[IP] David Pogue: Reconsidering Bill Gates
Begin forwarded message:
From: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: June 23, 2006 7:01:38 AM EDT
To: Dewayne-Net Technology List <dewayne-net@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [Dewayne-Net] David Pogue: Reconsidering Bill Gates
Reply-To: dewayne@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[Note: This item comes from friend John McMullen. DLH]
From: "John F. McMullen" <observer@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: June 22, 2006 3:24:19 PM PDT
To: "johnmac's living room" <johnmacsgroup@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Cc: Commonweal Mailing List <commonweal@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Dewayne
Hendricks <dewayne@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: David Pogue: Reconsidering Bill Gates
From the Desk of David Pogue: Reconsidering Bill Gates
A few days ago, the richest man in the world, Bill Gates, announced
that he'd be stepping down from daily Microsoft activities in order
to devote himself to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Through
this foundation, Mr. Gates has said that he intends to give away 95
percent of his wealth. The foundation's primary interests are
education, poverty and global health--saving the lives of the
millions who die of preventable diseases, mostly in poor countries.
Now, as faithful readers know, I don't always find Microsoft's
software-design work very impressive. And, under Mr. Gates's watch,
Microsoft has done a lot of ruthless and sometimes sleazy things over
the years. I'm not alone in having some mistrust of Microsoft's
motives; one Google search for "Microsoft + evil" will convince you
of that.
But until last week's announcement, I think I was in the same boat as
a lot of people: I never really allowed myself to confront the
apparent contradiction between Bill Gates, the merciless businessman
with ambitions for world domination, and Bill Gates, the
compassionate scientist whose goal is to save millions of lives.
A couple of years ago, Bill Moyers interviewed Mr. Gates on the
subject of his global-health interests. You can read the transcript
here (http://www.pbs.org/now/transcript/transcript_gates.html), but
here's a sample that makes you realize the possibilities of putting
money in the right places (this is Mr. Gates speaking):
"And there was one dinner after we'd given our first vaccination
grant. I think it was $125 million. All these doctors came. And they
thought, 'O.K., this is a dinner where I'm supposed to just say thank
you, thank you. And, you know, try not to use the wrong fork or
something.'
[snip]
-----
This week's Pogue's Posts blog:
<http://www.nytimes.com/technology/poguesposts/index.html?8cir&emc=cir>
-----
Visit David Pogue on the Web at:
<http://www.davidpogue.com>
Weblog at: <http://weblog.warpspeed.com>
-------------------------------------
You are subscribed as roessler@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
To manage your subscription, go to
http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip
Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/