Talk:Bill Gates

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640 k/1 MB

The source of "640 kB ought to be enough for anybody" may have actually been "No one will need more than 637 kB of memory for a personal computer", and it may have been said in the early 1970s. // Liftarn

The earliest mention of a version of this quote on usenet seems to be a signature by Evan Champion in 1992-07-25 (News:2175291@overmind.citadel)

LX 2.1 TD . "640 k ought to be enough for anybody." - Bill Gates, 1981

—This unsigned comment is by 130.225.221.142 (talk • contribs) at 14:50, 11 December 2004 (UTC).

What about "DOS addresses only 1 Megabyte of RAM because we cannot imagine any applications needing more." - is it sourced? —This unsigned comment is by 84.142.227.223 (talk • contribs) 16:22, 8 June 2005 (UTC).

I've heard someone saying that this sentence was actually said by an IBM engineer. Unfortunately I don't remember where I read it and neither the engineer's name. Do you know something about this? —This unsigned comment is by Tcp-ip (talk • contribs) at 22:35, 6 February 2006 (UTC).

"640K ought to be enough for anybody" *was* *definitely* said by Bill Gates. He said it at an early microcomputer trade show in Seattle in mid 1981. It is the Microsoft PR machine that has tried over the years to rewrite history and pretend that Gates never made this asinine comment. —This unsigned comment is by 216.150.131.207 (talk • contribs) at 15:22, 21 November 2007 (UTC).

Oh, well, then that proves it. ... Or rather, it proves that there's just one more anonymous moron on the internet. —This unsigned comment is by 96.247.231.243 (talk • contribs) at 18:14, 14 July 2014 (UTC).

The comment wasn't asinine. It is very easy to look back and say that it was stupid, but at the time, it was a very reasonable statement. Can you think of any reason for personal computers to have terabytes of RAM? Probably not. But maybe in 15 years, there will be a reason, and most PCs will have terabytes of RAM. The only reason you probably wouldn't make the same mistake right now and say, "no one will ever need terabytes of memory" is because you've already seen how predicting the future worked out for Bill Gates and have learned from his mistake. —This unsigned comment is by 2620:0:102f:1100:d267:e5ff:fef1:a0bc (talk • contribs) at 01:58, 13 July 2012 (UTC).

The reason Gates and Microsoft have tried to downplay this quote (and yes, he did say it) is not because it is or is not asinine, but because it proves that Gates is not, and has never been, the "visionary" he wants the world to see him as. 173.68.125.114 22:06, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

"yes, he did say it" He specifically denies it, and nobody has provided any documentation that he ever did. The fact that it's been attributed to various people makes it even more suspect. Gbisaga (talk) 17:57, 6 May 2021 (UTC)

I'm inclined to agree with the above comment, since we know Bill also said "we will never make a 32-bit operating system". Given that things were moving from 8 bit to 16 bit at the time, the eventual transition of desktop CPUs to 32-bit and beyond should have been just as obvious. But unless you can find a reliable citation, I don't think it should be on the page.. -- zcat —This unsigned comment is by 203.173.163.127 (talk • contribs) at 00:09, 29 July 2008 (UTC).

Citation - Page 303, right margin of;

The Unauthorized Guide to Windows 98

By Paul McFedries

Published by Que Publishing, 1999

ISBN 0789719126, 9780789719126

784 pages

[1] —This unsigned comment is by 140.168.69.130 (talk • contribs) at 04:59, 3 October 2008 (UTC).

This is not a reference, this is the simply the same misquote immortalised in print -- zcat 118.90.73.183 20:08, 26 January 2010 (UTC))

If he said it, come up with ANY piece of evidence. Ofcourse, he never said it, so no one can come up with any. —This unsigned comment is by 69.207.208.75 (talk • contribs) at 08:48, 29 March 2009 (UTC).

He did not say it, he says it himself: http://www.wired.com/politics/law/news/1997/01/1484 :) --normis —This unsigned comment is by 91.188.51.136 (talk • contribs) at 08:10, 8 February 2010 (UTC).

The "640 kB is enough" is a myth attributed to Gates. The blame for this should actually be placed at IBM's feet, because the 640 kB limit was an architectural limitation imposed by IBM, who decided to load drivers in high mem starting at those addresses, in effect imposing a hardware ceiling on the memory available for OS and apps. —This unsigned comment is by 124.148.147.118 (talk • contribs) at 19:12, 7 April 2011 (UTC).

I believe this is actually a result of how the 8086 and friends handled segmentation (and of the physical number of address lines present on these processors before the "A20 gate" became a thing). —This unsigned comment is by 76.88.85.148 (talk • contribs) at 07:21, 26 September 2014 (UTC).

In Wired, 32-bit per se, in not mentioned, but Gates mentions indirectly here with 16-bit and 640K. Should the sourced (from here at some point?) "never make a 32-bit operating system" be mentioned as misattributed[2] or not? Comp.arch (talk) 11:55, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

Do you guys think that maybe it was just an assessment of the current situation at that time and not a prediction of what things would be in the future? --99.24.181.162 20:34, 17 May 2014 (UTC)

What part of "he never said it" don't you understand? -- 98.171.173.90 18:47, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

"He never said it" is easy to understand; it simply isn't true. He said it. He's worked hard to try to erase it from the world's memory but he said it. —This unsigned comment is by 2600:2c00:9000:1010::2d (talk • contribs) at 22:25, 16 January 2017 (UTC).

Proving something from 1981 will be difficult when iphone evidence is demanded. —This unsigned comment is by 192.47.255.254 (talk • contribs) at 22:09, 21 September 2018 (UTC).

What part of "you say 'He never said it' is just as much proof as someone saying 'he said it'" don't you understand?

This site https://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/09/08/640k-enough/ seems to have done some thorough investigation. They still conclude the quote isn't provable, and I concur. It is, however, remarkable, that there seems to be enough documented proof Bill Gates heavily underestimated the development of memory demands. And I really like that in the very same often quoted interview , where he denies ever having said that 637k thing, he later remarks that "Probably the fastest conventional telephone dial-up modem you'll ever have is 28.8.". 194.76.232.147 09:11, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

Removed what might be a translation

Someone had posted the following statement which I have removed from the article.

• "Kommt ein Mann in den Steg Computer und sagt: "Ich hätte gerne den fettesten, gröbsten Prozessor den Sie haben!" Sagt der Verkäufer: "Tut mir leid, die Lorenz ist gerade in der Therapie"
  • Source: Richli at Work by Adrian Eggmann (2004), ISBN 0914845713

This may or may not be a quote of Bill Gates translated into German. Statements originating in German or any other language are welcome here, preferably accompanied by an English translation, but translations of statements into German, if that is what this is, must await the development of a German language Wikiquote. There has been growing interest expressed in creating such Wikiquotes for other languages, and this statement perhaps would belong there. ~ Kalki 12:19, 13 Jul 2004 (UTC)

It's a bad joke in German, probably of a Swiss. Definitely not a quote of Bill Gates. —This unsigned comment is by 193.134.254.145 (talk • contribs) at 10:00, 20 January 2005 (UTC).

Source

Did Bill Gates truly say "The internet is just a passing fad" in a Microsoft press conference in late 1995? I find no source using Google. —This unsigned comment is by 216.229.224.153 (talk • contribs) 15:33, 28 October 2004 (UTC).

There is also this famous "The Internet? We are not interested in it"

-- Bill Gates, 1993

that keeps just appearing in a lot of forum signatures. Source Anyone? —This unsigned comment is by 85.74.48.4 (talk • contribs) at 09:55, 6 January 2006 (UTC).

In 1995, while living in Washington State and promoting that the Internet is the future ... Bill Gates was publicly denouncing the web as just a fad and costing many companies financial difficulties in the Northwest, including, but not limited to, Zipee Corp, the Plaintiff in a lawsuit with the United States Postal Service on the domain postal-service.com in which the case has become the foundation of Internet law around the world !

- David Apperson, Internet Senior Architect 1995 - 2004 —This unsigned comment is by 63.225.87.219 (talk • contribs) at 00:56, 19 September 2014 (UTC).

I think 1993 is too early. I distinctly recall Gates' statement that Microsoft was not interested in 'the internet phenomenon', or otherwise downplayed it's significance, about 6 months prior to releasing IE (1995) as a competitor to Netscape. This was obviously a calculated position to take in public prior to releasing IE. I'd place it late 1994, early 1995. —This unsigned comment is by 69.211.1.92 (talk • contribs) at 01:41, 29 November 2006 (UTC).

1995 quote: No reason to think this is genuine. In August Gates wrote a memo (introduced as evidence in the antitrust case) titled "The Internet Tidal Wave" that very clearly recognized the internet's significance. Windows 95, released in August, included Internet Explorer 1.0 which had been licensed earlier (and before that Microsoft had tried but failed to license the Booklink browser).

1993 quote: Often appears alongside established phony Gates quotations like "640kB should be enough" and "Be nice to nerds." However, it is not impossible nor would it be terribly surprising if he said it. 1993 was the year that NCSA Mosaic was released, and before that the Internet wasn't much to look at for an end-user.

Anything Gates said about the internet at that time should be considered in the context that Microsoft was doing active development on networking in the early 1990s but not necessarily internet networking. Microsoft's awakening to the Internet as not just an interesting technology but a profitable one (which matters to Gates) is documented in Renegades of the Empire and Breaking Windows. w:User:Gazpacho 07:12, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

(PS: what do you mean by "distinctly recall"? Do you recall hearing him say it? Reading about him saying it? In what kind of source?) —This unsigned comment is by 24.17.110.177 (talk • contribs) at 07:23, 28 December 2006 (UTC).

He wrote in his autobiography user:12.9.138.10 21:12, 25 March 2013

The Internet Tidal Wave is available online. --Omnipaedista (talk) 00:47, 29 November 2013 (UTC)

Removal

Removed

• "Bill can't make competitive software but he can play Monopoly well." Groklaw.net blog

Maybe someone can explain the significance of this quote to me or the importance of who's saying it. Until then I say leave it cut least we have quotes from everyone with a livejournal with an opinion of Bill Gates. scy7he —This unsigned comment is by 68.142.12.252 (talk • contribs) at 13:26, 23 June 2005 (UTC).

"Linux best OS ever!"

http://bbspot.com/News/2001/06/gates.html May I add it? —This unsigned comment is by 201.22.84.59 (talk • contribs) at 01:59, 11 August 2006 (UTC).

No, that's a fake news story. 24.238.166.85 02:27, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

"At a Mac conference in the eighties"

I'm unfimiliar with Wikiquote's policies, but if it were an article on Wikipedia, I would remove anything using this as a "source". w:User:RN —This unsigned comment is by 67.185.158.12 (talk • contribs) at 01:56, 26 August 2006 (UTC).

The sourcing is inadequate here, but I have seen the video of this statement, I believe in an early Apple promotion video, when Gates actually was working with Apple in developing Word for the Mac, and will try to get more information on it, if I can, within the next few hours. ~ Shadow 02:48, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

I intend to keep looking between other tasks, but I've not yet found definite sourcing of where the original clip is from, or what date it was, though I did find 2 video clips on Youtube of Gates making the statement: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZfuEHAZerY & http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xtba2GkVOII —This unsigned comment is by Shadow (talk • contribs) at 04:58, 26 August 2006 (UTC).

this one says circa 1984 "around the time of the introduction of the macintosh", but it still isn't very specific. Most places give seperate dates which isn't too impressing, and the German wikiquote says a 1984 mac conference as well but no source either (http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Gates). A slashdot comment says [3] 1984 as well. So, that's what I found after checking all of the googles for

"the Macintosh, of all the machines I've ever seen, is the only one that meets that standard"

and

"And the Macintosh, of all the machines I've ever seen, is the only one that meets that standard"

If this were a real quote, I would be expecting someone like forbes or time magazine... hopefully someone's search goes better then mine :). w:User:RN —This unsigned comment is by 67.185.132.50 (talk • contribs) at 17:55, 26 August 2006 (UTC).

Sourcing

Gates is a sufficiently public figure, has left a big enough paper trail, and has inspired enough bogus quotes, that I think it's reasonable to insist on very specific citations for anything that gets added here. Not just "someone posted it on the internets." w:User:Gazpacho 09:15, 30 August 2007 (UTC) —This unsigned comment is by 24.16.41.121 (talk • contribs) at 09:15, 30 August 2007 (UTC).

It violates the "no original research" policy to suggest that

a) All collections of humorous material, even those from Oxford University press, are unreliable; please provide a source if you wish to assert that;

b) Because it is your personal opinion that Bill Gates said something, therefore he could not have done so; please provide a source if you wish to assert that.

--Cato 18:19, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree. I mean, come on - "In my case, I went to the garbage cans at the Computer Science Center and fished out listings of their operating system." A fairly obvious troll. --199.89.64.178 21:53, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Dumpster diving quote

The dumpster diving quote (the one that starts "the best way to prepare") has a longer quote, which includes valuable extra information, in this slashdot comment. Could somebody confirm that this quote is true and then include it? --212.130.183.202 10:24, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

The dumpster diving quote is from the book "Programmers at Work: Interviews With 19 Programmers Who Shaped the Computer Industry", published by Microsoft Press. I've seen enough different people claim to have actually got the book and found the quote that I don't believe they could all be making it up, EG the above posting on slashdot or this;

http://danbricklin.com/log/2004_03_11.htm#paw

This occurrence is particularly interesting because Dan Bricklin was one of the 19 programmers interviewed in the book and in a scan of the (hardback) cover, his photo appears on the top left.

If you really want to be sure, you could just buy the book yourself from Amazon. There are four copies available right now. —This unsigned comment is by 203.109.205.86 (talk • contribs) at 02:26, 11 March 2008 (UTC).

Factoring large primes?

One of the Gates quotes I see most often is the (silly, no doubt) mistake regarding factoring. From Wikipedia's entry on The Road Ahead:

"The obvious mathematical breakthrough would be development of an easy way to factor large prime numbers." (p.265)

Is this quote omitted because it came from a multi-author book? If so, I can understand the reasoning: who knows who wrote it? If not, surely this should be included. 207.172.209.70 03:18, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Limit of Quotes

Just to let everyone know this page has too many quotes.(StarWarsFanBoy 00:58, 5 December 2009 (UTC))

"You can quote me on this . . . " —This unsigned comment is by 66.161.247.98 (talk • contribs) at 16:36, 2 March 2011 (UTC).

Can I add Bill Gates Quotes? Like we have collect very powerful quotes of him! If your permit me i'll add to External Links. 2401:4900:190A:3A4B:3551:7E94:82C7:C3B7 23:10, 24 November 2021 (UTC)

What about "The Road Ahead"'s dismissal of the internet?

Not putting it directly on the page (yet)

He released a book in November 1995 called "The Road Ahead", which largely dismissed the internet (mentioning it briefly) and the web, seeing it as a mere stepping stone towards the "real" "information superhighway". All the while trying to use Windows 95 to push "The Microsoft Network" ("MSN"), at the time a proprietary online service to compete with the likes of Compuserve and AOL.

Gates realized that the internet was gaining traction, so one month after it hit the stores MS's strategies were allegedly realigned, and a "Completely Revised and Up-to-Date" edition of "The Road Ahead" came out in October 1996.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Road_Ahead - note also Time Magazine's comment from December 1995 about MS's change of strategy, at the bottom...

http://www.amazon.com/Road-Ahead-Completely-Up-Date/dp/0140260404

83.242.11.22 07:20, 31 March 2010 (UTC) gautelund

When you're ready to add the quotation to the page, make sure you actually have a quotation, not just circumstantial claims. —This unsigned comment is by 24.22.157.251 (talk • contribs) at 08:04, 30 May 2010 (UTC).

On internet

At comdex 1994, it is seen that he said "I see little commercial potential for the Internet for at least 10 years", at least this has been seen in a book: http://books.google.com/books?id=Tj-tNMt050gC&lpg=PA321&ots=rHUKRQufBK&pg=PA321#v=onepage&q&f=false --Jarl 06:23, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

born poor/die poor

I've seen "If you're born poor, it's not your mistake. But if you die poor, it is your mistake" attributed to Gates, but without sources, has anyone seen something? —This unsigned comment is by 77.176.68.241 (talk • contribs) at 18:47, 10 February 2012 (UTC).

I don't think Bill Gates is that stupid. I sincerely doubt the quote is real. There's literally millions and millions of counter-examples to that. Let's name a few, just to be sure: Nikola Tesla, Ignaz Semmelweis (died broke and insane because his contemporaries kept refusing to listen to his "insane" theory that washing hands in hospitals would save lives), Vincent van Gogh, William Blake, Gutenberg. And that's really not even including the kind of people who weren't geniuses who died poor because of economic conditions or otherwise. In short - Bill Gates = not a moron. Person who would say that quote = moron. Bloomingdedalus (talk) 15:41, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

I wouldn't say that they're not at fault for dying poor. If Semmelweis wanted to make money, he could have. Tesla was brilliant, but his focus was on progress, not money. Gutenberg was a criminal by the time's standards, in an unprofitable field. 2001:1948:212:1020:BC67:AB1:74FC:1F6D 19:11, 8 January 2014 (UTC)Tanner Griffin, 12:11, 8 January 2013

The quote flies in the face of the poverty-reduction work he's dedicated billions of dollars to. —This unsigned comment is by 188.227.166.162 (talk • contribs) at 17:25, 29 November 2014 (UTC).

There's no source and it in no way sounds like something he would say (what's the context where a quote like that would come up? an address to shareholders?). I think it's fair to say this is not an authentic quote. 162.250.145.156 18:35, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

Antitrust movie

Attributed: it's very hard to imagine that this is not Bill Gates.

Allusions

Tim Robbins (2008, left) and Bill Gates (2007, right)

Roger Ebert found Gary Winston to be a thinly disguised pastiche of Bill Gates; so much so that he was "surprised [the writers] didn't protect against libel by having the villain wear a name tag saying, 'Hi! I'm not Bill!'" Similarly, Ebert felt NURV "seems a whole lot like Microsoft."[7] Ebert wasn't alone making these observations; parallels between the fictional and real-world software giants were also drawn by Lisa Bowman of ZDNet UK,[8] James Berardinelli of ReelViews,[9] and Rita Kempley of the The Washington Post.[10] Microsoft spokesman Jim Cullinan said, "From the trailers, we couldn't tell if the movie was about [America Online] or Oracle."[8] —This unsigned comment is by 188.88.70.42 (talk • contribs) at 10:17, 22 April 2012 (UTC).

Lazy person to do a hard job

“I choose a lazy person to do a hard job, Because a lazy person will find an easy way to do it.”

I see this all over, but can't find a source. May be good for the misattributed section. 68.190.69.212 21:58, 16 January 2013 (UTC)

Based on Google searches, the first attribution of this to Bill Gates was June 28, 2009, and not through a reliable source. Previously, it is attributed through the same unreliable sources as being a Hitler quotation. —This unsigned comment is by 170.135.176.108 (talk • contribs) at 17:52, 4 March 2014 (UTC).

For further information regarding the origin of that (or similar quotes) have a look at: http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/02/26/lazy-job/ and http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/02/28/clever-lazy/ —This unsigned comment is by 170.135.176.108 (talk • contribs) at 12:34, 16 March 2014 (UTC).

Image

Sorry I am not entirely familiar with Wikiquote code nor policy partly because it takes one to know one but could someone please change the article image of Bill Gates? Or in other certain terms, http://www.microsoft.com/global/en-us/news/PublishingImages/bod/billg/gates_print.jpg ...? Kind regards. (125.238.89.3 03:36, 23 June 2013 (UTC))

The current image may not be the most appealing; but we can only use images that are in the public domain or released under terms compatible with the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA license, and the link you provided does not include licensing information. Several other images that are available for use here are listed at commons:Category:Bill Gates and its subcategories. ~ Ningauble (talk) 20:13, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

Measuring aircraft building progress by weight

Could we get a source on this quote? "Measuring programming progress by lines of code is like measuring aircraft building progress by weight." --Traal (talk) 20:19, 27 September 2019 (UTC)

This thread has some information on the quote. Interestingly, someone pointed to this newsgroup post from 2001, meaning that the phrase has been floating around for quite some time. On Wikipedia, someone claimed it was from Gates' 1999 book Business @ the Speed of Thought. I did some searches (1, 2, 3, 4), but the book does not seem to contain this phrase or anything resembling it. Cheers, Manifestation (talk) 10:48, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

In Gates (1994), he is said to have described IBM's management approach to OS/2 as "building the world's heaviest airplane." No complete sentence or original source is given. 73.71.251.64 02:15, 8 August 2020 (UTC)

Unsourced quotes

The following quotes do not provide original sources:

• “The belief that the world is getting worse, that we can’t solve extreme poverty and disease, isn’t just mistaken. It’s harmful.”[4]
• “Everyone needs a coach. It doesn't matter whether you're a basketball player, a tennis player, a gymnast, or a bridge player."[5]
• We all need people who will give us feedback. That’s how we improve.[6]
• "Don't compare yourself with anyone in this world ... if you do so, you are insulting yourself."[7]
• “Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning.”[8]
• “It’s fine to celebrate success, but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure.”[9]
• “Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can’t lose.”[10]

~ UDScott (talk) 14:22, 6 November 2024 (UTC)