
Ask yourself: what would Bill Gates do? - grenek
http://blog.123ship.it/2013/03/ask-yourself-what-would-bill-gates-do.html
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davidjgraph
"I know most of you can't stand the guy"

Really? I thought people took objection to Microsoft but generally thought of
him as an intelligent, charismatic and, more recently, very generous man.

~~~
melling
No, I hate Microsoft because they destroyed Borland, Lotus, WordPerfect, etc.
They gobbled up everything (Visio, PowerPoint, etc). They killed off Netscape
the company, stuck us with IE6 for a decade by "making it part of the
operating system." They embraced, extended, and tried to extinguish everything
they could. (e.g. Java->C#, OpenGL->DirectX).

Bill, however, I greatly admire. He took no prisoners. :-) I've got his book
on my shelf somewhere. It's 20 years old now. I should go back and read it.

~~~
bdcravens
Apple has arguably destroyed/killed off RIM. Microsoft's "destruction" is
today's startups' "disruption". (At least in HN circles I think we applaud
AirBNB or Uber doing damage to the hospitality or transportation industries).
Twitter and Google are gobbling up and often times killing products of value.

I think Microsoft did a lot of things we value: disrupt and grow. Looking
back, I think we see it through a different lens, but modern startups (or
those who have eclipsed that label to be "big") can be Microsoft (or at least
little Microsofts). Probably the only thing separating Microsoft from many
companies is the presence of a moral compass at the company level.

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meerita
Even fearing downvoting I must say these articles, most of them I've been
reading in the past month from that site are just plainly wrong assumptions.
This article for example try to argues that you can be like BG and try to sell
something without actually having it. I say BG had the OS in that time, he
just didn't bought it but he knew the SO was right away to be bought (and
cheap).

~~~
pmelendez
It wasn't finished though nor available and didn't know how much work required
to be ready to sell it.

They just knew that they couldn't let that opportunity pass away.

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adventured
In the same vein as how Microsoft sold IBM an OS that didn't exist, one of my
favorite stories is Excite bidding $3 million to be on Netscape's browser
circa 1996 or so (while having $1 million in the bank), prodded on by Vinod
Khosla (they didn't get the deal, but it's still a great move).

[http://bnoopy.typepad.com/bnoopy/2004/09/persistence_pay_1.h...](http://bnoopy.typepad.com/bnoopy/2004/09/persistence_pay_1.html)

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brvs
Don't forget that the businessman is the new political savior.

We all love the oh so charitable landlord who by day evicts his tenants and by
night donates cardboard boxes to them for shelter now that they're homeless.

Isn't it so wonderful that the man that's taken more of a share of the world's
wealth than any human in history gives some of it back? It should be obvious
that if you want to change the world, don't vote or organize, buy more copies
of Windows!!

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hallomac2013
If being dark lord of the evil empire is what you want, you would follow in
his steps. Beware of the jedi order that is 'us' though.

~~~
derefr
Let's put that another way: if you're not afraid of _being seen as_ the dark
lord of an evil empire in order to get what you want (which, in Gates' case,
seems to be "billions of dollars to solve the most important problems the
world has to offer") then you should follow in his footsteps.

In other words, if you have world-changing vision, and want to succeed on a
truly massive scale, you probably have to Think Like A Supervillain
([http://dirtsimple.org/2009/02/everything-i-needed-to-know-
ab...](http://dirtsimple.org/2009/02/everything-i-needed-to-know-about-
life.html), <http://lesswrong.com/lw/gp7/think_like_a_supervillain/>).

~~~
hallomac2013
If you are destroying a part of the world to fix another, you are not good.
You may be evil even. Because you are selfishly choosing the part to fix, in
expense of the part you destroy. If you are good, you should do no evil, or at
least strive to.

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mikecane
Those who don't know how Microsoft once operated need to read this book:

Startup: A Silicon Valley Adventure [http://www.amazon.com/Startup-Silicon-
Adventure-Jerry-Kaplan...](http://www.amazon.com/Startup-Silicon-Adventure-
Jerry-Kaplan/dp/0140257314)

Hell, _anyone_ doing a startup needs to read it anyway.

~~~
sreyaNotfilc
Just ordered it. Can't wait to read it. Great find Mike!

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Datsundere
those are the worst suggestions to be given to a startup guy today. Gate's
business strategy isn't something we should learn from.

I can't believe people like those exist that want to learn and reprocure what
Gates did to apple and the rest of the world.

In a way I'm glad ballmer is the ceo now, you reap what you sow microshit

~~~
grenek
I was only pointing that one special situation, not his whole career. He
behaved like a sales genius on that occasion and it doesn't have anything to
do with his futher strategy. I wouldn't advise to copy the whole Microsoft
strategy.

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venomsnake
Bill Gates also shipped the office assistant, windows ME was done mostly under
his command and got the attention of the DOJ anaconda on microsoft. And I
would recommend against doing this things.

All great people have a track record of good and bad decisions. And you cannot
take only the ones you like.

Also I had this pretending to be done project once ... one year later we were
still struggling, the customer was losing money daily and I was happy watching
my management being roasted on a slow fire for not listening to us lowly
techies.

~~~
pyre
You're also forgetting WinFS. WinFS was apparently his baby during the
development of Windows Vista (aka Longhorn), but was one of the things cut
when shedding cruft. I can't find a reference to it, but I recall hearing that
there were grumblings from the rank-and-file about 'making a pig fly' (not
exactly, but something similar) with regards to Gates' focus/drive on WinFS.

------
Nightrider
If Bill wanted to uncover a hidden talent or keystone habit of his, or to
rediscover what made him happy, why, he would revert to his Last Known Working
Configuration: [http://zerotosuperhero.com/mindhack/find-your-lifes-last-
kno...](http://zerotosuperhero.com/mindhack/find-your-lifes-last-known-
working-configuration/)

This "hack" was super useful for me for identifying what habits and activities
really improve my quality of life. May be of help to others as well.

