
Good News You Might Have Missed in 2013 - ohjeez
http://www.thegatesnotes.com/Personal/Year-in-Review-2013
======
tn13
As people in Tech industry we should be very proud of Bill Gates and what he
has done with Microsoft and his charity work.

A lot of people totally miss the point when they say "hey anybody could do all
that if they have enough money". That is simply not true. Charity is not just
about throwing money at poor, it is a far more difficult job than say building
a company. Working for profit is simpler where clear regulations, contracts
are in place and a government which has an interest in making businesses work.

Charity is a different ball game, I remember I was in Pune-India when Bill
Gates quietly flew there in his private jet sneaked into local red light area
to meet the health workers and monitor the progress. No one knew about his
visit, when media reached there his private security somehow managed to make
him disappear. He had a review meeting with health workers and key government
people, and then simply flew out. He does this in all the countries where no
sane minded Billionaire would set a foot.

Throwing money and feeling good is simple. Achieving results is very
difficult. Pune's red light area has benefited immensely by his efforts. There
are at least 3 NGOs who have successfully managed to reduce AIDs and help the
children of prostitutes rehabilitate in better professions. Over last 10
years, the sex workers in this area have reduced.

Bill Gates is actually very stingy when it comes to money. You cant simply
setup a NGO in red light area and get funding from him. The whole process by
which he chooses whom to help is the real USP of his work. That is something
takes a lifetime to build and he has done it well.

~~~
shutupalready
> Over last 10 years, the sex workers in this area have reduced.

Hardly anyone wants to ask if that is an overall benefit to society?

The sex ratio for India is 108 men per 100 women [1]. For those under 15, the
ratio is 113:100, so the problem is set to get much worse in the near future.

If India (pop. 1.2 billion) were to have maximal monogamous relationships and
no sex workers, you'd have 577 million happy couples, and 46 million men left
over who have no chance of any sexual intimacy.

EDIT: Condoms, contraception, and safe sex are obviously good things. My
comment is whether eliminating sex work should be the goal. If that's the
goal, then please answer the following question: Should men who don't have or
can't find a normal relationship be forever denied occasional intimacy?

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_sex_ratio](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_sex_ratio)

~~~
kamaal
The ratio is actually far worse! A lot of 'adjustments' go on during census
times. The net ratio is close to (<850 women) per (1000 men). You are right in
pointing out that its going to get a way more worse very soon.

The main reason for that is dowry and extremely bad treatment meted to women
in India. Most people prefer to not have girls at all given these scenarios.
Imagine having to spend money on your daughters education, tending to physical
safety and then only to find the boy's family asking for big money gifts
during marriage. And not just that, in most common cases the demand for gifts
just keep coming infinitely even after marriage. The demands are insane of
course- Asking for large quantities of gold, real estate, or just plain hard
cash, cars combined with a demand for lavishly marriage party are a common
place here in India.

Some people have absolutely no shame and sense of self esteem and resolve
themselves to this kind of begging to get money. This includes people from all
over India, regardless of caste, religion, color, regional, linguistic
belongings.

This whole thing promotes a culture for a madness to have male children.

I am assuming marriage among people of same gender especially men is going to
be a common place in India only a couple of decades from now.

>> Should men who don't have or can't find a normal relationship

Such men should actively work towards a society that doesn't kill girls before
birth and after wards. If they can't may be they should suffer and live in the
society they built.

~~~
wmkn
> The net ratio is close to (<850 women) per (1000 men)...Most people prefer
> to not have girls at all given these scenarios. Imagine having to spend
> money on your daughters education, tending to physical safety and then only
> to find the boy's family asking for big money gifts during marriage.

With a shortage of women, shouldn't the groom's parents be paying instead?

~~~
kamaal
Having the ability to kill somebody before they were born is a recent medical
advancement. Before that you had to simply accept what ever was born to you.

Dowry system has been going on India since ancient times. The system works
like this. By and large Indian society still works in a system where your
parents choose your spouse. So when a boy is of marriageable age, their
parents go a matchmaker- and put forward their clauses. There are some typical
things they look in a girl, The girl must be fair, beautiful, not taller than
the boy, shy, and obedient. She must not be too intelligent, or bold or
sometimes not working or well educated.

Apart from these behavior and cosmetic demands. They also put down financial
clauses- Generally the demand is in gold, or real estate. Or a car, Or just
hard cash. The demands for gifts never really ceases. Women are harassed, many
women set themselves on fire unable to bear the torture and harassment. Dowry
deaths are common and you will often hear of them in the news papers. In many
cases women commit suicide, or worse there are cases where the mother in law
burns the girl alive. As much as shocking to you all this may seem, it happens
all the time here.

This has been happening since a long time. There are trends of these demands.
If the boy is a doctor/Civil Servant the money demanded is highest,
engineers/rich business men come next and so on... And this is so common, if
you have to marry off your daughter you have to often pay up!

So you need to undo that much of cultural thing. I don't think it will go away
anytime soon.

~~~
wmkn
I guess the laws of supply and demand do not apply when ancient traditions are
involved.

~~~
avar
They do apply, just because there's fewer women than men doesn't mean they're
on the supply side.

In traditional Indian culture daughters are seen as a deprecating asset that
their parents want to get rid of.

Presumably the bribes dished out to get rid of them are less than their upkeep
would cost if they weren't married off, with some added cost to account for
the social stigma of having an unmarried single daughter.

------
matthewmacleod
I don't really get the canonisation.

I'm very happy the the Gates' foundation is doing good work. You'd be a fool
to say that it wasn't. However, I don't believe that the tech industry should
be proud as a result, nor do I think that there is a particular difference
between the foundation and some other charities, nor do I understand the
obvious astroturfing.

I especially don't think that the act of charity somehow excuses the dodgy
business practices or Microsoft or the long-term damage done to the tech
industry.

So we should be grateful that the Gates' money is being used to positive ends.
But that certainly doesn't make Bill a saint, and I suspect that this
hyperbole and short-term memory-ism can fuel the backlash.

~~~
Houshalter
>I especially don't think that the act of charity somehow excuses the dodgy
business practices or Microsoft or the long-term damage done to the tech
industry.

How much damage do you think that is? You don't think all the lives saved have
"made up" for that? You don't think the world is better off than it would
otherwise be without Bill Gates?

~~~
matthewmacleod
No, because I don't think that positive or good acts can somehow "cancel out"
(or as you say, "make up for") bad or negative ones. Karma is not a concrete
concept, and the question "is the world better off" is objectively
unanswerable.

~~~
bmelton
Hate the man's business practices. Love the man for his philanthropical work.
They don't need to cancel out, and you don't need to forgive one to appreciate
the other.

Michael Vick was put in prison for dog fighting. I absolutely hate him for
that. At the same time, I appreciate his talent on the field as a football
player.

Orson Scott Card is a rampant homophobe. I absolutely hate him for that.
Doesn't affect my opinion of his novels though, not in the least.

There's no logic in idolizing or demonizing anyone. Life's a lot better when
you get out of casting a pall over everything a person does by some other
things that they've done. People like making villains and heroes of people,
whether or not they deserve it.

We see someone we don't like from afar, and it's easy to assume that they're
bad at everything, that they're horrible people, that they're bad parents,
that they're likely running around kicking puppies all day long. That's very
rarely the truth.

With people we're nearer too, it's easier to accept that they have strengths
and weaknesses, and I don't know why it's hard to imagine the same thing of
famous people, but it is. There's very little to love about Bill Gates, CEO of
Microsoft. Similarly, there's very little to hate about Bill Gates of the Bill
and Melinda Gates Foundation. Roll with it.

~~~
rbanffy
> Hate the man's business practices. Love the man for his philanthropical work

At the core of this is trust. Bill lost mine at Microsoft's helm - he has
shown a borderline sociopath that will stop at nothing and will destroy anyone
on his path.

To give this much credit to someone with such dark history is appallingly
naive.

~~~
anigbrowl
'Dark history'? Aggressive business practices for sure, but it's not like he
was dumping toxic chemicals in the water supply or something. How many people
were killed as a result of Gates 'sociopathy'? I'm afraid that slowing the
popularity of Linux and the open web doesn't strike me as particularly
impressive in the Evil Genius stakes.

~~~
yapcguy
Jimmy Saville, well-known British celebrity with lots of charity work for
kids, now known to be a sick child abuser.

Lance Armstrong, well-known cyclist with lots of charity work fighting cancer,
now known to be a drug cheat.

Can Bill Gates wash away his sins? Has he really turned over a new leaf?

 _" The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation's investments in Monsanto and
Cargill have come under heavy criticism. Is it time for the foundation to come
clean on its visions for agriculture in developing countries?_"

[http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-
matter...](http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty-
matters/2010/sep/29/gates-foundation-gm-monsanto)

~~~
anigbrowl
/facepalm at how many logical fallacies you have squeezed into one short
comment.

------
simbolit
In slightly related news,nobody is talking about the UN Millenium Goals
[1][2]anymore, which are due next year. And it doesn't need a prophet to
predict that we will miss most, if not even all eight, of them[0].

[0][http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/pdf/report-2013/2013_progr...](http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/pdf/report-2013/2013_progress_english.pdf)
[1] [http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/](http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/)
[2]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Development_Goals](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Development_Goals)

------
paul_f
I am proud that the technology industry, of which I am a part, has created
Bill Gates, a living saint.

~~~
tptacek
I don't think he's a saint. I think a lot of people on HN, given the same
resources Gates has, would do substantially similar things with their lives.
It seems like incredibly rewarding and important work.

I'm just really glad he chose to do it.

~~~
gfodor
Yeah right. Most of the people on HN will never quit the game, and will keep
trying to make more money until they have one foot in the grave. (And no, I
don't think there is anything particularly wrong with this.)

Gates got to a point where he knew his time as a competitive capitalist was
over, and that his time as a generous philanthropist had begun. This isn't
about net worth, this is about making that choice at a point where you still
are physically, mentally, and financially able to have an impact.

Anyone who has a good exit has sufficient resources to no longer work and
could make a similar choice, even if they won't have the same net impact as
Gates. But most of them don't. Most of the people at Gates' level don't
either. It's commendable.

~~~
phaus
>Most of the people on HN will never quit the game, and will keep trying to
make more money until they have one foot in the grave.

That's because, as was already stated, most of them won't have billions of
dollars. If they did, they would probably at some point start thinking about
something besides personal wealth.

>Anyone who has a good exit has sufficient resources to no longer work and
could make a similar choice, even if they won't have the same net impact as
Gates.

Getting a good exit is only slightly more likely than winning the lottery. You
make it sound like most of us here at HN will be millionaires. That's just
ridiculous.

------
suprgeek
BillG is one of the very few people about whom I have completely changed my
opinion.

Post his Microsoft days, he is the highest profile "rich tech person" who has
promoted so many projects and efforts to help the poor. While Microsoft was
famous for “embrace, extend—and extinguish” where it crushed any product that
felt like a threat (saw this first hand with Netscape).

Now BillG is using his enormous wealth in the best possible way! Kudos and
Thanks

~~~
dennisgorelik
I have different view on that.

The charity Bill Gates is doing now is good, but what Bill Gates did as
Microsoft founder was much better and way more important.

Lots of people are still using Microsoft products.

~~~
aestra
>Lots of people are still using Microsoft products.

Huuuuuh? What? What does that have to do with ANYTHING?

Lots of people still use Bayer aspirin but that doesn't make their actions
during WWII ok. They used slave labor and manufactured gas used in Nazi gas
chambers and their executive Fritz ter Meer, sentenced to seven years in
prison for his actions.

They also invented heroin as a "non-addictive morphine substitute."

------
techtivist
It's a little unfortunate that rather than discussing the contents of the
piece we are focusing on the individual

But I would like to comment on the substance because that is the link that was
shared; and avoid all the on and on conflicts about the author of the piece.

I hate to be that guy, but while I appreciate the optimistic note (no pun
intended), I think we really should introspect on how 2013 was actually a year
of setbacks in fight against poverty and other related social problems
including the ones listed by BillG, which I want to point out. I am writing on
the basis of my knowledge (which I can assure you is credible) and will append
references later.

1.Polio: While there are some obvious achievements, the question of Pakistan
is one country that has taken long backward steps since being close to
eradicating it just before 9/11, and most of that has to do with geopolitical
reasons. Post 9/11 the insurgent groups started targeting polio workers and
banning immunization programs alleging that they were American spies. Because
none of these were allegations were substantiated, the village elders fought
against their voices, and the immunization program continued with the
insurgents not being able to do much. However that changed with the Laden
killing which in a way vindicated the insurgents as the chief informant was a
doctor affiliated with the polio program. Since then the elders lost their
ability to object, and the insurgents gained their authority which has
resulted in completely dismantling of the polio program with periodic killings
of polio workers, the last one less than a week back.

The number of polio cases in Pakistan has grown about 40-50% since then. And
one would argue there's a lot that the west can do to regain confidence for
the local workers without jeopardizing the so-called continuing war on terror.
This is a contentious issue, but ones that needs to be highlighted and not as
simple as the Pak PM giving assurance to Gates.

2\. Child mortality: Sure child mortality has gone down but it is far from the
target set in the Millennium Development Goals (UN MDGs). More importantly its
not just the poorer countries that are doing badly. Amongst the worst
performing countries has been India which goes on to my next point that
economic growth or the rate of poverty going down means nothing more than in
numbers to the state of social welfare. The overall child mortality has gone
down because of two separate factors: 1. Countries in latin america and south
east Asia have improved drastically through better "socialistic" maternal and
child welfare programs while the rest amongst the poorer countries languish.
2. The civil wars that plagued sub saharan countries before the 2000s have
gone down both in their occurrences and their casualties, of which women and
children formed a huge number. Sure you hear about the current violence in the
likes of South Sudan, Mali, Syria and CAR but these are nothing compared to
the violence of the past and the civilian casualties are much lower in number.

3\. Poverty rate: From the point above while in absolute terms poverty has
gone down, social inequality has grow. More importantly the measure of poverty
line is highly debated as growth in income in low and middle income counties
has also seen concurrent high real inflation on the ground which is highly
under measured.

4\. Rich counties re-committed to saving lives: This is actually perhaps the
most concerning. Just read this piece by Jeffrey Sachs, one of the world's
most well known development economist who was is a key advocate of the Global
Fund that Gates mentions that [http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeffrey-
sachs/world-to-poor-dr...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeffrey-sachs/world-
to-poor-drop-dead_b_4385420.html)

Sorry if this sounds like a long rant. But I really strongly believe that we
need to be realistic of what has been achieved. I appreciate what Gates is
trying to do, but we need to introspect on how little we are doing to address
these grave issues. And discussing the man and not the article itself is one
of those key symptoms of our indifference and lethargy.

~~~
icambron
Points 2 and 3 both sound like steps forward to me.

Also:

> middle income counties has also seen concurrent high real inflation on the
> ground which is highly under measured.

What does that actually mean? "Real" is an economic term that doesn't make
sense in that context. And if inflation's not being measured properly, how do
you know in which direction it's off? Or more generally - you seem to think
inflation is higher than is being reported; why do you think that?

~~~
astine
When people say that inflation is not being properly measured, what they're
likely referring to is the fact that some policy makers use the CPI Less Food
and Energy which means that some of the biggest expenses for the majority of
people, food and energy, are sometimes ignored when discussing the effects
inflation.

~~~
icambron
That's not a measurement problem, though; that's a what-should-our-policy-
response-be problem. Food and energy prices are actually easier to measure and
compare year-over-year. There are good arguments for (and some against)
excluding them from your monetary policy targets, but I've never heard of
anyone doing it when discussing human wellbeing. But either way, it's still
being _measured_.

The World Bank has inflation for middle income countries as 4.1% [1]. If you
download their data sheet, you'll see that number is a GDP deflator, so no
food/energy exclusion. That's not an ideal number, but it's not high either,
and it's much lower than most previous years. They also have a CPI number,
which is actually higher: 4.6%, but again not terrible. So my question still
stands: does the GP think that number is wrong, and if so, why?

[1]
[http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/mic](http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/mic)

------
mateuszb
Things you might have missed in 2013:

The Gates Foundation's Hypocritical Investments

[http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2013/12/gates-
foundat...](http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2013/12/gates-
foundations-24-most-egregious-investments)

~~~
salient
Seems like the Gates Foundation is mostly a front for a profit-seeking
venture.

~~~
jblow
It is the other way around. If you are doing effective altruism, you want to
make sure you have money coming in that you can be altruistic with.

The bit about Walmart was especially badly done. If the author of this article
thinks Walmart employees are poor on the same scale as the poor that the
foundation targets, he really has no clue about world poverty. If the minimum
standard of living throughout the world were equal to that of a typical
Walmart employee, the world would be tremendously better off.

~~~
rbanffy
So, your argument is that it's right to make Walmart employees poor in order
to maximize profits because they are not nearly as poor as the poorest people
in the world?

If there is something poor here, it's the excuse.

~~~
bluekitten
How does buying a lot of Walmart shares make Walmart employees poor? I am
frankly baffled here. Walmart buyers should probably get more blame here.

Have you ever spared a thought about who made the electronics you own and
under what conditions?

~~~
rbanffy
When you buy shares you send the signal the company is doing the right thing.
It says you support the company and its business practices and, ultimately,
enables the company to continue them. If everybody refuses to buy their
shares, their stock will plummet and prompt changes.

As for my electronics (and consumables), yes, I try to avoid manufacturers and
brands that are associated with poor working practices. Nice try attacking me
to try to disprove my argument against the Gates foundation.

------
kayoone
A lot of people here hate on BG for his past and at the same time idolize
Steve Jobs. If you would just have swapped MS and Apple in terms of market
growth i am not so sure if Jobs wouldn't have made as many questionable
decisions as Gates. Apple of today is making lives harder for a lot of
companies, arguably more than MS of today. Also MS seems to share a lot more
(Open Source, Public research) while Apple seems to be 100% self-centered.
That of course makes sense for any competitive company, just saying that when
one reaches the top, they always look kind of evil while the underdogs seem
more sympathetic.

------
dbalan
Health activists in India, observers the states push for pentavalent vaccines
with suspicion. They are more expensive and does not really provide the cost-
to-benefit.Also, experts are divided on the fact that there are 18 deaths
reported on which state has confirmed 3 being caused by the vaccine.

EDIT: Context - gates pushes pentavalent vaccine being the exciting thing for
next year. [1] [http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/centre-confirms-
three-...](http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/centre-confirms-three-
pentavalent-vaccine-deaths) [2]
[http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Thiruvananthapuram/penta...](http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Thiruvananthapuram/pentavalent-
vaccine-caught-in-fresh-row/article5455511.ece) [3]
[http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/policy-draft-backs-
new...](http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/policy-draft-backs-new-
expensive-vaccines)

~~~
icegreentea
Ugh, it's seriously hard to read those articles. The writing is just off
enough a bit to make it super jarring to read.

In summary: 2 million doses delivered, 3 doses per child, 18 reported deaths
(of which two apparently were in child who didn't take the vaccine at all).
Depending on the sources, the actual number of deaths caused by the vaccine is
3 or up to 16. This is ontop of a base infant mortality rate of 12 deaths per
1000 infants per year. Also controversy over the actual need to vaccine Hep B
and Hib (the two additional vaccines added to the original 3-combo vaccine),
over spending their resources on other vaccines.

------
amalag
I would be more interested in they can work for self sufficiency. They seem to
be more interested in bringing big business to every corner of the world then
making corners of the world self sufficient. Instead they want to push GMOs
along with the purchase of those seeds.

------
ccarter84
He links to a pretty decent site too -- 'oooh shiny visualizations'
[http://www.healthmetricsandevaluation.org/gbd/visualizations...](http://www.healthmetricsandevaluation.org/gbd/visualizations/country)

------
braydenm
If others in the tech industry are keen to contribute to having as big an
impact on the world as Bill has, I encourage you to check out the Effective
Altruism movement in your area. Effective Altruism overlaps with lean
approaches and evidence based action, and many of the proponents are big names
in the Valley:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effective_altruism](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effective_altruism)

------
stesch
How to Become As Rich As Bill Gates:
[http://philip.greenspun.com/bg/](http://philip.greenspun.com/bg/)

------
Daishiman
I wish he were to post something similar regarding climate change and energy
developments.

~~~
tptacek
I wish someone was working as hard on climate change as Gates is on
preventable disease in the developing works. But I do not wish that Gates
worked any less diligently on the problems he's chosen. Global poverty and
disease in the developing world are, particularly in the way they stifle the
potential of a huge fraction of the world's people, root causes of most of our
other big problems.

~~~
pizza234
"Global poverty and disease in the developing world are, particularly in the
way they stifle the potential of a huge fraction of the world's people, root
causes of most of our other big problems."

No, they're definitely not the root causes. There's plenty of interest from
the richer countries to keep poor countries in such condition, that is the
root cause.

~~~
tptacek
Waiting for the drone strikes to take out Bill Gates then.

------
sidcool
I love you, Bill. I will do everything in my ability to get all help to your
foundation, financially or otherwise. Thanks for your enormous contribution to
the world. Here's hoping you get a Nobel peace prize.

------
rbanffy
Saint William of Redmond?

