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While what the comment states may be factually correct, it is unfair, in my opinion. Classic example of people sitting in their couches at home to point out eve

While what the comment states may be factually correct, it is unfair, in my opinion. Classic example of people sitting in their couches at home to point out everything Bill Gates did wrong in an attempt to judge him for the right he's doing. Business is business, he did what he had to in order to see his company thrive. And now he's stepped back and wants to give back to society. Branding him as a villain who wants to buy his way into heaven is a cheap shot.

TeMPOraL 9y ago
> Branding him as a villain who wants to buy his way into heaven is a cheap shot. Moreover, in reality the choice is usually between a villain "who wants to buy his way into heaven" and a villain who doesn't give a fuck. I'll take the former over the latter any time, because forever-saints with lots of money generally do not happen.
- croon 9y ago
  > Moreover, in reality the choice is usually between a villain "who wants to buy his way into heaven" and a villain who doesn't give a fuck. I'll take the former over the latter any time, because forever-saints with lots of money generally do not happen. Indeed. There's also an immense difference between doing a genuinely good act for self-serving reasons (ie getting into heaven), and masquerading a self-interest as a noble good, meaning the act will have tangible negative effects, in conflict with its image. What I mean is that "buying your way into heaven" and being a saint with tons of money doesn't have any meaningful difference. It doesn't matter if I build wells and schools in a third world country for instantaneous euphoria or for delayed euphoria through praise or for speculated reward in the afterlife. As long as you're not building the school in order to indoctrinate the children into supporting your plans of world domination, you can and should do good for whatever reasons you want.
  - TeMPOraL 9y ago
    I agree. > What I mean is that "buying your way into heaven" and being a saint with tons of money doesn't have any meaningful difference. It doesn't at the act of doing the spending, yes. The difference I meant was of history - by "a saint with tons of money" I meant someone who never did anything questionable throughout their entire life, and yet somehow still ended up in command of millions (or billions) of dollars. That pretty much doesn't happen (especially because there is always someone who'll find something questionable in everything and will spin it as evil; even Jesus got tried and executed for pissing off the establishment).
oceanghost 9y ago
No. Fuck that. He is a thief, plain and simple.
Retric 9y ago
Their are limits on what people are willing to do so their company will thrive. His actions happened to cross the line for many people as well as the law. As to giving money away, when someone is still one of the richest persons to ever live their past donations while valuable are no real sacrifice. I respect the effort he has put into being effective with his givings vastly more than the vast quantities of wealth he has donated.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  > As to giving money away, when someone is still one of the richest persons to ever live their past donations while valuable are no real sacrifice. I respect the effort he has put into being effective with his givings vastly more than the vast quantities of wealth he has donated. That's the point, though. Just giving away all your earnings and going poor from then on is stupid, not charitable. The way Gates does it, he ensures much more money will be invested (and also money invested won't be squandered as easily) over time than if he just gave it all away in an instant. I feel that talking about donation size relative to one's remaining wealth often boils down to implicit references to the Parable of Poor Widow's Offering, in which Jesus compared the rich people offering God money they didn't need to a poor widow who offered the last money she had. But then, that parable was about sacrifice and the priority God takes in one's life. It was not a recipe for effective altruism! (For an effective altruism recipe, the Parable of the Talents is better, IMO.) (INB4: I make references to the Bible not because I assume everyone is Christian, but because those stories are a big part of the culture almost all of us here grew up and live in.)
  - Retric 9y ago
    Charities can invest, just look at the Nobel prize for example. Anyway, I am not saying he should become poor, just that the qualitative difference from 50 billion to 100 billion is effectively meaningless. If he had donated down to say 200 million that would have had a meaningful impact while still leaving him incredibly wealthy. Consider, if someone makes a huge donation in their will they still make an impact, but it's got zero lifestyle impacts on themselves. The money is still very useful to other people it's just useless for the dead person.
cooper12 9y ago
Morality is not a zero sum game, where evil is cancelled out by good. Just because it is criticism, doesn't make it a "cheap shot" nor is someone's opinion invalid because they're not millionaires.
rectang 9y ago
> Business is business, he did what he had to in order to see his company thrive. Do you believe in ethics?
- sgift 9y ago
  Business and ethics are like fire and water. One kills the other. Not that I like it that way, it's just reality.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
spaceflunky 9y ago
But he is a villain trying to buy his way into heaven and I'm not willing to give Bill Gates the "Machiavellian" benefit of the doubt and say that his means justified his end achievements. Furthermore, I'm really disliking this narrative of "billionaire-turned-good" cause now he feels bad for some reason. This is the same thing Donald Trump is doing, so if you don't like it when he does it, why do you like it when Bill Gates does it? Because Bill has a cool reading list? So now you have Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, the Koch brothers, etc etc, all trying to buy a final "positive" public image and leave the world in everyone's good graces after consistently fucking over lots of people over for the majority of their wealth soaked lives. I'm not buying it.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  The mistake is in assuming that it's "cause now he feels bad for some reason". I seriously doubt Bill Gates does what he does to atone for anything (and he definitely doesn't try to play that narrative). Maybe he found conscience, maybe he just removed himself from the making-money environment - but right now, he looks like a guy with lots of money and heart in the right place, trying to make as effective use of that money as possible to make the world a better place.
olavk 9y ago
I don't think BG feels he or Microsoft did anything wrong, so I agree he in not trying to atone for anything. He is just doing good because he can, and that is great. It is likely he doesn't care what some bitter geeks thinks, since was already considered a hero by larger parts of society on account of being extremely successful. (And non-geek people generally like MS products like Office, especially if they have tried the competition.) That said, we are still allowed to judge. Just saying "business is business" can justify anything and is akin to saying nothing is unethical as long as you make a profit.
js8 9y ago
I disagree. Bill Gates is exactly what the title says, a villain who became a hero. We also have people who were heroes and stayed heroes. For example, Linus Torvalds or Richard Stallman. It's unfortunate that our society values Gates (the converted villain) more highly than Torvalds or Stallman (the hero from the beginning). Or values Jobs more than Wozniak.
- majewsky 9y ago
  While I agree with your sentiment, it is worthwhile to point out that Linus is a villain (or at least not a shining hero) in the eyes of a lot of people because of the behavior he displays on mailing lists.
- croon 9y ago
  > We also have people who were heroes and stayed heroes. For example, Linus Torvalds or Richard Stallman. It's unfortunate that our society values Gates (the converted villain) more highly than Torvalds or Stallman (the hero from the beginning). I can really identify with this, but I also disagree. We reward effort, and it takes a lot more to become good than staying good. In the same way that we reward a struggling child who in the end manages to climb an obstacle or finish a task, while not recognizing the other kid who has already done both 20 times with ease. I will never claim I'm a better person than anyone else, but I definitely was a well behaved and quiet kid, and I remember seeing this a lot as a kid, at which time I too wanted praise for my behavior when some frankly shitty kids got it for occasionally not being jerks to the other kids. But kids (and many grownups) aren't rational. I don't think kid me was right. I think I wouldn't have grown as much, and I think my values would've been a lot worse had I been constantly rewarded for something that came naturally to me. But perhaps it is different with grownups where we don't (or shouldn't) have the expectation of shaping them. It's probably not shocking that I've always valued Wozniak more.
  - js8 9y ago
    > We reward effort I don't think so. Capitalism (or human society in general) isn't really consistent in rewarding anything, and as a consequence, it is not automatically moral. (Despite many people, for instance libertarians, making lot of contortions to make it appear moral.)
PurpleRamen 9y ago
Whether you are a hero or villain is more a matter of perception and whom you ask. In the past Microsoft under Bill Gates did many things which people considered as evil and damaging, and some were even illegal and they were convicted for it. Now, instead of doing more businees or investing in new technologies to better the world, like Elon Musk for example, Bill Gates invests his money and time into wellfare-projects. This of course give the impression that he wanna cleans himself from the past sins. Whether it's true is a different case, but the impression is simply there.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  > investing in new technologies to better the world, like Elon Musk for example But the thing is, Gates is like Musk, he's investing in new technologies too. The two of them have different priorities, though. Musk is focusing on ensuring humanity's long-term survival, Gates is focusing on saving lives and reducing suffering now. They're much more alike than it would seem if you classify them as "Musk - tech, Gates - welfare".
  - PurpleRamen 9y ago
    Yes, but Gates is focusing on developments that delivers instant fame, with things which seems to be outside his original expertise. And he even is using his name for it, instead of supporting it anonymous. This support the impression that he is doing this things for fame, less for the result.
- zimpenfish 9y ago
  > Now, instead of doing more businees or investing in new technologies to better the world, like Elon Musk for example, Bill Gates invests his money and time into wellfare-projects. I would suggest that the Gates Foundation is doing more to better the world than Musk.
meuk 9y ago
While I don't like Microsoft, I think Bill Gates is an extremely smart and well-meaning guy. In public opinion, it is far more important how charismatic you are. IMO Steve Jobs was a terrible person, and this can be seen from his actions in both his decisions in his personal as well as his professional life. However, people worship him as a god because he fits the stereotype of charismatic leader better. Apparently, people need that.
Nokinside 9y ago
The positives and negatives of a person are not additive in a way that if you add good things and subtract negative things you get some final value. These all can be true at the same time. * Gates was an angry office bully - he admits this himself. He was total jerk. * Gates routinely used dishonest business tactics and monopoly power to crush competition. Microsoft contributed negatively to software development. Microsoft Research was famous for doing good stuff that was absent in MS business. * After retiring donates his money to charity. Gates is not alone. John D. Rockefeller and many other business tycoons have done the same.
oldcynic 9y ago
> he did what he had to in order to see his company thrive I'm thinking you perhaps weren't aware of some of Microsoft's activities. Embrace, extend, extinguish? AARD Code? Scalability day? SCO vs IBM? Comparing TCO of linux v Windows using an IBM mainframe available for Linux? Heck I've forgotten most of them as there were so many.
- gandhium 9y ago
  One of the early blatant examples - when they've killed their competitor (DR-DOS) by altering Windows 3.1 to work in MS-DOS only.
bryanlarsen 9y ago
"Business is business" B.S. A large reason for the success of Britain, America and the west was Protestant morality. Because one could reasonably expect fair dealing when conducting business with someone, even a stranger, there was no hesitancy conducting business rather than doing everything yourself or with your family. The West was built on handshake deals. We've lost that, which is one reason for the rise of large firms and the rise of bureaucracy, rules & regulation.
- brudgers 9y ago
  The slave trade, colonial empires, tobacco, opium, and the extirpation of indigenous peoples for their land each seem a bit at odds with my concept of fair dealing and morality. On the other hand Caedite eos. Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius is consistent with the theological premise of Predestination in Calvinist theology. So I agree in part.
  - bryanlarsen 9y ago
    It's at odds with my concept of fair dealing and morality too. But not incompatible with their concept, since unlike us, they didn't believe those concepts applied to non-Christians.
tarboreus 9y ago
A lot of the comments are setting up a dichotomy that BG giving away money makes him good, and not giving it away is bad. Really, if you get to the level of wealth that BG has, giving away money is really the only thing that makes sense. It's a way of making your mark on the world even more than you already have. Unfortunately, the way you give away your money can have negative as well as positive effects. Though a lot of what BG does is great or fine, other interventions, especially in education where he was involved with the Common Core, have arguably been a net nagative. Really, billionaires giving away money is, at bottom, another way they exercise power. It should be viewed in that light, not as an unalloyed good.

TeMPOraL 9y ago

> Branding him as a villain who wants to buy his way into heaven is a cheap shot. Moreover, in reality the choice is usually between a villain "who wants to buy his way into heaven" and a villain who doesn't give a fuck. I'll take the former over the latter any time, because forever-saints with lots of money generally do not happen.

croon 9y ago
> Moreover, in reality the choice is usually between a villain "who wants to buy his way into heaven" and a villain who doesn't give a fuck. I'll take the former over the latter any time, because forever-saints with lots of money generally do not happen. Indeed. There's also an immense difference between doing a genuinely good act for self-serving reasons (ie getting into heaven), and masquerading a self-interest as a noble good, meaning the act will have tangible negative effects, in conflict with its image. What I mean is that "buying your way into heaven" and being a saint with tons of money doesn't have any meaningful difference. It doesn't matter if I build wells and schools in a third world country for instantaneous euphoria or for delayed euphoria through praise or for speculated reward in the afterlife. As long as you're not building the school in order to indoctrinate the children into supporting your plans of world domination, you can and should do good for whatever reasons you want.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  I agree. > What I mean is that "buying your way into heaven" and being a saint with tons of money doesn't have any meaningful difference. It doesn't at the act of doing the spending, yes. The difference I meant was of history - by "a saint with tons of money" I meant someone who never did anything questionable throughout their entire life, and yet somehow still ended up in command of millions (or billions) of dollars. That pretty much doesn't happen (especially because there is always someone who'll find something questionable in everything and will spin it as evil; even Jesus got tried and executed for pissing off the establishment).

oceanghost 9y ago

No. Fuck that. He is a thief, plain and simple.

Retric 9y ago

Their are limits on what people are willing to do so their company will thrive. His actions happened to cross the line for many people as well as the law. As to giving money away, when someone is still one of the richest persons to ever live their past donations while valuable are no real sacrifice. I respect the effort he has put into being effective with his givings vastly more than the vast quantities of wealth he has donated.

TeMPOraL 9y ago
> As to giving money away, when someone is still one of the richest persons to ever live their past donations while valuable are no real sacrifice. I respect the effort he has put into being effective with his givings vastly more than the vast quantities of wealth he has donated. That's the point, though. Just giving away all your earnings and going poor from then on is stupid, not charitable. The way Gates does it, he ensures much more money will be invested (and also money invested won't be squandered as easily) over time than if he just gave it all away in an instant. I feel that talking about donation size relative to one's remaining wealth often boils down to implicit references to the Parable of Poor Widow's Offering, in which Jesus compared the rich people offering God money they didn't need to a poor widow who offered the last money she had. But then, that parable was about sacrifice and the priority God takes in one's life. It was not a recipe for effective altruism! (For an effective altruism recipe, the Parable of the Talents is better, IMO.) (INB4: I make references to the Bible not because I assume everyone is Christian, but because those stories are a big part of the culture almost all of us here grew up and live in.)
- Retric 9y ago
  Charities can invest, just look at the Nobel prize for example. Anyway, I am not saying he should become poor, just that the qualitative difference from 50 billion to 100 billion is effectively meaningless. If he had donated down to say 200 million that would have had a meaningful impact while still leaving him incredibly wealthy. Consider, if someone makes a huge donation in their will they still make an impact, but it's got zero lifestyle impacts on themselves. The money is still very useful to other people it's just useless for the dead person.

cooper12 9y ago

Morality is not a zero sum game, where evil is cancelled out by good. Just because it is criticism, doesn't make it a "cheap shot" nor is someone's opinion invalid because they're not millionaires.

rectang 9y ago

> Business is business, he did what he had to in order to see his company thrive. Do you believe in ethics?

sgift 9y ago
Business and ethics are like fire and water. One kills the other. Not that I like it that way, it's just reality.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

spaceflunky 9y ago

But he is a villain trying to buy his way into heaven and I'm not willing to give Bill Gates the "Machiavellian" benefit of the doubt and say that his means justified his end achievements. Furthermore, I'm really disliking this narrative of "billionaire-turned-good" cause now he feels bad for some reason. This is the same thing Donald Trump is doing, so if you don't like it when he does it, why do you like it when Bill Gates does it? Because Bill has a cool reading list? So now you have Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, the Koch brothers, etc etc, all trying to buy a final "positive" public image and leave the world in everyone's good graces after consistently fucking over lots of people over for the majority of their wealth soaked lives. I'm not buying it.

TeMPOraL 9y ago
The mistake is in assuming that it's "cause now he feels bad for some reason". I seriously doubt Bill Gates does what he does to atone for anything (and he definitely doesn't try to play that narrative). Maybe he found conscience, maybe he just removed himself from the making-money environment - but right now, he looks like a guy with lots of money and heart in the right place, trying to make as effective use of that money as possible to make the world a better place.

olavk 9y ago

I don't think BG feels he or Microsoft did anything wrong, so I agree he in not trying to atone for anything. He is just doing good because he can, and that is great. It is likely he doesn't care what some bitter geeks thinks, since was already considered a hero by larger parts of society on account of being extremely successful. (And non-geek people generally like MS products like Office, especially if they have tried the competition.) That said, we are still allowed to judge. Just saying "business is business" can justify anything and is akin to saying nothing is unethical as long as you make a profit.

js8 9y ago

I disagree. Bill Gates is exactly what the title says, a villain who became a hero. We also have people who were heroes and stayed heroes. For example, Linus Torvalds or Richard Stallman. It's unfortunate that our society values Gates (the converted villain) more highly than Torvalds or Stallman (the hero from the beginning). Or values Jobs more than Wozniak.

majewsky 9y ago
While I agree with your sentiment, it is worthwhile to point out that Linus is a villain (or at least not a shining hero) in the eyes of a lot of people because of the behavior he displays on mailing lists.
croon 9y ago
> We also have people who were heroes and stayed heroes. For example, Linus Torvalds or Richard Stallman. It's unfortunate that our society values Gates (the converted villain) more highly than Torvalds or Stallman (the hero from the beginning). I can really identify with this, but I also disagree. We reward effort, and it takes a lot more to become good than staying good. In the same way that we reward a struggling child who in the end manages to climb an obstacle or finish a task, while not recognizing the other kid who has already done both 20 times with ease. I will never claim I'm a better person than anyone else, but I definitely was a well behaved and quiet kid, and I remember seeing this a lot as a kid, at which time I too wanted praise for my behavior when some frankly shitty kids got it for occasionally not being jerks to the other kids. But kids (and many grownups) aren't rational. I don't think kid me was right. I think I wouldn't have grown as much, and I think my values would've been a lot worse had I been constantly rewarded for something that came naturally to me. But perhaps it is different with grownups where we don't (or shouldn't) have the expectation of shaping them. It's probably not shocking that I've always valued Wozniak more.
- js8 9y ago
  > We reward effort I don't think so. Capitalism (or human society in general) isn't really consistent in rewarding anything, and as a consequence, it is not automatically moral. (Despite many people, for instance libertarians, making lot of contortions to make it appear moral.)

PurpleRamen 9y ago

Whether you are a hero or villain is more a matter of perception and whom you ask. In the past Microsoft under Bill Gates did many things which people considered as evil and damaging, and some were even illegal and they were convicted for it. Now, instead of doing more businees or investing in new technologies to better the world, like Elon Musk for example, Bill Gates invests his money and time into wellfare-projects. This of course give the impression that he wanna cleans himself from the past sins. Whether it's true is a different case, but the impression is simply there.

TeMPOraL 9y ago
> investing in new technologies to better the world, like Elon Musk for example But the thing is, Gates is like Musk, he's investing in new technologies too. The two of them have different priorities, though. Musk is focusing on ensuring humanity's long-term survival, Gates is focusing on saving lives and reducing suffering now. They're much more alike than it would seem if you classify them as "Musk - tech, Gates - welfare".
- PurpleRamen 9y ago
  Yes, but Gates is focusing on developments that delivers instant fame, with things which seems to be outside his original expertise. And he even is using his name for it, instead of supporting it anonymous. This support the impression that he is doing this things for fame, less for the result.
zimpenfish 9y ago
> Now, instead of doing more businees or investing in new technologies to better the world, like Elon Musk for example, Bill Gates invests his money and time into wellfare-projects. I would suggest that the Gates Foundation is doing more to better the world than Musk.

meuk 9y ago

While I don't like Microsoft, I think Bill Gates is an extremely smart and well-meaning guy. In public opinion, it is far more important how charismatic you are. IMO Steve Jobs was a terrible person, and this can be seen from his actions in both his decisions in his personal as well as his professional life. However, people worship him as a god because he fits the stereotype of charismatic leader better. Apparently, people need that.

Nokinside 9y ago

The positives and negatives of a person are not additive in a way that if you add good things and subtract negative things you get some final value. These all can be true at the same time. * Gates was an angry office bully - he admits this himself. He was total jerk. * Gates routinely used dishonest business tactics and monopoly power to crush competition. Microsoft contributed negatively to software development. Microsoft Research was famous for doing good stuff that was absent in MS business. * After retiring donates his money to charity. Gates is not alone. John D. Rockefeller and many other business tycoons have done the same.

oldcynic 9y ago

> he did what he had to in order to see his company thrive I'm thinking you perhaps weren't aware of some of Microsoft's activities. Embrace, extend, extinguish? AARD Code? Scalability day? SCO vs IBM? Comparing TCO of linux v Windows using an IBM mainframe available for Linux? Heck I've forgotten most of them as there were so many.

gandhium 9y ago
One of the early blatant examples - when they've killed their competitor (DR-DOS) by altering Windows 3.1 to work in MS-DOS only.

bryanlarsen 9y ago

"Business is business" B.S. A large reason for the success of Britain, America and the west was Protestant morality. Because one could reasonably expect fair dealing when conducting business with someone, even a stranger, there was no hesitancy conducting business rather than doing everything yourself or with your family. The West was built on handshake deals. We've lost that, which is one reason for the rise of large firms and the rise of bureaucracy, rules & regulation.

brudgers 9y ago
The slave trade, colonial empires, tobacco, opium, and the extirpation of indigenous peoples for their land each seem a bit at odds with my concept of fair dealing and morality. On the other hand Caedite eos. Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius is consistent with the theological premise of Predestination in Calvinist theology. So I agree in part.
- bryanlarsen 9y ago
  It's at odds with my concept of fair dealing and morality too. But not incompatible with their concept, since unlike us, they didn't believe those concepts applied to non-Christians.

tarboreus 9y ago

A lot of the comments are setting up a dichotomy that BG giving away money makes him good, and not giving it away is bad. Really, if you get to the level of wealth that BG has, giving away money is really the only thing that makes sense. It's a way of making your mark on the world even more than you already have. Unfortunately, the way you give away your money can have negative as well as positive effects. Though a lot of what BG does is great or fine, other interventions, especially in education where he was involved with the Common Core, have arguably been a net nagative. Really, billionaires giving away money is, at bottom, another way they exercise power. It should be viewed in that light, not as an unalloyed good.