I remember when I was growing up, tech industry has so many people that were admirable, and you wanted to aspire to be in life. Bill Gates, founders of Google Larry Page, Sergey brin, Steve Jobs (wasn’t perfect but on a surface level, he was still at least a pretty decent guy), basically everyone involved in gaming from Xbox to PlayStation and so on, Tom from MySpace… So many admirable people who were actually really great…
Now, people are just trash. Look at Mark Zuckerberg who leads Facebook. Dude is a lizard man, anytime you think he has shown some character growth he does something truly horrible and illegal that he should be thrown in prison for. For example, he’s been buying up properties in Hawaii and basically stealing them from the locals. He’s basically committing human rights violations by violating the culture of Hawaiian natives and their land deeds that are passed down from generation to generation. He has been systematically stealing them and building a wall on Hawaii, basically a f*cking colonizer. That’s what the guy is. I thought he was a good upstanding person until I learned all these things about him
Current CEO of Google is peak dirtbag. Dude has no interest in the company or it’s success at all, his only concern is patting his pockets while he is there as CEO, and appeasing the shareholders. He has zero interest in helping or making anyone’s life pleasant at the company. Truly a dirtbag in every way.
Current CEO of Home Depot, which I now consider a tech company because they have moved out of retail and into the online space and they are rapidly restructuring their entire business around online sales, that dude is a total piece of work conservative racist. I remember working for this company, This dude’s entire focus is eliminating as many people as feasibly possible from working in the store, making their life living heck, does not see people as human beings at all. Just wants to eliminate anyone and everyone they possibly can, think they are a slave labor force
Elon musk, we all know about him, don’t need to really say much. Every time you think he’s doing something good for society, he proves you wrong And does the worst thing he can possibly do in that situation. It’s like he’s specifically trying to make the world the worst place possible everyday
Like, damn. What the heck happened to the world? You know? I thought the tech industry was supposed to be filled with these brilliant genius people who are really good for the world…
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Bill Gates was a huge piece of shit in his heyday, rivalling the Zuckerberg and Musks of today, and Jobs was an abusive narcissist shitcunt on a surface level.
Tom and Zuckerberg both came from the same time. Zuck was shit since day 1, today has nothing to do with it.
I think you just have some very rose tinted glasses.
Going back even further is assholes like Edison and Ford.
I think it’s easier to name the people who have been decent in tech. Woz seems like a decent guy.
Ted Waite all in all was decent. Not perfect but decent.
Stallman was right about everything
Stallman is a notable figure in the industry but he was never the leader of a large tech company. That’s probably why he’s a decent guy
He was a big defender of paedophilia, necrophilia, incest, and bestiality. He thinks people should have the right to fuck their pets and their children. Not to mention the reports on his creepy behaviour with women.
Stallman is an incredible steward of FOSS, and he’s been very prescient in predicting the absolute nightmare of proprietary software, but he is not a decent guy overall IMO.
It hurt me to find that out, because I looked up to him. But I guess it’s another sobering reminder of why celebrity worship is bad. I see way too many people try to bury or deny his scummy side, just because they worship him as a FOSS celebrity figure.
Let’s note that necrophilia with mutual agreement (pre-mortem, and same with cannibalism) and incest with mutual agreement (between adults) are fucked up, but should be defended. Animals can’t consent, children can’t consent, so not that.
Not to mention the reports on his creepy behaviour with women.
That - yeah.
But I guess it’s another sobering reminder of why celebrity worship is bad. I see way too many people try to bury or deny his scummy side, just because they worship him as a FOSS celebrity figure.
Believing in discourses and narratives without understanding that they are never real is bad.
You can believe only in what you see with your own eyes since inception and till death.
and incest with mutual agreement (between adults) are fucked up, but should be defended.
Why are you saying between adults, as if that’s what he said? He was talking about children. I even provided multiple examples of him saying so.
He’s saying all of those. Those concerning children obviously can’t.
I had never heard that about him. That’s disappointing.
Yeah, for me too. Because I love practically everything he says when it comes to software.
“The nominee is quoted as saying that if the choice of a sexual partner were protected by the Constitution, ‘prostitution, adultery, necrophilia, bestiality, possession of child pornography, and even incest and pedophilia’ also would be. He is probably mistaken, legally–but that is unfortunate. All of these acts should be legal as long as no one is coerced. They are illegal only because of prejudice and narrowmindedness.”
RMS on June 28th, 2003
“I am skeptical of the claim that voluntarily pedophilia harms children. The arguments that it causes harm seem to be based on cases which aren’t voluntary, which are then stretched by parents who are horrified by the idea that their little baby is maturing.”
RMS on June 5th, 2006
"There is little evidence to justify the widespread assumption that willing participation in pedophilia hurts children.
RMS on Jan 4th, 2013
In the interest of fairness, he did claim to have changed his mind on some of this, although that only happened 2 days after his job became on the line after making strange comments about Epstein/Epstein clients/Epstein victims, particularly in presenting Epstein’s underage sex workers as being willing.
For me, suddenly having a change of heart on a decades-held (and publicly-championed) opinion, only to suddenly change your mind the second it threatens your job seems a bit too convenient, so I’m unwilling to believe it.
Holy shit…
as long as no one is coerced
Well, the opinion that a child can consent is technically acceptable, because the line at 12,13,14,16,18,21 years is arbitrarily drawn which is why it differs in various countries.
But in practice he should have used common sense and at least drawn his own line.
“I am skeptical of the claim that voluntarily pedophilia harms children. The arguments that it causes harm seem to be based on cases which aren’t voluntary, which are then stretched by parents who are horrified by the idea that their little baby is maturing.”
That’s scary, but I’m not sure how really wrong he is. The issue is again with child’s consent being less certain, affected more easily by various distractions.
so I’m unwilling to believe it.
So am I, the question is whether he has internal consistency or not in his views. If yes, it’s still better than, well, just being a jerk and proud of it.
I would say it’s not a sincere change. It’s groupthink.
Well the skit keeps getting smaller and smaller
The FSF isn’t exactly what you think of when you hear the words “large tech company”… but you could argue that in some ways it is one couldn’t you… 😁😛
You could, but the OP is talking about the people who became filthy rich or at least notable. I don’t know if Tom ever made any real money. Almost all of the people listed used their corporate power to smash competition and dominate the market.
If anything, Stallman is the antithesis of most of these people.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/tom-myspace-sold-social-media-153011703.html?guccounter=1
Don’t know how he invested it but the guy certainly wouldn’t have had to work another day in his life
What he did is important, but he’s definitely an asshole as well
Old captain crunch is another one that turned out to be a weirdo
he was never the leader of a large tech company. That’s probably why he’s a decent guy
I think you have that backwards.
Gabe too.
There are no good billionaires
You don’t even know whether Gabe is or isn’t a billionaire.
Why are we using his first name
Because people think he’s their friend because he offers a good product when the truth is he’s just another one of those leeches at the top of a big company taking money from people’s pockets and accumulating it while their clients can barely afford to pay rent.
Why not?
https://www.forbes.com/profile/gabe-newell/
https://luxurylaunches.com/transport/gabe-newell-luxury-yachts.php
If he wasn’t a billionaire it would be very simple, there are no good multi millionaires either!
Ok, I was wrong, I didn’t know about all the boats and the second company/charity.
The Forbes thing is just an educated guess though. And are you saying anyone with 2 million dollars or anyone with 2m in assets is automatically a bad person?
People around you are starving and barely able to afford to pay rent and you’re worth 2m? Sorry my man, you’re one of those who is taking advantage of the system.
https://www.cnbc.com/2023/10/28/americans-median-net-worth-by-age.html
Overall the median is under 200k, you’re talking about someone worth ten times that.
Daniel Stenberg seems like a nice guy.
It’s hard to beat ignoring doctors and not treating your very treatable form of cancer, then using your wealth to get a liver transplant and then dying anyway. Dude committed manslaughter because of his own arrogance.
Bill Gates was a huge piece of shit in his heyday, rivalling the Zuckerberg and Musks of today,
Bill Gates was a ruthless businessman destroying competition but as far as I know he didn’t support fascists or facilitate pogroms.
Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter has done far more harm to our societies than whatever shady tactics Bill Gates used.
Not to take away from Zuckerberg, Musk, and the less-known people in tech like Thiel, but Bill Gates was and is a huge piece of shit who harmed more than just his competitors. Among other things he convinced the world that we need IP and patents for covid vaccines instead of sharing them freely, which alone cost countless lives around the world. I don’t even want to know what other ills his “philanthropy” has and will cause. https://newrepublic.com/article/162000/bill-gates-impeded-global-access-covid-vaccines
Gates and Jobs both are responsible for consumer based computing. Proprietary software lynched what should have been a global birth of inventive software engineers.
The crap that Zuck shills had its groundwork laid by those two.
Proprietary software lynched what should have been a global birth of inventive software engineers.
That actually happened. Just wasn’t perpetuated after 1995 or something.
Before Microsoft, programmers were treated like factory workers by HP and IBM and setup in large open floor rooms like a secretary pool from the 1960’s. Gates thought programmers were important and gave every programmer a private office.
Gates did dirty tricks to competitors even to tiny ones they could have bought out (stacker). But he was never Musk’s level of evil.
Adding to that, Bill Gates put quite some effort into image building and mostly succeeded.
I remember when I was growing up, tech industry has so many people that were admirable
Perhaps you were too young to understand who these people were:
- Bill Gates dominated the PC world with aggressive business tactics and vendor lock in.
- Larry Ellison bought up his competitors and jack up prices on databsae products owning the industry for more than a decade.
- Steve Jobs lied and cheated his investors, his family, and his closest friends to benefit himself.
Tom was a good guy, but possibly because he took his fortune and left tech. There were very few admirable leaders.
Steve Jobs decided to kill himself by being an idiot.
So…there was a redemption arc there.
I’m not a fan of
HitlerSteve Jobs, but I am a big fan of the guy who killedHitlerSteve Jobs.Yes but Steve Jobs also bought himself a pointless liver transplant that someone else didn’t get. One he would have never needed if he had listened to doctors instead of trying to treat a very treatable kind of cancer with a diet. So while he did the world a favor, he also took someone with him on the way out.
That man’s killer’s name?
Steve Jobs, the friend of Steve Jobs’ biggest enemy, Steve Jobs🔔
Larry Ellisons Oracle gobbled up many great companies and open source projects and sucked the life out of them, such as Sun Microsystems, OpenOffice, MySQL to name just a few
That was a single blow, Sun owned OpenOffice and MySQL when bought.
See the acquisition of Sun Microsystems by Oracle Corporation.
Also Java.
Larry Ellison bought up his competitors and jack up prices on databsae products owning the industry for more than a decade.
It’s well known that ORACLE is an acronym for One Rich Asshole Called Larry Ellison.
I don’t ever remember Bill Gates or Steve Jobs being good people. Or Jeff Bezos, trying to kill bookstores.
The guys behind Google seemed okay at first and I think they really wanted to do good. But the way the company culture was built was toxic.
But in the end it’s all about the greed. As soon as a company becomes public and whose stocks become available on the market, it turns to shit.
Look at how Steam is going well and actually helping personal computing progress. Gabe Newell is doing a great job because he loves that he does and ensures the people who work for him do too.
Newell also has overseen Valve as one of the pioneers of the most predatory monetization in the video game industry (lootboxes, etc.).
There are no saints at this level.
I mean their unwillingness to do anything about the market abuse and rampant child-gambling aside, the lootboxes for purely cosmetic items are one of the least predatory ways to do microtransactions. It’s not like EA where the only way to unlock entire characters in some games is to grind for hundreds of hours or pay, or like COD where they took the lootbox idea and made it actually affect (multiplayer) gameplay
the least predatory ways to do microtransactions
Damning with faint praise.
I mean, in some ways, yeah. In other ways, CS2 is entirely free to play, and the microtransactions fund that, like LoL.
You’re not going to out-compete the sociopaths if you’re a saint. That’s a reality.
And in politics, too!
Bethesda used to be awesome. Until they popularized DLC
TBF to Valve, their lootboxes were limited to cosmetic items in a free to play multiplayer games. You can ignore those and it wouldn’t change the gameplay at all.
Capitalism rewards psychopathy
Complete explanation in three words. Well done.
Concision!
I’m not sure about that. Nobody wants to work with psychos. Work is too much of your short life.
You don’t work with them, you work for them. The only capitalists in capitalism is the ownership class, the rest are just slaves to the system under which they are born.
But you don’t stay working for them. You move on. Then they find no one wants to work for them and they spend their whole time complaining they can’t get the staff. Psychos are bad news for a company long run.
There is a book about it, “Snakes in Suits”.
Psychos aren’t the ‘scream in your face and belittle you’ type of people, it’s the silver-tongued devils that talk about family values and the environment and how their thing helps people, all while making backroom deals and lobbying governments to pass laws in their favour or any other number of shit. Psychos will appear on the surface as the nicest goddamn person you ever met, and you won’t think otherwise until you find the knife in your back.
I think they are more like Musk. It’s obvious if you look he’s a wrong’un. It’s not possible to stay lying about yourself, especially when the ego get boosted so much. The mask slips.
Right, but even taking Musk the mask has only slipped over the last five or so years. Before that he was often treated as a darling for pushing EVs to help fight climate change and SpaceX for reigniting people’s fascination with space. It’s only after he’s got huge amounts of wealth and exposure that its become clear to people what an awful person he is.
Not sure about that. I thought he was a nob before it was cool. He was claiming too much engineer credit for himself since forever. No humility or crediting others.
Then they find no one wants to work for them
At which point the board fires them, they add another golden parachute to their collection, and they get hired to be CEO at another company for a few years until the cycle repeats.
Precisely. Maybe small companies have decent owners, but anything with a value of over a few million is likely to be run by one of these types.
I’m sure that happens. But this why you look how long people have worked at places and get a reference.
Psychopath is being used in a colloquial way here and not an exact diagnosis. Even if they are actual psychopaths they are known for being very charismatic and there are a lot of sadomasochistic people in the world who are motivated by punishment.
Further the people who work directly for these people want to be them, so they see it as just part of the process.
Another factor is money, it’s a motivator. Those who work lower down the org chart can often be desperate, struggling to get by and get used to the punishment, convincing themselves that it would be worse elsewhere.
The Idea that life is short and work just isn’t worth it comes from a place of privilege and the luxury of time for self reflection. Something not everyone can afford when one lives in survival mode.
This is tech workers. They won’t be in survival mode. They are highly employable and always have options. I think most people outside tech will have other employment options. Though if you don’t, your screwed in multiple other ways on top of has bosses.
Tech companies are operated like any other company and have a wide range of employees. Also not every tech position is highly employable. I know from personal experience in tech middle management that many employees are very easy to replace and have very common skill sets that are oversaturated in the market. Many many tech workers are absolutely operating in survival mode in 2024.
I’ve been in tech for over twenty years. About half of it in games (first half) and half Linux embedded stuff. What I’ve seen is it’s hard to recruit good people. The first job to get is the hardest as you have no experience or references. I know I’ve been lucky, falling in my feet multiple times, but so has everyone I entered industry with. A few now have their own companies. I’ve had to let a few people go myself and I hate it, but I knew they’d be fine, and they have been.
when I was growing up
This is really the key. We’re all stupid and unaware of how things work and the particular goings-ons when we’re kids. There were plenty of shitty people running the tech giant companies back then, but we just didn’t realize the extent of what was happening.
Edit: The evolution of social media also adds a lot to this. We are both more connected to each other and society, and therefore more aware of BS think it’s pulled by corporations. Then, of course, you have folks like Elon Musk who seem to make a point of making sure everyone knows how big of a piece of shit they are, and how proud of it they are.
Yeah we’re baffled about how kids get sucked into worshipping Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos, but I remember a brief time in my life when I thought Steve Jobs was the greatest and that he singlehandedly invented the iPhone with a rusty pair of pliers and gumption.
They were all evil shit back then… You were just innocent and information didn’t travel as fast
Also, Jobs “pretty decent”? That asshole was Narciso reborn
Gates was always a dirtbag.
He is one of the main reasons proprietary software is so prevalent and predatory nowadays.
bill gates was like, one of the worst of the worst. Dude literally broke the law, and then settled to avoid paying for acquiring fees.
They have never been good.
Convicted monopolist. Slimy and dishonest: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRelVFm7iJE
His direct influence is in numerous places in the Horrorween Documents.
Screw that guy.
yeah, it’s basically this kind of shit from every wealthy business man. Even the fabled Rockefeller was hated for the same reasons, dude controlled 80% of global/american oil refining and people still hated him, even though his product was the market leader.
I think that is lack of competition regulation.
yeah, it’s pretty common for any super aggressive business sector, they just completely vore the entire market sector in hopes of gaining total control, shits weird.
Monopoly is a super profitable and comfortable position, but it’s when capitalism fails.
…wish I hadn’t looked up vore…
yeah, that’s a monopoly position for you, also the vore part is… weirdly accurate.
Dude literally broke the law, and then settled to avoid paying for acquiring fees.
That sounds really tame compared to nowadays.
it’s tame, except we’re talking like, literally stealing a piece of software or it’s design blatantly, settling, and then acquiring the rights in the settlement for much cheaper than they would at market rates.
It’s not his problem that they settled for so little though.
he shouldn’t have broken the law in the first place, but that’s not the problem of the small business.
I mean there are literally three options here, purchase it from the business legally. Which costs shit tons of money, or steal it. And then deal with it after the fact, which is what they did, and it saved MS lots of money, while probably fucking yeeting the small business.
Well duh. I’m just saying it’s really tame compared to nowadays.
Also I personally don’t really care too much about copyright.
copyright isn’t generally a huge deal, until you’re a company trying to sell things for money, although even there copyright probably isn’t super relevant. It depends on what specifically it is, because you can’t exactly implement a copyrighted “mechanism” however you can patent them.
It’s probably pretty similar to a lot of modern day shenanigans, the difference being that it’s mostly VC funding pushing for the market share rather than stealing shit.
Pretty sure that is a chapter in a Donald Trump book
Was going to say this.
sociopaths have a pretty big advantage in capitalist leadership positions over non-sociopaths. they are more likely to get there in the first place, and they will perform better.
In all leadership positions, period. Capitalist or communist. Democratic or autocratic. Does not matter, those that are not held back by their morals have an advantage.
In communist societies, many people who rise to power are evil, because theyre seeking their own power primarily. In capitalism, anybody who is not actively evil enough gets thrown under the bus because theyre getting in the way of profits. Communism allows it, capitalism requires it.
It is the opposite. In capitalism, there is at least a chance a good person has some power because power is distributed, not only held by governments. There are multiple examples in the main post. Even better examples are European countries where the government and businesses hold each other in check instead of govt being bought off legally like in the US.
In communism, the way power is distributed ensures corrupt people raise to the top. See an amazing video “rule for rulers” by CGP gray for a simplified explanation how that corruption works and why a good person can’t hold power.
CGP Grey refers to dictatorships in that video, not communism exclusively. Marx predicted a revolution of labor that would get rid of scarcity which was never realized by the Soviet system. If you read a bit about it you’ll see that the so-called marxists never reached communism, as they kept pumping resources into the government, police and bureaucracy.
Communism. A utopian society without classes, divisions of wealth, exploitation or suffering. Members would provide what they could and receive what they need. The instruments of state, like government bureaucracies, police and military, would become unnecessary and would “wither away”.
Rules for rulers is explicitly about human behavior in heirarchy, not specifically anti communist. He mentions fascist dictatorships and monarchial systems as well. The solution for it is not necessarily capitalism in the video but commerce and democratic systems of voting.
Commerce is not inherently capitalist.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs
https://alphahistory.com/russianrevolution/marxism/
https://www.npr.org/2021/07/05/1012733811/capitalism-neoliberalism-america-ideology
CGP gray very specifically refers to democracies as well and explains how things like farm subsidies are used to buy votes. Maybe re-watch the videos.
And yes, CGP gray also indirectly explains why Marxists kept pumping resources into the government, police and bureaucracy. (Clarification: CGP Gray never mentions Marxists specifically, he just explains why leaders have to funnel resources to areas that help them stay in power.) It is inevitable in a system where you concentrate power in a limited group of people.
That is why distributing power between large number of independent capitalists and voters is the system that so far worked best, although still very far from perfect.
As long as humans behave like humans and are in charge, the utopian communism is as realistic as wizards in flying castles.
The book he references in that video does not make the capitalist argument you are making and by my interpretation neither does CGP.Capitalism is not inherently democratic as the market is unregulated by government. If you vote with your dollar, those with more money have more votes.I’ve edited my previous comment with more context and sources, and now I see so have you.
Sorry if it is unclear, I am saying CGB Gray explains how corruption happens in leadership structures and why it is so difficult to prevent.
The opinion that this is why capitalism can work better than communism is entirely my own logical conclusion. I am not trying to claim CGP Gray said so.
Again sorry for the confusion.
Please name which country in Europe has a government thats hasn’t been bought and paid off.
Of course, no one can. Unfortunately, that’s because capitalism is incompatible with actual democracy. Theres isn’t a country in the world whos democratic process and systems of governance hasn’t been utterly corrupted by capitalism and all that it brings with it.
If there’s a top that someone could rise to, it isn’t communism.
Netherlands? Switzerland? Norway?
Like sure, there always is some corruption but relatively insignificant amount.
Honestly, I can’t think of an EU country that is anywhere near the US levels of “corrupted by capitalism”.
If there’s a top that someone could rise to, it isn’t communism.
What? Top? What do you mean?
Nope, come on man are you kidding me (?) and disagree again.
I agree that maybe you can’t but that doesn’t make it true or not. The last Conservative government of great Britain showed themselves to be utterly corrupted by greed and capitalism. They didn’t even have to pretend not to rip the entire country off during the covid pandemic.
Even then, its not “more” or less than the US. My point is just that capitalism corrupts all governments, to one extent or another, because its incompatible with democracy.
If there is a top, in terms of money or having things etc., then it isn’t communism.
I remember when I was growing up, tech industry has so many people that were admirable
Like, damn. What the heck happened to the world?
Nothing happened to the world. You just grew up.
yes
If you think Bill Gates and Steve Jobs were good for the world then I don’t know what to tell you.
Bill Gates during the early years, yes. But now, I thought he’s turned 180°.
Bill Gates pressured the group at Oxford University not to open source their Covid vaccine, as it would undermine his investments in pharma companies.
(The team had originally secured funding from the UK gov with the intention of making it open source so that it would be more accessible to poorer countries.)
Imagine lobbying against that. Imagine knowingly making life saving medicine more expensive and less accessible, particularly to the poor.
The guy is a dick. He just spends money on good PR so people can remember him as a good guy.
Yeah, he “mostly” was successful at following the Carnegie and Rockefeller plan of convincing people you’re a philanthropist in your later years so you’re remembered fondly.
He’s always been a ruthless capitalist scumbag.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp.
https://en. wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Microsoft
https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/72o8qh/the_sordid_history_of_microsoft_or_alternatively/
Do you mean when he started to chip the population through the covid vaccines? jkjk
No, that was 5G!
/s (<- somehow this is needed)
Bill Gates was an evil piece of shit, that did many illegal things to secure Microsoft’s software empire.
It was much easier to “hide” sit back then unless you were in the know in the industry.
That said I think because tech was such a young industry and innovating so quickly. Many geeks got a chance to run companies that took off. Nowadays it’s Like every other industry with sociopaths in charge.
It was much easier to “hide” sit back then unless you were in the know in the industry.
It wasn’t hidden. Everybody knew back in the day what an evil piece of shit he was.
It has just been forgotten about and many current adults weren’t old enough, or even around, in the heyday of his evil empire, so he has been able to whitewash his image. My 50 year old ass remembers though. Fuck Bill Gates.
Bill Gates was an evil piece of shit, that did many illegal things to secure Microsoft’s software empire.
Yup. And his wife left him because of his association with Epstein.
Melinda Gates Says Bill Gates’s Work with “Abhorrent” Jeffrey Epstein Led to Divorce
Nah, she knew about his husband and Epstein ( and his at least strange occupation ) far lower than she’s wiling to admit.
deleted by creator
Bill Gates admirable? Did we grow up in the 90s in the same dimension? Him and Windows were the butt of almost every IT joke, and there was his whole thing of never doing anything original or innovative except gobbling up companies and tech who were. Then the court battles. Those were a pretty big thing, even as a teen I followed the progress of it on the news. Then holding the whole web back for almost a decade as we had to deal with the monopoly of IE.
My dad wrote software in the 90s and developed a pretty good name for his business. He once got a call from Microsoft saying they wanted to package his software in their newest OS builds. Holy crap, right?! That would be a major break!
They told him they needed to do some deep interviews to set the plan in motion. I can’t remember if there were supposed to be 4 calls total or if it was on the 4th call, but after a couple conversations my dad realized the questions they were asking were to reverse engineer his software. They were never trying to make a deal; they were trying to learn what they could so they could rewrite it and not pay him a dime. He told them to pound sand.
There were a few other conflicts he had with Microsoft. I was young and didn’t understand it well, but my whole childhood I knew Bill Gates led a shady as fuck company and thought he was an awful POS. It honestly still kills me to admit that he (now) does some good in this world.
<blink><marquee>
I remember when I was growing up,
You remember propaganda (when corporations do it, it’s called “Public Relations”).
That’s what you remember. Now, thanks to the internet democratizign information somewhat, they don’t just get to feed us their “public relations” anymore. Now people can counter that shit, and people see them for what they really are - parasites.
It’s capitalism, baby. Welcome to the real world.
Social media would be drowning in negative posts about Bill Gates if they were a thing in the 90s. The only difference, perhaps, is back then the industry was still at its early years, it was quickly evolving, so many brilliant people had a chance to achieve something too. Today, it’s huge corporations where each individual has virtually no impact.
Greed. A sane person will walk away from working once they have enough saved to comfortably retire.
$100 million can let you live comfortably forever, but there are plenty of people who want that much every year.
Those are the folks who become ‘leaders.’
And they should be eaten.
