Google “Bill Gates is Evil” and you get a whole lot of results going over all the horrible, terrible things that Gates has done. People don’t like his business practices, his public persona, or his products. Fine, but I personally think evil is oversimplifying.
Awesome Simpsons moments notwithstanding.
The concept of “this businessman is BAD and everything he touches is EVIL” is a needlessly reductive cliche. As a comic book fan, it reminds me of when Bill Jemas was running Marvel. Everything that happened that fans didn’t like was his fault (Marville, Mark Waid fired off Fantastic Four) and everything they liked either quietly ignored or credited to people “fighting” him (Milligan and Allred’s X-Force, the Ultimate line, the relaunch of the Avengers franchise). It’s happening now with DC Comics and Dan Didio, and it happened with Jim Shooter, Bob Harras, and pretty much any other publisher or editor in chief I can think of. People need a pinata.
Is Mr. Gates perfect? Hardly. Is he Satan? I don’t know about that. Would Satan found the Bill And Melinda Gates Foundation?
The Gates Foundation is also in the news currently due to being Occupied by local homeless, who are looking to get support for local shelters. It seems like a no-brainer for the Foundation, but one wonders why such drastic steps had to be taken in the first place.
Dedicated to funding causes that the Gates family is passionate about, the Gates Foundation has recently been credited with saving over 100,000 Indians. As the article notes, the foundation has deriders who are not thrilled with the Gates-funded Avahan-project, saying that it’s throwing money at treating infections instead of preventing them, and the Indian government will be taking it over soon. However, it’s an impressive stat and something to keep in mind the next time you hear someone call Bill Gates (or indeed, any other CEO) the Devil.
It does make for some snazzy desktops though.
What gets me is when folks who go bashing the business practices of Bill then go on to praise Steve Jobs.
Oh the irony- Apple has adopted many policies and business practices that are arguably worse than some of the criticism of Microsoft. However the bottom line is that both of these companies (and their former CEOs) were doing what was best for the company, not what was necessarily best for the consumer.
I don’t understand why anyone would expect anything less of either. No tech company exists solely for the betterment of mankind. They need to be competitive and stay on top or die trying. I don’t like everything Bill did as CEO (nor Jobs at his Apple camp), but I understand that in most cases, it had to happen that way. Because they aren’t in the business of doing everything I want.
Now Mr. Gates no longer works in the commercial tech world. Now he is no longer obligated to be a ruthless business man. Now we get to see the real Bill Gates- as a human being.
Mr Gates, on behalf of the human race I’d like to apologize for all the hatred.