http://philip.greenspun.com/humor/bill-gates.html
Why Bill Gates is Richer than You
part of the Career Guide for Engineers and Computer Scientists by Philip Greenspun
The Short Answer (to "Why Bill Gates is Richer than You")
"Bill [Gates] is just smarter than everyone else," Mike Maples, an executive vice-president of Microsoft, says. "There are probably more smart people per square foot right here than anywhere else in the world, but Bill is just smarter."
The New Yorker, January 10, 1994
The Family Answer
A lot of immigrants look up to Bill Gates as proof that the American Dream is achievable by anyone. They don't seem to realize that William Henry Gates III comes from one of the wealthiest families in the Pacific Northwest (see "How to Become As Rich As Bill Gates"). Another way to look at this is that the birth of Jennifer Katherine Gates on April 28, 1996 proved that America is still a country where anyone, regardless of race, creed, color, or software quality, can go from having a rich white Anglo-Saxon Protestant daddy to being a rich white Anglo-Saxon Protestant daddy.
What the Government Should Do About Microsoft
Should the government be suing Microsoft for violating antitrust laws? Perhaps. But doesn't it seem kind of odd for government lawyers to be typing Microsoft Word documents about how bad Microsoft is? If the federales were serious about increasing competition in the world of software it would be much more effective simply to convert government operations to open-source software. For very small organizations it may not make sense to use open-source software. The cost of hiring a programmer to add a feature or two to Linux or Star Office, for example, can't be recovered if you only have five employees to use the feature. But the U.S. Government has millions of employees. Whatever it costs to improve the open-source software that the feds use will be much less than the government currently pays to Microsoft in license and upgrade fees. And, by releasing those improvements back to the community, the U.S. Government will greatly strengthen the market for open-source software and support.
Will Society Free Itself?
In the absence of government intervention, is there any hope of society freeing itself from the Microsoft monopoly? Perhaps. Consider Microsoft's mainstay product: the desktop computer system that costs $10,000 per year to administer and lets you work by yourself. What most users want, though, is a cheap simple device that lets them collaborate with others. Successful collaboration with others typically requires that someone run a big reliable server (see Chapters 1 and 17 of Philip and Alex's Guide to Web Publishing). Thus the market for computing may in the end boil down to simple stuff to be used by consumers and reliable stuff to be operated by professional IT staff. Windows is way too complex for most consumers and difficult to justify on the server side when you can run Linux for free.
Microsoft Corporation will survive of course. By acquiring WebTV, a simple Internet appliance, they've got a toehold into the future of the desktop. By acquiring Hotmail they've got a toehold into the future of server-based applications. But to sustain their position as one of the most valuable companies in the world they may need to develop valuable services that people will want to use every day. Historically the most valuable company on the American stock market was AT&T. They had a monopoly on telephony, something that most people needed to use a few times every day. Whether Microsoft Corporation is creative enough to develop something similarly essential, in the absence of the legal monopoly held by AT&T, is an interesting question.
Why Bill Gates is Richer than You
part of the Career Guide for Engineers and Computer Scientists by Philip Greenspun
The Short Answer (to "Why Bill Gates is Richer than You")
"Bill [Gates] is just smarter than everyone else," Mike Maples, an executive vice-president of Microsoft, says. "There are probably more smart people per square foot right here than anywhere else in the world, but Bill is just smarter."
The New Yorker, January 10, 1994
The Family Answer
A lot of immigrants look up to Bill Gates as proof that the American Dream is achievable by anyone. They don't seem to realize that William Henry Gates III comes from one of the wealthiest families in the Pacific Northwest (see "How to Become As Rich As Bill Gates"). Another way to look at this is that the birth of Jennifer Katherine Gates on April 28, 1996 proved that America is still a country where anyone, regardless of race, creed, color, or software quality, can go from having a rich white Anglo-Saxon Protestant daddy to being a rich white Anglo-Saxon Protestant daddy.
What the Government Should Do About Microsoft
Should the government be suing Microsoft for violating antitrust laws? Perhaps. But doesn't it seem kind of odd for government lawyers to be typing Microsoft Word documents about how bad Microsoft is? If the federales were serious about increasing competition in the world of software it would be much more effective simply to convert government operations to open-source software. For very small organizations it may not make sense to use open-source software. The cost of hiring a programmer to add a feature or two to Linux or Star Office, for example, can't be recovered if you only have five employees to use the feature. But the U.S. Government has millions of employees. Whatever it costs to improve the open-source software that the feds use will be much less than the government currently pays to Microsoft in license and upgrade fees. And, by releasing those improvements back to the community, the U.S. Government will greatly strengthen the market for open-source software and support.
Will Society Free Itself?
In the absence of government intervention, is there any hope of society freeing itself from the Microsoft monopoly? Perhaps. Consider Microsoft's mainstay product: the desktop computer system that costs $10,000 per year to administer and lets you work by yourself. What most users want, though, is a cheap simple device that lets them collaborate with others. Successful collaboration with others typically requires that someone run a big reliable server (see Chapters 1 and 17 of Philip and Alex's Guide to Web Publishing). Thus the market for computing may in the end boil down to simple stuff to be used by consumers and reliable stuff to be operated by professional IT staff. Windows is way too complex for most consumers and difficult to justify on the server side when you can run Linux for free.
Microsoft Corporation will survive of course. By acquiring WebTV, a simple Internet appliance, they've got a toehold into the future of the desktop. By acquiring Hotmail they've got a toehold into the future of server-based applications. But to sustain their position as one of the most valuable companies in the world they may need to develop valuable services that people will want to use every day. Historically the most valuable company on the American stock market was AT&T. They had a monopoly on telephony, something that most people needed to use a few times every day. Whether Microsoft Corporation is creative enough to develop something similarly essential, in the absence of the legal monopoly held by AT&T, is an interesting question.
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