Essay, Research Paper: Bill Gates

Personal History
William Henry Gates III was born in Seattle, Washington on October 28th, 1955. Bills father Bill Gates Jr. worked for a Seattle law firm and Bills mother Mary, taught school until they started their family. Bills parents were married in 1951 and two years later gave birth to their first child, Bills older sister, Kristanne. Two years after that Bill was born and in 1964 the third and final Gates was born, her name is Libby. As a child Bill enjoyed rocking back and forth, today he still has a habit of rocking when he is thinking about something. Bill was very bored at school and his parents knew it so they were always trying to feed him more information to keep him busy. Bills parents finally decided to put him in a private school where he would be challenged more. The Lakeside private school had just bought a new computer when Bill arrived and he was immediately hooked. Within a week he had surpassed the knowledge of the computer teacher at Lakeside. Learning the BASIC programming language was a breeze for Bill and he was soon writing his own programs. Bills love for computers and math led him to a new place around his neighborhood that was renting computer time. He got an arrangement with the owners that he would get free computer time if he found things that would make the computer crash. During this time Bill met Paul Allen his business partner for the rest of his life. Together they started a small company called Traf-O-Data, they sold a small computer outfitted with their program that could count traffic for the city. This company wasn't a big success but it did earn the two boys some money as well as good business skills. Bill also wrote a schedule program for his school which he modified a bit to put little Bill Gates in a class full of the prettiest girls in the school. Bill was deemed by his peers and his teachers as the smartest kid on campus. Upon graduating from Lakeside Bill enrolled in Harvard University in 1973, one of the best universities in the country. Bill was also bored here so he spent most of his time programming, playing poker and seeing how little work he could do and still get A's. He told his teachers that he would be a millionaire by the time he was 30, this was one of the few times he underestimated himself, Bill was a billionaire when he was 31. One of Bills teachers was quoted saying "He was a helluva good programmer, but he's an obnoxious human being." The intense lifestyle Bill lived during his first year in Harvard made him ill for most of the summer of 1974. Bill soon left Harvard for business opportunities in programming which turned him into a multi-billionaire. Later he met Melinda French who he married and they now have a little daughter named Jennifer. It's very interesting that even with all that money Bill drives himself to work in an average family car and he even flies coach. A very interesting man and a very interesting childhood.



Work History
Although Bill Gates is known mostly for his founding of Microsoft he also has done a number of programming jobs before becoming the worlds richest man. Bill Gates first programming job would be when he offered the principle at his high school a timetable organizer that would be more efficient and easier to use than what the principle had previously been using. Little did Gates' principle know that Bill had created the program to his own benefit... Bill was going to be in all the pretty girls classes. Bill's second job was a summer's work programming in which he earned 4200 dollars. At the age of fourteen Bill Gates and his programming buddy thought up the idea for a traffic counting computer which would later be named 'Traf- o-Data' and earn them 20 000 dollars. But when word got around that the computers were being sold out of a basement by a couple of teens the business fell through. Gates also worked as a Congressional Page and at a programming company called 'TRW'. After dropping out of Harvard Gates created the first basic operating language for the computer. Although Gates has programmed a number of programs he is still going strong at it and is programming as I write this.



Personal Beliefs
Most of Bills personal beliefs revolve around working hard and trying your hardest to succeed. He believes that if you are intelligent and know how to apply your intelligence you can accomplish anything. Bill thinks that if you don't work your hardest you will never succeed. Microsoft's vision is "A computer on every desk, and Microsoft software on every computer. Bill is obviously a visionary but he also works very hard and very competitively to carry out his vision. His belief in high intelligence and hard work is what put him where he is today, as well as being in the right place at the right time. He doesn't believe in luck or any sort of god, just hard work and competitiveness. Some smaller software companies complain that even if they have a better product than Microsoft they can't market it because Microsoft can and will always out advertise and out price their product. Bill simply sees it as good competition and he will continue to stomp out the competition until he dies. Interestingly one of Bills favorite games is the game of Risk, the game of world domination. These beliefs are few but they are quite powerful in the computer software industry and will continue to increase Bills wealth and his monopoly on the industry.




Industry History
Bill Gates is the most successful business man in the world today, and he is also in the fastest growing industry in the world. Bill has been involved in this industry since he was in school, he made money selling software that he made to his school and city. His first company was called Traf-O-Data, they sold a program that could count traffic in a city. That was about all he did in Traf-O-Data. However with his computer partner Paul Allen he co-founded Microsoft back in 1975 when he was only 19. Within a few years Microsoft had made a name for itself with their operating systems and shrewd business deals. One of Microsoft's earliest successes was the MS-DOS operating system which is still used today. Now Microsoft has grown to be the largest software company there is and they show no sign of slowing down. It has been calculated that Microsoft controls 80-85% of the entire PC software industry. The company has hundreds of products and nearly 18,000 employees making it one of the largest companies to date. Many of the companies share holders are now millionaires and a few including Bill Gates and Paul Allen are billionaires. Microsoft is no doubt the fastest growing company in the PC software industry, without some of Microsoft's software I may not have even been typing this up. Bill Gates, head of Microsoft, the richest man alive, also one of the most powerful and influential men alive, all this power in the hands of a single man has some people very frightened. There are many battles going on about the vast monopoly Microsoft has on the industry, but you have to admit it, he earned it, and he'll do anything in his power to keep it.




Activities
Bill Gates is not the greedy man that allot of people picture when hearing the name 'Gates' in fact Bill Gates is quite the giving man when it comes to computers and the internet. Last year some time Bill Gates visited Chicago's Einstein Elementary School where he announced grants benefiting Chicago's schools and museums where he donated a total of 110 000 dollars , a bunch of computers, and connected the internet to a number of schools. Secondly Bill Gates donated 38 million dollars for the building of a computer institute at Stanford University. Thirdly Gates donates to Habitat for Humanity and plans to give away 95% of all his earnings when he is old and gray. To conclude Bill Gates donates to a number of charities and causes especially those promoting computers.

Who was this author - Harold Robbins: who said, behind every successful business there is a crime. I sometimes believe Paul Allen was true brain and bill inherited or simply used his fathers Law practises. You and me know how lawers are!

Atul Kumthekar,
Dallas,TX

Very Nice job
I got what I need with a lot of other important information
Thanks!
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