Re: Gates spending more time with charity work

On Fri, 16 Jun 2006 19:15:37 +0200, Walter Mitty <mitticus@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
See below. I fail to see how this is IBM giving him anything except for
a HW platform to sell SW for.

You *fail* to see because you are clueless. Full of metrosexual
emotion, but completely lacking in facts.

Some drink at the fountain of knowledge... others just gargle.

You're full of ***. Sorry. What Gates has, Gates earned.

Heres an extract from the Wiki:

You've decided to pull your facts from a Wiki... well that right there
proves my point about being clueless. But let's use it anyway.

First off, did you know Gates was born rich? His father was a rich
lawyer in Seattle who had done work for IBM, and his mother was a
prominent socialite who already knew several IBM executives.

When IBM decided to build the hardware for a desktop personal computer
in 1980, it needed to find an operating system. Microsoft did not have
any operating system at this point. The most popular microcomputer
operating system at the time was CP/M developed by Digital Research in
Monterey. CP/M allowed software written for the Intel 8080/Zilog Z80
family of microprocessors to run on many different models of computer
from many different manufacturers. This device-independence feature was
essential for the formation of the consumer software industry, as
without it software had to be re-written for each different model of
computer. Bill Gates referred IBM to Gary Kildall, the founder of
Digital Research,

This is simply incorrect. IBM went to Digital Research ( DR ) first
because they already had a shipping OS. A real deal. IBM flew to DR
headquarters, but Gary Kildall was not there. But his wife was.
Kildall's wife was a bit of a nutcase and was belligerent and pretty
much threw them out when IBM wanted DR to sign non-disclosure
agreements just to tell DR what IBM wanted.

Gates NEVER referred them to DR.

but when they did not reach immediate agreement with
him they went back to Gates, who offered to fill their need himself. He
licensed a CP/M-compatible OS called QDOS ("Quick and Dirty Operating
System") from Tim Paterson of Seattle Computer Products for $56,000, and
IBM shipped it as PC-DOS.

They came to Gates because of this parents. Remember PC's were not out
yet, and IBM only knew "Big Iron" (mainframes) so when it came to
these little tinker-toy machines they were going to hang-off the Big
Iron, they were sort of desperate. So, as written above Gates did get
Q-DOS. What that article doesn't say is it had over 300 documented
bugs. Loooong story short, IBM engineers fixed most of the bugs for
MS. Any old dogs will remember IBM WAS the computer business back then
and they were doing everything they could to simply expand the market.
They fixed the bugs for free. That would never happen today.

Later, after Compaq licensed Phoenix Technologies' clone of the IBM
BIOS, the market saw a flood of IBM PC clones. Microsoft was quick to
license DOS to other manufacturers, calling it MS-DOS (for Microsoft
Disk Operating System). By marketing MS-DOS aggressively to
manufacturers of IBM-PC clones, Microsoft went from a small player to
one of the major software vendors in the home computer
industry. Microsoft continued to develop operating systems as well as

Yet again a distortion of the truth. His father SUED anyone who came
out with a competing operating system. Get it. How many of us can get
a rich Dad to sue our competition?

Back then I was buying a competing OS from a small company called
Falcon DOS. One day I call to order more and they tell me they are
being sued out of existence by Microsoft and they could not afford the
lawyers to fight it, and all the legal paper work the were being
deluged with. Soon they were gone.

Digital Research fought on as valiantly as they could, well into the
80's. Again, do some actual research and find out MS did to DR. It is
well documented. Also find out Gates did to IBM in regard to OS/2.

Oh and btw, I do not need a Wiki, I've been involved with the PC
business almost from the beginning. Sorry to impinge on your
"Gatesian" fantasy with true experience.

Facts, not emotion, would help bolster your credibility.

Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but
most pick themselves up and hurry off as if
nothing had happened. - Winston Churchill
.