So I just read Bill Gates' 1976 Open Letter To Hobbyists, in which he whines about not making more money from his software. You know, instead of being proud of making software that people wanted to use. And then the bastard went on and made proprietary licences for software the industry standard, holding back innovation and freedom for decades. What a douche canoe.

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[–] General_Effort@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

That's true in the same way that Trump's tariffs are paid by other countries. Which is to say: Not at all.

Bill Gates was no billionaire at the time. His background was probably shared by almost all computer hobbyists at the time.

[–] SwingingTheLamp@midwest.social 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Hardly. Bill Gates came from a wealthy family, attended a private school, and through it had thousands of hours of computer programming time several years before even the Altair 8800 came out. He had a personal connection to IBM through his mother, which is how Microsoft got the DOS deal. His circumstances were unique, and his success the result of a hefty dose of luck.

[–] General_Effort@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

What kind of person owned a computer as a hobby in 1976?

[–] umbrella@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

a rich person

[–] General_Effort@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

Yeah, one would think so. And those were the hobbyists that Gates was addressing in that open letter.