Gates on the Past, the Future, and Google

Published: Nov 16, 2006
Updated: May 12, 2021
1 minute read

STANFORD, Calif. — Philanthropist Bill Gates is able to take things a little slower these days, since he doesn’t have to worry anymore about the day-to-day irritations of running a major multinational corporation. He mostly thinks about how to give his — and colleague-in-cash Warren Buffett’s — money away for the betterment of mankind through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Do not misunderstand: Gates is still chairman of the Microsoft board, and he still sees progress reports, goes to the occasional company strategy meeting, speaks at keynotes and intervenes in big customer deals as needed.

But he also has more time for events like TechNet, held Nov. 15 at Stanford University’s venerable Memorial Auditorium.

Gates was interviewed by PBS’s talk-show host Charlie Rose in a wide-ranging, hourlong conversation before an audience of about 1,000 Stanford students, media members and various guests — including Gov. Arnold Schwartzenegger of California.

TechNet describes itself as the “bipartisan political network of CEOs that promotes the growth of the innovation economy.”

Read the full story on eWeek.com: Gates on the Past, the Future, and Google

Chris Preimesberger

Chris Preimesberger

Content Writer

Chris J. Preimesberger is Editor-in-Chief of eWEEK and responsible for all the publication's coverage. In his 15 years and more than 4,000 articles at eWEEK, he has distinguished himself in reporting and analysis of the business use of new-gen IT in a variety of sectors, including cloud computing, data center systems, storage, the IoT, security and others. In February 2017 and September 2018, Chris was named among the 250 most influential business journalists in the world by Richtopia, a UK research firm that used analytics to compile the ranking. In January 2017, he was named among the internet's top 100 influencers by Scienceofdigitalmarketing.com. He has won several national and regional awards for his work, including a 2011 Folio Award for a profile of Salesforce founder/CEO Marc Benioff--the only time he has entered the competition. Previously, Chris was a founding editor of both IT Manager's Journal and DevX.com and was managing editor of Software Development magazine. His resume also includes: sportswriter and columnist for the Los Angeles Daily News, editor and television critic for the Peninsula Times Tribune (Palo Alto, Calif.), and Assistant Sports Information Director at Stanford University. He has been an assistant for The Associated Press since 1983 and resides in Silicon Valley.

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