Pirates Of Silicon Valley

Pirates Of Silicon Valley
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Okay here's a little bios of two people who dont like each other at all.
I havent seen the movie BTW so please add and brush me up on the subject...



William H. Gates
Chairman and Chief Software Architect
Microsoft Corporation

William (Bill) H. Gates is chairman and chief software architect of Microsoft Corporation, the

worldwide leader in software, services and Internet technologies for personal and business

computing. Microsoft had revenues of US$28.37 billion for the fiscal year ending June 2002, and

employs more than 50,000 people in 78 countries and regions.

Born on Oct. 28, 1955, Gates grew up in Seattle with his two sisters. Their father, William H.

Gates II, is a Seattle attorney. Their late mother, Mary Gates, was a schoolteacher, University

of Washington regent, and chairwoman of United Way International.

Gates attended public elementary school and the private Lakeside School. There, he discovered his

interest in software and began programming computers at age 13.

In 1973, Gates entered Harvard University as a freshman, where he lived down the hall from Steve

Ballmer, now Microsoft's chief executive officer. While at Harvard, Gates developed a version of

the programming language BASIC for the first microcomputer - the MITS Altair.


Top row: Steve Wood (left), Bob Wallace, Jim Lane. Middle row: Bob O'Rear, Bob Greenberg, Marc

McDonald, Gordon Letwin. Bottom row: Bill Gates, Andrea Lewis, Marla Wood, Paul Allen. December

7, 1978.
In his junior year, Gates left Harvard to devote his energies to Microsoft, a company he had

begun in 1975 with his childhood friend Paul Allen. Guided by a belief that the computer would be

a valuable tool on every office desktop and in every home, they began developing software for

personal computers. Gates' foresight and his vision for personal computing have been central to

the success of Microsoft and the software industry.

Under Gates' leadership, Microsoft's mission has been to continually advance and improve software

technology, and to make it easier, more cost-effective and more enjoyable for people to use

computers. The company is committed to a long-term view, reflected in its investment of more than

$4 billion on research and development in the current fiscal year.

In 1999, Gates wrote Business @ the Speed of Thought, a book that shows how computer technology

can solve business problems in fundamentally new ways. The book was published in 25 languages and

is available in more than 60 countries. Business @ the Speed of Thought has received wide

critical acclaim, and was listed on the best-seller lists of the New York Times, USA Today, the

Wall Street Journal and Amazon.com. Gates' previous book, The Road Ahead, published in 1995, held

the No. 1 spot on the New York Times' bestseller list for seven weeks.

Gates has donated the proceeds of both books to non-profit organizations that support the use of

technology in education and skills development.

In addition to his love of computers and software, Gates is interested in biotechnology. He sits

on the board of ICOS, a company that specializes in protein-based and small-molecule

therapeutics, and he is an investor in a number of other biotechnology companies. Gates also

founded Corbis, which is developing one of the world's largest resources of visual information -

a comprehensive digital archive of art and photography from public and private collections around

the globe. In addition, Gates has invested with cellular telephone pioneer Craig McCaw in

Teledesic, which is working on an ambitious plan to employ hundreds of low-orbit satellites to

provide a worldwide two-way broadband telecommunications service.

Philanthropy is also important to Gates. He and his wife, Melinda, have endowed a foundation with

more than $24 billion to support philanthropic initiatives in the areas of global health and

learning, with the hope that as we move into the 21st century, advances in these critical areas

will be available for all people. To date, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has committed

more than $2.5 billion to organizations working in global health; more than $1.4 billion to

improve learning opportunities, including the Gates Library Initiative to bring computers,

Internet Access and training to public libraries in low-income communities in the United States

and Canada; more than $260 million to community projects in the Pacific Northwest; and more than

$381 million to special projects and annual giving campaigns.

Gates was married on Jan. 1, 1994, to Melinda French Gates. The couple has two children: a

daughter, Jennifer Katharine Gates, born in 1996; and a son, Rory John Gates, born in 1999.

Gates is an avid reader, and enjoys playing golf and bridge.



steve Jobs(Apple Founder)
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Info On Steve Jobs

Born: February 1955; full name is Steven Paul Jobs; grew up in Mountain View and Los Altos,

Calif., an area later became known as Silicon Valley

Parents: Adopted from infancy by Paul and Clara Jobs; father a machinist for a company that

manufactured lasers; mother an accountant; both deceased

Sibling: Biological, younger sister Mona Simpson, whom he tracked down; they now have a close

relationship

High school: Graduated from Homestead High School, Los Altos, Calif. in 1972

College: Attended Reed College in Portland, Ore.; dropped out of baccalaureate program after one

semester

Wife: Laurene Powell; they met at Stanford University he was speaking at a class; they married in

1991; both are vegetarians.



Children: Daughter Lisa born when Jobs was 23 (Jobs didn't marry her mother); Lisa lived with

Jobs as a teen; he has three children with wife Laurene

Residence: English style red-brick home in Palo Alto, Calif.; built in 1930s; valued between $3

million to $5 million; sparsely decorated

Appearance: Slender; wears jeans, usually with a black turtleneck and running shoes

What's he like: People say he is a high-strung workaholic, motivates others with his enthusiasm,

has a "reality distortion field," passionate about technology, a micromanager, arrogant and

intolerant; can exude a Zen-like calm

Heroes: Dave Packard, Bob Noyce, late co-founder of Intel, and Andy Grove and singer Bob Dylan

Friends: Jerry Brown, former governor of California; Lawrence J. Ellison, billionaire software

entrepreneur and chairman of Oracle; sister, novelist Mona Simpson

Worth: More than $900 million

Honors: National Technology Medal from President Reagan in 1985, before founding NeXT; Jefferson

Award for Public Service in 1987; Entrepreneur of the Decade by Inc. magazine in 1989

Brushes with fame: Dated Joan Baez in his 20s; Ella Fitzgerald sang at his 30th birthday party;

entertained President Clinton at his home in Palo Alto, Calif.

Apple stock: Now owns only a symbolic one share; he's paid $1 a year from Apple so that he can be

on the health plan

E-mails: Receives about 300 per day

First Apple sales: After receiving an order for 25 Apple I computers, Jobs and Wozniak raised

needed capital by selling Jobs' Volkswagen van and Wozniak's Hewlett-Packard scientific

calculator

Phenomenal growth: Sales of Apple II computer in the late 1970s totaled $139 million after three

years, growing by 700 percent

Time Line

1970s
1974: Video game designer for Atari; worked there several months; used savings to travel to

India; returned to California and spent a brief time on a communal farm

1975: Attended meetings of the Homebrew Computer Club in Palo Alto, Calif., attended by friend

and engineering genius, Stephen Wozniak; they joined forces and built a marketable table-top

computer in Jobs' parents' garage; co-founded Apple Computer Inc.

1976: Introduced Apple I computer for $666; first single-board computer with onboard Read Only

Memory (ROM) that told the machine how to load programs from an external source and had a video

interface

1977: Introduced Apple II; first mass-marketed personal computer; had a plastic case and included

color graphics; Jobs encouraged programmers to create applications for the Apple II; this

resulted in 16,000 programs from games to farm budgets; former Intel marketing manager Mike

Markkula became Apple chairman and secured venture capital of $600,000



1979: Development of a computer named Lisa, which would redefine personal computing; Jobs removed

as project manager; he began working on the Macintosh personal computer

1980s
1980: Initial public offering of Apple; market value of company rose to $1.2 billion; Apple III

introduced with eight applications, including text and graphics; initial problems forced a

recall; once fixed, it became popular with professional customers; situation created a management

shakeup; Markkula became president, Jobs became chairman

1981: Stephen Wozniak took leave of absence after being injured in a private plane crash; IBM

sold its first personal computer, four years after Apple II; Apple's sales continued to rise

1983: Public debut of Lisa, a powerful, more intuitive computer controlled by hand-held mouse;

designed for computer illiterate; smaller, less expensive version called Macintosh also

introduced; Jobs recruited former PepsiCo President John Sculley as new Apple president and CEO

1985: Jobs essentially ousted from Apple in a boardroom coup after a power struggle with Sculley;

resigned with $150 million but personally hurt; formed NeXT Software to develop computer hardware

and software; Microsoft sold its first Windows 1.0 operating system

1986: Bought Pixar computer animation studios from George Lucas for less than $10 million

1989: NeXT produced a powerful but expensive computer, which was rejected by the marketplace;

Pixar won an Academy Award for computer-animated film "Tin Toy"



1990s
1993: Still unprofitable NeXT ended hardware division to focus on software for programmers and

building Internet sites; Sculley resigned as CEO of Apple

1995: Walt Disney Pictures released Pixar's first feature film, "Toy Story," first animated

feature created entirely on computer; was highest domestic grossing film that year

1996: Jobs contacted Apple; Apple acquired NeXT; Jobs returned as non-salaried adviser to

chairman Gilbert F. Amelio

1997: Apple's revenues dropped significantly; Jobs negotiated deal with longtime competitor Bill

Gates of Microsoft; Apple made deal to include Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser on Macintosh

operating system; Microsoft agreed to invest $150 million of non-voting Apple stock and to

develop Mac versions of popular Microsoft Office software; Amelio ousted by Apple board; Jobs

offered CEO and chairman position, and he agreed to serve on an interim basis

1998: Apple Computer rebounded with three profitable quarters in a row



Quotes

"I was lucky to get into computers when it was a very young and idealistic industry. There

weren't many degrees offered in computer science, so people in computers were brilliant people

from mathematics, physics, music, zoology, whatever. They loved it, and no one was really in it

for the money."
(Fortune)

"The personal computer was created by the hardware revolution of the 1970s. The next change will

come from a software revolution."
(Current Biography)

"The Macintosh turned out so well because the people working on it were musicians, artists, poets

and historians who also happened to be excellent computer scientists."
(The New York Times)



"We started out to get a computer in the hands of everyday people, and we succeeded beyond our

wildest dreams." (Time)

"I'm not a hostile-takeover kind of guy."
(The New York Times)

"I am at a stage where I don't have to do things just to get by. But then I've always been that

way, because I've never really cared about money that much."
(Fortune)



bye!