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Bill Gates, Time Magazine "Person of the Year"
klubar writes "Bill Gates and his wife, Melinda, were named Time Magazine "Persons of the Year". He was joined in this honor with Irish rocker Bono-all being named for being "Good Samaritans" who made a difference."
I know for a FACT that none of them are from Samaria!
This should prove... once and for all, to the teeming masses of Slashdot kids, that people, by and large, DO NOT hate Microsoft and Bill Gates.
I don't respond to AC's.
wtf?
As much as we dislike him, he does give an awful lot of money to charity, so well done Billy.
Of course the other argument is that, percentage wise he doesn't actually give that much...
And why shouldn't he be?*
*I doubt the story is posted here so we can congradulate him.
Keep up the good work, Mr & Mrs Gates.
Backup not found: (A)bort (R)etry (P)anic
As much as I dislike Bill Gates and his business practices, there is no doubt that he and his wife have done more for charitable organizations than anyone in history. Bill Gates and his wife deserve to be celebrated for their efforts.
Aero
Please stop hurting America -- Jon Stewart
In the year 1936 Adolf Hitler was the person of the year on the time magazine.
Before you all flame Time for liking Bill Gates... bear in mind that Hitler also won man of the year back in his day...
:)
I am not making any links, I am not vehemently anti-Gates, but I just thought it would be a good perspective to keep in mind before you went and sent letter bombs to Time
MoM++ - A Classic Expanded - [Master of Magic 1.5]
http://mompp.sourceforge.net/
"For being shrewd about doing good, for rewiring politics and re-engineering justice." I think I understand now. Those commie bastards in the open-source community are reverse-engineering justice and giving it away for free.
Bill Gates is not a philanthropist at all. In fact, he is making the problems of the world that he pretends to be helping to solve much, much, much worse.
If I went into a poor neighborhood and built five houses for five families, and then bulldozed the rest of the neighborhood and sent hundreds of other families out freezing and starving into the streets, well, give a good PR team like Gates has and I guess the newspapers would call me a philanthropist, too.
You are in error. No-one is screaming. Thank you for your cooperation.
Do you realize how many charities and how much charitable work has been done in his name? Besides, it seems you are measuring charitable work with money, which is a shame.
On Forbes, or Fortune, or The Robb Report..... but TIME?
I agree that Time always tries to be a little off-centre in their selection of Man of the Year (PC Man of the Year, etc...) but this is getting ridiculous. Plus, he's already been Man of the Year, when he most deserved it for his dominance (for better or for worse) in the emerging IT marketplace.
Some of the previous winners:
1938: Adolf Hitler
1939: Joseph Stalin
This award can mean both good and bad.
a guy named Hitler was Time's Man of the Year too.
Mark 12:41-44
41 Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts.
42 But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a fraction of a penny.
43 Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, "I tell you the truth, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others.
44 They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything-- all she had to live on."
As much as I understand the necessity of patting people on their back for doing anything at all with their insanely huge wealth - to stop them turning away sneering at the 'ingratitude' of the world, I can think of a lot of "Good Samaritans" who better deserved Person of the Year
Bill Gates amassed a fortune through ruthless and merciless and eventually illegal practices.
For every illegal practice Bill's company has been accused of, there are at least a few practices that have helped bring computers and the internet to the masses. Not sure I would personally consider Bill Gates to be a good person, but you have to be a ruthless dictator in order to run a multi-national. When in Rome. Show me one CEO who can exist in *that* world, without holding true to the values of the Sith.
That said, much of Bill's contribution to the dark side of the force has sparked great strides for the light. Our enemies unite us, and there is no clearer enemy to Open Source than Bill Gates. Maybe he just wants us all working for free? Nah.
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
Yes. A difference to the whole wide world and not to the US!
... is his crappy operating system
This is my sig. There are thousands more, but this one is mine.
Although they did give a large amount back, what percentage is this to what was taken in? There are a lot of people that don't make a lot of money and give a large percentage to charities. The total amount given is really not a measure of one's thoughtfulness, the percentage is really where it counts.
While I commend the Gates Foundation for it's great work, surely there has to be someone that, in the past 12 months, has afected the news more than he has.
Isn't that what the Person of the Year was designed to be? Has it fallen so far that anyone with enough money can buy the post?
He arguably robbed from the rich and gave to the poor...
Is it really so hard to have the headline be accurate? Bill & Melinda Gates, and Bono were the Persons of the Year. There was no single person of the year. I know the summary elaborates on it, but the headline and actual story are not the same.
I know slashdot tries to make Bill Gates to focus of everything, but lets try for some accuracy.
Say whatever you like about Microsoft (I can't say I'm a big fan of them!), but you can't realy fault Bill Gates as a man.
I mean, how many billions of dollars have you given to charities and foundations?
Yeah... thought so.
There is nothing more practical than a good abstract theory.
... with arguably shady background, named man of the year by magazine for his charity efforts.
In other news: ocean is wet and mountains are high...
Hardly a good samaritan when he doesn't spend his own money. He lives in a mansion and he has servants and then begs the working class of the west to pay Africa's way.
We already discussed this here and this was my comment on the topic.
The thing is it was one of the few discussions on slashdot (it's about Billy of the M$) which was truely fair or at least gives me such a feeling
It's Gates and Bono, 2 unscrupulous business men that earned their fortune ripping off other peoples work. Of course they both support strong 'intellectual property' and do lots of work for charity so lets forget that they are a pair of lying, thieving shitbags.
I nominate Gary Glitter for the next time magazine person of the year, with honors going to Michael Jackson.
reminds me of that old rich lady in Futurama that everybody love because they think it's a good old grandma although she's a real bitch.
The True FOSS Skype Replacement
Is linking to nut-job conspiracy sites really +4 Insightful on Slashdot now?
Giving away millions does not excuse you from Microsoft tactics such as:
1) EULAs that take away the users rights
2) Operating systems with little or no security
3) Business tactics that make the Borgias look like a kindergarden group.
5/10, try harder.
Ed Almos
The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws. - Tacitus, 56-120 A.D.
Not trolling, but asking out of genuine curiousity.
Isn't Linus Torvalds also a millionaire? Does anyone have any figures
about his charitable donations?
she makes him spend that money. otherwise it'd be sitting in the warehouse of a home he has being his only friend.
Power to the Penguin!
...twice.
I really have to give Melinda Gates credit for influencing Bill to start that foundation because, from what I read, Bill didn't donate anything until after he married her.
No data, no cry
The award was to Bill Gates, his wife AND BONO!
How could anyone forget such important person?
Bill Gates has donated more money to charity than anyone else in history.
So Microsoft shennanigans aside, he still has donated a good chunk of cash back into society.
Why are the rich and powerful obsessed with fighting disease? I wonder why they don't feed these people rather than stick a syringe in their arms. I think all these foundations are probably just fronts for medical research groups with suspicious motives (race specific biological weapons, the choice of the new war generation). I know the IMF force female sterilisation programs in South America so countries can borrow from them and the IMF can "fix"(up :-) their economies. Ever wondered why the police in Brazil are quick to murder orphans? The IMF promotes and funds abortions in third world countries to again not cause major economic withdrawals.
If Bill is sincere then good luck to him, but feeding the third world should be of greater importance.
Check out Greg Palast's articles, he's been exposing the work of the IMF for years. Must be difficult being a legitimate journalist (who investigates and doesn't just read "news" off of a printer!!) at the BBC these days.
http://www.gregpalast.com/
I'd do so, but I haven't got any points left at the moment.
A really interesting read, thanks for the link.
:%s/Open Source/Free Software/g
YTARY!
Rip off people, lie, cheat, do WHATEVER IT TAKES to make billions... ...then give a lot of it away to receive praise.
Time Magazine, how stupid are you.
Isn't AOL/Time/Warner/CNN currently trying to sell an organ to Microsoft?
good samaritan who made a difference n. Rich bastard in need of a tax break.
Standard Slashdot comment every time this topic comes up.
Hopefully, at sometime time, the morons will realize that
making charitable donations doesn't increase your money.
1) You have 100$. No charitable donations.
You pay say 30% tax on it - i.e. 30$.
You have 70$ left with you.
2) You have 100$. You give 20$ to charity.
Now you pay tax only on the remaining 80% i.e. 24$.
The money you have left = 100 -24 - 20 = 56$.
i.e You would have been left with more money if you
hadn't given charity & got the tax breaks.
The only diff to this scenario is when giving the
donation puts you in a lower tax bracket. However
I doubt it that's the case with Bill Gates - he should
far far above the highest tax bracket.
Who's more foolish; the fool, or the fool who follows him?
Bill Gates gives away (strings attached) large amounts of money, and is made Time Man of the Year.
Thousands of programmers give a far higher percentage of their time, money, and rights, to humanity, with fewer strings attached, for various reasons, but you'll never read about them in Time.
It's all about the money.
What I find interesting is that Bill is clearly someone who has helped change the world and touch many peoples lives already, and now seems to be looking towards an even greater legacy in Africa and 3rd world countries.
At only 50 years old, his next triumph may still be his greatest.
On an offtopic side note, my little test revealed Wikipedia is already up to date. Cool.
__Broadband funny videos for adults. Now updated 3 times daily.
Time also named former Presidents George Bush and Bill Clinton as "Partners of the Year" for their humanitarian efforts after the Asian tsunami and Hurricane Katrina, and the unlikely friendship that developed from that work.
Unlikely friendship??? Someone hand me a hanky. Gotta love applauding Bush for Katrina. It ain't as ironic as giving Kissenger the Peace prize, but it's gettting there. And Bono??? Bono???
The guy may be well meaning and all, but by allowing politicians to exploit him, he essentially allows them to look good while they make the problems of Africa worse. Him and Bobby Geldof were complete tools at the last G8, allowing Blair to look like he wanted to help Africa, when all they did was continue the same IMF policies of handouts in exchange for selling off of resources to the west. And Bono does it over and over again.
Deconstruct the State
Gates is convicted abuser of monopilist power. This means he obtained a large amount of his tremendous wealth through illegal means. The only reason he/his corporation hasn't been chastized for this is his enourmous contributions to the rebuplican party during the Bush vs. Gore elections. So not only is he guilty of abusing monopolistic power, but in my mind he is also guilty of subverting democracy. Granted this type of subversion is pretty common in modern America, but I still find it reprehensible behavior.
Now, for whatever motivations he has, he is taking some small portion of his ill gotten gains and using it for charity. But he gained that wealth by putting lots of smaller and often better companies and products out of business. God only knows what the final cost of the Microsoft monopoly is on the world.
I hope that it's clear to almost everyone that such monopolies are always bad for the consumer (there may be an argument to be made for publicly controlled monopolies like rail systems and postal systems, but this is a complex debate, and I don't think it's germane here). The lack of competition means less incentive to do strong quality checking, less responsiveness to the consumer, and higher cost. Not to mention the god awful EULA's and customer service. And this hasn't even mentioned the nightmarish influence of Microsoft on the public domain and the patent service.
Now I don't want to focus on the typical fodder of microsoft bashing. My point is this wealth was accumulated using illegal business practices, and those illegal business practices were protected by using the wealth so gained to influence the political engine. Great. What a man! A real role-model.
Had he not accumulated such a vast amount of wealth through these illegal manoeverings, who knows how that wealth would have been spent otherwise? In essence, I see this as robbing money from the masses, and using it to purchase prestige and influence via charitable organizations. Granted his tactics aren't as bad as the Mafia's, but one can see a bit of an anology to the local mafia boss being a 'pillar of the community' because he does so much to maintain the local schools, libraries, and parks...
His charity may be good
but that doesn't make his software good
or innovative.
Only he can do that.
And time and again he has not managed to do that
until somebody else does it first
and then he tries to do something similar.
Professor Finds Fulfillment In Emptying His Pockets (might need to be registered) about a DC area community college mathematics professor who has a goal of donating $1million to charity before he retires, and he's already up to $770,000. Many years he's donated more than half of his annual income to charity.
I think that tells you what we can all make of Time Magazine's exalted choice.
1 worst
http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=1
This quote epitomizes U2's pious, holier-than-thou attitude:
"I don't know why, but we always had this belief that there was something sacred about our music, that it was almost holy."
-Bono, pompous asshole and lead singer of U2
Cocky, high-handed, imperial assholes.
When you're done pickin' Gates' pubic hairs outta your teeth you outta brush 'em, your breath smells like ass.
You are in error. No-one is screaming. Thank you for your cooperation.
MS did not win the award. The gates did. Big difference.
In addition, the foundation was set up by Melinda, NOT bill. And she did it for marketing. I would say that it has paid off.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Al Capone was big on financing community development in Chicago. I guess as long as you spend 10% of your money doing good deeds, it doesn't matter where the money comes from.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
I must be fuzzy on the "Good Samaritan" parable. Did it involve the Good Samaritan cheating and stealing their way to being the wealthiest person in the world, and then giving that unethically and illegally gained money away, non-anonymously, to pump his ego and buy good will?
"A man lay robbed and dying on the side of the road. Many men walked buy but did nothing. Then along came the Good Samaritan. He was the guy that robbed the dying guy. He mercifully killed the dying man by cutting off his air supply. Then the Good Samaritan went back to his village and built a huge house, and lived like a God on earth, not humbly at all. Later, the Good Samaritan donated a portion of his stolen wealth in front of all the people of his village, so that he would look like a great guy, and they would forget his ego, crimes, and greed. Remember, my children, that is why he is the Good Samaritan -- because he is good at fooling that masses."
I'm not sure I'd be smiling as much as Bill is if Bono were standing between me and my wife with such a smug look on his face.
-Pinkoir
As far as Gates flaming wars are upon us here at Slashdot, I wanted to take this time and thank the Gates for their contributions. I vote Bill Gates for president of the US as well. If he can run a business efficiently, why not the US next? I am serious, he would be a great person for the job.
Bill Gates for President! Who's with me?
It's a "Hey! let's feel good, America!" broadsheet. They admire Gates for his money. All the illegal, constrictive, arrogant business crap he's pulled doesn't matter. The 2% wealthiest people are who is running this country these days. They are who is crafting what the world sees as America. They are who is crafting what you see as America. They are crafting what Time sees as America.
So I salute you as my Person of the Year: the decent, responsible, modest, law abiding people in this country; the real Americans. You're smaller in number than ever before, and "Time" ignores you, as does your government. But there are millions in the world who hope that some day America will become your reflection and not that of the carpet baggers in power now, Democrats and Republicans alike.
How much would Hitler need to have given to charity to bring honor to his name? (and imagine how we would have gotten the money, GASP!)
I don't believe one can make Billions through *honest* means, even in America...
It generally seems to require some form of deception, dishonest billing, and/or a monopolized market...
Or you believe that the Airlines operate an honest business? Cell-phone companies? Fast-food? Multi-level marketing? "Get Rich" schemes? QuickStar/Amway schemes? What about companies that exist to only hold patents???
How many Billions does MSFT have laying around in CASH right now??? Not revenue, not capital, but pure CASH... The number is truly staggering.
Hopefully the money MSFT donates does some good, but it is ill-gotten gains. Robin Hood is a nice child's story, but it is still not right to go around performing armed robbery in order to get some money to donate... MSFT's guns are not the projectile type, but the legal & financial type.
So please, don't delude yourself and other readers...
...millions of Slashdotters cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced...
It just goes to show that people are stupid and that the mass media are sycophants.
I am sick and tired of hearing what a great genius and philanthropists Bill Gates is.
Let us not forget that Bill Gates went to India in 2002 and gave $100 million to fight AIDS, which received great press. What the main-stream media failed to report was that $421 million of Microsoft's money at the time went to fight Linux and Free Software.
So make your own conclusions about his priorities.
Stick Men
There's nothing like a good woman to get the best out of a man, heh, heh! It's good to see the Gateses getting some recognition, but I think it's especially cool that Melinda is getting some cover time too. I don't think it's any coincidence that Bill Gates' philantropy really took off after he married Melinda. Now if Melinda can also do something to make Windows better then I will be clearing out some space in my home for a special shrine!
To the making of books there is no end, so let's get started
Time is owned by Time Warner.
Time Warner also owns AOL.
Google is negotiating with Time Warner to buy part of AOL.
Time Warner wants Microsoft to push Google's offer higher.
is a powerful motivator. Bill, like everyone else, wants people to think he's a good guy. Since he's as famous as the Beatles (though not as famous as that Guy you don't want me to mention or you'll bash me as a zealot), he has to do more to be seen as a good guy.
But "there is no doubt that he and his wife have done more for charitable organizations than anyone in history" is a stretch. Ever hear of Andrew Carnegie? Built libraries, died broke. He gave more than Bill and the Missus, since he gave everything he had.
How about Stallman and Torvalds? They don't do much for charitable organizations per se, but having given us GCC and Linux I'd say they've done quite a bit of giving.
But that's an aside. From IUPUI:
Lotsa folks give money. What do you do with the rest of yourself -- are you kind to others, or do you try to suck the last penny out of their pockets, taking the crumbs from the plates of the poor?
Raise your children as if you were teaching them to raise your grandchildren, because you are.
In 1991, Bono's band U2 sued seminal independent label SST (home to, among others, Black Flag, Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr, Hüsker Dü, Soundgarden, ...) over a satirical record by a band on the label, Negativland. They claimed that Negativland was infringing on U2's IP by using samples and other stuff (e.g., the letter U and the numeral 2).
This nearly ruined SST over the costs of the suit alone, but by forcing SST to fight an expensive suit, while the music they had greatly contributed to for more than 10 years exploded into the mainstream, it greatly contributed to the eventual demise of the label, robbing the artists of an important channel.
Later U2 claimed to have not been greatly involved. "It wasn't us, just the label", paraphrased.
I'm sorry, but if you let your lawyer sue, I'll hold you responsible. And if you wanna preach to people about responsible behavior, I'll expect that you know what your agents do in your name.
I have one thing to say about Bono: hypocrite. I think this is a fitting "people of the year" panel: They all give to charity in the limelight, then turn around and fuck people over.
"When I first heard Daydream Nation it quite frankly scared the living shit out of me." -- Matthew Stearns
Steal from the rich and give to the poor? Reminds me of a character from Nottingham :)
I've never seen so many references to Hitler in one Slashdot article, and yet the discussion rages on! Stop breaking this extremely important law before the universe disappears and is replaced by something even more bizzare and inexplicable!!!
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
There are lots of global philanthropists out there -- not like Bill Gates, Melinda Gates, and Paul Hewson are the only ones -- so I don't see them as closely connected enough to share the cover. So how about this: either Bill and Melinda OR Bono. Much more dramatic cover shot without three people on it, and less cluttered idea. Alternatively, one could bear in mind that Bono is doing a lot of his stuff with Band Aid, Make Poverty History/Live 8, et cetera; that is, in collaboration with Bob Geldof. If they want Bono on the cover but don't think he can hold it alone, stick Geldof in there -- he's done a lot on this front, albeit somewhat controversially. Or just let the Gateses stand by themselves, without the dilution of the "Person of the Year" brand resultant from a triple award.
How people in privileged places always seem to have other people in privileged places giving them props when a great deal of the majority suspects their all full of shit.
And then the media airs it.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
An ad hominem argument goes like this:
1. A makes claim B;
2. there is something objectionable about A,
3. thus, claim B is false.
Is that where you were going? Just curious.
un burrito me trampeó.
Bill Gates, Peron of the Year
Let the flamewars begin!
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not entirely sure about the universe - Einstein
Somebody quantify their contribution to society and destruction to society?
If contribution is greater than destruction, then...
If destruction is greater than contribution, then...
If you delay pleasure infinitely, the pleasure will be infinite. (YM)
Resistance Is Useless
Overthrow the proletariat another day, buddy. Bill Gates and his billions of dollars look like the proletariat to me... From Miriam Webster: 1 : the lowest social or economic class of a community 2 : the laboring class; especially : the class of industrial workers who lack their own means of production and hence sell their labor to live Also from same: bourgeoisie 1 : MIDDLE CLASS 2 : a social order dominated by bourgeois So, mod "MOD PARENT "IDIOT"" idiot. Please.
I pity all the folks who run windows by design or choice ... as for me, I run gentoo linux.
My two copies of windows I have live came in the form of
1. my new Dell laptop [which dual boots with gentoo linux as well, split my 100GB drive as 15GB for winxp and rest for gentoo]
2. My desktop where someone else bought me a copy of windows so I could do some crypto work for them.
I may hate microsoft but I keep a partition or two around just in case I get stuck with a windows job. [Though I wouldn't let windows touch any of my dual-core 64-bit boxes].
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
Stupidity is like nuclear power, it can be used for good or evil. And you don't want to get any on you.
"Steal from the rich and give to the poor? Reminds me of a character from Nottingham :)"
It's the same argument that P2P pirates use. At least they can relate.
Yeah, I wish I had a spare $258 million to donate toward malaria vaccine and drugs, so that I can lower my tax liability and (coincidentally) make Time Woman of the Year.
Some of his money must have come as a result of Microsoft's high prices, only possible because of monopoly status and illegal business practices. Then, whose money is he giving away?
Sometimes, charity is given to ease the sufferings that are caused by the donors wrongdoings, and give the donor a better conscience. The AIDS epidemic is killing millions in Africa. The medical industry is not willing to let the Africans make low cost copies of their high priced medicines to save lives, they are eagerly "protecting their IP" through patents and and law enforcements, just like some other large companies from the rich parts of the world.
I will read Time Mag to find the reasoning behind their choice of "Person of the Year"
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Well, in one sense he is stealing to the rich (us first worlders) in order to give to the poor (third worlders)... He just gets to keep a percentage for himself.
Nuffsaid
________
Don't know about his cat, but Schroedinger is definitely dead.
I was only making the point Hitler made "Man of the Year", I am not saying that Gates is Hitler, I was trying to nip that in the bud.
:)
If you inferred that connection, you must have missed the part about not making links, or thought I meant I wasn't making a web link or something.
Cheers!
MoM++ - A Classic Expanded - [Master of Magic 1.5]
http://mompp.sourceforge.net/
Standard Slashdot comment. Some guy pulls numbers out of his ass to get +3 Insightful.
Ubuntu: If at first you don't succeed, blindly slap a sudo in front of it
And there came a certain poor widow, and she threw in two mites, that might make a farthing.
Yes, Jesus praises her for throwing in 'even, all her living'. But that's his opinion, and obviously far more of people on Slashdot's opinion than I'd have thought. The economic fact here though, is that her farthing [yes, I'm an old timer with an old bible from his school days] wo'n't feed as many mouths, it wo'n't fund as much research into AIDS/HIV cures, and it certainly wo'n't be felt anywhere near to the same effect as Gates' donations.
I'm not saying her theoretical donation is worthless, I'm saying that holistically viewed, all the charity in the world is nescessary, and if she gives, and Gates' gives, that's more money that's helping others. But when you break it down, he's helping more people, regardless of the percent. So don't cry over Time magazine not recognising the greatest charity-donor you personally know, because Time doesn't know them, haven't even heard of them, maybe your friend doesn't want recognition etc. And don't belittle what Gates' is doing for charity, because of personal politics you've picked up from reading too many slanted Slashdot articles. He's done wrong things, he still is in some ways, but in this sense, he's doing a good thing.
... is a bus thief. Say what you want about Bill Gates, or Bono, or whichever "great man" that Time wants to honor this year, but I really can't let my bosom swell over a millionaire or a billionaire throwing out a little bit of their plentiful time and/or money here or there. Hell, if somebody has that much power and money, we shouldn't be "thanking" them for doing the right thing, it should be *expected* of them.
My person of the year is Jabbar Gibson, the 18 year old kid who saved 70 people from the aftermath of Katrina by stealing a bus and driving to Houston. Maybe that's because my definition of a hero is somebody that rises above even when the chips are down.
Tax rates are marginal anyway, so it wouldn't save you any additional money if you did switch brackets. Assuming that there's a tax bracket at $90, with everything below it taxed at 15%, and everything above it taxed at 30% as above. Repeating the same two scenarios that you used:
(1) $100 income, no charitable contribution. $90 @ 15% + $10 @ 30% = $13.50 + $3.00 = $16.50 of taxes. After-tax income: $83.50
(2) $100 income, $20 charitable contribution. $80 @ 15% = $12.00 of taxes. After-tax income: $68
So not only does money not magically appear from crossing marginal tax rate boundries, but your tax refund on the donation isn't even as large ($6 in the parent's example, but only $4.50 here), so while the $20 contribution only took $14 out of the parent's pocket at the end of the day, here the same contribution would cost us $15.50
Ah, 'tis Christmas, the season in which all disbelief and rational mind is suspended, or pickled in alcohol.
... ." Fine-sounding phrases but, really, they mean zilch. Time's reporters badly need to get out and about a bit more. They might find that seemingly "ordinary" folks are capable of the most extraordinary things and that "re-engineering justice" might begin with closing down the massive agricultural subsidies beloved of the rich world and an end to running torture networks. We have to deal with those through the ballot box and not through Bill Gates.
Bill Gates and his wife Melinda fully deserve recognition for their many charitable works. The fact is, though, that they've already had a fair share of that in years gone by. In a year of ghastly natural calamities it is really lame of Time Magazine to play oh-so-safe and choose the world's richest couple and a clapped-out rock star.
In addition, Time Magazine's write-up is pretty nauseating: "For being shrewd about doing good, for rewiring politics and re-engineering justice, for making mercy smarter and hope strategic and then daring the rest of us to follow
Las qué passoun
tournoun pas maï
1)overcharge for services (i.e cds,concerts and software)
2)donate a small percentage of that cash to charity
3) profit ?!?!?!?
Sanity is the trademark of a weak mind. -- Mark Harrold
I wasn't aware that was Bono's last name...
--- Sigmentation Fault - Comments Dumped
interested me neway... ;)
As any faithful Christian knows, we store up our treasures in heaven, not on earth. The fact you put so much weight in one Magazine's earthly praise while quoting from the Word which instructs you to seek fortune elsewhere, strikes me as a tad bit hypocritical (if not downright jealous).
Furthermore, not only is it apparent you have no context of understanding about that passage you cite, I think what you really meant to quote was this:
Mark 10:20-25 (Camel and eye of the needle)
20 And he answered and said unto him, Rabbi, all these have I observed from my youth.
21 Then Yahushua beholding him loved him, and said unto him, One thing thou lackest: go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, take up the cross, and follow me.
22 And he was sad at that saying, and went away grieved: for he had great possessions.
Peace, brother...
"...or for ill." Get it?
Now in this case, Bill and Melinda Gates and Bono are being recognized for their efforts to make the world a better place.
-S
--- What parts of "shall make no law", "shall not be infringed", and "shall not be violated" don't you understand?
As of the time I am writing this, no one has quoted the germane part of the article:
"Time has been naming its person of the year since 1927 and the tradition has become the source of speculation every year, as well as controversy over unpopular choices such as Adolf Hitler in 1938 and Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979. The aim is to pick 'the person or persons who most affected the news and our lives, for good or for ill, and embodied what was important about the year, for better or for worse.'...'You want to make a choice for the history books as well as one which is fresh and interesting,' Kelly said."
This is NOT about whether Gates is good, or rich, or generous, or bad or stingy. Geeeeeez!
And every time the MS support crew mods down any mention that, from the B&M Gates public, online records thew foundation MAKES BILLIONS ANNUALLY. Next step for MS fanbois with zero knowledge of corporate accounting is to become neophyte fiscal analysts and proclaim the extra billions are neccessary to 'grow the fund'. If the Shriners or Unicef annually kept billions more than they distributed you'ld have no qualms calling corruption to the skies, but since this is the Greatest Man on Earth and you're incabable of raising thought or sight above the petty squabbles of Slashdot you'll put such notions down to the bitterness of Slashbots and go on blindly praising such the essence of charity.
To many people Bill is the epitome of greedy and selfish... but what they probably don't know is that he is a huge philanthropist. I think he gave somewhere around half his net worth away to charities. That's great.
My choice would have been the millions of Iraqi's who despite death threats from terrorists voted three times this year - for a provisional government, a new constitution, and a parliament. But the story wasn't particularly well covered, so I can understand how the editors of Time could have missed it.
[Insert pithy quote here]
Read up on Gates' views on religion, and then ask yourself if the FOX News-watching Bible-thumpers in this country would cast their vote for him.
Those crazy fucks took a man who is a dullard and was an addict, who ran business after business into the ground (who couldn't find oil in TEXAS!), and made him the leader of the most powerful nation on Earth-- simply because he found religion and told them what they wanted to hear.
They wouldn't care a whit about Gates' business acumen and what it could do for the country. They would just fixate on the fact that he is noncommittal (to say the least) about religion, and would quickly mobilize to defeat him.
~Philly
Who had the most impact on peoples lives around the globe this year? Mother Nature.
The year started out with the Tsunami, went through the hurricane season and destroyed a whole city displacing what...about a million people? Not to mention the earthquakes and tornadoes through the year.
Nature had the most impact on people's lives this year. Much more so than Bono and the Gates'.
"Leo Fender was in a 'state of grace' when he designed the Stratocaster." -- Paul Reed Smith
It is like robbing a bank yearly and then giving away about 1%. He gives away about .5 billion a year.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
...giving 50 cents when all you've got is $1
Charity is NOT giving 10% (or even 50%) of your multimillion formue, that is called either a "PR stunt" or a donation.
Just how many of the readers and responders spend even 1% of their income on charitable donations?
I see all this crap bashing time for hitler being man of the year. well he was man of the year before world war 2 and he did some real good things for germany, he more or less brought them out of massive debt after world war 1. and he was a brilliant strategist, he just went a little off in the late 1930s and wanted to take over the world. but hey, who doesn't want to take over the world in one way or another.
From other posts, you'll learn that Hitler was once "for better or worse" Time's person of the year in 1938.
... You know, part of the truth is not the whole truth ... so read(buy?)...$THIS_MAGAZINE_INSTEAD". What this means that those schools or charities from Bill has also its "price tag" attached (and no, I havent build any school or free highway myself lateley either), as did the school and wonderfull highway systems in hitler's time, accordint to this magazine publicity. The problem is that we are just so calmly paying the "price tag" attached to this "charity" from Bill. The question is not if the money donated is good for the people that might receive it, but then again, how that money was collected in the first place.
There was a magazine around here whose publicity used to say "This man built more schools and made more free-highways than any other in his country recent history. His name was Adolph Hitler.
If any monopolist/dictator/assassin would just throw a couple of millon $ to charity, would you (or we as a society) just go and buy a magazine that portrays him as "person of the year" or his products? What would it take to do so? How much harm has this monopolist/whatever done in order to give those millons/billos/gazillons away? Is that a good price (for us as a society) for his charity?
:-). It is good to know that maybe U$S 1 or .02 out of the U$S 2M got to people in need somewhere. I just might wonder what would have happened if there was some real competition in the OS/Office product areas and we had to pay maybe not much as half of that to the SW companies (and not that much in antivirus and costs from non-availability of MS-products and/or similar stuff)... Could that money "saved" have been used to build a better future for people around here?
... Yeah, tought so...
I dont live in the US... AFAIK, I havent seen a single buck of his charity around here (and it is not like there's not much needed), but of course at the same time have seen M$ people collecting more than a couple of millon U$S a year for his programs on the places I work. So, enjoy our "bucks"
How many of you have seen M$ people collecting lots of money for "maybe not so stable/secure/dependable products", and seen a charity of almost a half, almost as much, or maybe more from M$ to someone in your vicinity?
He arguably robbed from the rich and gave to the poor...
Stood up to the Man
and gave him what for!
The Man of the Year
that all Slashdot hates,
The hero of Redmond
the man they call Gates!
More like the latter. Over price your product by 250%, give a 20% discount and you you can with luck be viewed as contributing something worthwhile. I bet the outflow of cash from those receiving the so-called charity dwarfs the cash back.
that he was married to Melinda and had all those billions to philanthropize with, otherwise Melinda would have received this award alone!
It's true no man is an island, but if you take a bunch of dead guys and tie 'em together, they make a good raft.
Your heart is in the right place, nobody thinks hunger is a good thing, but there is also the reality that well meaning people may create an even greater human tragedy in the future. If you feed a million people hungry people now and DO NOT address the underlying conditions that contributed to the hunger in the first place then you will just have several miilion hungry people in a generation. You have to address the root causes of hunger, not merely treat the symptom which is the hunger itself. The underlying problems are not transporting excess food, they are local political, economic, religious, and cultural. These are very hard to change. This problem is far more complex than you suggest. If it were as easy to fix as you suggest it would have been fixed long ago.
The only diff to this scenario is when giving the donation puts you in a lower tax bracket.
That doesn't make any difference either. Dropping into a lower tax bracket doesn't change the tax rate on all of your income, it just means you don't pay the higher rate on the bit of your income that you gave away.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
2) You have 100$. You give 20$ to your own charity.
Now you pay tax on the remaining 80% i.e. 24$.
The money you have left = 100 - 24 - 20 = 56$.
You pick up the 20$ from your charity = $76.
Profit!
(Sorry for all the "snip"s; but you never know what sort of people frequent Slashdot!)
...surely there has to be someone that, in the past 12 months, has afected the news more than he has.
It's been a slow year.
"If anything can go wrong, it will." - Murphy
in Access.
Person of the year... Wonder how much THAT costed...
"hey, could you pass me a paper towel? er.. I mean... DEPLOY ABSORBTION PANEL!"
1. "Man of the Year" is not awarded for doing good. It is awarded for influencing the world, for good or evil.
2. He was a delusional piss-poor amateur strategist. The general staff had some brilliant people, going on his own he got hundreds of thousands of his soldiers killed/captured for no good reason. Oddly, the world was better off due to his imcompetence. He was delusional partly due to a malfunctioning brain and partly due to sentiments like those you offer. Some successs in the amateur hour politics of post-WWI germany, where thuggery trumped intellectualism and competence, proves nothing.
Hopefully, at sometime time, the morons will realize that making charitable donations doesn't increase your money [...] The only diff to this scenario is when giving the donation puts you in a lower tax bracket.
The tax bracket scenario is also false. If you move into a higher tax bracket by a certain amount, you are taxed at a higher rate only on that amount. For example if you are right on the border between the 15% and 20% tax brackets, and you earn $1000 more, then you are taxed $200 on the $1000 (20%), but 15% on the rest of your income.
The only benefit donation deductions give you is that you look like you are giving more than you actually are. For example if Bill donates $100M it only costs him $50M, because he would have paid $50M in tax, had he not donated the $100M
Well done Bill, Melinda and His Boness. Good people with good intentions, doing what they perceive as necessary and possible with the resources they have.
However, I believe that we are witnessing the last era of great philanthropy. I say this because the awareness is growing that charity (aid, philanthropy, whatever) will never solve the problems which give rise to the horrors which motivate us to dig deep or volunteer or otherwise react. And while our reaction is limited to a charitable donation the horrors will continue and worsen - the environment is beginning to crumble while we ignore the warning signs.
I have lived in two developing countries for over 12 years and have worked in others (including Sierra Leone, Liberia, DRC (Congo) and Haiti) and have seen the efforts of international organisations such as UN; government aid agencies (USAID, DFID (UK), CIDA (Canada) etc); big NGOs (take your pick - Habitat for Humanity, Concern, Oxfam etc) right down to the the heroic "one man and his truck" micro-charities.
The bottom line for me? Unless we rewire the way the world works - trade, environment, consumption, international law; the world will spiral downwards to the point that even the huge donations of the likes of Bill & Melinda will be invisible and the combined might of US, UN, EU whoever, will be unable to alleviate the multiple crises faced.
The scariest thing is that I'm not convinced that the human race has the capacity to act globally.
Pessimistic - yes - I hope I'm wrong!
Backward%20compatibility%20is%20over-rated
Bill Gates gets lauded for his charity work, and what do we hear from Slashdot? "he actually doesn't give much, he stole his money anyway, it's all a plot to kill free software".
Listen to yourselves for a second...pull your fucking tinfoil hats off for a minute, and listen to yourselves....you sound like black-helicopter grassy-knol types...I don't care how much free software RMS has written, people dying of aids in africa don't give a flying fuck about GNU\anything but staying alive. Getting the latest version of GCC is great...if you're not wasting away in the Kalahari somewhere.
Would it be too much to ask for you people to get a little perspective???
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
They deserve this, their foundation has dumped TONS of money into our local schools, including significant funding for an Apple 1-to-1 initiative, and the funding for an entire school site for the next few years. No BS "you must use Windows computers" crap, not even a mention of it.
Bill Gates may be "Satan" and a monopolist, but he's also a genuinely giving, good man. Say what you will, he's bettering the world exponentially more than you or I ever will.
Ever try to blow up a pneumatic truck tire with a bicycle pump in a small town in Asia? No. Have you ever watched a honduran truck driver get out of his truck while still rollig uphill and throw a chock under a wheel just as the wheel stops before it starts rolling back because the truck has no brakes, etc.?
Bill Gates amassed a fortune through ruthless and merciless and eventually illegal practices. That he has chosen to give some back, and I tip my hat to him for that, anc for all the good he is now doing I liken to the mafia giving ill-gotten gains to charities and somehow being anointed for that.
Bill's corporation competed against other corporations, it harmed some of them, but that is how the market is supposed to work. That is in part how we have a darwinian process that determines supply and demand. MS' illegal practices were not obviously illegal at the time they were put into practice, the line is fuzzy and they were definitely treading in questionable territory but it was not a given that the government would see that it would warrant prosecution and it was not a given that a judge would rule against them. Comparing MS to the Mafia just destroys any credibility you may have, it exposes your politics / blind hatred. Linux destroys corporations, the traditional Unix vendrors. Apple can be even more heavy handed than MS. They merely don't get the bad press because they are not on top. Markets are like hamburgers, their creation is not a pretty picture.
I, too, clean the bathroom to get my legover once a week.
Stick Men
parent's a douchebag
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Out of curiousity, what exactly do the Gates donate?
The only headlines I remember about Gates donations deal with MS software and computers that have MS software preloaded, particularly to charities and schools. These donations are simply good marketing. They get people to feel good about MS, they get schools on the MS upgrade threadmill (first one is free, next one costs you), and they get students hooked on MS products so when they go out into the work-force they are MS evangelists. Most big companies, properietary or open source, to varying degrees, use the same strategy. For instance, Jobs wanted to donate OSX for the $100 laptops. Generosity aside, it would have been a huge marketing opportunity for Apple. In the end Red Hat was chosen.
If you subtract all the marketing related "charity" work, what how much have the Gateses actually donated compared to other billionaires in their league?
Homer spies a Time magazine with Ned Flanders on the cover and a caption "Man of the Century". Homer scoffs, "Must have been a pretty slow century."
http://www.snpp.com/episodes/3F07.html
Whats all this crap about Bill and Melinda Gates being great samaritans, and Rockefeller being a great donator?
Its all crap.
Billy G does it to promote his Microsoft products and to make politicians feel guilty about not buying M$ when he has "helped their country in the past"
Rockefeller, kept a personal army, and murdered any worker that refused to work, participated in a strike, or said anything else he didn't like. Henry Ford did the same, as did a hundred other "good samaritans"
So, NO, you check *your* facts.
(paraphrasing here) "If you had all that money, why not have an orbiting deathray sattelite, just in case?"
That neatly sums up why, despite all his charity, we should worry a little about Bill.
If Jesus wants me it knows where to find me.
> I see all this crap bashing time for hitler being man of the year. well he was man of the year before world war 2 and he did some real good things for germany, he more or less brought them out of massive debt after world war 1.
He got MotY in 1938, after his government had been introducing racist laws for five years.
Also, though not known in 1938, his policies ultimately brought a ruin on his country that couldn't have been imagined even in the gloomiest days of the interwar period.
> and he was a brilliant strategist, he just went a little off in the late 1930s and wanted to take over the world.
I'm not aware that he ever did anything that would qualify him as "good strategist", let alone "brilliant strategist". His country's military fortunes waned pretty much in proportion to how much he involved himself in the military decision-making process.
By the time of the Battle of Stalingrad he was sitting in Germany looking at maps and issuing orders for the placement of individual anti-tank guns, while the whole southern half of the front line was being routed.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
These are computers installed for educational purposes in a number of telecenters in the public libraries in Mexico for all the young students preparing for a global world.
n line.wsj.com/public/article/SB113193305149696140-4 42o71jo_IlBrLpyUeeOdsqDs7E_20061113.html%3Fmod%3Dt ff_main_tff_top+%24100+laptop+mit+apple&hl=en&clie nt=firefox-a
So these are special purpose computers that have a limited role. Preventing users from installing software seems like a pretty good idea. The BSD systems I used at the university had similar restrictions. How did we manage to get those CS degree under such oppression. More seriously:
Doesn't MIT engage in philosophically similar practices with the $100 laptop initiative. Apple was turned down for no other reason than to promote the donating community when Apple wanted to donate Mac OS X. The "tinkering" thing is a fraud, a cover story, basic computer literacy does not require tinkering. Wouldn't the children have been better off with a Unix based OS that also had the premier UI for their demographic. Apple designs for novices and school age kids. The education market has been a focus for decades.
"Steve Jobs, Apple Computer Inc.'s chief executive, offered to provide free copies of the company's operating system, OS X, for the machine, according to Seymour Papert, a professor emeritus at MIT who is one of the initiative's founders. "We declined because it's not open source," says Dr. Papert, noting the designers want an operating system that can be tinkered with. An Apple spokesman declined to comment."
http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:PAAMCASTOyMJ:o
I don't know whether Bono rightly should receive that same recognition for his work -- sure he's championed for the poor, but with what real solutions besides raising money? Thank you for donating your money Mr. Gates, but as pointed out by this commentary (from NYT a few days ago), it's not just about how much money you spend. It has to be done effectively -- being a good samaritan by just giving money blindly is not the best way to go:
December 15, 2005
Op-Ed Contributor
The Rock Star's Burden
By PAUL THEROUX
THERE are probably more annoying things than being hectored about African development by a wealthy Irish rock star in a cowboy hat, but I can't think of one at the moment. If Christmas, season of sob stories, has turned me into Scrooge, I recognize the Dickensian counterpart of Paul Hewson - who calls himself "Bono" - as Mrs. Jellyby in "Bleak House." Harping incessantly on her adopted village of Borrioboola-Gha "on the left bank of the River Niger," Mrs. Jellyby tries to save the Africans by financing them in coffee growing and encouraging schemes "to turn pianoforte legs and establish an export trade," all the while badgering people for money.
It seems to have been Africa's fate to become a theater of empty talk and public gestures. But the impression that Africa is fatally troubled and can be saved only by outside help - not to mention celebrities and charity concerts - is a destructive and misleading conceit. Those of us who committed ourselves to being Peace Corps teachers in rural Malawi more than 40 years ago are dismayed by what we see on our return visits and by all the news that has been reported recently from that unlucky, drought-stricken country. But we are more appalled by most of the proposed solutions.
I am not speaking of humanitarian aid, disaster relief, AIDS education or affordable drugs. Nor am I speaking of small-scale, closely watched efforts like the Malawi Children's Village. I am speaking of the "more money" platform: the notion that what Africa needs is more prestige projects, volunteer labor and debt relief. We should know better by now. I would not send private money to a charity, or foreign aid to a government, unless every dollar was accounted for - and this never happens. Dumping more money in the same old way is not only wasteful, but stupid and harmful; it is also ignoring some obvious points.
If Malawi is worse educated, more plagued by illness and bad services, poorer than it was when I lived and worked there in the early 60's, it is not for lack of outside help or donor money. Malawi has been the beneficiary of many thousands of foreign teachers, doctors and nurses, and large amounts of financial aid, and yet it has declined from a country with promise to a failed state.
In the early and mid-1960's, we believed that Malawi would soon be self-sufficient in schoolteachers. And it would have been, except that rather than sending a limited wave of volunteers to train local instructors, for decades we kept on sending Peace Corps teachers. Malawians, who avoided teaching because the pay and status were low, came to depend on the American volunteers to teach in bush schools, while educated Malawians emigrated. When Malawi's university was established, more foreign teachers were welcomed, few of them replaced by Malawians, for political reasons. Medical educators also arrived from elsewhere. Malawi began graduating nurses, but the nurses were lured away to Britain and Australia and the United States, which meant more foreign nurses were needed in Malawi.
When Malawi's minister of education was accused of stealing millions of dollars from the education budget in 2000, and the Zambian president was charged with stealing from the treasury, and Nigeria squandered its oil wealth, what happened? The simplifiers of Africa's problems kept calling for debt relief and more aid. I got a dusty reception lecturing at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation when I pointed out the successes of responsible policies
I believe we should be evaluated not by how much we donate, but by what we have left after the donation. Then, I could be considered as a _big_ donator!
Don't forget to take into account the actual effect of the donation.
It is very common that only the size of donation is regarded, sometimes in relative terms, and sometimes absolute. But there is no guarantee a big sum of money will do _any_ good. Just as there is no guarantee that walking into a store and leaving a pile of money on the floor will result in something worthwhile being delivered to your home.
In fact, if you can't be bothered to carefully follow up on how that money is used, you shouldn't donate it all. In many cases it does more harm than good. You need to choose between charities as ruthlessy as you would in buisness.
Gates has done this very well, at least in Africa. And he deserves this award a great deal more than Bono, whose contribution is to resist the very change which is statistically known to reduce poverty; the freeing of markets.
I don't like the subtitle "the rocker and the geek".
/me is back to holding his icepack on his head because he bumped his head against something
If bill gates is a geek i will personaly burn my Geek t-shirt.
But
by reading all the comment on this story. slashdotters had sink a new low.
you got people comparing Gates to Hitler. WOW! someone who give money away vs someone who kill million and comment like that got moded up. LOL. what a new low for opensource tards. enjoy your commies OSS.
Most mayors would not have shown the leadership that Giuliani did. See New Orleans, use the mayor or governer as examples. Not bad people, but simply not up to the task and not having the leadership skills needed to cope. You and I would probably not done much better.
Sorry, Katrina is in a whole other order of magnitude from 9/11. We're talking a few buildings knocked down vs. widespread destruction across an entire city and ensuing unlivability and anarchy.
Also, with 9/11, federal aid was instantaneous.
9/11 was a tragedy, but it has been so played-up to incite "patriotism" that many have lost perspective on what a true disaster is.
Didn't Lex Luthor get all sorts of humanitarian awards too?
Let's see... rich guy, gives money to charities, does humanitarian things, does some evil on the side...
From this link:
- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.
Bill Gates' company is propped up by government support of IP laws and a government granted corporate charter, and a government unwillingness to enforce antitrust law. So, this is kinda close to being taxed, then having some random authority decide what to do with your money. Especially since, in order to communicate with the government in many places, you have to send in Word documents and other things that require you buy things from Microsoft.
Bill Gates' money came from all of us. And now he's choosing to spend some of it on various charities. He seems to be doing a better job, generally, of selecting them than most of our public officials do, but that's what's going on here. Philanthropy with ill-gotten gains is not philanthropy at all.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
Americans, and of course there are always exceptions, tend to have something against taxes. I sometimes feel that a significant portion of US citizens would prefer living in anarchy if it meant they would not have to pay taxes. Rather no police, no roads then a single cent to the state. As for taxes that go to benefit someone else? COMMUNISM.
As a person in holland wich at the moment is struggling with partly going the american way and partly the swedish way I can see arguments on both sides. Americans will claim that their low social security improves employement rates hinting at their low unemployment figures. The swedes on the other hand point at their low poverty levels and figure it is worth it.
A good article I read by the dutch institution that handles benefits relating to disability suggested this: That any social security system survives or dies on wether the middle class thinks it is to their benefit or not. If the middle classes think that paying a chunk of their income to social security makes their world better (directly because they themselves might one day need it or indirectly because low poverty means a better live for all) then they are prepared to do so. Even if there are people who openly choose not to work. In sweden it is believed that their social security costs the workers a lot of spendable income BUT makes up for it by making their country a nicer place to live in. Sweden is a democracy and that is how they choose to live.
America is perhaps the other extreme. Give an american the choice between a low tax rate and childeren of poor families starving and well... Of course they wouldn't do that. Americans ain't heartless but when a politician stands up and says that goverment is wasting taxes and he is going to cut them most of the voters seem not to question were the tax cuts come from. America is a democracy and that is how they choose to live.
To those who argue that low taxes encourage employment I ask this, explain outsourcing being considered such a problem? America got super low taxes and still it is not enough. While Nokia on the other hand seems not to want to leave sweden were it easily could, just a thought
So what has all this got to do with Bill Gates? Well I have in the past read news stories that seem to suggest that Bill Gates and his company while making record sums of money are not exactly at the top of paying taxes on those incomes. Some nasty commies even suggest that Microsoft makes Enron and Worldcom look like complete amateurs or even that MS showed Worldcom execs the way in shunting money round and round until you can make billions in profit and yet have to pay no taxes. It is not unusual, ask that guy behind spiderman about how much money he got from his percentage of the profits deal.
Now some damned red communists might suggest that if MS behaved more like a responsible company then there might be less need for say schools to be donated money as they could simply buy new computers from taxes.
Of course that would allow schools to make their own decissions as to wich software to buy. Mmmm, so I am paranoid but I think I see a pattern here.
I am nasty, selfserving and paranoid and I do not believe in good samaritans. Mother Theresa? Good? Eheh, she was a devout christian, was she doing good for goodness sake OR was she buying a ticket into heaven? Yeah I know. Suspicious bastard ain't I. Yet everyone accepts that kids behave "good" at the end of the year just to make sure they get a fat loot from "santa".
But now apply this to Bill Gates. He could simply pay taxes normally without shunting his and his companies income through so many loopholes that the state comes out owning him money. If he paid his full taxes the state could then grant the money to schools and other projects. Leaving those projects free to spend the money in the best way according to the voters wishes. OR he can limit the taxes he spends by exploiting every loophole, amass HUGE wealth and then donate money to those projects that do
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Well, actions don't become right just because they could be worse. And actually, I think Microsoft has pretty much done everything it could get away with, whenever it stood to gain from it, regardless of the social consequences.
Pol Pot is named Humanitarian of the Modern Era Just kidding fan boys
Bill Gates-Time's person of year
Charlie Sheen, Two and a Half Men, nominated for best actor in a comedy-Golden Globes
Remember, Yassur Arafat won a Nobel peace prize.
Don't put much stock in these awards, their merits are a sham.
Game: Player 'Donald J Trump' now has AI skill level 'experimental'.
If contribution is greater than destruction, then...
If destruction is greater than contribution, then...
That would look better in C
But, I don't know C, so...
IBM had more to do with Gates becoming a success than illegal practices. He may have been ethically challenged but that is not criminal. In the real world the stakes are high and you're playing for keeps. Gates had extraordinary drive and intelligence to see where the world was going and the more critical part (it's easy to be Dvorak and put 100 guesses about 2020 out there) he actually took advantage of the opportunities available.
... rant reminded me of Howard Dean (the democrats are fucked, to my chagrin).
Having started 3 businesses on my own (3rd time is a charm) it is much easier to criticize someone that has succeeded than to go out and be successful yourself.
I admire Bill Gates for many things. I disagree with some of his methods but who's to say in the grand scheme of things he is a "bad" person? There are few visionary leaders in this world. Bill Gates is definately one of them. That being said WTF is up with Balmer, is this guy a nutjob or what? That developers
Guiliani made some good speeches, made people feel better, and did a respectable job coordinating the response in the aftermath of the attacks. And while he'll have a nice little entry in the history of NYC, he certainally has not had a national, much less international impact.
The actions of Osama Bin Laddin, on the other hand, will have a worldwide impact for decades at least, maybe even centuries. Just look at the lasting effect Gavrilo Princip has had on the world, and he killed just one person. Claiming that Guiliani has had a beigger impact than Osama is beyond nieve, to put it nicely.
I have no idea why people think Bin Laden wanted a war. He didn't. He wanted a blow so hard that we would be afraid of war. He wanted capitulation and the American people to rise up and tell the government to get us out of Saudi Arabia and the middle east, and in particular, to quit helping Israel. He has stated as much, many times, so this isn't exactly guesswork.
Of course he wants us out, what you are missing is how he planned to go from Point A to Point B. So yes, he wanted us to launch a war in the Middle East, because we would be drawn into a quagmire and weakened militarily, politically, and at home. And that is exactly what has happened.
First of all, Gates throws in about 50% of his net worth, not 10%.
The most common interpretation of tithing in the Mosaic law refers to ten percent of your gross income, not your net worth. In this case, it would be ten percent of the salary and dividends that Mr. Gates collects from Microsoft Corporation.
I blogged about this. Seems we're comparing the goodness of a person to how much $$$ they're willing throw at the right people.
That being said, go see the movie "The Insider", about the guy who ratted out that cigarette manufacturers knew about the health risks of smoking and lied about it for decades. Think about companies supporting dictators, intimidating people, poisoning people, ruining people... Microsoft is not my favorite company, but they do play by some rules. And the Gates' interest in changing the world through there fortune may be part arrogance and hubris, but they seem to genuinely want to make a difference.
So, my hat's off to the Gates', keep up the good work, and I'm still not buying anything from Microsoft! And to the non-nerd world, I say - even our bullies and tyrants are better than yours.
It's not wasting time, I'm educating myself.
Don't be a jerk...Its lot more than a tinuy fraction...BTW How much did Linus Torvalds or Mozilla foundation gave to poor people...Zero..?
If you open source folks are not capable to beat Microsoft products (not the company, but just the products) atleast don't hate the good deeds of them.
But anyway, you bring up an interesting point. If most of that money going to MSFT, and then into Bill's pocket, was from businesses and otherwise would have gone into the pocket of that business's CEO, then it would be better to give directly to the public good. But of course that depends on Bill doing the right thing.
I didn't yet see the Walmart (puke, I feel so dirty after typing that word) high cost of low living movie, they took it out of our theater before we got the chance to go. But for your analogy to work, you should compare the Waltons to Bill Gates, not to WMT directly. You could compare corporate charity of WMT vs MSFT, though. The thing is, as much as I can't stand MSFT, they at least take care of their employees far better than WMT.
I used to despise MSFT back in the day. I still do, but now I despise companies like WMT far more. MSFT basically drives or out-markets only software companies out of business, while WMT does that to companies in all areas of the consumer product arena. (Note, I cannot stomach writing these company names out, so I refer to their stock ticker instead, which seems to sum up what they're all about.)
make world, not war
Take a another look at Antitrust laws, it's a Federal pound me in the ass felony.
One of the few saving graces of the great robber barons is that in their latter years they often feel a need to give something back to the world that they have so ruthlessly exploited.
While it is hard to find much good to say about Gates's business tactics or his impact on the computer industry, he has approached philanthropy with care and consideration, targeting unmet needs where his investment can do the most to relieve human suffering.
Ya know, Microsoft was widely favored to win a major deal for a chunk of AOL when TimeWarner was deciding who to make "man of the year"...
I'm surprised none of you slashdotters caught that coinkydink.
Even though Billy lost, he at least has this PR plum as a consolation prize.
awesome. you are rad.
If its any consolation so were FDR, Pope John Paul, Martin Luther King Jr, and Ghandi but still... It makes you kind of wonder ;)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man_of_the_Year
Actually Stalin got it twice. Once in 1939 and again in 1942.
Other notables include Kruschev and Ayatollah Khomeini.
You can actually browse Time Inc's mag covers here.
"I am the king of the Romans, and am superior to rules of grammar!"
-Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor (1368-1437)
It's from TheOnion. You do know that the article's not real, right? If you did, and I missed your sarcasm, I apologize. It is a joke newspaper. They make spoof stories. It is not real.
That sound like a figure that smells just as unpleasant and pulled from a similar orifice as some of the RIAA's losses.
Web Developers: Celebrate to our roots! Animated Gifs and Tiled Backgrounds, dont let our history die!
Like many /.ers, over the years I developed a strong dislike, even hatred of companies like MS, AOL, SCO, and others, but in the case of MS, I have realized something. Yes, the company is shamelessly beholden to bad marketing and legal practices instead of producing reasonably priced quality products (few are, but not most) and the alternatives are better but usually only implemented by people who would rather not shell out money just to avoid thinking. But I now see this as a tax on people not willing to think a bout their actions. Just like the lottery is a tax on people bad at math, MS (and some other companies) products are a tax on people bad with computers. What makes this better is that this money isn't being completely wasted - it, because of Mr. Gates (who isn't even close to the most "evil" parts of MS like marketing, legal, and Steve Ballmer) who give the money to charity. He's like a rich Robin Hood who tricks the rich into giving him the money instead of stealing it, then gives it away. Definetly one of the best models for a billionare, whatever the company does.
The 'Net is a waste of time, and that's exactly what's right about it. - William Gibson
Um I do believe you meant, 'Thats just shiny'.
Though I personally prefer 'Frelling drad!'.
Of all the things this man has, money is the least valuable to him. He has it in such abundance, it is literally worthless to him. Whilst people can benefit enormously from his 'generosity' his actions have little to do with real giving, which has to do with sacrifice and not the size of the gift that you give.
If he were to give up his market share of the desktop world-wide, to foster the diversity of systems and the companies that service them, now, that would be giving away something which is worth more than money to him, and would be actually generous. If he were to relinquish control over all of his patents so that everyone everywhere could impliment ideas without having to pay him money that he does not need...that would be truely>/i> philanthropic.
Need I go on? I think not. This culture worships wealth, and anyone that gives it away is made into a saint, no matter what that person does or did to attain wealth. Simply giving away money is not enough to make you a great philanthropist.
Now if you would only put more into better QA for the stuff you sell to the military and medical fields. Rushing your product to these markets without very extensive QA is putting lives needlessly at risk for profit. I can not forgive that, no matter what you are giving to charity at the same time.
Ruthlessly crushing the competition is horribly phychotic and antisocial, but not evil. Creating a shoddy product for gamers and home PC users is terribly annoying, but not evil. Putting lives at risk by selling known faulty OSes to the military and medical fields is just evil.
Until Microsoft changes that, I can't justify giving them a single penny.
Even the robber barons of the early 20th century were quite charitable. Look at Carnegie. I think it's a guilt thing. Besides, it's easy to be charitable when you've robbed, bullied and stolen more money than anyone in history. I'm not impressed.
Nitewing '98
Everything works...in theory.
Perhaos because they have the ambition, patience, imagination and resources to be effective.
feeding the third world should be of greater importance
"The most famous health campaign..started with Rockefeller money was the drive, begun in 1907, to rid the rural American South of hookworm.
Called "the germ of laziness" because it caused anemia and made victims lethargic and dull-witted, hookworm afflicted up to a third of Southerners. "A lot of people would say, 'you've got to reduce poverty to get rid of hookworm.' But the Rockefellers said, 'You don't need a 20-year intervention. You can use shoes." The Rich, Sometimes, Are the Best Medicine
Also, charitable deductions are limited to 50% of Adjusted Gross Income, and an effort to reduce his tax burden by claiming too many deductions would likely trigger the alternative minimum tax.
Wow. I can procrastinate on slashdot and study for my tax exam.
Melinda is the one with the big heart.
Not to mention ten or more years ago most of us would be happily running 3.1 using dos regularly to play homemade games making jokes about how Mac is doing everything in their power to run their own company into the ground and excited to get our new DOS disks (With Hologram) to play the new kings quest. With no qualms whatsoever to give Microsoft more of our money because they were doing exciting things. And really, back then it could have gone one of two ways, The monopoly could have fallen on apple, who would have then used their market position to sue any competitor who tried to manufacture computers with stolen apple software on it (because permission would not be forthcoming), prohibited or crippled third party computers, continue to block support for non apple products, and fill their systems with as much proprietary hardware as possible, all because they are a "Hardware company" So instead of one monopolized market, we would have two. Want to blame anyone for Microsoft's dominance, blame apple and blame yourself. Because I'm pretty sure most of you could relate to that first paragraph. (yes Mr obligatory "I was using unix before you were born" we understand you were cool before it was "in", please be quiet)
Web Developers: Celebrate to our roots! Animated Gifs and Tiled Backgrounds, dont let our history die!
This award was once given to the person who most affected the news in a given year. Since at least 2001, this has certainly not been the case.
This is not an anti-Gates tirade. It's common sense. Yes, the man does some great things with his money, for which he should rightly be commended. But exactly how has the affected the news in 2005? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?
My nomination: Cindy Sheehan.
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!
I do agree but I want to embellish it with what I think it's about (no guarantee that this is the "correct" view, think and decide for yourselves).
Does it mean that rich people shouldn't donate? No
Does it mean we shouldn't encourage rich people to donate? No
Does it mean that we shouldn't be happy when rich people donate? No
What it means is that we shouldn't scoff at those who donate the little they have just because they're poor and can't give "much" dollar-for-dollar.
What it means is that we should applaud those people who have little but still give as much as they can, some of them even give everything they have.
I'm sure there are some rich persons who have given away everything too but even then it is how much they give the next day when they're poor which will really be comparable to the "widow".
What it means is that we shouldn't be full of pride for what we do, that we gave so-and-so much, because how many people notice those "widows" giving everything they've got? They never make any fuss over it themselves.
So it is a teaching about sacrifice and humility.
But we should also applaud something which is more widespread among the rich in the US than anywhere else (it's slowly catching on in Europe -- at least in Norway -- and hopefully around the world (I'm hearing about good efforts from Jackie Chan)): philantrophy.
I'd like to congratulate Bill, Melinda & Bono because they are trying. No, they will never reach the level of the poor widow in the temple (few of any of us do, at least I don't) but they are far far less hypocrites than many rich people (and average people) who do even less than them percentage-wise.
As for Time and their opinions I couldn't care less, the common journalists are among the biggest (if not the biggest) hypocrites in any way you can find anywhere, and the whole idea of nominating a person(s) of the year is to increase profit (which is not bad in itself unless it becomes the sole aim of the journalism and I dare say that it is in this case).
Last but not least let's not forget all the things lots of people do/give that doesn't involve money at all be it various volunteer work, open source or even donating spare CPU cycles: it all counts.
this comment is provided "as is" and without any express or implied legibility or congruity [...]
Please forward this email to everybody in your email address book, blah blah blah....
It's not Apple Computer, Sun Microsystems, or Novell that I feel sorry for when I decry Microsoft's practices.
I pity the consumers who have so little choice in the market as a result of Microsoft's scorched-earth business practices. The millions of people who feel its perfectly normal to have to run antivirus and antispyware software twice a week. Who are "locked in" to proprietary formats. Who are, as a result of questionable practices, left with almost no say in who gets their software dollars.
It is possible to do right by your shareholders and customers at the same time.
The US free market: two halves of a government-granted duopoly are free to set the market price.
This should prove... once and for all, to the teeming masses of Slashdot kids, that people, by and large, DO NOT hate Microsoft and Bill Gates.
I don't think that surprises anybody. In fact, there are lots of historical figures that were perceived positively by their contemporaries and later turned out to be great villains. Besides, you're confusing cause and effect. Stories like the Times story are PR tools to create images; they don't necessarily reflect public opinion.
As for Gates, I suspect in the long run, history will judge him for what he is: a monopolist who has cheated the public out of hundreds of billions of dollars, stolen intellectual property wherever he could, and who has held back progress by decades. Donating a small fraction of his earnings for his pet projects and PR stunts doesn't change any of that.
One question....
So what's your point? It's a gift, they can do what they want with the gift.
If I send you a coffee maker that only accepts those pod things (look it up) are you going to go on a rampage about how it doesn't take regular coffee?
Here are your choices:
1. Throw it away.
2. Modify it yourself and lose support.
3. Return it.
4. Use it.
That was the best reply EVER!
Of course this may not work out so well in the long run. I don't know and neither does anybody else, feel free to speculate. Some would even argue that the existence of a monopoly in the operating systems industry is good for the world. So long as all that good ends up in America, I'm happy.
That's the dirty truth.
He is more of a humanitarian than most of us are, apparently. He gives a friggin ton of money to help ALOT of people, and i'm sorry but the socialist argument that he isn't giving enough doesn't wash here. He is generous and you can't argue that. I'm not a huge fan of the monopoly and strongarm tactics either but ya can't argue with that. (though i'm sure alot of you will anyway- heh)
Mother Theresa said "I ask you one thing: do not tire of giving, but do not give your leftovers. Give until it hurts, until you feel the pain."
Wow. I think it is a PR attempt mostly, and judging by the fact my parent comment was modded down, the PR works. Slashdotters are completely taken in by a small amount of charity, and now Bill Gates is a great guy. Very weak minded, in my opinion.
Arguably it should be Grand Ayatollah Sistani of Iraq for demanding free elections at a time when the Americans were planning to impose their "Proconsulate" indefinitely.
We KNOW the Gates Foundation is a stock-laundering and corporate control scam, just like most of the rich "philanthropies" that exist. He stores billions there, hands out one or two percent of it (which actually comes from the investments that he uses to influence other companies he has an interest in.)
Bono I can understand - he's been using his rock fame to push charitable causes for years. My favorite band, the Corrs, just got MBEs (Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) for their musical contributions and charity work, some of which was done in conjunction with Bono and U2. Being Irish and thus a bit at odds with England, it was a surprise to them, since it puts them in a class with the Beatles, the Bee Gees and Bob Marley, among others. They've also sold a million albums in Ireland specifically, which only U2 has done before. Andrea and Bono are particularly close friends (I suspect Bono has the hots for her, despite being married for twenty years.)
And then while posing for pictures with the medals, Caroline had to go and drop hers on the sidewalk, an embarassing but Irish moment. Also, when asked about the benefits of receiving the medals, Andrea could only say it would "go with the new military look" and Jim said now they could get married in St. Paul's Cathedral - whereupon Sharon reminded him that he'd have to change his religion first (they're Catholic and the church is Anglican.)
But they got the awards for doing charity concerts for Children in Need, the Special Olympics, the hospital at which their mother died, and Nelson Mandela's AIDS foundation (the Corrs appeared at the 46664 event in South Africa, and Sharon appeared at the Arctic one - Mandela is a fan.) While all this is obviously valuable as PR for a band, they've put their efforts behind less visible causes such as opposing nuclear power plants in Ireland, providing music instruction for Irish schools, and building houses for townships in South Africa (Sharon's husband, a Belfast lawyer, actually works as a laborer for several weeks each year in South Africa as part of the Niall Mellon Township Challenge which sends hundreds of Irish contractors and laborers to South Africa to build houses.)
I personally am not a charitable person at all. But I can respect Bono and the Corrs for acting on their principles, mostly because I believe they actually have them.
Gates is another matter entirely.
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
You should get a copy of Negativland's book "The Letter U and the Numeral 2". If you have one already, reread it.
The lawsuit is on page 4.
The plantiff is Island records, the defendants are SST and Negativland (Hosler, et al). Neither the band U2 nor the members are listed on the lawsuit.
Furthermore, the lawsuit is primarily about Negativland's use of the enormous letters "U2" on the cover of the EP. It does mention the lyrics and samples down lower. The songs were actually rereleased later (much later) with a non-infringing cover.
Additionally, if you continue to read the book or other info on the case, you realize the main problem isn't Island or U2. The main problem was that when the lawsuit rolled in SST immediately rolled over, stopped distribution of the EP, paid off Island and then BILLED BACK Negativland for the payoff (while simultaneously depriving them of income!).
If you continued to investigate, you'd find that Negativland was wrapped up on court for years over this. Not against Island, against SST. SST didn't rack up huge bills defending themselves against Island, they settled immediately. They did rack up huge bills fighting Negativland in a contractual dispute.
How about if you read page 32, where Chris Blackwell of Island Records says in a letter to Negativland "I have been getting a huge amount of hastle (sp) from the members of U2, not to press for payment."
Hosler could probably explain it better than I (he's perhaps even on here), but the main villain here is SST, not U2. Island probably comes in 2nd place.
Note that a later part of the book talks more about "audio collage" and sampling, etc. That's where the stuff on "No Copyright" is. And there are some good arguments here, in fact, so good that (IMHO) the recent Creative Commons stuff is a spiritual descendant of this work.
I like Negativland, I have all of their SST stuff and some of their Seeland stuff. But, I do know they are very subversive and not stupid. When the Tower records standup picture of the EP bin on page 3 of the book says "buy it before they get sued", I think it's probably that Negativland understood they would get C&D'd over this record and likely sued by Island too. What they didn't understand was that SST would roll over on them and leave them with the bill (illegally it turns out).
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
I only have to say who cares!
Thank you so much - I'm saving this into my slashdot.txt and am posting it any and every time ignoramuses vomit out the giving-money-to-charity-is-selfish-lol line for the umpteenth time.
I've said several times in slashdot that the Gates should be considered for a Nobel Peace Prize for the impact of their charity work and example to others.
How bad does your band have to degrade themselves to, before your contributions as a humanitarian are outrivaled by the crapticity of your music.
Bill Gates and Bill Clinton were in a good discussion earlier this year at a Global Health summit. I encourage you to check it out. Video of Clinton and Gates' talk is about 1/2 way down, nov. 2 at 4:00pm.
Two comments:
Tax brackets are graduated. A charitable deduction may reduce your marginal tax bracket but won't lower the tax bracket on the income after the deduction. You're right with respect to gates being far into the maximum brackets. His cap gains on MS stock sales is still 15% however. (Thats another issue).
There's a bill pending which would allow MS or any other company to donate merchandise (inventory) to charity and write off the full market value even though their cost could be much less -e.g. copies of windows.
It's not how much you give away that shows how generous you are, neither the actual amount nor as a percentage. It's how much you decide to keep. Bill Gates has decided to keep enough money to remain the richest man in the world.
I'll probably be modded down for this...
I'm far more impressed with a kid that spends his free time raising money for charity than a multibillionaire that gives away excess cash. He should give back because he's taken so much. He only started after some one pointed out what a cheapskate he was. It's still about ego, he's out to prove them wrong. Where's the nobility in that?
That comment by me was actually quite unfair to Bill.
I'd say "YHBT YHL HAND", but the grandparent wasn't even a troll. Get a sense of humor... PLEASE.
MS then included drive compression called "DoubleSpace" in the beta versions of MS-DOS 6.0 which by their own admission infringed Stac's patents. Even after admitting this, though, they stalled as long as they could on providing a beta version of DOS 6.0 to Stac for its inspection (which, when it did happen, confirmed to Stac that DOS 6.0 infringed). Microsoft again tried to strongarm Stac into granting that royalty-free license. During this time they were even issuing promotional materials that said they would grant a royalty-free license for DoubleSpace to OEMs (the algorithm they stole from Stac). Eventually MS wound up paying Stac $120 million and releasing DOS 6.21, the purpose of which was solely to remove DoubleSpace from DOS 6.2 (the current version at that time). MS-DOS 6.22 was released shortly thereafter to replace it with non-infringing disk compression.
Even back at the beginning, Microsoft was either knowingly or recklessly committing wholesale theft of others' code. MS-DOS 1.0 could be made to generate a Digital Research copyright notice.
All of which is by way of saying, don't tell me Microsoft is ruthless but not criminal. They very much are criminal -- their entire empire originated in a key act of copyright infringement which was never really redressed (probably because the courts were afraid to assess a fine of the full retail price of CP/M plus statutory damages for every copy of MS-DOS ever sold).
-- Old Man Kensey
(didn't notice the damned "HTML formatted" option was on)
./ doesn't "matter" much as the slogan claims. I haven't RTFA, I'm here because I'm bored, how about you? Who gives a damn about Time anyway? Thanks for an enjoyable argument.
Like many others on Slashdot and elsewhere, I love early U2 but I think most of their recent stuff is shit. If nothing else, The Joshua Tree is a classic. What's so "low" about that opinion? Because it's not cool to like U2 at the moment? Because popular opinion doesn't take into account that they were making music long before "uno, dos, tres, catorce" and the dreaded iPod commercials?
But this is all a red herring.
You're a troll for sidetracking the issue to U2's music and Bono's opinion of it; the matter at hand is Africa and what he has or hasn't done for the continent's plight.
You are also misguided on this point, I think. Bono founded and helps fund the Debt, AIDS, Trade, Africa organization, and when he talks about it, the media pays attention to him. People who consume media, which is basically everyone in developed countries, must then pay some sort of attention to him, positive or negative; even if they disagree with Bono on the precise nature of and solutions for Africa's problems, they must acknowledge that the problems exist. Other such visible reminders, for people in the first world, are relatively few. Furthermore Bono has discussed these issues with Bush, Blair, and Christian leaders, and perhaps made some progress on AIDS funding at least. Though I'm not sure whether Bono spoke to him exactly, I know Billy Graham has become a sort of anti-AIDS crusader of late.
Those who accuse him of collaborating with the enemy (and I certainly agree that all of the above are The Enemy) are missing the point: these are the people in power, and action is better than inaction. I think it's particularly savvy of him to talk to Christians. Surely history was in the back of his mind here: many of the progressive social movements around the turn of the 20th century were inspired by applying Christ's message of tolerance and charity (which the WASPs admittedly distort whenever they can) to modern social issues.
So I don't think your post is relevant, nor do I think you have a real case about the Africa issue.
Anyway, I don't consider "troll" an insult; trolls enliven Slashdot and because of the moderation system don't generally cause much trouble. Even then,
The same person the Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act is named after? Screw him!
People become narrow minded when it comes to hate. Once you find a reason to not like someone you find faults in them no matter what. Bill Gates donates so much $$ that we can't even imagine having it, not only that, he also does it quietly. So all you people who think the world ends outside the 4 corners of their monitor, WAKE UP. I personally don't like windows, linux or mac os. (they all frustrate me). If I could I would make my own os (and not force it on people).
Doesn't the "Person of the Year" have to be a human?
It doesn't matter how much money he gives away, he still has billions of ill-gotten dollars. If he has $50 billion and he gives away $35 billion, he's still got $15 billion in spare cash, and that $15 billion was gained at the expense of the software industry.
Microsoft's destruction of the PC software industry is well documented. They have repeatedly destroyed tech startups and stolen their technology. Companies that try to compete will find Microsoft announces vapourware to cut sales, then Microsoft will release competing software for "free" (actually subsidised by Microsoft's other businesses) to cut the financial legs out from the competitor. Microsoft has repeatedly modified their OS for no purpose other than to cause problems for competitors' software (and although I've read the revisionist historians claims to the contrary, I have done the reverse assembly myself). Microsoft has been convicted of illegal activity on multiple occasions - including patent abuse, antitrust violations, and threats against OEMs and hardware manufacturers.
What was particularly disgusting was the blatant and unashamed theft of the Macintosh OS - even to the extent of having a Microsoft employee work with the Mac team to "write applications" when that same developer would later become the architect for Windows. I'm not a supporter of the myth that the Mac was revolutionary - I know it was an incremental improvement on dozens of research designs and commercial products that existed in that era - nor do I support the myth that Apple "stole" the GUI from Xerox, but without a doubt I know that Microsoft stole the GUI from Apple. Microsoft didn't even attempt to obscure the theft; they maintained similar function names and internal data structures throughout Windows!
Even ignoring the legal and technical evils that Microsoft has used to destroy competition you need look no further than their original big-win with MS-DOS. They were handed a golden goose by IBM; supply an OS and you will be richer beyond your wildest dreams. Rather than write it in-house they bought the OS for a mere $50,000 however the estimated value of that single sale was retrospectively worth billions. Now although that was legal it was without a doubt unethical to have gypped the original author without so much as a per-sale royalty. Perhaps in a world without ethics that was shrewd business but in my world it was opportunism at its most vile and anybody who defends such behaviour is vile as well.
And at the helm of this evil monstrosity of a company, an entity that has done more to harm and hinder the software industry than any other company except perhaps for IBM, is the despicable Bill Gates. The son of a wealthy man who (ab)used his family's influence to accumulate wealth beyond what any single person is worth. A person who moreso than any other single person has held back the PC software industry so as to expand his own power. Now he donates a fraction of his wealth - still leaving billions for his own personal gratification - and he expects forgiveness? Not a chance. Mr Gates can't buy repentance.
Bill Gates has got to great lenghts (immoral and illegal) to dominate the computer industry.
The company he started and for which he is moral leader is constantly under investigation in the US, Europe, Japan, South Korea and many other places for monopolic practices of all kinds.
But this same individual gives billions to worhty causes.
Do the ends justify the means? I would say no.
It reminds me of the Colombian drug dealers like Pablo Escobar and others. They use their ill gotten profits to improve life on their towns, they become benefactors of the poor, the church and the exploited and are widely admired and respected.
Illegal and immoral commercial practices are not comparable in gravity to drug dealing certainly, but it leaves a sour taste in the mouth that such a person is honoured so widly without seriously questioning why there is so much anthipathy about him and his company.
I think it is sad that we need this kind of megalomaniacs to do good deeds since goverments all around the world continue to ignore their responsibilites towards their people.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
How much did it cost him to get on top of the list?
The only 'list' that prick should be on is the back of a milkcarton for being abducted. Or the FBI wanted pages at the postoffice for being a crook.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
"The glory of great men should always be measured by the means they have used to acquire it."
-Francois de La Rochefoucauld
They infringed on some IP, paid $120 million for it, and had to remove it from DOS. Looks like the system is working.
...giving away a billion of your $50 billion which you will never miss or giving away your lifes work like people such as Linus Torvalds and Richard Stallman have done?
It is not yet clear to me who has really helped society more (only time will tell) but I know who has made the greater personal sacrifices worthy of my admiration.
Some of what you're saying is ok with me, but not all of it. Before Bill Gates, IBM was *EVIL*. Now they are GOOD, giving millions to Open Source. Now some other body (ahem, Google, ahem) is giving Microsoft a run for their money, so MS will be forced towards more righteous practices (or bankruptcy).
It's critical to separate the baby from the bathwater, and talking about Microsoft is no different. Some of their practices and policies are evil. That's the bathwater. The rest is still the company that curbed IBM and delivered computer GUI to the planet. I certainly don't like the bathwater, but I kinda like the fact that a company is connecting people, don't you?
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
Because he's fucked up the country so badly there's no where to go from here but up and everyone else is a hero in comparison.
... the whole action against poverty thing, or whatever it was called. Myself, I think that Time's decisions have been very dubious at times (believe it or not, Osama Bin Laden probably had a bigger impact on the world in 2001, than the mayor of New York, whose name I know but can't spell so...) - however, I see nothing wrong with this decision. I certainly don't like Microsoft's throttlehold on the industry, especially in terms of internet browsers (is there any current internet browser that isn't actually worse than IE?) - but that doesn't change the fact that Bill Gates is a philanthropist. The business ethics of his company (rather deplorable) make no impact on the man, I'm not even sure if ol' Billy does anything but cash his paycheck every once in a while, really.
"(although there is the question of how much of that is Bill and howmuch is his wife, although it should be noted that his mother was a philanderist)."
Normally I don't do the grammar-nazi thing, but confusion between these two words could get you shot someday. A "philanthropist" is someone who loves people and tries to help them...A "philanderer" is a slut.
It brings in some interesting thoughts. On one hand he destroyed my hobby and job by causing me to use crap software at work all day every day... On the other day, if more more pleasing and less problematic systems were being used I would be solving business problems instead of technical problems... perhaps a lot of techies would be out of a job.
Georgey Boy, George Walker Bush, fucked up in his Saturday TeleCon.
He ment to say the he had instructed the National Security Agency
to tap the telephone lines of Niggers, not Americans and not
United States Citizens.
Had he said, "Niggers", there would be no crap as we got now.
Everybody knows that all Niggers are against the Big White Boy
sitting in the White House.
And we all know that the Big White Boy in the White House is
just a little shit.
Salute.
Toodles!
"Time also named former Presidents George Bush and Bill Clinton as "Partners of the Year" for their humanitarian efforts after the Asian tsunami and Hurricane Katrina, and the unlikely friendship that developed from that work."
Yeah, Bush was only about two weeks late with the help for Hurricane Katrina...
"I see undead people" Warcraft III - Necromancer
On the back of that new book on Commodore there's a quote from Chuck Peddle: "There's nothing nice about Steve Jobs and there's nothing evil about Bil Gates."
Considering Mr. Peddle has met both of them several times throughout his carreer, I'd trust his analysis more than any random Slashdotter.
I know that the magazine hasn't even been shipped yet!
...that the government saw the merits in splitting the OS layer from hardware to avoid monopolistic abuse by IBM, but they didn't see the merit of splitting the OS and applications layers to avoid further monopolistic abuse by Microsoft.
Microsoft should have been split IMO. They argued that it would cause tremendous harm but that's a load of shit. The IBM OS/hardware split created tremendous economic growth, as did the AT&T split. Dividing the layers creates a new platform for competition and growth.
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
So the only people who made an impact was a mediocre business man, the leader of an overhyped band, and some other person no one knows... I guess they chose "pop-culture" over actual deeds / actions.
--WooooHoooo--
Not to mention he was in Stalingrad fighting the "wrong war" in the first place!
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
Cause he started one.
He wanted a blow so hard that we would be afraid of war.
Yeah, I'm sure he thought that by knocking down a few buildings he would scare the most powerful nation in the history of the world away. That makes sense.
Now what he has is a war in his own backyard, with more democracies than before (Afghanistan and Iraq), women voting and participating, and going to school.
....And the International credibility of the U.S. is down the tubes because of "The War on Terror" he started. And American solders are put in harms way in Iraq. And the U.S. was shown to be a liar (WMDS!) that is weaker than everyone thought (can't find a way to end Iraq War).
Actually it seems that he got a lot of what he wanted.
Open Source Sushi
What's a cover? Is it something like a home page?
For that matter, what's a magazine? A new kind of blog??
I find it peculiar that these acts of "charity" tend to be timed to fight Linux and Open Source more than to fight disease. It's been the same pattern whether in Australia, India or many of the African nations: Gates gives $100m to fight HIV, $421m to fight Linux.
Another thing that makes it stink of PR is the focus on HIV/AIDS which, compared to other problems like heart problems, smoke from cooking fires, etc, is not a major health problem. However, it is a high profile item for US audiences.
Yet another problem is that the solutions offered by Chairman Bill and his foundation focus on expensive pharmaceutical treatments, often draining significant matching funding coming from the target region. Most health issues are solved more effectively and cheapy with preventative measures not corrective measures, especially expensive ones. Cheaper is better, but it just so happens he's also heavily invested in the same pharmas, so maybe, jsut maybe there is a bit of conflict of interest.
Read the interview Time had earlier with Chairman Gates. He seriously couldn't seem less interested in the health and social aspects of the charity. The definition I had previously heard for Good Samaritan involved an active interest in helping and helping in an altruistic manner, not with strings attached or with major conflicts of interest.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
As if Time magazine is some liberal publication, and even then, they as liberals must support Bin Laden. You know, anything against amerikkka. yay! go terrorists!
It's not a fucking anarchist zine that someone printed at Kinko's. It's Time magazine. It gave person of the year to Newt Gengrich in 95 when all Newt did was plagarize reagan's speeches and call them a contract with america. I'm pretty sure they have Jesus or christianity on every other cover throughout the year. Jesus hasn't been counterculture for 2000 years!
Same goes for CNN. Softball tossing bastards.
I mean the lost productivity due to poor interoperability (even with other MS products), bit rot, incomplete products and difficult interfaces must be on the order of billions every quarter. That's along side the problem of security and having a system that's more or less designed to spread viruses, spyware, spam, Denial of Service attacks and worms. Each of those is estimated to individually cost many tens of billions of dollars per quarter. All are only made possible due to persistent design flaws and an architecture unsuited for any kind of networked environment. These flaws have been around long enoug that at this point they can be called intentional.
So that's the damage to any computer-using business.
On top of all that you have the damage that Gate's empire has done to the IT sector, especially in the US. He took a thriving, diverse, competitive, innovative industry and crushed it with give aways (illegal tying), strong arming (esp. OEMs), sabotage, false advertising, predatory and illegal business practices, overcharging and lobbying.
All that bleeds the country (pick one, any one) in way that bin Laden couldn't even begin to dream about.
But the good side is all the tax money the MS movement brings in right? Wrong. MS pays nothing and hides in foreign tax havens. So in return for all that damage, MS gives nothing. Ok maybe some feel-good advertising and nice lobbying budgets, but not much more.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
I will now sum up all article comments in 7 words
"Stupid rich guy. Why's he so good?"
Think of someone with average intelligence. Now think 1/2 the world is dumber than that guy.
I would like to see Wikinews person of the year ; where users from all over the world can vote for different people in different categories.
It would also be interesting to watch a list over the most mentioned people each year in wikinews..
Yep, thats pretty awful really, some dude drops 26 bill and its not enough. 26 Billion is WALKING AROUND money, it is a COLOSSAL sum of cash, and it must be worth even more in India, where I gather most of it ends up. Yeah, there is a hint of PR about it, even some degree of strategic thinking in aligning your efforts with a software tiger economy. Given that Gates is so utterly maligned, and has been for years, can you really blame him for not keeping this utterly quiet? It would have been a task in itself. Hats off to the guy, he is saving lives, and lots of them, and anyone who approaches this from the perspective of the Open Source v M$ debate should be properly ashamed of themselves. Really. Finally, this is Slashdot, the community Bill would happily send his storm troopers into to demolish given half a chance, this is where we come to dump on old Borg - face himself, so it's interesting, heartening, and a measure of the consistent quality of debate found here, that most of the responses are quietly supportive of what he has done with his foundation.
You may not agree with what I say, but you should fight to the death to allow me to say it, by modding me up.
From some more coverage:
The U2 frontman, speaking of his collaboration with the Gateses on tackling global health, said: "When an Irish rock star starts talking about it, people go, yeah, you're paid to be indulged and have these ideas.
"But when Bill Gates says you can fix malaria in 10 years, they know he's done a few spreadsheets."
Was that the same Gates who once said that spam would be solved by 2006 (who now has just under 2 weeks to make it happen)?
Just wonderin'.
Can't find examples of evolution? No matter, neither could Dawkins
If we didn't have Windows, we'd be running some sucessor to OS/2 instead...
Windows XP is in fact derived from OS/2.
I *can* claim that. You probably can too. I ran the numbers a couple of years ago, and here is what I came up with. If you have a net worth of $100,000 then 4 of your dollars is equivalent percentage wise with $1 million of Bill Gates' dollars.
So he donates $20 million a year? If you donate $80, you are on par percentage wise. But here is the kicker - Bill and I live in the same world. He could give away HALF of everything he owns, and still live extremely comfortably. I could not. So even if you look at percentages, it isn't quite the same.
Should he be commended for donating that much money? Sure, that money will go to good causes. (But let's remember, he did name his foundation after him and his wife. So his intentions weren't necessarily "pure".)
Bill Gates has donated more money than I will ever see in my lifetime. But make no mistake about it, he has made no sacrifices to do so, and he is by no means generous.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
What is the difference between Bono and God?
God doesn't think he's Bono.
Island owned the recordings. They sued SST/Negativland. How is U2 supposed to prevent this? And apparently, when they got involved, they tried to stop it as much as they could (told them not to collect).
Sounds like you want to make a villian out of Negativland too. I can go with that. Like I said, clearly they knew what they were doing was going to be a legal problem. They purposely got in trouble to start a discussion about copyright. And they were thwarted when SST caved and turned it into an issue of who is to be left with a financial liability, which is not a discussion-starter.
Still, I don't see how U2 did something wrong here.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
Antitrust is bullshit. Selectively enforced and for the most part worthless. The market does a better job than the government ever will. What is a patent? A government sanctioned monopoly. How can someone be sooooo pissed off about MS charging too much for Windows, and at the same time not give a shit about making low cost AIDS meds available at cost? Perspective. If people in Niger die from AIDS it doesn't affect the US economy materially.
... The only thing missing is massive amounts of viruses, trojans and spyware.
You cannot have it both ways and be moral and/or ethically correct. Some how the humanity of this world is going away. But let's focus on Microsoft. For some reason I don't think it's impossible to get by without using MS products. Linux > OO > Firefox > Thunderbird > Apache > qmail >
The market cannot do the job, that's why government steps in. Your point of open source reinforces this point. The only way you can compete with MS is to offer your product for free or more than free, as open source you also give up some of your rights to the code.
It's not like he can just write out a $20 billion check and say "Hey, here's 60% of my wealth, I only need the other $10 billion."
I'm not a particularly big fan of Bill Gates' business practices. But I've got to give him credit for his generosity to charity and the work he and his family are doing in Africa (at a time when most Americans only think of their own country).
-Eric
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
I think the basic question is that if someone punches you in the nose and then gives you some money is that person still an asshole?