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Bill Gates: AMA on Reddit
- blisterpeanuts 13y agoWhat a strange format. I'm not a regular Reddit visitor so maybe I just don't "get it" but it seems like the top level questions for Gates are pretty intelligent, all questions I'd like to ask him (well, almost all--I don't get the condom one), and the responses to those questions are mostly snide, petty, and stupid.
- Trufa 13y agoI'm a frequent Redditor, and while I find the IAMA subreddits one of the most interesting ones, I'm pretty disappointed by how softball questions they were. Reddit is a great opportunity to be more direct and poignant (always in an educated and intelligent manner). For the people that don't know, the general "consensus" on reddit is that Bill Gates is awesome and Steve Jobs sucked, of course it's oversimplified but you see it around. I for one would have liked to know if now with hindsight, he sees Microsoft's actions in the past over aggressive maybe hindering the progress of open source and stuff like that. I don't want to accuse him of anything, I just would like to know his perspective on some of the controversial topics in which he is involved. I can read in 150 thousand traditional interviews where does he see the future of technology and how exited he is about the cloud.
- crucialfelix 13y agoWhat's the point ? He would give diplomatic answers about events 20 years ago. What would that accomplish ? His energy right now is behind a really great thing and a great inspiration for all of us - to apply ourselves and our geek brains to doing something useful in the world, not just optimizing hip city limo rentals for inflated multiples. So I think these so called soft ball questions are great. They set him up to hit the ball out of the park. Go Bill ! Hit that thing ! Let even the shallow and dull minded hear the message and see that this is what great people do when they have the opportunity. Public opinion is fickle and there is far too much snark and strife. He is going in the right direction so God speed. But I'm not going to start using SQL-server or anything.
- gcb0 13y agoyep. not asking softball question wont gather you the karma. hence why i laugh hard every time people suggest those (this?) sites are even a slight replacement for editorialized news sources.
- 10feet 13y agoYour questions are awful questions. It is much more important to focus on what he is doing now, which is bigger than what he has done in the past. He is actually helping millions of people around the world now, and you want to focus on what he did in business 20-30 years ago. Of course he was over aggressive in his running of Microsoft in the past. Does it matter if he says so? Or does it matter what he does today with his billions?
- dennisgorelik 13y agoThrough Microsoft Gates was helping tens of millions of people (including myself). His charity efforts are small in comparison.
- Tyrannosaurs 13y ago"Microsoft's actions in the past over aggressive maybe hindering the progress of open source and stuff like that" Take your pick from: 1) Why do you think Bill Gates cares about open source given that he made his fortune from closed source software? 2) Sure it hindered the progress of open source, that was the whole point, open source was a potentially significant competitor to the corporation Bill Gates was running and he'd have been negligent in his role as CEO if he'd not looked to undermine and damage it at any opportunity. You may not like those positions or agree with them but it would be somewhat odd to think that they weren't relatively close to what Bill Gates was thinking at the time and still thinks. Neither of those would be what he'd say of course, he'd almost certainly point out that MS do embrace FOSS far more these days and also that while Windows may have been closed, by becoming a defacto standard for desktop computing it did an enormous amount for standardisation (in a practical, that is what people are actually using, rather than an open standards sense) and spreading computing to the masses. Ultimately it might be an interesting subject, but it's not one you can expect to get an honest answer on. Even if he weren't involved in MS day to day and a major shareholder still, he's very unlikely to perform an about turn that says "I was basically wrong about my entire career".
- chippy 13y ago>I'm pretty disappointed by how softball questions they were This is not the way to look at it. The answered questions were just that: answered. More hardball questions were ignored by the VIP. The VIP chooses which questions to ask. In short reddit IAMAs are basically free marketing exercises masquerading behind some kind of idea of "we did it, reddit" - that the audience has some kind of power. It doesn't, it's basically a false idea.
- ghost_IV 13y agoTrue. It is almost a public gimmick now. :(
- k-mcgrady 13y ago>> "snide, petty, and stupid" That's like the elevator pitch for Reddit comments. It really just depends on what you find humorous I guess.
- shas3 13y agoA few minutes ago, the top voted questions were about whether he uses Internet Explorer, Bing, etc. It is a bit disappointing to see such inane questions getting upvoted to visibility. All I can think of about that commenter is: You have one question to ask one of the greatest businessmen and philanthropists of our time, and all you can think of is some re-hashed 10 year old joke? I think in general, r/all is pretty stupid. However, many other subject-specific sub-reddits are awesome!
- patrickk 13y agoI find it depends on the subreddit. It's like HN, if there's a consistent effort at civility and on-topic discussion in a particular community, then it can be ok. All of the default subreddits are a disaster for discussion, some of the smaller niche ones are ok.
- sevia 13y agoIt's a consequence of the way comments on reddit are structured. The best top-level comment is displayed first, followed immediately by its (lower-quality) child comments, rather than the next-best top-level comment. One learns to simply read the top-level comment, read the response, then minimize it and move on. Reddit is a large community, and the average post quality reflects that.
- visarga 13y agoOn such an important AMA, a mod should be able to cut off some of the child comments (just hide them under the [-] button), especially on the top answer. It would be like a haircut on a tree of comments, but it would look better than ruffled.
- pilom 13y agoThe condom one is because the Gates Foundation held a competition [1] to redesign the condom to make condom use more prevalent in Africa (hopefully to help prevent the spread of HIV) [1] - http://www.grandchallenges.org/Explorations/Topics/Pages/NextGenerationCondomRound11.aspx http://www.grandchallenges.org/Explorations/Topics/Pages/Nex...
- Splendor 13y agoI'm glad to see him doing another AMA. His AMA last year was one of the better ones I've read.
- CmonDev 13y agoThere are always thousands of questions by the time you get there. Do his assistants check everyone of them and summarize?
- jedberg 13y agoI've done an AMA that was pretty popular, it's not that hard to keep up actually. You start with the top voted comment, reply, go to the next, etc. Then you reload the page and do it again. It helps if you have gold because then you can highlight the stuff that is new since you last loaded the page, which helps you find the questions faster. The trick for the user is to have a good enough question to get it voted to the top.
- tehwebguy 13y agoAlways wondered how that worked for the person answering
- phit_ 13y agoalternative to having gold is this chrome addon https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/reddit-new-comments-highl/ajdilinnnkbmpoegibgacadjlblmpjad https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/reddit-new-comment...
- CmonDev 13y agoOn the other hand it's not called 'I will answer anything' unfortunately. People are generally nice so a lot of 'comfortable' questions get a lot of votes rather than questions that could be seen as provocative.
- kyle_t 13y agoI am curious what Bill Gates (or anyone who doesn't necessarily have an immediate profit making venture to promote i.e an actor) hopes to achieve with an AMA? I can't imagine they are very much fun after the first dozen questions. Promoting philanthropy to a wider audience? Bringing the spotlight on a specific cause? Its awesome that someone as busy and important as Bill Gates is willing to take the time to do this whatever his reasons, I'm just wondering the reason why?
- jedberg 13y agoI always enjoyed doing it to share my thoughts with the community, since they seemed interested. It's kinda like, why do you talk to people at parties when you have no immediate profit making venture to push? Because it's fun. It's also a great way to stay connected with your base, even for someone like Bill, who is still trying to accomplish things that are easier with broad support.
- a1a 13y agoHis foundation makes a big "profit" by getting rid of these [1] myths. By "profit" I mean lives saved and/or enhanced. What better way of getting rid of myths than publicity? [1] http://annualletter.gatesfoundation.org/ http://annualletter.gatesfoundation.org/
- adamnemecek 13y agoOn the other hand, don't you feel like it's basically advertising if they do have something to promote?
- michaelt 13y agoDid you hope to achieve much personal gain from making this post here on HN?
- benbou09 13y agoOn the other hand, he also does his own dishes
- lmm 13y ago
- Aoyagi 13y agoNot having a Reddit account, this makes me want to create one and ask Gates if he's going to protect us from the power of the cloud. By "us" I mean "people who don't really trust the cloud".
- jedberg 13y agoIt takes like 2 seconds to make one. You don't even have to give them an email address! :)
- Aoyagi 13y agoBut I would lose my status of a social outcast if I used service as popular as Reddit :)
- sliverstorm 13y agoBut no one would ever know, unless you told them or gave yourself away in your comment.
- skeletonjelly 13y agoMake sure to use jedberg's referral code when you sign up!
- dublinben 13y agoIf he answers your question, it would probably be "no."
- rokhayakebe 13y agoI have one I use five times per year. Today, I cannot login.
- alayne 13y agoThe foundation is primarily working on health issues among the poor.
- throwaway_yy2Di 13y agoIs this his library in the background? http://i.imgur.com/iqvPs7N.jpg http://i.imgur.com/iqvPs7N.jpg edit: Apparently so, and here's his reading recommendations from 2013 (w/ same library in background): http://www.thegatesnotes.com/Personal/Best-Books-2013 http://www.thegatesnotes.com/Personal/Best-Books-2013 and more: http://www.thegatesnotes.com/Books http://www.thegatesnotes.com/Books <- lots of reviews here
- frik 13y agoa lot of science books (chemistry, weather, etc), but no MSPress book and no computer literature?
- throwaway_yy2Di 13y agoI assume it's only a tiny slice of his library. Inferring from the fact he's the world's richest geek, and that he's spent $30 million on a set of da Vinci papers, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codex_Leicester https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codex_Leicester
- sevia 13y agoFor ending poverty on a global scale, wouldn't weather and chemistry seem like a decent place to start? Consider immunobiology and agriculture. Also: I know it's a cheap shot, but I had a good laugh when I saw a book called "The Blue Death" on his shelf.
- pmelendez 13y agoAm I the only one who noticed the Weather for dummies? I wonder why he was interested on it.
- frik 13y agoHe added an link to a Youtube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZnmpDrjtDc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZnmpDrjtDc Interesting art style and that his assistants choose an old-school method to animate the movie. That gives the "information at your fingertip" a new meaning ;)
- pmelendez 13y agoAnother one? Wow.. he must like reddit a lot.
- richardlblair 13y agoLooking at his history, it seems he does. Did you see the girl who got her gift from Bill? http://redditgifts.com/gallery/gift/spoiler-alert-bill-gates-did-not-get-you/ http://redditgifts.com/gallery/gift/spoiler-alert-bill-gates...
- Arjuna 13y agoFor those that aren't aware, check out the "/r/tabled" subreddit [1]. From the official description: "a subreddit for tables of recent threads from places such as... /r/IAmA, /r/InternetAMA, /r/AMA, /r/AskReddit, /r/AskScience" It makes things nice to read. Of course, Bill Gates' new AMA will not be "tabled" yet, but as an example (and in case you missed it), here is his AMA from February 2013 [2]. [1] http://www.reddit.com/r/tabled http://www.reddit.com/r/tabled [2] http://www.reddit.com/r/tabled/comments/18d2n6 http://www.reddit.com/r/tabled/comments/18d2n6
- Spittie 13y agoCheck out http://topiama.com http://topiama.com (It was posted here some time ago, I have no connection with that site), I find it has a very nice interface. Like r/tabled, his new iAmA it's not here, but to give the same example, here's his old one: http://www.topiama.com/r/911/im-bill-gates-cochair-of-the-bill-melinda-gates http://www.topiama.com/r/911/im-bill-gates-cochair-of-the-bi...
- dmunoz 13y agoThanks for the reminder about topiama. I knew something like this existed, but forgot where. I was thinking recently about writing my own as a quick pet project. Still might, just for fun. It's actually a bit surprising to me that reddit themselves have not written an IAMA question-answer view. Celebrity AMAs have become a pretty big draw for reddit, but browsing them from the default view sucks. Perhaps they view it like they do the mobile clients (the community does them better), but it would be nice to have something native to reddit for this behaviour.
- joshschreuder 13y agoIt makes a pretty good RSS feed, even if I do skip the majority of them.
- xpose2000 13y agoI appreciate the link! I created topiama and posted it on hackernews almost 2 years ago. As a fellow user of topiama... I am a bit annoyed at how it looks on mobile. What I plan to do is use bootstrap to make a nice responsive layout for all devices. Stay tuned. Probably Spring/Summer.
- kosei 13y agoNot gonna lie - seeing an interaction between David Hewlett and Bill Gates on a reddit AMA pretty much made my day.
- pavanky 13y agolink ? EDIT: NVM (http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1xj56q/hello_reddit_im_bill_gates_cochair_of_the_bill/cfbspdi http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1xj56q/hello_reddit_im...)
- mrmondo 13y agoTimely, given all the bad Microsoft press yesterday stemming from Paul Thurrott's public disapproval of Windows.
- skeletonjelly 13y agoJudging by the official photo of the alien suit in Gates' office, I don't think this was planned on a whim.
- GFischer 13y agoI hadn't read that, thanks for pointing it up. Was it discussed here on HN? Found the original link: http://winsupersite.com/windows-8/what-heck-happening-windows http://winsupersite.com/windows-8/what-heck-happening-window... I don't think Bill timed it on purpose :) and it won't change most people's perception of the latest Windows (I hate it too, and respect Bill Gates a lot).
- interstitial 13y agoThey are always AMAIWAAIC anyway. (Ask me anything, I will answer as I choose). If there were pre-voted by community questions, and rules requiring answers by the AMAer, now that would be interesting.
- Jemaclus 13y agoWell, it IS called AMA (Ask Me Anything) and not IAA (I'll Answer Anything).... You can ask all you want, you just might not get an answer!
- theinterjection 13y agoWait, he did one less than a year ago. What an attention whore!
- um304 13y agoanonymouslives: "What is your best personal financial advice for people who make under $100,000 per year?", thisisbillgates: "Invest in your education.". Trying to digest this bit when dropping-off to do startups is in fashion.
- jleader 13y agoNote that he didn't say "go to school". If you don't know much about startups, dropping out to do one (as Gates did) might be considered an investment in your education. So might reading widely, or taking online courses, or of course paying a lot of money to attend a 4-year university.
- Aldo_MX 13y agoNote that he didn't say "go to school". Quoted for Emphasis.
- dragontamer 13y agoQuote from Reddit: "I feel like he is probably one of the least qualified people to answer this question. When was the last time Bill Gates made less than $100,000 per year?" Bill Gate's Response: "I never went for a big salary but your basic point is correct." Indeed, this probably isn't the best question to ask Bill Gates.
- trollingineer 13y agoA) Reddit = HackerNews + actually being cool B) % of virgins on Reddit = % of virgins on HackerNews C) QED
- m_ke 13y agoDid he really just say that deep learning started at Microsoft?
- jhartmann 13y agoI saw that and maybe its stretching it a little bit, but I know Patrice Simard was involved in this sort of research relatively early (he started at Microsoft in 99, and worked at Bell Labs before.) I would not be surprised if there were some other people there that were doing this sort of research even earlier. There is actually some very high quality ground breaking research that comes out of Microsoft, they just have had problems making it into products traditionally.
- seanmcdirmid 13y agoHinton is where it really starts of course, but a lot of our researchers were involved in making it practical (e.g. train quickly on GPUs).
- nl 13y agoTIL Hinton's great great grandfather is George Boole (inventor of Boolean logic).
- ntnj 13y agoWithin an hour, he reached all time top 5 IAmA. His previous one is at no. 2, after Obama.
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- kevinalexbrown 13y agoYou can tell it's him by the succinct and direct responses. It's a trait that's consistent across the most successful people I know.
- skeletonjelly 13y agoIn my opinion it's the other way around. Because they're successful, they're busy, they're proven with the tongue, they have to be succinct and direct.
- richforrester 13y agoI'd rather think it's a personality trait. Even someone who's not busy, or successful, can come across as direct and succinct.
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- kmfrk 13y agoOne reason is that people have a vested interest in taking your words out of context and do a big non-story on your remarks.
- kevinalexbrown 13y agoThat's true, but the responses seem to be specific and tangible, rather than vague, which is what I might expect from someone worried about being taken out of context.
- Consultant32452 13y agoIf I were anywhere near being the richest guy on the planet I would have a hard time caring whether or not I was taken out of context. In fact, I'd probably just say all sorts of awful stuff that people would find shocking. That's probably one of the many reasons I'm not one of the richest guys on the planet.
- kimonos 13y agoI would like to ask him: What can you do to help the poor especially those that are in the 3rd world countries?
- yen223 13y agoRunning a huge charity foundation seems to be a good start.
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- anonu 13y agoIm not sure why Bill Gates decided to do this a 2nd time. Just reading people's inane, nonsensical, idiotic comments makes me think there's got to be a better forum to host something like that...
- iambateman 13y agoI like Bill Gates. He seems like a kind, genuine guy who cares about people and doesn't mind making fun of himself. Big contrast from Bezos, Jobs, Ballmer.
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- 13hours 13y agoHe kinda reminds me of Woz in that way. Except Woz was never seen as evil, and Bill had an evil image for a while there in the 90s and early 2000s.
- n09n 13y agoThat's overly generous. Gates didn't just have an evil image for a while, he was evil for a while. It happens to the best of us.
- Consultant32452 13y agoIn his AMA he contrasts his younger self from other young billionaires and millionaires by stating that they are often much more interested in "giving back" than he was until he was much older. He was a ruthless man who cared only for himself in his younger days and that led to some rather unethical business practices. It wasn't until much later that he chilled out and learned some compassion for the rest of the world.
- TeMPOraL 13y agohttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynQ5ZhxYAss http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynQ5ZhxYAss <-- in this video (linked by Gates in AMA), there's a moment in which there's a book shown, with "Dell #1 in laptops" written on the back cover. Had a good laugh, given the whole Dell speakers thing from yesterday.
- ck2 13y agoThis was hilarious. There were years I was worried but he turned out to be great for humanity.
- donniezazen 13y agoThe part that resonated with how I feel everyone should live this tiny universe. Just creating an innovative company is a huge contribution to the world. World would be a much better place if we just go about minding our own business making our own lives easier and not interfering in other people's business.
- userbinator 13y agoDoes anyone know if someone has asked him about the infamous 640K quote?
- rbanffy 13y agoNo need to: https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Bill_Gates#Misattributed https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Bill_Gates#Misattributed
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