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Bill Gates to Finally Receive His Harvard Degree
coondoggie writes "It's not like he needs it to beef up his résumé, but the world's richest college dropout finally is getting his degree. Bill Gates, chairman of Microsoft, will speak at Harvard University's commencement ceremony in June and, like all commencement speakers, will receive an honorary degree from the institution. It's hard to guess if Gates, the wealthiest person in the world and co-founder of a company that brought in $44 billion in revenue last year, cares. But the programming whiz who once dropped out of Harvard will likely feel some sense of satisfaction."
I tend to view the bachelors degree as the high school diploma of the 21st century...
so I guess that makes the honorary degree something akin to a rich man's GED.
"Things are more moderner than before- bigger, and yet smaller- it's computers-- San Dimas High School football RULES!"
Bill Gates has already received honorary degrees from several other institutions: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Gates#Awards_and _recognition
Yawn!!!
It's hard to guess if Gates, the wealthiest person in the world and co-founder of a company that brought in $44 billion in revenue last year, cares.
Well, he certainly must care, as he's obviously not doing it for the money.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
doesn't count! He'll never be able to get a CS job with that!
now maybe he could get past the resume screeners and get a job at Google? It's good to see him do something with his life now.
In other news, Harvard University has just been granted 10,000 honorary Vista licenses and 10,000 Office 2k7 licenses...
Finally his parents will get off his back to go back to school and do something with his life!
Bullshit, he wrote Clippy!
Sure, going to college for 4 (or more) years can teach a person some good information. But the skills learned from life experience are usually much more important!
I have no degree but take college courses (adult continuing education) that interest me. At some point in most of them, the prof will usually add a remark like: "...but of course we know that's not how it works in the real world."
I'm not saying that they're teaching the wrong things in college, just that the average 18 year old will be learning mostly best-case theory. Most of the actual skills are learned during the early years in the workplace.
Seems like it would be a better process to work in your desired field for a few years, then go for the degree. Or, at least participate heavily in an apprentice program. But I do realize that some career fields are not compatible with this paragraph.
Love or hate the guy, he's certainly earned degree equivalency. Business Administration, most likely; they said in the article that Harvard doesn't announce which subject in advance.
If it's computing science, then I'd probably have a few words to say.
At Bently College, when we gave Jerry from "Ben and Jerry's" ice cream and honorary degree, he brought with him a truck of free ice cream. So much so that every student and proffessor willing had a freezer stuffed with the stuff afterwards... What will Gates do, give all the students copies of WIndows Vista? Thats a bit like someone dousing the students with STD infected blood...
Now who should get an honorary Harvard degree is Hugh Heffneir, for his buisness empire... Maybe he would pass the bunnies around...
3 degrees of separation from Vladimir Putin
"We notice you've made a lot of money and are therefore wise. We also notice you're not getting any younger, and you're giving away money. If you see anything you'd like to endow, please be in touch."
It's not the dot-com era anymore, companies aren't going to hire 17 year old dropouts as sysadmins. Your case was a complete one off, you may as well advise people to buy lottery tickets for a living.
Then maybe he'd have a better understanding of Ethics.
-R
From this page everything becomes limpid: http://www.siel.harvard.edu/2003/about/tour/classr ooms/maxw.jsp
: "The Maxwell Dworkin building was built with funds donated by Microsoft Chairman William H. Gates III and Microsoft President Steven A. Ballmer, both members of the Class of 1977, in memory of their mothers, Mary Maxwell Gates and Beatrice Dworkin Ballmer. Maxwell Dworkin building opened in 1999 and, with its extensive office and laboratory space, will allow Harvard to double the size of its computer science faculty over the next several years."
(Slide of Bill Gates' inbox comes up, showing "Ref1nance your morgage!").
However, sometimes they hit just by random chance.
(Next message in inbox is about "U.N.I.V.E.R.S.I.T.Y.D.I.P.L.O.M.A.S").
I hereby place the above post in the public domain.
What skills are involved in admining boxes?
Things I learned in college
1. algebra
2. calculus
3. data structures
4. algorithms [sorting, searching, etc]
5. compiler theory
6. numerical analysis
7. and a host of practical courses, etc.
And what do I do for a living? Software developer in the field of cryptography. So I need the math, algorithms, etc, etc. Yeah, granted I too taught myself a lot of my skills [like crypto], but to say college was a total waste because I had to sit through a "intro to C" class is ignorant.
Maybe if you had a job that required talent you'd be talking differently. I'm sorry, but setting up servers, changing network settings, etc, isn't exactly a skilled labour. I mean it's a job, but don't pretend you're some tech god because you can make Apache start and host a page.
Sorry for knocking you off your high horse, but you're advice is ignorant and misleading.
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
"At the same ceremony Harvard honored Steve Balmer's Contributions by giving him a Chair."
Gates began programming at age thirteen, at fourteen, he was clearing $20,000 a year at this game. In 1973 he co-authored and published a paper a paper on algorithms with computer scientist Christos Papadimitriou. Bill Gates That is moving damn fast and damn far for a "whiny wannabee."
Microscoft was founded in 1975. In Japan in 1978.
Microsoft was dominant in programming languages for the microcomputer in 1980 and not an unknown quantity to IBM. Gates promised to deliver a serviceable, low-cost, OS in time for the scheduled launch of the PC. Nothing more. But these were the words IBM needed to hear---and they weren't coming from Kildall.
You snooze, you lose.
The other day my bf B. was telling me about a low-level tech candidate he had interviewed for some support work in his department. The guy had a great-looking resume that consisted mainly of "in-the-industry" experience. He "implemented" this, "organized" that...B. asked him about 20 questions in all. Mix-n-match. From very basic, to very complex issues, and no theoretical, textbook stuff. You had to be there to fix it. It was appropriate, given that this dude ws claiming most of his qualifications from field experience.
He managed to answer from 20, oh, about one question. He got stumped on 19 other problems that he was supposed to be at least familiar with. His resume was a hoax. The "implementation" entries apparently meant that he carried PCs around for some project. No, really.
It's hard to properly qualify this type of candidate. This is how sometimes morons get hired into companies, and end up being a drain of resources and a problem waiting to happen, that most often their peers or boss will have to fix. Morons get stuck into jobs in the next cube beside people like you and me and they entail an ugly and exhausting cycle of damage control. All this to say, a college degree will at least indicate that the candidate is not a bum-off-the-street building a CV on fabrications, trickery and subterfuge. Saves time for most employers IMO. And if the person has proved that they can learn in school, they can likely learn and train to do well on the job.
Microsoft put the "sucks" in "success".
"Programming whiz"? I've heard others say this also, but what exactly was Billy boy so good at (besides sending nasty letters to early innovators)?
I'm under the impression that he made his mark by announcing vaporware and then coming up with something quick (primarily using someone else's work), before showing it off to potential buyers (e.g. QDOS, Altair BASIC interpreter).
Geeks like to think that they can ignore politics, you can leave politics alone, but politics won't leave you alone.-rms
I hope Mr. Gates understands that life is difficult for recent graduates. His first job post-degree will likely be an entry-level position without glamour or sufficient compensation. The dog-eat-dog world of corporate America isn't for everyone. Perhaps he won't get too put off by the whole thing.