Steve Jobs and Bill Gates in 2007 during the All Things Digital conference.
Call it my eccentricity.
But as far as I have rummaged around the Internet, I have yet to find an article that features Steve and Bill’s ability to score babes based on their respective merits. News reports and written articles always feature these two characters along with their gadgets. It’s all techno stuff. It’s all business. It’s all money talk.
Well, thank God for idiosyncrasy. I’m pitting these two against each other.
In one corner, we have Bill Gates. And in the other, we have Steve Jobs. Let’s put these two individuals under a limelight and strip them of their CEO / chairman titles, and try to look at them as regular, beer-guzzling guys in real-world scenario with no chauffeurs, chefs and personal assistants. Ladies, try to judge them according to their merits, and not just on their good looks.
As chairman of Microsoft Corporation and his family-owned charitable foundation, Bill Gates has a whopping net worth of about $58 billion. Currently, he is the third richest man on the planet. With that amount of money, he could certainly afford to buy a small third-world country.
Bill’s interest in computers came into being when he was still an eighth grader at Lakeside School, an exclusive preparatory school. During that time, the school’s Mothers’ Club had used the proceeds of a rummage sale to purchase an ASR-33 teletype terminal and computer for the school’s students.
Bill’s fascination for computers grew when he discovered how the computer would always execute software code perfectly. He remarked that there was something neat about computers. Thus, he wrote his first computer program, which was a tic-tac-toe game that lets users to play a game against the computer.
In 1973, Bill graduated from Lakeside School with an outstanding SAT result, scoring 1590 out of 1600. He enrolled at Harvard College, where he met his future business partner. Bill never had definite study plan. He would always dabble in computers. This appetite for computers brought out his decision to start his own computer software company. And the rest is history.
Under Bill’s leadership, Microsoft Corporation emerged as the worldwide leader in the software industry. During the 2007, the company reported over $51 billion in revenues, employing over 78,000 people in 105 countries.
Aside from Microsoft, he also has other investments. Bill served as a director of Berkshire Hathaway, as well as Cascade Investments LLC, a private investment and holding firm. He also founded a think-tank company called bgC3.
On the philanthropic side, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the family-owned charitable foundation that Bill and his wife set up, supports humanitarian efforts and initiatives towards global health and education. The foundation has pledged billions of dollars to organizations aimed at alleviating global health conditions, as well as providing learning opportunities in certain low-income communities.
From 1993 to 2007, Bill has been consistent on the Forbes list. It was even reported that Bill reached a monstrous $101 billion in 1999; hence, the media’s nomenclature on him as the “Centribillionaire.” On this note, Bill remarked, wishing he was not the richest man because of the unwanted attention that goes with it.
With 15 years of Forbes list notoriety, it’s no wonder why people turn their heads towards him. Though he may not seek the attention that he gets right now, it is undeniable that Bill is a widely acclaimed entrepreneur, philanthropist and business tactician.
Steve Jobs, on the other hand, is the chairman and CEO of Apple, Inc., in addition to his duties as member of Walt Disney Company’s board of directors. Though his net worth is just a tenth of Bill’s at around $5 billion, Steve was named the most powerful person in business by Fortune Magazine in November 2007.
His acclaims also include his induction to the California Hall of Fame on December 5, 2007. The event, which was held at The California Museum for History, Women and the Arts, was attended by California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and his First Lady Maria Shriver.
Aside from Apple, Steve was also involved in another computer company. He established NeXT Computer at the same time he ran Apple. Unfortunately, the former ran aground due to minimal sales at only 50,000 units. Only a few could afford NeXT computers; thus, they were shelved off as cost-prohibitive.
Despite its steep price, some people bought NeXT computers for its technical strength in its software system. The company, subsequently, shifted to software development with the release of NeXTSTEP / Intel.
Steve also headed the famous animation company, Pixar. Back in 1986, Steve bought The Graphic Group, which was later renamed Pixar, from George Lucas, who needed the money to finance his divorce.
The company started out as a high-end graphics hardware developer. But due to unprofitable conditions in selling Pixar Image Computer, Steve entered into a contract with Disney to produce a series of computer-animated films.
Under Steve’s headship, Pixar produced a handful of astounding box-office hit films, such as A Bug’s Life, Toy Story, Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo, and The Incredibles. However, Pixar was sold to Walt Disney Company back in 2006 for $7 billion in stocks. This deal made Steve the largest individual shareholder in Walt Disney Company, holding approximately 7% of the company’s stock.
On humble beginnings, Steve’s interest in computers became manifest when he frequently attended after-school lectures at the Hewlett-Packard Company in California. He also worked as a technician at a video games manufacturer. And to think, he took that job because he was intent of saving money for a spiritual retreat to India, not knowing that would be one of the initial steps that moulded him into a giant in the computer software industry.
Having the eye of an artist, Steve has always emphasized the aesthetic value of his products. Always adamant on visual aspect, he would persist even on the minute details. It’s no wonder why people adhere and appreciate the beauty of his creations, like the Macintosh and the iPod.
A perfect visualization of for phrase, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs has always been pushing the envelope. They have been the two most credited individuals that revolutionized the development of mass-market personal computers.
Significantly individualistic in their own right, Bill and Steve are both mirror reflections of each other and a parallel balance to the immense talent and knowledge each one has as they make up the opposite sides of a single equation, with one balancing out the other.
Bill Gates and Steve Jobs are the perfect synthesis and amalgamation of prescience and omniscience of what technology is and is about to be in the near future.
So, who can score more chicks: Bill Gates or Steve Jobs? Please cast your vote by posting your comments below.
