Dismissing rumors that he might be making a comeback at Microsoft, founder Bill Gates went down under to rule out the possibility of ever returning to the software behemoth full-time.
Instead, he says, he’ll be working full-time at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation until the day he dies. Gates stepped down from his day-to-day role at Microsoft in June 2008. → Read More
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has pledged $250,000 to the Startup Weekend EDU series of events, the dedicated education-focused vertical within the non-profit.
The Startup Weekend organization, which is supported by the Kauffman Foundation and the social learning startup Grockit, offers intense 54-hour events where entrepreneurs come together to share ideas, form teams, build products and launch startups. → Read More
Five years ago, I was working for a Belgian company that published the only weekly IT magazine in the country, Data News. I was not a reporter, but in charge of its online media products. When it was announced that Microsoft founder Bill Gates would be coming to Brussels to, for the first time, pitch Windows Vista to enterprise customers and partners at the MS Business Innovation Event, I jumped on the opportunity to convince the editor of the magazine to arrange for a camera to be placed in the conference hall so we could record his talk. → Read More
After the nuclear disaster in Japan at the Fukushima reactors, the general public is understandably skittish about nuclear energy once again. But not Bill Gates. Speaking today at a Wired business conference in New York City, he is talking up the benefits of nuclear energy, particularly next-generation designs. The backlash, he thinks, is overblown. “If you compare it to the amount that coal has killed per kilowatt hour,” he points out, “it is way, way less.” When an accident does occur, however, its effects are much more visible. “Coal kills fewer people at one time, which is highly preferred by politicians,” he says.
Gates is putting his money where his mouth is. He is an investor in his friend Nathan Myrhvold’s nuclear reactor startup Terrapower, which is designing one such next-generation nuclear reactor which produces one thousandth as much radioactive waste. But he also has investments in “dozens” of other energy companies, from battery companies to solar to biofuels. “We should pursue them all,” he says. “The amount of IQ working on energy today and the tools they have to simulate compared to 20 years ago is night and day, but it is unpredictable whether we will get a breakthrough.” → Read More
When students asked what subjects they should major in to become a tech entrepreneur, I used to say engineering, mathematics, and science—because an education in these fields is the prerequisite for innovation, and because engineers make the best entrepreneurs.
That was several years ago.
I realized how much my views have changed when the The New York Times asked me to write a piece for its “Room for Debate” forum this week. The paper wanted me to comment on the divergence of opinion between Bill Gates and Steve Jobs. In a speech before the National Governors Association on Feb 28, Gates had argued that we need to spend our limited education budget on disciplines that produce the most jobs. He implied that we should reduce our investment in the liberal arts because liberal-arts degrees don’t correlate well with job creation. Three days later, at the unveiling of the iPad 2, Steve Jobs said: “It’s in Apple’s DNA that technology alone is not enough—it’s technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the result that makes our heart sing, and nowhere is that more true than in these post-PC devices”. → Read More
You can debate if there is still that much of an epic battle between Bill Gates and Steve Jobs – or Microsoft and Apple in other words – at all these days. As much as pundits like to keep drawing comparisons to their financials, the tech world is far more interesting that the competition between those industry giants, who are destined to remain giants for a long time.
Before I start rambling further thoughts about this, here’s a cool animation made by the folks at Albinal. Enjoy the rap battle between Beatbox Bill and Sinista Steve, and tell us who you think laid down the better verses. → Read More
This weekend, a ratified nuclear arms control treaty between Russia and the United States went into effect, reducing and limiting each nation’s allowable arsenal of nuclear weapons. The new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START 2) also allows U.S. inspectors access to monitor Russian nuclear weapons technology, facilities and forces, which they were prevented from doing since the original START treaty expired in December 2009. As the nations attempt to mitigate a global nuclear arms race, questions remain: what can be done with extant, surplus and aging nukes? Can they be used as a source of clean energy? Do we have the technology? → Read More
Well, Steve Ballmer certainly had a productive week.
Over the past three days, the Microsoft CEO has sold 49.3 million shares of his company stock, Reuters reports. With the share price hovering around $27, the sale has made him about $1.3 billion. Not bad for three days.
And he’s not done yet. Ballmer apparently intends to sell as much as 75 million of his shares in total by the end of the year. At the current prices, that would earn him about $2 billion, all told. → Read More
The “Waiting for Superman” movement continues to sweep through the Valley with news that Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg has donated $100 million to Newark Schools– no doubt encouraged by his COO Sheryl Sandberg who has been a big supporter of the movie and the movement to reform public education.
Some people have insinuated the move was a calculated ploy to whitewash Zuckerberg’s image with the fictional and snarky “The Social Network” coming out and getting rave reviews. Although Zuckerberg sounded more media trained than I’ve ever heard him in his interview this week with Mike and Jason, the idea that he donated a sum that large to rebut at movie that’s widely-documented to be fictional is a stretch. Especially considering this week’s leaked emails and IMs weren’t exactly a smoking gun supporting the whole evil genius theory.
But I’ll tell you who will win big social capital points as “Waiting for Superman” gains steam: Bill “still the richest man” Gates. → Read More
Bill Gates thinks something is going to die too.
No, it’s not physical books like Nicholas Negroponte — instead, Gates thinks the idea of young adults having to go to universities in order to get an education is going to go away relatively soon. Well, provided they’re self-motivated learners.
“Five years from now on the web for free you’ll be able to find the best lectures in the world,” Gates said at the Techonomy conference in Lake Tahoe, CA today. “It will be better than any single university,” he continued. → Read More
To wrap up the Techonomy conference in Lake Tahoe, CA, Bill Gates took the stage to talk with host Brent Schiender. A big idea of the conference was the future of technology, especially as it related to the economy. Gates talked a lot about that, but perhaps in a way you wouldn’t imagine. His mind was in the gutter. Literally.
“Latrines are fascinating,” Gates said. The way he said it was in a bit of a joking manner, but he’s not kidding. He talked about how many books he reads on the subject these days. “No one wants to read about it — it’s one of the greatest under-investments,” Gates said. → Read More
EcoMotors announced today a $23.5 million series B funding round from Khosla Ventures and Bill Gates that the company will use to build and test its eco-friendly engine, known as an Opposed Piston Opposed Cylinder (OPOC) engine.
EcoMotors makes engines that run on diesel or gasoline but have greater power density, weigh less and produce lower carbon emissions than conventional engines. OPOC engines are being developed for passenger vehicles, as well as for commercial vehicles, aerospace and power generators. → Read More
Bill Gates, the chairman of Microsoft, was on Larry King Live on CNN last night. (Larry King’s still on the air? Gotcha.) He was there with his father, William Henry Gates, Sr., and they talked about a number of fun and exciting things. And wouldn’t you know it, the iPad was one of those things. His take on Apple’s “magical and revolutionary” thingamajig? It’s “not quite there yet.” That’s fair to say, no? → Read More
The movie Pirates of Silicon Valley (based on the book Fire In The Valley) came out in 1999. The final scene takes place in 1997 when recently-reinstated (interim) CEO Steve Jobs takes the stage at Macworld to announce an alliance with Microsoft to ensure Apple’s future — with Bill Gates’ head on a giant screen behind him. Times have changed. Jobs has now been the official CEO for the past 10 years. Apple no longer goes to Macworld. The world now has the iPod, the iPhone, and the iPad. Apple has over $40 billion in cash in the bank, and is rapidly approaching Microsoft in market cap. It’s probably time for a sequel.
That sequel, according to one TechCrunch reader, is Iron Man 2. → Read More
How does Bill Gates inspire students to change the world? Tune in here to find out. Gates is kicking off a college tour today with a speech to students at UC Berkeley. He will talk about the big challenges facing the world today (poverty, health, energy, climate change) and what can be done to tackle them. The key is innovation in both the public and private sectors, using technology in smart ways, and changing people’s economic incentives.
Gates and his wife Melinda are spending much of their time and money on these issues through their foundation. But you don’t have to be a billionaire to try to make the world a better place to live. In partnership with the Gates Foundation, we are proud to present his speech in the live video after the jump. → Read More
Bill Gates is spending most of his time these days with the Gates Foundation, which he started with his wife Melinda to take a new approach to philanthropy after leaving his day-to-day responsibilities at Microsoft. Gates has been blogging occasionally and taking to Twitter.
Today, he is going back to college on a speaking tour to encourage students to take on big challenges like fighting poverty, improving world health, developing new energy sources, and combating climate change. His first stop will be at UC Berkeley, and we will livestream his speech here on TechCrunch, starting at 11 AM PT. → Read More
If it turns out that Gates really is an evil genius, we’re all screwed. I mean, first he’ll unleash a plague of hurricanes on the coasts of the world, then he’ll release clouds of mosquitoes all over the newly marshy world, and then he’ll tell all the Windows-running reactors to shut down and he’ll be only power source, running for 100 years off depleted uranium. → Read More
My last post triggered some interesting debates in the blogosphere about whether entrepreneurs were a product of nature or could be nurtured. It’s not black or white. People are a product of their upbringing and education. Average humans can achieve extraordinary feats when they really try. I’ll concede that, like some great athletes, some great entrepreneurs may have something different about them that gives them a special advantage (this is a topic that I am presently researching). But not every entrepreneur needs to reap the same fortune as Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg to qualify as a success. You can build a good lifestyle business that pays the bills, or that does good for the world, and be considered a successful entrepreneur. (And you’ll probably be happier and gain more respect than most billionaires do.) Entrepreneurship isn’t all about the IPO. → Read More
Sometimes tips come in that seem too good to be true. Take today, for example. I got a tip that Bill Gates’ new site, The Gates Notes, was running on a Linux-powered server. This would be ironic since Gates is of course the founder of Microsoft, which is Linux’s biggest competitor in the server market. It would be the equivalent of catching Gates or CEO Steve Ballmer being caught using (and not just signing) a MacBook at a conference. So is it true?
A quick search on Netcraft shows that thegatesreport.com sure enough looks to be running on the Linux OS. But wait. The results also say that web server is Microsoft-IIS/7.0. That doesn’t sound right, so what gives? Well, it turns out that because Gates is using Akamai to mirror his sites’ content in the event of massive traffic (or more specifically, something like a DDoS attack), this data is being filtered through there. Akamai uses Linux for its servers, so that’s what OS is being passed back to Netcraft. But at the same time, to make things more confusing, the Akamai servers are still passing back the correct server header for Gates’ site: Microsoft-IIS/7.0. → Read More
Even the Daily Show is fair and balanced! Jon Stewart interview Bill Gates last night and it was pretty interesting. When Gates isn’t trying to sell his company anymore he’s very mild-mannered and delightfully polite. Plus he dances like Pauly-D. → Read More
San Francisco, CA
