4 ms·

"You're ripping us off!", Steve shouted, raising his voice even higher. "I trusted you, and now you're stealing from us!" But Bill Gates just stood there cooll

by jfb 12y ago

"You're ripping us off!", Steve shouted, raising his voice even higher. "I trusted you, and now you're stealing from us!" But Bill Gates just stood there coolly, looking Steve directly in the eye, before starting to speak in his squeaky voice. "Well, Steve, I think there's more than one way of looking at it. I think it's more like we both had this rich neighbor named Xerox and I broke into his house to steal the TV set and found out that you had already stolen it." http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=A_Rich_Neighbor_Named_Xerox.txt http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=A_Rich_Neighbor_N...

Aloha 12y ago
a great quote, but not quite right.. The Alto UI was revolutionary for its time, but it was not the same as the Macintosh UI, no overlapping windows for example, regions in quickdraw being the big differentiator. http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=I_Still_Remember_Regions.txt http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=I_Still_Remember_...
- jfb 12y ago
  I love the Herzfeld version because of how Gates is portrayed, really.
- yarrel 12y ago
  The Apple team added overlapping windows because they misunderstood what they'd seen at PARC. (Source: Insanely Great, iirc.) QuickDraw was completely awesome, whatever its inspiration.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
nemo 12y ago
The key difference is that Apple gave Xerox $1 million in shares as a payment for them to demo the Alto to Apple engineers with the understanding that they'd implement the ideas in Lisa/Mac.
- kahirsch 12y ago
  Apple didn't give Xerox $1 million in shares, they gave Xerox the opportunity to buy $1 million in stock, which Xerox did.[1] There was no agreement that Apple was allowed to use the technology. Ten years later, Xerox tried unsuccessfully to sue Apple.[2] Microsoft did pay Apple for the rights to use Macintosh-style interfaces in Xerox but there were disagreements as to whether it covered later versions of Windows. Apple tried to claim extremely broad protection for the "look and feel" of a program covered by 95-year copyright! Those claims would have been terrible for the software industry if upheld, not just in this particular case, but many others. [1] http://books.google.com/books?id=mXnw5tM8QRwC&pg=PA75&dq=%22xerox+signed%22 http://books.google.com/books?id=mXnw5tM8QRwC&pg=PA75&dq=%22... [2] http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/15/business/company-news-xerox-sues-apple-computer-over-macintosh-copyright.html http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/15/business/company-news-xero...
  - nemo 12y ago
    >Apple didn't give Xerox $1 million in shares, they gave Xerox the opportunity to buy $1 million in stock, which Xerox did. Well, yeah, it was an offer of 100,000 shares of pre-IPO stock for $1 million that wound up being worth $16 million. >There was no agreement that Apple was allowed to use the technology. Right, they agreed to give a demo of their tech. Apple didn't use their technology, they saw ideas and created their own unique implementation that went far beyond the Star interface (and they hired some PARC employees). Xerox wasn't given what amounted to $16 million to visit the cafeteria, they knew what they were doing. After Xerox got a new CEO they filed their suit as a followup to exploit Apple's suit against MS in case they won. >Microsoft did pay Apple for the rights to use Macintosh-style interfaces MS paid Apple for some rights (with the license really tied to giving MS early access to develop apps for the Mac), and Apple filed suit over the MS implementation since they interpreted the license as limited, while MS exploited it as unlimited and Apple screwed up the dating in the agreement expecting an earlier ship date. MS completely screwed Apple in that deal. The eventual suit Apple filed was what triggered Xerox to file suit. >Those claims would have been terrible for the software industry if upheld, not just in this particular case, but many others. Yes, it's a good thing those claims weren't upheld. Though, had MS not pulled their Machiavellian stunt the suit wouldn't have been filed in the first place.
failed_ideas 12y ago
Steve went to the neighbours and paid to use the TV, Gates came and took it. If you were a developer in the 90's, Gates is still more evil than Jobs ever was, and philanthropy years later doesn't wash away the sins. Ruthless, but with enough money, it appears you can make people forget.
- fpgaminer 12y ago
  > philanthropy years later doesn't wash away the sins. You could argue that they do, in the sense that stealing software/design isn't particular "evil", while Gates' recent philanthropic efforts are most certainly "good". I'm not saying what Gates did back then was right, but it really only led to damage localized to an industry; it didn't endanger people's lives or destroy culture. As a counter example, I'd call the RIAA/MPAA evil, in that they promote copyright extension and censorship, both of which directly damage culture. Back to the argument, improving the quality of life for millions of people is something I put squarely in the "good" category. In other words, Gates' previous actions didn't harm the quality of life for anyone, but his recent actions improve quality of life. So I call that "washing away the sins." But please don't take that argument too seriously, because I don't. Its myopic and doesn't take into consideration the other, worse, things that Microsoft has done (that actually harmed people's quality of life). And really, quantifying these things is quite difficult. I'm just presenting an alternative viewpoint.
  - pixl97 12y ago
    >in the sense that stealing software/design isn't particular "evil", Stealing ideas may not be that evil. Stealing ideas, then rabidly attacking anyone who attempts to copy you does seem more evil.
  - Decade 12y ago
    > Gates' previous actions didn't harm the quality of life for anyone Disputable. Getting people to use pre-XP Windows, and also strong-arming the PC manufacturers into not bundling other operating systems such as BeOS, definitely count as harm to me.
- 12y ago

by jfb 12y ago

Aloha 12y ago

a great quote, but not quite right.. The Alto UI was revolutionary for its time, but it was not the same as the Macintosh UI, no overlapping windows for example, regions in quickdraw being the big differentiator. http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=I_Still_Remember_Regions.txt http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=I_Still_Remember_...

jfb 12y ago
I love the Herzfeld version because of how Gates is portrayed, really.
yarrel 12y ago
The Apple team added overlapping windows because they misunderstood what they'd seen at PARC. (Source: Insanely Great, iirc.) QuickDraw was completely awesome, whatever its inspiration.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

nemo 12y ago

The key difference is that Apple gave Xerox $1 million in shares as a payment for them to demo the Alto to Apple engineers with the understanding that they'd implement the ideas in Lisa/Mac.

kahirsch 12y ago
Apple didn't give Xerox $1 million in shares, they gave Xerox the opportunity to buy $1 million in stock, which Xerox did.[1] There was no agreement that Apple was allowed to use the technology. Ten years later, Xerox tried unsuccessfully to sue Apple.[2] Microsoft did pay Apple for the rights to use Macintosh-style interfaces in Xerox but there were disagreements as to whether it covered later versions of Windows. Apple tried to claim extremely broad protection for the "look and feel" of a program covered by 95-year copyright! Those claims would have been terrible for the software industry if upheld, not just in this particular case, but many others. [1] http://books.google.com/books?id=mXnw5tM8QRwC&pg=PA75&dq=%22xerox+signed%22 http://books.google.com/books?id=mXnw5tM8QRwC&pg=PA75&dq=%22... [2] http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/15/business/company-news-xerox-sues-apple-computer-over-macintosh-copyright.html http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/15/business/company-news-xero...
- nemo 12y ago
  >Apple didn't give Xerox $1 million in shares, they gave Xerox the opportunity to buy $1 million in stock, which Xerox did. Well, yeah, it was an offer of 100,000 shares of pre-IPO stock for $1 million that wound up being worth $16 million. >There was no agreement that Apple was allowed to use the technology. Right, they agreed to give a demo of their tech. Apple didn't use their technology, they saw ideas and created their own unique implementation that went far beyond the Star interface (and they hired some PARC employees). Xerox wasn't given what amounted to $16 million to visit the cafeteria, they knew what they were doing. After Xerox got a new CEO they filed their suit as a followup to exploit Apple's suit against MS in case they won. >Microsoft did pay Apple for the rights to use Macintosh-style interfaces MS paid Apple for some rights (with the license really tied to giving MS early access to develop apps for the Mac), and Apple filed suit over the MS implementation since they interpreted the license as limited, while MS exploited it as unlimited and Apple screwed up the dating in the agreement expecting an earlier ship date. MS completely screwed Apple in that deal. The eventual suit Apple filed was what triggered Xerox to file suit. >Those claims would have been terrible for the software industry if upheld, not just in this particular case, but many others. Yes, it's a good thing those claims weren't upheld. Though, had MS not pulled their Machiavellian stunt the suit wouldn't have been filed in the first place.

failed_ideas 12y ago

Steve went to the neighbours and paid to use the TV, Gates came and took it. If you were a developer in the 90's, Gates is still more evil than Jobs ever was, and philanthropy years later doesn't wash away the sins. Ruthless, but with enough money, it appears you can make people forget.

fpgaminer 12y ago
> philanthropy years later doesn't wash away the sins. You could argue that they do, in the sense that stealing software/design isn't particular "evil", while Gates' recent philanthropic efforts are most certainly "good". I'm not saying what Gates did back then was right, but it really only led to damage localized to an industry; it didn't endanger people's lives or destroy culture. As a counter example, I'd call the RIAA/MPAA evil, in that they promote copyright extension and censorship, both of which directly damage culture. Back to the argument, improving the quality of life for millions of people is something I put squarely in the "good" category. In other words, Gates' previous actions didn't harm the quality of life for anyone, but his recent actions improve quality of life. So I call that "washing away the sins." But please don't take that argument too seriously, because I don't. Its myopic and doesn't take into consideration the other, worse, things that Microsoft has done (that actually harmed people's quality of life). And really, quantifying these things is quite difficult. I'm just presenting an alternative viewpoint.
- pixl97 12y ago
  >in the sense that stealing software/design isn't particular "evil", Stealing ideas may not be that evil. Stealing ideas, then rabidly attacking anyone who attempts to copy you does seem more evil.
- Decade 12y ago
  > Gates' previous actions didn't harm the quality of life for anyone Disputable. Getting people to use pre-XP Windows, and also strong-arming the PC manufacturers into not bundling other operating systems such as BeOS, definitely count as harm to me.
12y ago