Version: 2008

Comments on: Microsoft after Gates, Bill without Microsoft

As Bill Gates prepares to walk away from Microsoft, both the man and the company he founded will face challenges getting along without each other, Newsweek reports.

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by paulwcrain1 June 22, 2008 1:12 PM PDT
I have known Bill since the DOS 3.0
I want to wish him well on his retirement..HE IS A GREAT MAN !!
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by HugeBiotch June 22, 2008 2:09 PM PDT
Yo author and editors - it's ROLE, not ROLL...
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by stevenmusil June 22, 2008 2:31 PM PDT
ah the perils of being my own editor. thanks for bringing the typo to my attention.
by humanssssss June 22, 2008 2:51 PM PDT
I believe ROLL should also work because instead of changing the de facto definition, you make ROLL the standard.

Microsoft became big because they make you accept their standard. When I used the word Windows, more people think of Microsoft Windows than think of windows.
by C_G_K June 22, 2008 3:15 PM PDT
I for one won't be shedding any tears. Good riddance.

Microsoft has held back computer technology by years if not decades. His greed and ego played a large role in Microsoft becoming the huge pseudo-monopoly that it is. The garbage these people put out has made him a billionaire, but the shoddy software has also empowered con artists and criminals like the Russian mafia who have taken advantage of it's poor quality by turning peoples computers into spam zombies, or by extorting money from innocent people through software scams made possible by the atrocious security that windows has.

Gates' motivation has always been greed and power, NEVER putting out a quality product. Windows has been designed from the ground up to lock out competition and take unfair advantage of the fact that people want compatibility with others to make their life and/or job easier.

Don't let the door hit you in the butt on your way out Mr Gates.
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by Mister C June 23, 2008 8:41 AM PDT
Yep! Vista buggier than 3.1. That's what a megalomaniac and a monopoly will get you after 20 years.
by benjaminstraight June 22, 2008 3:20 PM PDT
Maybe Gates and Buffett will get a condo down south and relax...
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by mcwdigital June 22, 2008 3:23 PM PDT
What??? I thought he left ages ago. This guy has had more farewell moments than Barbara Streisand!
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by p.shearer June 22, 2008 3:48 PM PDT
And yet the market loved him. One question for you... if MS products are so bad then why does the NASDAQ run its exchange on them and why aren?t we hearing of them experience constant outages?
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by catch23 June 23, 2008 8:02 AM PDT
Banks also run on MS products, and hospitals (don't hear about people dying because of it).
'poor quality' is a ABM shills mantra. Nothing more
by drichards1953 June 23, 2008 8:05 AM PDT
I am not so sure the market "loved" Gates. MSFT does not exactly have a great track record. MSFT closed Friday at $28.23, Five years ago MSFT (6/23/03) closed at $25.78. Ten years ago (6/23/98) MSFT closed at $100.75. Fifteen years ago (6/23/93) it closed at $88.62. Twenty years ago (6/23/88) MSFT closed at $66.00. (Note price adjusted for splits, etc.)

MSFT has not been a darling of Wall Street for some time. The MSFT historic highs were more than a decade ago, and they are trading at fraction of the historic high. For the last eight years MSFT has traded in a rather narrow band of generally plus or minus about $6 for where the stock is now.

The Wall Street folks have generally not paid much attention to MSFT. When Vista did nto rake in the immediate sales and profits MSFT stated it would, MSFT went back to the expected trading pattern it has had for the last eight years.

Bill gates is in reality little more than a figure head of MSFT now. Ballmer is not much either other than is chair tossing stunt and monkey boy antics.

The MSFT we see now and what we will likely see in even five to ten years may well be very different. MSFT is now starting to face very serious competative forces. They have proven, over and over, they do not play well with others. No amount of chest pounding by MSFT "fanboys" is going to change that. The money in software has little to do with home users, but the professional (business) side of computing. Vista has not been received well in that segment of the market. That alone has been a huge cost to MSFT. Office 2007 falls in the "why?" category. Again the acceptance has not been what MSFT dreamed of. There was little need to upgrade from any version of MS Office to Office 2007. Plus there is new competition in that arena too.
by Penguinisto June 23, 2008 10:39 AM PDT
Please, prove that NASDAQ allegedly runs Windows as its entire back-end - I only see it running (at most) a piece of it on Windows (and all the info on it looks really old - as in NT 4 old). Meanwhile, I can say for certain that the larges stock exchange on the planet (the NY Stock Exchange) is now a Linux shop: http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/17/139256 Also, so is the Chicago Merchantile Exchange: http://search.techrepublic.com.com/search/chicago+mercantile+exchange+inc..html So, err, you were saying something? Oh, and meanwhile, the "market" doesn't seem to be loving MSFT of late - seems they're tanking a bit.
by tehrani625 June 22, 2008 4:11 PM PDT
I would like to point out that the other alternatives have their drawbacks too. As macs gain market share more people will want to hack them and do what they are already doing to windows machines. I would also like to say that a mac can be compromized faster then a windows machine. Then ther is linux and to be honist I can't think of anything off the top of my head thats bad about it except for maby some dodgy hardware support.
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by bno130 June 23, 2008 8:47 AM PDT
You shouldn't comment sir. You clearly do not have a clue.
Though you do serve as a timely reminder of why Mr Gates became so rich. By brainwashing 'tards.
by DarkerRaul June 23, 2008 10:11 AM PDT
Yeah, macs can be hacked faster than a windows machine, thats why it happens so often, right....? Maybe the new guys at microsoft will learn to build some security into the operating system rather than forcing you to pay for something that should be the designers first priority. If Gates was responsible for the total lack of organization inherent in each incarnation of windows, I'm sure the company could only get better. To be honist, i mean honest.
by grvn June 22, 2008 5:45 PM PDT
History will credit him as person who created a big market which wasn?t there before.
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by bno130 June 23, 2008 8:48 AM PDT
Actually IBM created the market as a response to the AppleII... read a bit of history and stop embarrassing yourself.
by Chrisa444 June 22, 2008 8:21 PM PDT
This man is the man of the century and all time- just like the pioneers who invented electricity and also the ford vehicle-
also I live in his neighborhoods- nearby- amazing such a person i keep bumping into wherever i go- move to. I did not know - he is amazing- cant imagine that kind of income- or life either- He was given a gift and Im sure compassion came knocking on his head- gives to the poor. Great person to do this and we would be proud he is an american with this intellegence.
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by bno130 June 23, 2008 8:50 AM PDT
Thanks Chrisa, now get back to your work at M$.
by wolivere June 23, 2008 4:54 AM PDT
I remember well the early day's. One one side we had the huge companies with hardware software that where married to each other. Huge costs and fairly locked out systems.

Then Microsoft came around and brought an OS that allowed open development, allowed for an open hardware architecture.

It seamed only yesterday we cheered him on. Over the years we saw more and more people enter the industry.

Yes there where bad times with the good times. Hind sight is always 20 - 20.

But I say thank you.

Today is a much different playing field then 25 years ago.
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by loridav1 June 23, 2008 5:40 AM PDT
Funny you say garbage but more then 90% of the world uses Microsoft because it works. There is no perfect software and never will be as long as we have the human element called personal preference. I can only imagine with out Bill Gates ambitions and drive how far behind we would be today. I am thankful to him and all the others that continue to push the envelope further everyday.
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by cdestroyer1 June 23, 2008 6:29 AM PDT
He was in the right place at the right time. You can't fault him for taking advantage of the situation. It would have been better had the competition for computer software not been so rigorous, maybe there would be other operating system/s available. Business is business. And the computer industry is no different. I can see a future for Linux and I hope it continues.
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by satish rao June 23, 2008 7:59 AM PDT
I am not sure what kind of man Bill Gates is, but these Java, Sun, IBM and erstwhile Netscape guys are no different, except for the fact that they are infinitely less capable from him in Marketing.
I have seen how ridiculously slow Java is while running as a Desktop application, how ugly it looks and so on. Java has its strengths and MS tools have its own.
I am not sure how and from where these other vendors think they have a high ground over MS. They are equally greedy, and it is a requirement in a capitalist economy anyway.

I think MS is good and all this vilifying of MS is just sour grapes syndrome.
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by celticbrewer June 23, 2008 11:41 AM PDT
Cheers to Bill. Even if you hate the OS, he's a brilliant man who made a fortune through his ideas and hard work. Windows has the largest market share, yes. Are people restricted from making alternative OSes? No. Can they make them better, cheaper, and more popular? Yes. Has anyone successfully done that? Apparently not, or consumers would have moved on. I'ved used all the major OSes over the ages including OS/2, Mac, and Various Linux Distros. Today, I have 3 Windows PCs at home. I'd gladly change if there was something as flexible, better, and cheaper. Kudos to Bill.
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by C_G_K June 24, 2008 5:26 PM PDT
"Are people restricted from making alternative OSes?"

They absolutely are. Ever heard of the goofy software patent system in the U.S., where you can use patents of obvious ideas to block competition?

Linux is cheaper and better in a lot of ways. Many businesses and governments in Europe are switching. Personally, I only use windows because that is what my clients use. This is why Windows dominates. No one could come up with any real alternative because of software patents and compatibility issues. It's not because it isn't technically feasible. I wonder if any of you Gates brown nosers really understand any of that, or maybe you just don't care. Who knows.

Gates is redeeming himself somewhat with his charities and I do give him credit for that.
by fredtheviking June 24, 2008 11:06 AM PDT
With all due respect, is it necessary to take pot shoots at Bill, on the news of his retire. Much of your critizique is based on the idea that some other company would have done better than Microsoft. Which is far-fetched, consider IBM and Apple. I doubt either of these companies would have been better. Apple not only lock you in to the software, but to the hardware as well. If Apple won, the market would have long be calling bloody murder (that's why they didn't win). IBM was monopolistic and paid for it later. Microsoft got away with it because OS could on a great deal of hardwar. Also Windows isn't that bad, it gets the job done.
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