
Bill Gates: He eats Big Macs for lunch and schedules every minute of his day - bilifuduo
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/men/thinking-man/bill-gates-he-eats-big-macs-for-lunch-and-schedules-every-minute/
======
askafriend
Yeah honestly if it came down to this kind of to-the-second-planned lifestyle,
just kill me now and get it over with. You can keep the money.

This is just me personally though. I'm sure Gates is used to it, and probably
enjoys it. But it's certainly nothing that I would want to aspire to.

I'm reminded of the sentiment: "You have your place, and it's not more
exalted, relevant, profitable, or contributing to the general advancement of
humankind than that of a pretty good salesman possibly selling a decent
product. Or that of a pretty decent java developer, or a decent graphics
designer."

But I still admire parts of his approach to life and I think he's done some
pretty cool stuff. The world is a beautiful place filled with many beautiful
people, who are not heroes and can never be heroes...but can be wonderful
human beings (which comes with all the faults of being human).

Ok let me stop talking before I go off on 20 other tangents. I haven't had my
morning coffee yet.

~~~
hackermailman
Most successful people have a schedule planning out their days
[https://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/oct/08/daily-
rituals-...](https://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/oct/08/daily-rituals-
mason-currey-review)

Your productivity skyrockets and it becomes automatic after a few weeks. I
started by just getting up early and scheduling my mornings to finish
technical books like CS:APP and it worked so well I now schedule my work week
as much as possible [http://calnewport.com/blog/2015/09/29/deep-habits-three-
rece...](http://calnewport.com/blog/2015/09/29/deep-habits-three-recent-daily-
plans/)

~~~
unicornporn
> Most successful people have a schedule planning out their days

Successful at what exactly? Enjoying life, earning money or something else?

~~~
ak39
Really there's only one definition of success: Getting shit you want done.

~~~
coldtea
Well, lots of succesful artists get "shit they want done", in that they leave
a great body of work/legacy, and yet their days are nothing like micro-
managed...

~~~
hackermailman
Mason Currey's book is full of examples of artists that micro managed their
time like Mozart and Kafka's strict schedules

[https://podio.com/site/creative-routines](https://podio.com/site/creative-
routines)

~~~
CuriouslyC
In science, major breakthroughs don't usually come from strained application
of rational thinking, they come from spontaneous intuitive leaps. These leaps
occur more readily when the mind is in a relaxed state free from worry and
distractions, where you can just let your thoughts wander.

~~~
hilop
And that relaxed state comes from externalizing your process into structure
and routine, so your mind can focus on high thinking and not juggling all your
cluttered concerns

------
rdlecler1
A few months ago some people from Bill's team contacted us about a demo day
that they personally give Bill every 4-6 weeks. This particular topic was on
Agtech. They said they spend about 400-500 hours researching each market and
preparing a 2-hour closed door demo day for Bill and a few of his advisors.
For a particular topic they said they research the market and narrow it down
to six or seven companies. They ask each company for a bunch of information
and then his team gives Bill a 5-10 minute demo of each company followed by a
question period.

This is probably just one of many examples how Bill is able to acquire
information at such a higher rate than most of us. Quite literally he's
probably spending over a million dollars a month on education. For the rest of
us, we just have to read HackerNews :)

~~~
shostack
Are there any affordable services that do something similar for the rest of
us? I'd love learning from someone who could give me a bird's eye view of
industries, key players, challenges, etc. with the data and demos to back it
up.

~~~
hilop
Why would they be affordable? That is incredibly valuable information.

------
thematt
I'm sure having a McDonald's Gold Card helps:
[https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/shortcuts/2015/nov/...](https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/shortcuts/2015/nov/17/free-
big-macs-for-life-billionaire-rob-lowe-mcdonalds-gold-card)

~~~
nostromo
These free perks are technically income. It seems like a billionaire would
prefer to just pay for the food out of pocket rather than worry about the
accounting overhead of declaring gifts on their income tax.

~~~
VLM
Keep your intake below $38/day to stay under the annual exclusion and it
should be OK.

[https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-
employe...](https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-
employed/frequently-asked-questions-on-gift-taxes)

~~~
WalterSear
I'm going to assume that you are a billionaire, wise about tax paperwork.
Possibly Buffett.

------
willvarfar
oh I wish _this_ millionaire stood as an independent presidential candidate!

He has demonstrated himself wise, kind, well meaning and uncorruptable.

I well remember how Microsoft was evil and Gates was the devil and we all
loved to hate this success.

But applying himself to philanthropy he has demonstrated his intellectual
integrity and genuine goodness.

~~~
nugget
Keep in mind that the media can demonize anyone and turn any hero into a
villain. If Bill Gates ran for national office you'd soon hear stories about
how he is an evil monopolist who used Microsoft to enrich himself at the
expense of hundreds of small, independently owned software companies, who were
crushed in the 80s and early 90s, with thousands of unfortunate people out of
work as a result. Etc. Etc. Not to mention whatever skeletons would fall out
of his (or anyone's) personal closet. (Personally I am a fan of Gates' life
and career and do think he'd serve competently in almost any position he
occupied; just using this example to make a point.)

~~~
didibus
But all candidates get demonized, and then you choose between the least of
both evils. In practice, it results in a similar outcome. Media could paint
all candidates as the greatest hero, and you'd pick the bigger Saint of them
all.

One style is the complement of the other, so I don't think you make a good
point.

~~~
p333347
> But all candidates get demonized, and then you choose between the least of
> both evils. In practice, it results in a similar outcome. Media could paint
> all candidates as the greatest hero, and you'd pick the bigger Saint of them
> all.

> One style is the complement of the other, so I don't think you make a good
> point.

I am not a psychology student or a professional and I am unaware if studies
have been done on the topic. Also, I am speaking in general, not just with
respect to the US elections.

I disagree. Demonizing and providing the option to select the lesser evil is
much more effective psychologically than saintifying and providing the option
to choose the better saint. It is reasonable to expect people to be extra
cautions in choosing the lesser evil as it troubles their morality if they
wrongly choose the bigger evil. In the latter case however, people could
afford to be more complacent, and could even fail to perceive any difference
at all. And we can all see that demonizing is never done equally, some parties
get targeted more than others, for whatever reasons, So it seems one could
steer the result by choosing to demonize. I don't think or know that this is
intentionally used as a strategy (by whom?) but if it were its clever.

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stefap2
I wonder if his schedule included 3 hours of YC news and random internet
reading.

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conception
When every minute is probably like $10k+ in "cost", I can see why you'd
schedule every minute.

~~~
WalterSear
How much is a minute of your life worth to you?

~~~
paulddraper
Much less than that.

What I do with a minute of my time will make virtually no difference to me or
anyone else.

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vit05
I remember a similar interview, years ago when he was still at Microsoft. He
had 3 monitors, one was exclusive to e-mails and meetings every hour.

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awqrre
Does he order his big macs some special way so that the buns don't slide?

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Joof
He does seem to have an effective charity organization. There is a big focus
on high-impact problems that other organizations just don't have.

------
Frogolocalypse
Paywall for me.

