This interview is gold in so many different ways. Of course, there's the predictions that are laughable now: >We are involved in a new generation of fax machin

This interview is gold in so many different ways. Of course, there's the predictions that are laughable now: >We are involved in a new generation of fax machines that we think will be better and easier to use. And a generation of screen phones [a standard phone with a minicomputer] in which the typically cryptic buttons are replaced with a graphics interface. And in the home environment, something you can carry in your pocket called the Wallet PC. >PLAYBOY: In your pocket? >GATES: It's a futuristic device unlike today's personal digital assistants. But it also shows the human side of Gates (his family nickname is Trey) and how really intelligent and quick he is. A lot of clueless people think he's just a corporate raider, incomparable to Jobs, they're quite wrong. I've heard many stories from my friends at Microsoft about him interacting directly with engineers, asking very sport on questions. Believe me, this kind of thing is rare in some other tech companies, where MBA types rule. Not many people could have handles an interview like this one. I also remembered once again how good the articles and fiction on Playboy used to be. Yea, yea, "I read it for the articles" is a common joke, but do you realize that many top writers, including Oates, Updike, Nabokov, and (this seemed incredible) Borges have published stories there?