Here are some completely TRUE stories about
Bill Gates!
Wait until you hear about what he LOVES doing
to get arrested!
12 - The Real Bill Gates
Bill Gates and the late Paul Allen may forever
be synonymous in the tech world, but that
doesn’t mean everything ran smoothly.
They’re credited as the creators of Microsoft,
but there’s a lot more to their relationship
than just that.
Supposedly there’s a whole other side to
Bill Gates we just don’t know.
We've always heard Bill Gates' side of the
story, but Paul Allen wanted to let the world
know that HE was the real idea man behind
it all.
In Allen's autobiography, Idea Man, he went
on to explain how he was the person who came
up with the idea for a piece of software that
would create personal computers.
That was the software BASIC and it made personal
computing user friendly.
But supposedly, Bill was against the idea,
because he felt that they would need more
advanced hardware for that.
According to Allen, it was also him, not Gates,
who ultimately came up with the name Microsoft.
But of course, it was Bill who made the name
popular, making people believe the company’s
name was his idea.
Paul Allen was excited to be the nerdy tech
guy, and Bill was excited to be the business
guy, so it was a good fit the way they worked
together.
But according to Paul Allen, there were a
lot of not so positive sides of Bill.
Such as Bill was a sore loser in chess.
He’d apparently get angry when he was losing
and just knock all the pieces to the floor!
The worst for Allen was the way Bill tried
to maximise the money for himself.
Allen claimed that Bill said it wouldn't be
right for him to get half.
Bill reasoned that because he "did almost
everything on BASIC," the split should be
60-40 in his favor.
Gates then renegotiated the terms of their
partnership to give himself 64-36.
As the final insult, Allen overheard Bill
discussing with Steve Ballmer how to dilute
Allen's equity in the company! Gates was complaining
that Allen was extremely unproductive and
he shouldn’t even be getting what he was
getting.
Well Paul Allen had a very good reason though.
He was missing a lot of work because he was
fighting cancer at the time!
For what it’s worth, Bill Gates went to
claim that Paul Allen’s account doesn’t
match his own!
11 - C-Cubed
What else did Paul Allen reveal in his book?
We all know Bill Gates’s sheer determination
was one of the biggest reasons that determined
Microsoft’s success.
Gates would work until his body would stop
and he would crash on the carpet in the middle
of his office!
And this started at an early age.Allen revealed
that during their work-filled weekends, they
would find time to go to a dumpster.
Why exactly?
In high school, Gates and Allen honed their
programming skills on a minicomputer owned
by a local company, C-Cubed.
But as students, they didn't have access to
as much information as the company's employees.
That obviously frustrated them.
So at night Allen would help Gates step into
the dumpster and start looking around for
computer print-outs that would help the company
get information and a literal leg up!
The idea was that, if they were able to get
some sort of indication of how earlier operating
systems worked, they would get clues on what
they needed to work on to develop better technology.
Back in those days, using the computer wasn’t
exactly free.
They also had to pay for time to use the computer!
As the charges mounted up for their computer
time in high school, Gates and Allen began
looking for a way to access one of the free
accounts at C-Cubed.
They somehow got access to an administrator
password, and used it to steal the company's
internal accounting file.
They were hoping to decrypt the file to get
access to one of the free accounts, but they
eventually got caught!
10 - License Plate Checks
Although Bill Gates is seen as an approachable
tech billionaire, his employees probably tell
a different story about a different Bill back
in the day!
What defines Bill’s success is his relentless
drive and fixation on making sure productivity
levels remained high.
He was known for pulling all-nighters all
the time!
He also didn’t believe in time off on weekends
or in vacations!
During the first years of Microsoft, he resorted
to what many people may consider unorthodox
measures to make sure his employees were being
as productive as they could be.
He used to memorize his employees' license
plates, so he would know when people came
to work!
And this wasn’t JUST on the weekdays.
This was also on the weekends!
This is definitely motivation to take public
transportation or maybe ride a bike to work,
because would YOU want to be monitored by
YOUR boss like this?!
As if that weren’t enough, after employees
would put in long hours to finish a special
project, Bill would just ask them to start
another one.
Immediately!
Of course, his relentless drive wasn’t met
without resistance.
Apparently, even some of the most passive
employees would start pushing back telling
him that they weren’t going to work insane
hours.
Also, he would have meetings with top managers
just to make sure they were in control of
their projects.
Bill would ask harder and harder questions
to his managers until they admit that they
didn’t know, and then Bill would yell at
them on purpose for being unprepared!
These aren’t exactly the best ways of being
a leader, but what’s undeniable was that
Bill’s drive and demanding personality were
what ultimately pushed Microsoft to the top
of the tech business for decades.
9 - Lawyer Bill?
Being a notoriously smart boy from an early
age, it comes as no surprise that Bill Gates’s
trajectory was set up to be a highly successful
one.
Although he displayed a strong interest for
computers and programming in his high school
years he didn’t go straight into computers
right away.
His dad was William Henry Gates Senior, a
prominent Seattle attorney.
You can see why it would have been understandable
that Bill’s dad wanted Bill to have the
same career path as his first option!
His dad was a prominent member of Preston,
Gates & Ellis, one of America's largest law
firms.
Bill was accepted into Harvard pre-law, which
is practically a guarantee for a successful
career in the judicial system.
Is there a Bill Gates arguing cases before
the Supreme Court in another dimension?!
Obviously in this universe, Bill didn't find
it to be quite like that.
He couldn’t help but run through Harvard’s
most challenging Math and Computer Science
courses.
After two years, he put law and Harvard on
pause all together to work on his first software
venture for MITS, an American electronics
company that manufactured calculators and
personal computers.
Two years later, he finally dropped out with
a clear aim on founding his long-desired software
company!
8 - Traf-o-data
Did you think Microsoft was his first company?!
Nope!
Bill has been a visionary from an early age.
With this in mind, Gates co-founded Traf-o-data
with Paul Allen during the summer break right
before Harvard.
The idea was to basically find a way to read
traffic data and then provide it to traffic
engineers to interpret.
Basically they created a minicomputer to track
the flow of traffic.
Although that sounds incredibly boring, it
IS very useful to cities wanting to know where
to place new traffic signals or stop signs,
or make road repairs.
Although the idea seemed to be quite useful
for any city, it wasn't received with the
resounding applause they had expected.
They worked nonstop for two years and invested
around $1500 dollars!
That was a lot of money at the time, especially
for someone who JUST graduated from high school.
However, Gates and Allen found that their
product just wasn’t anything people nor
governments were interested in.
After six years and almost 3500 bucks later,
it proved to be a failure.
But although the company didn’t take off,
the experience did give real contributions
to Bill and Paul in the software programming
skills they gained.
Of course, they went on to create Microsoft
right after Traf-o-data's failure to launch!
7 - Strong Like Bull
For any entrepreneur, life's pretty rough
in the beginning.
Bill Gates wasn’t a stranger to this reality.
His work schedule was so demanding, he had
virtually no time to even eat something!
He says his incessant drive is what ultimately
allowed him to achieve what he achieved.
Bill has publicly acknowledged many of the
tricks he would use back then to keep his
workflow going, without ANY type of distraction.
Food included!
This meant working all day long and not worrying
about whether or not he’s had dinner.
How did he get enough energy to work without
food?
Bill’s secret to his almost never ending
source of energy?
Tang.
Yep.
The famous orange instant drink that first
came out in the late 50's in powdered form!
If you don’t remember, this was the same
drink that astronauts would take with them
on space missions back in the 60’s.
And THAT was Bill’s power source during
those long coding sessions.
And he would spare himself the hassle of mixing
it in water!
This kind of reminds us of Dolphins who would
poke pufferfish just for their toxins!
Find out more in this video right here!Apparently,
he would go as far as just licking it off
his hands!
He made the argument that the human body already
had plenty of water!
He admitted that his face, hands, AND keyboard
would all be covered in orange dust!
That’s uh…...something WE definitely wouldn’t
do in this day and age!
6 - Knighthood
Bill is known for how smart he is when it
comes to technology.
But did you know that he’s also a knight?!
You probably already know that Bill is a BIG
philanthropist, through the Bill and Melinda
Gates Foundation.
He and his wife have managed to donate BILLIONS
of dollars to help make the world a better
place!
His contributions have been important for
the development of third world countries that
have to deal with many problems we don’t
face anymore.
One very special person took interest in what
he was doing: Queen Elizabeth!
Through the United Kingdom's Foreign Office,
the Queen decided to award Gates with an honorary
title not many people have had the pleasure
to receive!
The Knight Commander of the Order of the British
Empire.
This is a title awarded to citizens that are
believed to provide great contributions to
the British people.
You’re probably saying, but wait, Bill Gates
is American!
Well, that’s true, but Microsoft has operating
offices in the UK AND it directly employs
almost 3,000 people in England.
Queen Elizabeth has said that she’s not
too big into typing on computers, but she
does somewhat still embrace technology.
She sent her first email way back in 1976,
with some help of course.
However, she was way late to Instagram!
Her first post was only back in March of 2019!
Although Bill is now a knight of the British
crown, he's actually not allowed to be called
'sir', since this is only reserved for actual
British citizens!
5 - Worst game ever
Did you know Bill Gates wrote the first game
ever made for a personal computer?
In 1980, he was able to convince tech giant
IBM that Microsoft had the best operating
software for IBM’s new personal computer.
Well, the problem was…...Bill lied.
Microsoft didn't have ANY operating system
in development at the time.
So what’d he do?
He bought an operating system from a small
startup and just repackaged it to IBM for
$430,000 thousand dollars!
As part of the deal, though, IBM wanted the
operating system to come with a programming
language for beginners called BASIC, along
with a few games to show off how it worked.
After long hours of brainstorming and coding,
Gates and Neil Konzen came up with a very
simple game called DONKEY.BAS.
It was a very simple driving game.
So simple to the point that you can’t steer,
brake, or accelerate.
All you can do is just avoid donkeys by pressing
the spacebar!
The player basically drives in order to avoid
donkeys.
Does that logic even make sense?!
Their competitor, Apple, bought a IBM PC in
1981 in order to dissect and spy on Microsoft’s
work.
Once they got a hold of the Donkey game, they
didn’t hold back on the review!
Apple employee Andy Hertzfeld reported to
Steve Jobs that the graphics of the game were
extremely bad, along with the entire concept
of the game.
He was amazed at the fact that, with how bad
the game was made, why Bill Gates even bothered
to write that he was a co-author of the game
within the game itself!
4 - Class Games
Bill Gates is easily one of the most notorious
college dropouts in the US.
But there’s a little secret Bill Gates had
kept to himself for years.
Not only did he just drop out of Harvard.
But he also didn't actually attend ANY of
his classes!
However, that doesn’t mean that he NEVER
went to class, because he did.
He just NEVER went to HIS scheduled classes!
He basically made up a little game for himself
just to make things fun.
The classes that he actually signed up for,
he NEVER went to class.
He just took the exams.
And for classes he didn’t sign up for, he
ALWAYS went to class!
Is it any surprise that he managed to score
A's in most of the classes he registered for?
And, of course, Gates being who he is, was
consistently among the most vocal students
at the classes he wasn't supposed to be at.
How did he get mostly A’s?
He would just study extra hard during Harvard's
reading period, the extra time when students
would prepare for their exams.
Bill revealed his secret during a Ask Me Anything
session he did on Reddit.
People were able to ask him all sorts of questions
regarding his life, business and early years.
When he was asked what his fondest memory
was at Harvard, that’s when he went on and
spilled the beans on his secret of playing
his own little game he made.
Although Gates has proved he’s one of the
most successful people in the world, he's
still human.
He wasn't able to get an A in organic chemistry–
he had to settle for a C+!
3 - Office romance
Major corporations tend to have policies on
disclosing romantic relationships.
And any relationship between direct supervisors
and a subordinate is almost always strictly
prohibited!
But, despite the risks, office romances do
happen.
Bill and his wife, Melinda, weren’t an exception!
Melinda Gates, formerly Melinda French, was
working as a product marketing manager at
Microsoft.
They met in 1987, four months into her job
at Microsoft, when they sat next to each other
at a work dinner in New York.
It seems like they didn't quite hit it off
right away, because they both went their separate
ways that same night.
A few months later, they reconnected when
they bumped into each other at the Microsoft
parking lot.
Bill asked her to go on a date with him.
Except his problem was that he asked her to
go out a whopping two weeks later!
Melinda basically told him he wasn't spontaneous
enough for her and said no.
An hour later, Bill called her asking if this
move was spontaneous enough, and they went
out for dinner.
This is how they started a very discreet romance
that went on for a couple of years.
Long story short, in 1994 they got married
in Hawaii!
2 - Class Schedules
Who knew Bill always had a thing for the ladies?!
Back in 1967 Bill was still in High School
and met Paul Allen.
They became a known pair because of their
shared interest in computers.
Once their school knew of their ability to
do coding, they started to give them some
work.
But Bill saw an opportunity and took it!
They hacked into the school’s computer and
scheduled Bill in classes that were supposed
to be all girls!
Unfortunately for Paul Allen, he was two years
ahead of Bill and he was already off to college
by then.
Although it was a fantastic idea, Gates has
publicly acknowledged that he wasn't able
to take advantage.
He apparently just wasn’t social enough
back then.
And that was something he would carry with
him to Harvard, to his regret.
1 - Leadfoot
Surprise surprise, Bill Gates actually has
been arrested before!
And not just once, but he’s actually been
arrested twice, although it wasn’t for anything
major.
The first time happened back in 1975 when
he allegedly ran a stop sign in his hometown
of Medina, Washington.
Gates was then pulled over by a cop who had
been sitting right in front of the sign out
of sight.
Several reports say Gates started acting verbally
aggressive and that’s when the cop decided
to arrest him.
Bill was arrested again in 1977 for reckless
driving.
It happened in New Mexico, where he was pulled
over for speeding, running a stop sign AND
driving without a license!
However, all these stories haven’t been
exactly confirmed by Bill Gates himself, so
some of the details are probably a little
fuzzy.
But the mugshot IS real!
In 2008, Gates appeared in a Microsoft ad
with Jerry Seinfeld, where Jerry runs into
Bill at a fake shoe store called Shoe Circus.
At one point in the commercial, Bill shows
the salesperson his membership card for shoe
circus.
And Bill used his mugshot as the photo on
his membership card!
