# Bill Gates really worked for Apple before?



## sandboy6184 (Jul 11, 2004)

Just watch Pirates of silicon valley, and yes I know there are some false parts from reading Wozs site.

But I wanted to know some general apple history.

1. Did bill MS really work for Apple before?
2. How did MS rise, when Apple had a huge team, more money, hardware with a popular OS?
3. Whats with , out of nowhere, some apple employees go to Japan and they happen to pick up some NEC computers, and HEy wow windows is on here which is made by one of our employees Bill GAtes. What were they doing in japan?
4. So did windows really steal most of its ideas from the apple OS?

Thanks!


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## Jamesrdorn (Jul 11, 2004)

If he didnt work for them before... he will soon....

Apple will be the only one left still making money from there hard efforts once Linux takes over.

=) j/k (but hope I am right!)


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## chevy (Jul 11, 2004)

1) No
2) MS had a very good contract with IBM... and then was able to reuse his work on other computers... and they created some of the most useful software for all computers (Word and Excel), even if the first of both could have been better with more competition
3) ?
4) depends how you define "steal"


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## sandboy6184 (Jul 11, 2004)

chevy said:
			
		

> 1) No
> 2) MS had a very good contract with IBM... and then was able to reuse his work on other computers... and they created some of the most useful software for all computers (Word and Excel), even if the first of both could have been better with more competition
> 3) ?
> 4) depends how you define "steal"



im guessing you never seent he movie PIRATES OF SILICON VALLEY


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## chevy (Jul 11, 2004)

Are you asking about the film, or about what really happened ?


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## JetwingX (Jul 11, 2004)

a good book that i read which explains it from the Microsoft developers point of view is  Barbarians Led by Bill Gates  by Jennifer Edstrom and Marlin Eller


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## sandboy6184 (Jul 11, 2004)

what really happenend


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## Elliotjnewman (Jul 11, 2004)

yeah what did happen?


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## Ripcord (Jul 11, 2004)

who knows apple bill gates were emplyed by them btu you cacn see wha thappened


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## soulseek (Jul 11, 2004)

who cares about the past.... the important thing right now is that longhorn rules !!!! or is it Tiger its called ?


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## Ripcord (Jul 11, 2004)

Boy, I hope you can distinguish between them, if Microsoft's actually been successful in cloning OS X, then A) that's big trouble for Apple, and B) armageddon is upon us.


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## MisterMe (Jul 11, 2004)

sandboy6184 said:
			
		

> Just watch Pirates of silicon valley, and yes I know there are some false parts from reading Wozs site.
> 
> But I wanted to know some general apple history.
> 
> 1. Did bill MS really work for Apple before?


No, Apple did not work for Apple. This is not in the film. Congratulations on being the first person I have ever known to ask the question. Microsoft got its start writing the BASIC interpreter for the Altair 8800. Gates was immensely aided in this effort by having dumpster-dived in the DEC headquarters trash. In the early days of microcomputers, Microsoft BASIC was the company's dominant product.



			
				sandboy6184 said:
			
		

> 2. How did MS rise, when Apple had a huge team, more money, hardware with a popular OS?


There are three eras in Microsoft's history. The first was the pioneering Microsoft BASIC era. This was a time when the company sold BASIC for such platforms as CP/M and Radio Shack's TRS-DOS. Actually, MS BASIC was integrated with TRS-DOS. The second was the PC-DOS/MS-DOS era. This era began when Microsoft licensed PC-DOS to IBM, even though Microsoft did not own it. Microsoft then duped Seattle Microcomputer out of Q-DOS (quick and dirty operating system), a 8086-compatible rip-off of Digital Research's CP/M. Key to Microsoft's success was the PC-DOS license was non-exclusive. Microsoft was able to sell MS-DOS, its own version of PC-DOS. The third was the Windows era. By this time, IBM had lost its ability to dictate the hardware market. IBM tried to regain its dominance with the PS/2 in hardware and OS/2 in operating systems. Microsoft exploited the market's reluctance to switch to OS/2 and the PS/2. With Windows 95, Microsoft killed the last vestiges of competition from DR-DOS, the direct descendant of CP/M-86. The Microsoft Office era might qualify as a fourth era. It is most certainly a major part of the third era. During the DOS era, Microsoft was a bit-player in the office productivity application market on Intel-compatible hardware. Its productivity applications were actually more popular on the Mac. Lotus, WordPerfect, Paradox, and others were dominant in office productivity software. Windows versions of PC-DOS stalwarts, especially Lotus 1-2-3, performed poorly in the GUI environment. IIRC, it is a proven fact that Microsoft had concealed Windows APIs that allowed its own Word, Excel, _etc_. to perform well. Feature-wise, WordPerfect was considered to be far superior MS Word. Most, however, agree that Excel was an excellent spreadsheet. With Office, Microsoft was able to leverage Excel and its secret APIs to displace its competition in productivity applications.


			
				sandboy6184 said:
			
		

> 3. Whats with , out of nowhere, some apple employees go to Japan and they happen to pick up some NEC computers, and HEy wow windows is on here which is made by one of our employees Bill GAtes. What were they doing in japan?


I have no idea. Perhaps, you ought to research this on your own.


			
				sandboy6184 said:
			
		

> 4. So did windows really steal most of its ideas from the apple OS?
> 
> Thanks!


You ought to go through the MacKido web site.  However, by now you should understand that much of Microsoft's history has been marked by deceit, rip-offs, and outright theft. However, there are an awful lot of poverty-striken thieves out there. Microsoft is Bill Gates. Bill Gates was born rich. He is single-mindedly dedicated to getting richer. This is why you don't see Microsoft deterred by the lawsuits brought against it from around the world. This is why Microsoft continues its profitable Macintosh business when others are afraid to enter it.


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## sandboy6184 (Jul 11, 2004)

grrrr


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## sandboy6184 (Jul 11, 2004)

Ripcord said:
			
		

> Boy, I hope you can distinguish between them, if Microsoft's actually been successful in cloning OS X, then A) that's big trouble for Apple, and B) armageddon is upon us.



You  I was talking about apples early days OS, not now


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## sandboy6184 (Jul 11, 2004)

MisterMe said:
			
		

> No, Apple did not work for Apple. This is not in the film. Congratulations on being the first person I have ever known to ask the question. Microsoft got its start writing the BASIC interpreter for the Altair 8800. Gates was immensely aided in this effort by having dumpster-dived in the DEC headquarters trash. In the early days of microcomputers, Microsoft BASIC was the company's dominant product.



Maybe you became blind when the part came when Bill Gates is wearing a Apple t-shirt and attending the apple headquarters and attending apple seminars.


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## sandboy6184 (Jul 11, 2004)

Ripcord said:
			
		

> who knows apple bill gates were emplyed by them btu you cacn see wha thappened



[PERSONAL ATTACK REMOVED]


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## Ripcord (Jul 11, 2004)

sandboy6184 said:
			
		

> You  I was talking about apples early days OS, not now



That's fine, though my reply was directed to the message directly above it, and had nothing to do with any of your posts.

Also, please refrain from name-calling.



			
				sandboy6184 said:
			
		

> [PERSONAL ATTACK REMOVED]



Sorry, was trying to emulate some of the more, er, interesting writing styles so far in this thread =)


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## sandboy6184 (Jul 11, 2004)

Ripcord said:
			
		

> That's fine, though my reply was directed to the message directly above it, and had nothing to do with any of your posts.
> 
> Also, please refrain from name-calling.
> 
> ...



im just messing with you, here drink some of my coffee coolata friend


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## MisterMe (Jul 11, 2004)

sandboy6184 said:
			
		

> Maybe you became blind when the part came when Bill Gates is wearing a Apple t-shirt and attending the apple headquarters and attending apple seminars.


Sorry for the typo. I should have said that _Gates_ did not work for Apple. I take it, however, that you understood what I meant. I also understand that you think that Gates attendance at seminars at Apple headquarters is proof of his employment at Apple. If this is the case, then it is a monumental leap in logic. Do you believe that every developer who attended a seminar at Apple worked for the company? If you believe that, then you have a lot to learn about how corporations work.


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## fryke (Jul 12, 2004)

Just to clear up why the original question came up and why Bill Gates is seen wearing a Macintosh shirt in that flick:

Microsoft (and with it, Bill Gates) was one of the first - and most important - developers for the Macintosh platform. They brought Excel, and later Word to the Mac long before there was an Office for Windows. So, in a way, yes, Bill Gates did work 'for' Apple. But he wasn't on Apple's payroll, if that's what you're asking.


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## kendall (Jul 12, 2004)

if bill gates did work for apple, apple would be the largest computer company in the world, mac os would have a 95% market share, and we'd all be getting excited by keynote speeches performed by bill gates!


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## soulseek (Jul 12, 2004)

[PERSONAL ATTACK REMOVED] but i dont think most of us here would like any other than Steve on that stage...

remember the keynotes in the 90s when steve wasnt there ???


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## hulkaros (Jul 12, 2004)

LOL


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## kendall (Jul 12, 2004)

soulseek said:
			
		

> [PERSONAL ATTACK REMOVED] but i dont think most of us here would like any other than Steve on that stage...
> 
> remember the keynotes in the 90s when steve wasnt there ???




my posts was kind of like an alternate reality.  assuming gates went to work for apple in 1980 and was still there today, we probably wouldnt know who steve jobs is or even give a crap.


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## soulseek (Jul 12, 2004)

and if George Bush wasnt elected president Bin landen wouldnt have crashed 2 planes into the twin towers , and Spiderman the movie would have turned out a lot better  
who cares, whats done is done


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## hulkaros (Jul 12, 2004)

LOL



This is getting funnier by the moment... It is like watching multiple episodes of Friends


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## kendall (Jul 12, 2004)

soulseek said:
			
		

> and if George Bush wasnt elected president Bin landen wouldnt have crashed 2 planes into the twin towers , and Spiderman the movie would have turned out a lot better
> who cares, whats done is done



you sir are a sick man.


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## soulseek (Jul 12, 2004)

i was sick some time ago, but a good friend of mine helped me find my way  i bought a mac and gave my pc to my bro.... since then i feel better everyday


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## kendall (Jul 12, 2004)

soulseek said:
			
		

> i was sick some time ago, but a good friend of mine helped me find my way  i bought a mac and gave my pc to my bro.... since then i feel better everyday




no really, your comment was disgusting.  you should really stop talking now.


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## chevy (Jul 12, 2004)

kool down boys....

The subject of the thread is "Bill Gates really worked for Apple before"... and I think he is still... the main advantage of the Mac over Linux is that it runs MS Office, no ?


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## fryke (Jul 12, 2004)

Yep, keep it on topic, please... If you want to talk about the 9/11 stuff, head somewhere else, for example a cinema showing Fahrenheit 9/11. Or politics. Or a café. Or something...

And chevy: Yep, that's kinda funny, isn't it... Although I'd say the main advantage of the Mac over Linux is that it's a UN*X that actually _works_ for the desktop/notebook. (And Adobe, Macromedia would have to be counted, too - not just MS makes important software for the Mac but not Linux.)


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## soulseek (Jul 12, 2004)

well personally i can wait a cocoa version of Openoffice, then its goodbye microsoft forever


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## chevy (Jul 12, 2004)

If you like the integration, you can try NeoOfficeJ. It is not as bad as they say.

For the rest I also use OpenOffice 1.1.2 (no MacOSX version of OpenOffice 2 yet).


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## Ripcord (Jul 12, 2004)

chevy said:
			
		

> the main advantage of the Mac over Linux is that it runs MS Office, no ?



Oh, but there are SO many other advantages of OS X over Linux.  

Like, for example, I can install software without getting the obscure error message "ApplicationX depends on gtk+2.4.3-2 which is not installed".  And after installing this mysterious "gtk+2.4.3-2" I don't get an error message that says "Nice job, braniac.  ApplicationY depends on gtk+2.2.10-3 which will now terminate and will devour random blocks of data while it's at it".

I have a Window manager/evniroment (Finder/Quarts/etc) that doesn't make my brain explode with its quirks, bugs, non-intuitaveness, and duplicity.  I have programs that work (have you ever tried using GnomeMeeting?  iChat AV it is not.  It isn't even NetMeeting, and using tin cans + holding up a picture of your chat partner hand-drawn by a 5-year old is better than NetMeeting).  

I can run OS X on ALL of my hardware, I can use 802.11G NICs, and sound tends to work.  I don't have to spend 50% of my time trying to get the machine to work for me (as opposed to the other way around).  Sure, I'm "forced" to know more about how my system works internally, but you can bet if I was "forced" to spend 50% of my "driving time" working on my car, I'd quickly become a permanent pedestrian.

Don't get me wrong, I really like Linux, and I LOVE OSS and the idea behind OSS (I'm a contributor to a couple of different programs).  I just think desktop Linux needs some serious work, and its developers need some serious attitude adjustments (get over it folks - _just statically link libraries into the @%#% programs!  They'll actually *run* on people's machines!_).  See my earlier "linux killed my grandma" rant - Linux 2.6, KDE 3.2, and Gnome 2.6 have improved things a little, but not nearly enough.

Needless to say, if MS Office was suddenly made available for Linux in some suped-up, shiny version, Linux would still be unusable by 95% of the population.  This will be fixed eventually (hopefully sooner than later; as soon as MS starts to feel the pain it'll whip out the "patent" stick, and then the party will be over.  It's registering 2000 patents a year, so the sooner Linux becomes a viable product and gets this out of the way, the better).  In the meantime, I'll stick with OS X (or even, gasp, Windows), which I can actually *use* on a day-to-day basis.


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## drunkmac (Jul 12, 2004)

Thats a really good movie. Does anyone have a copy of it I can score? You cant rent it around here, and besides, wasnt it an HBO thing?


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## kendall (Jul 12, 2004)

why do "special" people like yourself [FRYKE: soulseek's original post deleted because of unnecessary comments] start ranting about Windows XP when it has nothing to do with the situation at hand?  is it because i mention it in my signature?


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## fryke (Jul 12, 2004)

kendall, soulseek: stop it. you both know very well that we don't want flamewars on here. and as long as they're not on topic, we want them even less.


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## kendall (Jul 12, 2004)




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## fryke (Jul 12, 2004)

wha', you unhappy because i moderated a little, kendall? ... i hope you understand _why_ i did... if you still feel that you want to discuss things with soulseek, i suggest private messaging as the medium of choice... ;-)


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## kendall (Jul 12, 2004)

no, you did the right thing!


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## chevy (Jul 12, 2004)

Ripcord: of course, the quality of the integration is the first reason to buy Apple. And there, Linux is not better than Windows.

Fryke: yes, not only MS does good software for MacOS that is not available on Linux: Adobe does too, Macromedia... and Apple !

My only wish: that the MacOS GUI becomes sleeker and faster. I don't need that large lifts, I probably don't need all graphical effects... and that's where Bill is (or was) better than Steve: he can think barebone.


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## soulseek (Jul 12, 2004)

having looked @ longhorn pictures i think Bill is just once again copyin Steve. this times its mac os x interface etc...


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## mindbend (Jul 12, 2004)

The history of Apple and Microsft is one of my favorite topics. There are many books on the subject, most of which I have read. I encourage other fans to check some out. They are a great read.

Also, there are a lot of references on the web (no I don't have links now, I'm too lazy to go diggint hem up) with things like old Apple advertisements featuring Microsoft and an even geekier Bill Gates. And even some old e-mails (or pre-emails/letters) where Gates explicitly recommends/begs Apple to go down a different path so that his company (M$) can write the best applications for Apple. Gates was right. And not to mention the Mac expo 20 years ago where Gates was a featured guest and looked like a pawn in Steve's chess game. Oops.

I'm surprised nobody mentioned Xerox PARC here. That's where this all REALLY started. Steve was just the first to realize it was the future for a mass audience. He was so dead on.

In short, Gates was a huge Mac fan early on and intended on developing the best apps for that platform. In the end he didn't like where Apple was going, and/or the contract he was able to get from them, so he went his own way. 

There are a lot of other reasons for why M$ came to dominate (Apple's board demanded a profit margin aproach versus market share, huge mistake), but nonetheless, it all came together for Bill. Obviously.

Finally. Bill Gates never worked for Apple. He developed software for Apple, just like "he" does now.


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## sandboy6184 (Jul 12, 2004)

you s messed up my thread , gosh


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## sandboy6184 (Jul 12, 2004)

mindbend said:
			
		

> Finally. Bill Gates never worked for Apple. He developed software for Apple, just like "he" does now.



SO then why did Steve Jobs get mad that Bill made his own OS.

In the movie, Steven finds out about Windows on japanese NEC computers and gets super pissed.

Macromedia makes Flash and Dreamweaver for Microsoft windows. If they started making thier own OS, do you think Bill gates at MS is going to get super pissed and say HOW DARE YOU DEVELOP an OS behind my back!!! , just like how Steve did to Bill.

My point is Steven got mad, and he got mad because Bill was not just a developer, he was more than that to Apple, he was a part of them, thats what the movie shows, why else did Steve get mad at Bill?


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## chevy (Jul 12, 2004)

'cause Steve thought that Bill got the idea of the windows oriented GUI by visiting Apple.

And don't forget... you watched a movie !


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## Ripcord (Jul 12, 2004)

sandboy6184 said:
			
		

> you <expletive> smessed up my thread , gosh



Boy, with that and all your other, er, wonderful posts, you're really hoping to get your account banned, aren't you?


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## MisterMe (Jul 12, 2004)

sandboy6184 said:
			
		

> ....
> 
> My point is Steven got mad, and he got mad because Bill was not just a developer, he was more than that to Apple, he was a part of them, thats what the movie shows, why else did Steve get mad at Bill?


As difficult as this is for you to understand, Microsoft was never a part of Apple. You really need to do some research on the history of Apple _and_ Microsoft. Your flawed memory of a TV movie is simply not good enough.


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## Ricky (Jul 12, 2004)

Alright, about time this thread was locked and sandboy6184 gets his first *PUBLIC WARNING*.


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