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"“Our father, Gary Kildall, was one of the founders of the personal computer industry, but you probably don’t know his name. Those who have heard of him may rec
by pavlov 1y ago
"“Our father, Gary Kildall, was one of the founders of the personal computer industry, but you probably don’t know his name. Those who have heard of him may recall the myth that he ‘missed’ the opportunity to become Bill Gates by going flying instead of meeting with IBM. Unfortunately, this tall tale paints Gary as a ‘could-have-been,’ ignores his deep contributions, and overshadows his role as an inventor of key technologies that define how computer platforms run today.
"Gary viewed computers as learning tools rather than profit engines. His career choices reflect a different definition of success, where innovation means sharing ideas, letting passion drive your work and making source code available for others to build upon. His work ethic during the 1970s resembles that of the open-source community today.
"With this perspective, we offer a portion of our father’s unpublished memoirs so that you can read about his experiences and reflections on the early days of the computer industry, directly in his own voice."
Sounds really interesting. Thanks for making this available!
- gertlex 1y agoI just happen to have been reading this past week, the Digital Antiquarian's IBM PC release overview (4 parts). This covers comparing Gates and Kildall (and includes e.g. the uncertainty of what actually happened with that "flying instead of meeting with IBM") Here's the url to part 2 of that 4-parter, where Gary gets mentioned (also covered in parts 3 and 4): https://www.filfre.net/2012/05/the-ibm-pc-part-2/ https://www.filfre.net/2012/05/the-ibm-pc-part-2/
- lproven 1y ago> the uncertainty of what actually happened with that "flying instead of meeting with IBM" There is zero uncertainty; it's well documented and the passenger in the plane is alive and well and has given interviews about it. There is a lot of lying and disinformation about it, though.
- elzbardico 1y agoLet's be frank. Gates was from the WASP elites, old money stuff. IBM would probably find a reason to give him the deal rather than to Gary no matter what.
- acdha 1y agoIn particular, his mother – Mary Maxwell Gates – was on the United Way board along with IBM’s chairman John Opel and reportedly discussed her son’s company with Opel a few weeks before they made the decision to license MS-DOS. https://www.nytimes.com/1994/06/11/obituaries/mary-gates-64-helped-her-son-start-microsoft.html https://www.nytimes.com/1994/06/11/obituaries/mary-gates-64-...
- WalterBright 1y agoThere's little doubt that Ms Gates suggested that IBM look into Bill Gates, but I seriously doubt that IBM made the major business decision to contract with Gates because of his mother's suggestion.
- 0xEF 1y agoSo, and correct me if I am wrong, you don't think a little old fashioned nepotism happened like it does in pretty much every major industry?
- WalterBright 1y agoNepotism certainly happens, but companies that practice it rarely thrive. Ms Gates was not associated with IBM.
- acdha 1y agoNone of us know what was said but I have no reason to doubt it based on the reports of his subsequent conversations with lower-level IBM executives. It probably didn’t seem like an especially consequential decision both because neither Gates nor Kildall were especially proven at that time by the standards of a Goliath like IBM and the mainframe guys were notoriously dismissive of PCs (Opel came up through S/360). I’ve seen enough nepotism not to question the plausibility but it’s especially easy to imagine people high up the management ladder at the biggest mainframe manufacturer thinking it didn’t really matter which of the toy computer operating system vendors they picked. I didn’t work in that world then (that was my dad’s generation) but even in the mid-90s when I started working in tech it was not uncommon to find mainframe people who were dismissive of PC or Unix systems as non-serious.