What Bill Gates Wishes More People Knew About Paul Allen (paulallen.com) 124
Microsoft's original co-founder Paul Allen was honored posthumously with a lifetime achievement award for philanthropy this week at the Forbes Philanthropy summit.
Bill Gates remembers Allen as "one of the most intellectually curious people I've ever known," adding "I wish more people understood just how wide-ranging his giving was," and shared his remembrances at the ceremony: Later in life, Paul gave to a huge spectrum of issues that seem unrelated at first glance. He wanted to prevent elephant poaching, improve ocean health, and promote smart cities. He funded new housing for the homeless and arts education in the Puget Sound region. In 2014 alone, he supported research into the polio virus and efforts to contain the Ebola outbreak in West Africa -- all while standing up an amazing new institute for studying artificial intelligence.
If you knew him, the logic in Paul's portfolio is easy to see. He gave to the things that he was most interested in, and to the places where he thought he could have the most impact. Even though Paul cared about a lot of different things, he was deeply passionate about each of them.
There's a picture of a young Bill Gates in the eighth grade watching Paul Allen on a teletype terminal. "The only way for us to get computer time was by exploiting a bug in the system."
"We eventually got busted, but that led to our first official partnership between Paul and me: we worked out a deal with the company to use computers for free if we would identify problems. We spent just about all our free time messing around with any machine we could get our hands on." One day -- when Paul and I were both in Boston -- he insisted that I rush over to a nearby newsstand with him. He wanted to show me the cover of the January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics. It featured a new computer called the Altair 8800, which ran on a powerful new chip. I remember him holding up the cover and saying, "This is happening without us!"
Paul always wanted to push the boundaries of science. He did it when we were testing the limits of what a chip could do at Microsoft, and he continues to do it today -- even after he's gone -- through the work of the Allen Institute. When I first heard he was creating an organization to study brain science, I thought, "Of course...."
I wish Paul had gotten to see all of the good his generosity will do. He was one of the most thoughtful, brilliant, and curious people I've ever met....
I will miss him tremendously.
Bill Gates remembers Allen as "one of the most intellectually curious people I've ever known," adding "I wish more people understood just how wide-ranging his giving was," and shared his remembrances at the ceremony: Later in life, Paul gave to a huge spectrum of issues that seem unrelated at first glance. He wanted to prevent elephant poaching, improve ocean health, and promote smart cities. He funded new housing for the homeless and arts education in the Puget Sound region. In 2014 alone, he supported research into the polio virus and efforts to contain the Ebola outbreak in West Africa -- all while standing up an amazing new institute for studying artificial intelligence.
If you knew him, the logic in Paul's portfolio is easy to see. He gave to the things that he was most interested in, and to the places where he thought he could have the most impact. Even though Paul cared about a lot of different things, he was deeply passionate about each of them.
There's a picture of a young Bill Gates in the eighth grade watching Paul Allen on a teletype terminal. "The only way for us to get computer time was by exploiting a bug in the system."
"We eventually got busted, but that led to our first official partnership between Paul and me: we worked out a deal with the company to use computers for free if we would identify problems. We spent just about all our free time messing around with any machine we could get our hands on." One day -- when Paul and I were both in Boston -- he insisted that I rush over to a nearby newsstand with him. He wanted to show me the cover of the January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics. It featured a new computer called the Altair 8800, which ran on a powerful new chip. I remember him holding up the cover and saying, "This is happening without us!"
Paul always wanted to push the boundaries of science. He did it when we were testing the limits of what a chip could do at Microsoft, and he continues to do it today -- even after he's gone -- through the work of the Allen Institute. When I first heard he was creating an organization to study brain science, I thought, "Of course...."
I wish Paul had gotten to see all of the good his generosity will do. He was one of the most thoughtful, brilliant, and curious people I've ever met....
I will miss him tremendously.
Re: From one deadbeat to another (Score:1)
You aren't a nerd, or a techy. You are chan trash, and it seems a number of you have shown up to crapflood on slashdot.
Re: (Score:2)
So you'd rather Bill Gates not spend money on eradicating Malaria and bringing clean drinking water to people?
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:From one deadbeat to another (Score:4, Informative)
Gates new [sic] about Q-DOS, bought the rights legitimately, and sold the rights to that to IBM.
Actually MS bought QDOS (from Seattle Computer Products [SCP]) deceptively, even if legally. SCP later threatened to sue MS for misrepresenting what they intended to do with it (they were not told that IBM would be involved). MS settled out of court, for a trifling sum compared with what they made out of it.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
they were not told that IBM would be involved
Why should they have been?
Re: (Score:2)
sold the rights to that to IBM.
And then came Compaq. Probably played a bigger role than most...
Re: (Score:2)
Gates got his monopoly by a) blind luck (IBM chose Microsoft), and b) extremely dubious business practices.
Re: From one deadbeat to another (Score:1)
It wasn't blind luck that Microsoft's basic was in the roms of most other personal computers when IBM was shopping for software for their PC. It wasn't even a forgone conclusion that PC-DOS would be the predominant operating system. There were other operating systems supported on the PC at the time, including CP/M-86, the system that is always called out as the one Microsoft 'stole from.'
In fact, Microsoft was deep in the IBM PC at the hardware level. The BASIC roms were built into the PC motherboard and Mi
Re: (Score:2)
Not sure when Allen left, but Gates made Microsoft the unstoppable force it is by co-writing a BASIC interpreter from scratch, porting it to various architectures, and then being in the right place at the right time when IBM was shopping around for an operating system. Gates new about Q-DOS, bought the rights legitimately, and sold the rights to that to IBM.
Except he 'sold' QDOS to IBM before he had actually secured the rights to the program himself, then paid the developers a pittance to gain those rights after the fact while keeping the IBM deal quiet. Perhaps not illegal but very deceptive, towards both IBM and Q-DOS.
Re: (Score:2)
Control of the APIs allowed him to squeeze out competitors in the office software space (which was quite lucrative at the time). MS also had a practice of requiring PC manufacturers that sold windows to buy a windows license for every PC they sold, whether or not each PC even came with windows, a huge dis-incentive to sell anything else. There were many of these kinds of practices that put MS in a dominant position and made Gates rich. These things aren't exactly theft, but they are abusive and ant
Re: From one deadbeat to another (Score:1)
At the time, CP/M was predominantly an operating system for the 8-bit 8080 processor and it's derivatives like the Z80. CP/M-86 was mostly vaporware at the time. And anybody sane who had 8086 hardware before MS-DOS would run Xenix, Microsoft's licensed port of UNIX on the hardware.
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And anybody sane who had 8086 hardware before MS-DOS would run Xenix, Microsoft's licensed port of UNIX on the hardware.
Xenix didn't ship for 8086 until 1982 and that was not for the IBM PC. The PC was released in 1981 with DOS. Your timing is wrong.
Pats on the back (Score:1)
A bunch of ruthless, win at any cost, people having meetings to pat each other on the back. Nice self-serving promotion you got there.
On a Personal Note... (Score:3)
He's my go-to reference point for Hodgkin Lymphoma... diagnosed at 29 (for me it was 26), caught it at stage 1 (2a) and then got 26 years cancer free (21 and counting) before its return and even then after what they call 'salvage' treatment he manged another 9 years before his immune system finally quit.
Being a billionaire probably helped too I guess.
Re: (Score:2)
Wow. Wishing for continued good luck for you, man.
Empty words (Score:5, Interesting)
From a man who tried to devalue the shares owned by Paul Allen while he was ill. Tactic even Steve Ballmer was reluctant to do. When Paul found out Bill sent Steve to apologize. He couldn't even do that himself.
At this point in his life, Bill's conscience must weight heavily on him just like Andrew Carnegie on his latter years.
Re:Empty words (Score:4, Insightful)
At this point in his life, Bill's conscience must weight heavily on him just like Andrew Carnegie on his latter years.
That's why Gates is trying to re-build his karma by throwing money at charities, as if he earned that money honestly and as if there were anything else he could do with it in reality [billgatesmyths.org.uk]
he gave people accounts on hos PDP-10 (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: he gave people accounts on hos PDP-10 (Score:1)
Most of the early versions of MS-DOS were cross compiled on PDP-10 systems. At the time, a PC wasn't realistically a good machine to self-host a build system for it's own operating system.
Re:Saints of slashdot (Score:4, Informative)
The only reason many of you scums on here are against Bill Gates is cause he did well.
LoL! Gates is and always was a very nasty piece of work. Even Allen said so, part of the reason he left MS. Here are some sources :
....He had a hard-nosed, confrontational style even with his teachers - a style he is noted for today. His intensity at times simply boiled over into raw, unthrottled emotion, and occasionally childlike temper tantrums"
"... at Lakeside [School], He [Gates] was obnoxious, he was sure of himself, he was aggressively, intimidatingly smart.
[from "Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the making of the Microsoft Empire" by James Wallace & Jim Erickson, ISBN 0-88730-629-2]
and, even as a "mature" adult :
"[Gates] was known to get into shouting matches with CEOs of rival tech companies and to belittle his own [people] at Microsoft by calling their ideas "stupid." But perhaps the sorest victim of Gates's temper tantrums was Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, who said that dealing with Gates's frequent explosions was "like being in hell."" [from https://www.cio.com.au/slidesh... [cio.com.au] ]
Re: Saints of slashdot (Score:1)
Are you finished sputtering hate and innuendo? Of course you're not.
Re: PAUL ALLEN - RICH DEAD S.O.B. (Score:1)
Take a trip if you like. Just don't go there to live 24/7. And if you do check out, don't assume the rest of society will be happy to pay to take care of you.
Re: A solution to Seattle's homeless problem (Score:1)
Argentina. Make it a road trip, man.
Anonymous Coward (Score:2)
I realize I can filter out ac comments, but I wonder why they are allowed in the first place. I don't recall ever seeing one that would be classified as 'whistle blowing' or otherwise containing useful but risky content.
Re:Anonymous Coward (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm not sure I agree on the purpose of ACs you laid out her.
I mean who's gonna be a whistleblower on Slashdot of all places?
But trends come and go and sometimes (even in ye olden days) there wre things you could not say here withour risking the wrong people downmodding you into oblivion.
The purpose of posting as AC is to say what needs to be said even if it hurts.
Obviously that gets abused. The question is are we mature enough to live with the downside in order to hold up a principle.
Re: (Score:1)
Actually, I only ever post AC these days. I became weary of "logging in" to say simple things, and I'm truly paranoid of being tracked anymore. Also, I found that having karma made my words seem louder, when they are really no better than most.
Still my words are heard, even though I don't shout them, and hardly a week goes by that my AC posts don't earn a mod-point or two. It helps me to see when my ideas are actually valuable, and when I'm just full of vinegar. I do treasure the collective wisdom of th
Re: (Score:2)
Well, I have occasionally made humorous comments; once in a while contributed an insight.
Oh, and I have never posted made up nonsense and pretended it was actually factual
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I don't recall ever seeing one [AC comment] that would be classified as 'whistle blowing'
I've made one or two.
Oh please (Score:2)
When rich people give enough so that their net worth isn't in the millions, heck I'd give them the first 10 million, then I'll listen to how giving they are.
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I realize this is less important (Score:2)
... and it’s not gonna resonate with many people here. But he also put significant funds into our Pacific Northwest pro sports teams and, unlike some, was an involved owner who actively enjoyed the sports (while intelligently leaving decision-making to the team). If he hadn’t bought the Seahawks, we wouldn’t have had a pro football team in Seattle - or a Super Bowl championship to enjoy.
Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (Score:2)
Not in the summary, and I am interested in astronomy and cosmology ... so ...
Paul Allen gave a lot of cash for SETI, and that is why we have the Allen Telescope Array [wikipedia.org].
On the other hand, he basically sued the entire web [wired.com] using a patent portfolio in his Interval Research Labs.
Fine, but... (Score:2)
"Later in life, Paul gave to a huge spectrum of issues that seem unrelated at first glance. He wanted to prevent elephant poaching, improve ocean health, and promote smart cities."
That's great that he cared about all these things, but what did he accomplish? I may have missed it (only scanned the article), but spreading your resources all over the place doesn't make you wonderful, and most likely doesn't fix any of the issues you care about.
Cayman Islands coral reef (Score:2)
It seems one here has mention the Cayman Islands incident: Paul Allen megayacht destroyed most of Caribbean coral reef [seattletimes.com].
Now I know this was an accident, and Allen wasn't even personally on board, but seriously, why would someone even need a monstrosity like that? Was he so insecure that he needed the biggest yacht to prove to the world how rich he was, or what? I just don't get it. Even without destroying coral reefs it is an environment disaster. Allen's carbon footprint must have been a million time
Quoted for a Sentence Fragment (Score:2)
Empty Words (Score:2)
PDP or webcam? (Score:1)
Allen used to have a webcam that was purportedly pointing at his cube at M$ and he used to offer free accounts on a hobby PDP if one asked nicely.
The webcam is long gone but even when it was "live" it never showed anyone there but maybe the PDP is still active?
I can't believe that 20 years ago (Score:2)
I can't believe that 20 years ago or so I, and my peers all thought Bill Gates and Paul Allen were pieces of shit. I realize now so what, they had a monopoly on a closed source operating system and the software that ran on it. These guys weren't bad, but they weren't Marxists like us so they had to be bad, right?