Michael Goonan

History and Structure of the Internet

Bill Gates

Introduction

Bill Gates is one of few man that have changed the way that the entire world operates. He is also the current chairman of Microsoft. He is also a founder member of the company. He founded it with Paul Allen. He is always known as one of the worlds richest people. He was ranked the worlds richest person from 1995-2007. He was ranked third in 2008 but was once again the wealthiest person in 2009. His current net worth is $54billion. He has held the positions of CEO and chief software architect during his time at Microsoft. He is the largest individual shareholder of Microsoft as he holds over 8% of the common stock. Gates stepped down as CEO of Microsoft in January 2000. He still remained on as chairman but he also created the position of chief software architect which he took up himself. Gates announced in 2006 that he would be changing from full-time work at Microsoft to part-time work at Microsoft. He has not had a full-time day at Microsoft since 2008. Gates still remains at Microsoft as non-executive chairman. Gates has continued his philanthropy work since reducing his work hours with Microsoft.

Discussion

Bill Gates has probably had the biggest impact on the world over the last thirty years. He and his company, Microsoft, created an easy accessible operating system for computers. It makes a computer far easier to use. Gates' passion for computers first began when he was attending a private school called Lakeside elementary. With the help of a friend, Gates wrote his first computer program. This was just the first of many. When he was in high school he helped staff write programs for payroll. Bill and his friend Paul Allen then started a company which helped the government track street traffic patterns. After high school in 1972, Gates and Allen both went to college in Harvard University. They met Steve Ballmer while in Harvard. Gates and Allen began to develop software for their very first microcomputer. The finished language was called MS-BASIC. The pair then sold it for $100,000 to a company called MTIS. After his sophomore year, Gates and Allen felt that they were more suited to the business environment. They left Harvard in 1975 and started up a small computer programming business called Microsoft. They set up their company in Albuquerque, New Mexico. They also claimed the name Microsoft in the state.

The first step that they took was to acquire the right to use the language MS-BASIC. They had previously sold this language already. They acquired these rights once again, they then began to program new computers. Microsoft sold their products very cheaply but they believed that they could sell in such great quantity that they could make a profit. In the early stages, working at Microsoft was very hard. Gates had to work long hours. They began to sell more software so Bill was able to hire people to work for him and decrease his workload. Many of the people he hired were old school friends. People enjoyed working at Microsoft. Although the work was difficult, the atmosphere was relaxed and there was no dress code. In 1978, Microsoft moved to Bellevue, Washington. This was done in order to make the company more accessible to its customers.

Microsoft's first major contract came with IBM. They wanted Bill to create an operating system on disks which could operate with mice, keyboards and monitors. He had one year to do it. Gates knew he couldn't have it completed that quickly so he bought a pre-made operating system, Q-DOS, from another software company. He modified it for a year before sending it to IBM. He took half of Microsoft's then 60 employees and had them work around the clock in order to have it completed in time. They called it MS-DOS. Many people bought it. Steve Allen was diagnosed with cancer. It was treatable but he decided it was best if he left the company to get away from the stress. Gates replaced him with Steve Ballmer. Gates then concentrated on creating Windows. He believed that people wanted Graphical User Interference operating system rather than the plain text MS-DOS system. In 1985, Microsoft released Windows. People wondered if Windows would succeed. Gates was convinced that GUI was right way for computers to operate. Windows was not making much money but MS-DOS was still making a lot of money. By the end of 1985, Microsoft had over 1000 employee's.

In 1986, Gates allowed Microsoft to be traded publicly on the stock market. Within a few months Gates finally became a millionaire. He did not take advantage of this however, and he lived a very ordinary lifestyle. He soon after became a billionaire and he then released his second version of Windows. Like the first one, it was not a big hit. He finally got the world excited about Windows when he released his third version in 1990. In just two weeks he had sold 100,000 copies. Windows had finally become a success. Windows 3.0 had over 12 languages altogether and was sold in 24 different countries. Gates has received a great amount of wealth from his work with computers. At the moment he is worth $54billion. He has also donated around $26billion to charities in the past. Even today he is still creating more and more versions of Windows. In 2005, he had produced no less than nine versions of Windows.

Conclusion

Gates once famously said,''A computer on every desk in every home''. He said this around when he started off his company Microsoft. It showed his passion and his dream for computers. Through his amazing efforts, he is gradually getting closer and closer to this dream. He will someday meet his expectation and most, if not all, computers in the world will be running on his operating system. At the moment around 85% of computers use Gates' operating system. Due to Bill's global dominance, he has been in many court cases but as of yet, there has not been a serious penalty imposed on him. From all that Gates has done I believe that he has had a bigger impact on the world than anybody else. Most people who have a computer use his operating systems. He has made it so much easier for the world to use the internet and computers in general. Thanks to Gates, you now have the world at your doorstep.

Bibliography

Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Gates

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft

Hyper History

http://www.hyperhistory.net/apwh/bios/b4gatesb.htm

Microsoft

http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/exec/billg/bio.mspx

About.com

http://beginnersinvest.about.com/od/billgates/Bill_Gates_and_Microsoft.htm

Bio

http://www.biography.com/articles/Bill-Gates-9307520