!
Free MS Office for Linux beta for first 100
Sign up for free MS Linux Developers Kit
That ought to make the question and answer session interesting.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
I didnt know the Unabomber posted on slashdot.
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.