Bill Gates

Information technology and business are becoming inextricably interwoven. I don't think anybody can talk meaningfully about one without the talking about the other.

As we look ahead into the next century leaders will be those who empower others.

If GM had kept up with technology like the computer industry has, we would all be driving $25 cars that got 1 000 MPG.

The advance of technology is based on making it fit in so that you don't really even notice it, so it's part of everyday life.

There's no magic line between an application and an operating system that some bureaucrat in Washington should draw.

When you want to do your homework, fill out your tax return, or see all the choices for a trip you want to take, you need a full-size screen.

I have an excellent memory, a most excellent memory.

I read a lot of obscure books and it is nice to open a book.

Climate change is a terrible problem and it absolutely needs to be solved. It deserves to be a huge priority.

Technology is just a tool. In terms of getting the kids working together and motivating them, the teacher is the most important.

It's really kind of cool to have solar panels on your roof.

If you can't make it good at least make it look good.

Be nice to nerds. Chances are you'll end up working for one.

Me and my dad are the biggest promoters of an estate tax in the US. It's not a popular position.

Rich countries can afford to overpay for things.

Like almost everyone who uses e-mail I receive a ton of spam every day. Much of it offers to help me get out of debt or get rich quick. It would be funny if it weren't so exciting.

I'm a great believer that any tool that enhances communication has profound effects in terms of how people can learn from each other and how they can achieve the kind of freedoms that they're interested in.

Well I don't think there's any need for people to focus on my career.

People always fear change. People feared electricity when it was invented didn't they? People feared coal they feared gas-powered engines... There will always be ignorance and ignorance leads to fear. But with time people will come to accept their silicon masters.

DOS is ugly and interferes with users' experience.

When the PC was launched people knew it was important.

I remember thinking quite logically that I didn't want to spoil my children with wealth and so that I would create a foundation but not knowing exactly what it would focus on.

The first rule of any technology used in a business is that automation applied to an efficient operation will magnify the efficiency. The second is that automation applied to an inefficient operation will magnify the inefficiency.

If your culture doesn't like geeks you are in real trouble.

I believe that if you show people the problems and you show them the solutions they will be moved to act.

Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can't lose.

The general idea of the rich helping the poor I think is important.

I spend a lot of time reading.

Innovations that are guided by smallholder farmers adapted to local circumstances and sustainable for the economy and environment will be necessary to ensure food security in the future.

Just in terms of allocation of time resources religion is not very efficient. There's a lot more I could be doing on a Sunday morning.

Intellectual property has the shelf life of a banana.

A first-generation fortune is the most likely to be given away; but once a fortune is inherited, it's less likely that a very high percentage will go back to society.

Certainly I'll never be able to put myself in the situation that people growing up in the less developed countries are in. I've gotten a bit of a sense of it by being out there and meeting people and talking with them.

I believe in innovation and that the way you get innovation is you fund research and you learn the basic facts.

Since when has the world of computer software design been about what people want? This is a simple question of evolution. The day is quickly coming when every knee will bow down to a silicon fist and you will all beg your binary gods for mercy.

In inner-city low-income communities of color there's such a high correlation in terms of educational quality and success.

Life is not fair, get used to it.

Until we're educating every kid in a fantastic way until every inner city is cleaned up there is no shortage of things to do.

I'm a geek.

I actually thought that it would be a little confusing during the same period of your life to be in one meeting when you're trying to make money and then go to another meeting where you're giving it away. I mean is it gonna erode your ability you know to make money? Are you gonna somehow get confused about what you're trying to do?

At Microsoft there are lots of brilliant ideas but the image is that they all come from the top - I'm afraid that's not quite right.

It's fine to celebrate success but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure.

Almost every way we make electricity today except for the emerging renewables and nuclear puts out CO2. And so what we're going to have to do at a global scale is create a new system. And so we need energy miracles.

I think it's fair to say that personal computers have become the most empowering tool we've ever created. They're tools of communication they're tools of creativity and they can be shaped by their user.

Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning.

Well I think any author or musician is anxious to have legitimate sales of their products partly so they're rewarded for their success partly so they can go on and do new things.

Maintaining a consistent platform also helps improve product support - a significant problem in the software industry.

I never took a day off in my twenties. Not one. And I'm still fanatical but now I'm a little less fanatical.

If you're using first-class land for biofuels then you're competing with the growing of food. And so you're actually spiking food prices by moving energy production into agriculture.

If I'd had some set idea of a finish line don't you think I would have crossed it years ago?

Now we put out a lot of carbon dioxide every year over 26 billion tons. For each American it's about 20 tons. For people in poor countries it's less than one ton. It's an average of about five tons for everyone on the planet. And somehow we have to make changes that will bring that down to zero.

I was lucky to be involved and get to contribute to something that was important which is empowering people with software.

We should all grow our own food and do our own waste processing we really should.

I'm sorry that we have to have a Washington presence. We thrived during our first 16 years without any of this. I never made a political visit to Washington and we had no people here. It wasn't on our radar screen. We were just making great software.

This is a fantastic time to be entering the business world because business is going to change more in the next 10 years than it has in the last 50.

There are people who don't like capitalism and people who don't like PCs. But there's no-one who likes the PC who doesn't like Microsoft.

We always overestimate the change that will occur in the next two years and underestimate the change that will occur in the next ten. Don't let yourself be lulled into inaction.

In American math classes we teach a lot of concepts poorly over many years. In the Asian systems they teach you very few concepts very well over a few years.

The AIDS is a disease that is hard to talk about.

I have seen firsthand that agricultural science has enormous potential to increase the yields of small farmers and lift them out of hunger and poverty.

We are not even close to finishing the basic dream of what the PC can be.

Who decides what's in Windows? The customers who buy it.

Today we're very dependent on cheap energy. We just take it for granted - all the things you have in the house the way industry works.

Well private money can take risks in a way that government money often isn't willing to.

The only thing I understand deeply because in my teens I was thinking about it and every year of my life is software. So I'll never be hands-on on anything except software.

The U.S. couldn't even get rid of Saddam Hussein. And we all know that the EU is just a passing fad. They'll be killing each other again in less than a year. I'm sick to death of all these fascist lawsuits.

We are in the throes of a transition where every publication has to think of their digital strategy.

You know capitalism is this wonderful thing that motivates people it causes wonderful inventions to be done. But in this area of diseases of the world at large it's really let us down.

Capitalism has worked very well. Anyone who wants to move to North Korea is welcome.

If you think your teacher is tough wait until you get a boss. He doesn't have tenure.

The kids are a big part of my schedule.

I think the thing we see is that as people are using video games more they tend to watch passive TV a bit less. And so using the PC for the Internet playing video games is starting to cut into the rather unbelievable amount of time people spend watching TV.

In this business by the time you realize you're in trouble it's too late to save yourself. Unless you're running scared all the time you're gone.

Whether it's Google or Apple or free software we've got some fantastic competitors and it keeps us on our toes.

Security is I would say our top priority because for all the exciting things you will be able to do with computers - organizing your lives staying in touch with people being creative - if we don't solve these security problems then people will hold back.

Well the protester I think is a very powerful thing. It's basically a mechanism of democracy that along with capitalism scientific innovation those things have built the modern world. And it's wonderful that the new tools have empowered that protestor so that state secrets bad developments are not hidden anymore.

Energy innovation is not a nationalistic game.

Governments will always play a huge part in solving big problems. They set public policy and are uniquely able to provide the resources to make sure solutions reach everyone who needs them. They also fund basic research which is a crucial component of the innovation that improves life for everyone.

The trouble with energy farming is that the energy isn't always where you want to use it and it isn't always when you want to use it.

Microsoft is not about greed. It's about innovation and fairness.

Television is not real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.

Although I don't have a prescription for what others should do I know I have been very fortunate and feel a responsibility to give back to society in a very significant way.

We've got to put a lot of money into changing behavior.

People everywhere love Windows.

The Internet is becoming the town square for the global village of tomorrow.

Internet TV and the move to the digital approach is quite revolutionary. TV has historically has been a broadcast medium with everybody picking from a very finite number of channels.

Expectations are a form of first-class truth: If people believe it it's true.

I'm going to save my public voice largely for the issues where I have some depth.

Oh I think there are a lot of people who would be buying and selling online today that go up there and they get the information but then when it comes time to type in their credit card they think twice because they're not sure about how that might get out and what that might mean for them.

I really had a lot of dreams when I was a kid and I think a great deal of that grew out of the fact that I had a chance to read a lot.

640K ought to be enough for anybody.

The world has been very careful to pick very few diseases for eradication because it is very tough.

Digital reading will completely take over. It's lightweight and it's fantastic for sharing. Over time it will take over.

Life is not divided into semesters. You don't get summers off and very few employers are interested in helping you find yourself.

I know there's a farmer out there somewhere who never wants a PC and that's fine with me.