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Competing to Work for Microsoft

theodp writes "Addressing 5,000 developers in Bangalore, Bill Gates announced the Code4Bill contest, a nationwide talent hunt which will begin in January and last eight months. Twenty finalists will receive internships with Microsoft India before one Superhero is selected to join Mr. Gates's own team."

35 of 359 comments (clear)

  1. Familiar by Knightmare · · Score: 4, Funny

    I saw this movie once...

    1. Re:Familiar by iluvcapra · · Score: 4, Funny

      An awed hush falls over the crowd assembled, and then Mr. Gates speaks:

      "Is it imperative that we crush this rebellion before the start rainy season! And a shiny new donkey to whomever brings me the head of Eric Schmidt!"

      --
      Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
    2. Re:Familiar by TubeSteak · · Score: 4, Funny

      Gates stands in the back control area of his ship's bridge
      with a motley group of men and creatures. Admiral Allen and
      two controllers stand at the front of the bridge and watch the
      group with scorn.


      ALLEN: Bounty hunters. We don't need that scum.

      FIRST CONTROLLER: Yes, sir.

      ALLEN: Those Rebels won't escape us.

      A second controller interrupts.

      SECOND CONTROLLER: Sir, we have a priority signal from the Star
      Destroyer Avenger.

      ALLEN: Right.

      The group standing before Gates is a bizarre array of
      galactic fortune hunters: There is Bossk, a slimy, tentacled
      monster with two huge, bloodshot eyes in a soft baggy face;
      Zuckuss and Dengar, two battle-scarred, mangy human types;
      IG-88, a battered, tarnished chrome war droid; and Boba Fett,
      a man in a weapon-covered armored space suit.


      GATES: ...there will be a substantial reward for the one who finds
      Page and Brin. You are free to use any methods necessary, but
      I want them alive. No disintegrations.

      BOBA FETT: As you wish.

      At that moment, Admiral Allen approaches Gates in a rush of
      excitement.


      ALLEN: Lord Gates! My lord, we have them.

      http://www.google.com/corporate/execs.html
      Dr. Eric Schmidt; Chairman of the Executive Committee and CEO
      Larry Page; Co-Founder & President, Products
      Sergey Brin; Co-Founder & President, Technology

      --
      [Fuck Beta]
      o0t!
    3. Re:Familiar by Basehart · · Score: 3, Funny

      Admiral Gates is in his quarters struggling to put on his space tights and calls Captain Balmer over for assistance:

      ADMIRAL GATES: We need to do something about these damn space tights!

      CAPTAIN BALMER: But what about Longhorn?

      ADMIRAL GATES: That's the problem!

  2. Inquiring Minds Want to Know ... by richg74 · · Score: 5, Funny
    Twenty finalists will receive internships with Microsoft India before one Superhero is selected to join Mr. Gates's own team.

    That's interesting. What are they going to do to the second one that's voted off the team?

    1. Re:Inquiring Minds Want to Know ... by Dracophile · · Score: 5, Funny

      First prize: A weekend away with Bill Gates. Second prize: The whole week.

      --
      Athy, athier, athiest.
    2. Re:Inquiring Minds Want to Know ... by middlemen · · Score: 3, Funny

      They will send him to work on Solaris.

    3. Re:Inquiring Minds Want to Know ... by Baricom · · Score: 2, Funny

      He becomes a posterior support specialist assigned to Steve Ballmer.

    4. Re:Inquiring Minds Want to Know ... by RedneckJack · · Score: 2, Funny

      With former IU Basketball Coach Bobby Knight as their chair throwing coach.

      The runner up get's to join Mr. Ballmer's [chair throwing] team.

  3. Somehow... by E+IS+mC(Square) · · Score: 5, Funny

    this reminds me of Mr. Trump. Just dont know how!

  4. The article isn't clear... by Hawthorne01 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Does the winner or loser of this competition get to code for Bill? :-)

    --
    "Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."
  5. Just for fun by this+great+guy · · Score: 5, Funny

    If I lived in India, I think just for fun I would participate in this contest, and then when I win (because I am of course the best dev in the world), I will tell Balmer "I am sorry but actually I think I am gonna work for Google. Bye ! Oh BTW, nice chair you have there. Have a nice day !".

  6. Neat... by Cherita+Chen · · Score: 2, Funny

    Compete to sell your soul huh? Sounds good, Where do I sign up?

    --
    I'm not fat, just big boned...
  7. the donkey game by seringen · · Score: 1, Funny

    maybe you'll get to recode his donkey game for modern systems. If you don't know what I'm talking about you're blessed to have missed that horror.

  8. Product Development Strategy by codesurfer · · Score: 5, Funny

    Sounds like the final push to get Vista out the door is on! Winner gets to stay on as scapegoat for any problems encountered.

  9. Intervention needed by fmaxwell · · Score: 3, Funny

    Twenty finalists will receive internships with Microsoft India before one Superhero is selected to join Mr. Gates's own team.

    It sounds like Bill Gates has watched just a bit too many episodes of The Apprentice.

  10. Re:Why? by ari_j · · Score: 5, Funny

    Think of all the chicks you'd get...

    That didn't take long at all.

  11. Code for Bill? by fmaxwell · · Score: 5, Funny

    Addressing 5,000 developers in Bangalore, Bill Gates announced the Code4Bill contest

    As opposed to the "Code4Food" contest that they've been participating in?

    1. Re:Code for Bill? by Cowboy+Bill · · Score: 2, Funny

      Err.. Who do you think needs the Code4Food contest more? The devs in India or US? :)

      --
      --> Your Wisecrack Here
  12. Not the Apprentice for the dark side by Tjp($)pjT · · Score: 3, Funny

    I ate lunch with Donald Trump, I knew Donald Trump, Donald Trump was a client of mine. Mr. Gates, you are no Donald Trump.

    --
    - Tjp

    I am in wallow with my inner money grubbing capitalistic pig. ... Oink!

  13. Developers, developers, developers, developers! by nephridium · · Score: 2, Funny
    Ah thank god it was Bill Gates. You all remember Ballmer's "Developers" video - imagine him in Bangalore doing the exact same thing - but due to the lack of air conditioning WITHOUT his shirt. ;)

    Thank you, I'll be here all week.

    --


    And when you gaze long enough into the code, the code will also gaze into you.
  14. wouldn't it be cool by Khashishi · · Score: 2, Funny

    Wouldn't it be cool if whoever won this contest turned down the job offer?

  15. Ok kid, here's how to be like your idol... by bADlOGIN · · Score: 5, Funny

    From TFA:

    "I want to be like him. I am a huge admirer," said 24-year old Naveen Rao, a development engineer with the outsourcing company Aditi Technologies.

    Well, for starters, you need to drop out of an elite college just before you would have been thrown out for skipping classes. If you've already earned a college degree, forget everything you've learned. Get the point here? Next, since you're mom is rich and has big business connections through charity work, use those connections to steal someone elses product (a crappy OS simular to CPM) and pass it off as yours to a big dumb company with deep pockets.

    Are you getting the point now? After a few years of screwing the company you sold the product to, cut a deal with them to make a better product. Screw them over again by stealing yet another product by hijacking a product team working nearby that's been cancled (perhaps its a GUI on top of VMS by a guy named Cavid Duttler). Use this stolen product team to plow the compnay that gave you the big start (don't worry, your mom's friend moved on long ago).

    Is it starting to sink in yet? From there, you just keep going with whatever makes you money and screws hard working programmers over. Hijack a web browser from some poor startup (make sure they rhyme with "eyeglass").
    Through all of this, if you want to go after something, just throw money at it and duplicate features other companies have done the hard work for. By version 3 you'll figure it out more or less. If not, you can just spend them out of the market.

    Truth is, if you want to be like Bill Gates, all you don't need any technical tallent. And, if you admire Bill Gates, you have a serious lack of ethics.

    --
    *** Sigs are a stupid waste of bandwidth.
  16. reminds me of a joke... by jayloden · · Score: 4, Funny

    "it's like competing in the special olympics. Even if you win, you're still retarded"

    NOTE: the above is a *joke*. If you do not have a sense of humor, please ignore this comment and move on.

  17. Contest rules by Spy+der+Mann · · Score: 4, Funny

    1. Whoever makes the first blue screen, wins!

    2. Flying chairs screensavers earn a second place.

    3. the third place, Assistant programmer, will be awarded to the one who makes a program whose clippy assistant says "Developers Developers Developers!" repeatedly.

    4. Everyone in the country will be accepted to participate.

    4b. Except in Nebraska!

  18. Weakest Link by LittleBigScript · · Score: 3, Funny

    So on Bill Gates team you get the privledge of getting coffee for the richest man in the world. Ah, status.

  19. Re:RIP TIMECOP by Commander+Trollco · · Score: 0, Funny

    muh dick nigguh muh dick

    --
    http://persianews.on.nimp.org/?u=Tar_Baby
  20. Dear Code4Bill by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Please see attached program. I hope very much to work for Microsoft and feel I have all the right qualitys to do a very good job.

    hellobill.bas
    ---
    Const longintStrHELLOBILL = "Hello, Bill!"
    Dim intX,StrY,LongStrZ,doubleWordByteI

    REM Create something very important for the program
    REM
    For doubleWordByteI = intX To Ubound(StrY)
                    set objMyDictionary = CreateObject("Dictionary")
    Next

    Do While (intX doubleWordByteI)
                    LongStrZ = LongStrZ & Chr(intX)
                    If (objMyDictionary.ItemNotExist(StrY)) Then
                    End If
    Loop
    set objMyDictionary = Nothing

    REM if StrY = objDictionary.Item(doubleQuadNibbleString) then
    REM print the greeting to bill
    REM VERY IMPORTANT TO NOT CHANGE IF YOU DON'T KNOW HOW IT WORKS!!!
    REM
    If (StrY = objDictionary.Item(doubleQuadByteNibbleString)) Then
                    Print "Hello, Bill!"
    End If

  21. Re:hmm by JonJ · · Score: 2, Funny

    Nope, that's a part of "code4sony". Get yer facts straight :)

    --
    -- Linux user #369862
  22. I know this is tacky, by mikeage · · Score: 5, Funny

    But in Soviet Russia, Bill codes for you!

    --
    -- Is "Sig" copyrighted by www.sig.com?
  23. Re:Give me the winner's code, and by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Wow, I'm glad to know I'm not the only one who has felt that way. I've worked with other outsourcers in Eastern Europe, and the code from their senior devs was always comparable to US senior devs. With India outsourcing, though, I usually feel it would take me less time to write the code myself than it does to code read and fix what I get. Here is an example:


    boolean isBarSelected = bar.isSelected();
    boolean returnValue;
    if (isBarSelected) {
            returnValue = true;
    } else {
            returnValue = false;
    }
    return returnValue;


    Why in god's name would someone ever write code like this?

  24. Re:Give me the winner's code, and by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny
    Another example:

    int a;
    ...
    if (a != 0) a = 0;
    ...
  25. Re:Give me the winner's code, and by Pathetic+Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    You left out a few lines:

    boolean isBarSelected = bar.isSelected();
    boolean returnValue;
    boolean result;
    if (isBarSelected) {
                    result = true;
    }
    if (!isBarSelected){
                    result = false;
    }

    if (isBarSelected && !isBarSelected) {
                  result = false;
    }

    returnValue = result;
    return returnValue;

    I actually saw code like this in a production system only it was far worse. Said code was framed on my office wall.

  26. I knew I saw this movie somewhere.... by lwagner · · Score: 2, Funny

    Willy Wanker and the Software Factory. What bad things could happen to the 19 people who don't win?

  27. Re:Give me the winner's code, and by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Are you talking about Indians or Java programmers?