Your views: Bill Gates and Microsoft

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Love him or hate him, he’s on his way out.... sort of. Today marks Bill Gates’ last full-time day at the Microsoft office; he remains with the company as non-executive chairman but will focus his time on his own charitable foundation.

In our newsletter this week, we asked what you thought about the man and his departure – good luck or good riddance?

As ever, Gates inspires vitriol in many.

According to Mark – who admits he responded in the wee early hours of the morning, and may be a bit bitter as such: “He made a fortune from a non intuitive interface encased in ugly hardware. By 'saving peoples lives' his foundation will contribute to the rapid demise of the Earth due to unsustainable population growth.” Well, that's one way to look at it...

But Mark was not alone. John agreed: “I’m glad Bill Gates is devoting his time to charity – he deserves to do this as penance for the damage he has done to the world of computer users.”

Despite sitting on the other team’s bench, Jack had kind words. “I'm Mac through and through, but good luck to the man. His heart is in the right place,” he wrote.

Fred was more forgiving than others. “The man isn't perfect, (who is?) but he has done a brilliant job overall, and if he does even half as well in his chosen charity work, I think a lot of folk in difficult circumstances have a lot of good things to look forward to,” he wrote.

Gates has a big fan in Pete, who credits the man with creating modern computing. “Bill has done an incredible thing. In less than thirty years he has created computing for everybody. Granted, he has not done it totally on his own, but nobody else has contributed as much,” Pete said. “If the progress of computing had been left up to IBM....”

He believes Gates can have as much success with his charity, helping battle medical issues and poverty around the globe. “So Bill is going to use some of the money that I have given him to fix these problems. Good on yer Bill. If anyone can do it, you can,” he added.

So what next for Microsoft? Gates is still technically sticking around, but will be passing the torch to his hand-picked successors.

Roger pondered how the move will affect the firm’s operating system. “It could be that, without him there, they could now have the freedom to completely re-write their clumsy out-dated OS,” he said. “It is time for radical change. The down-turn in the world economy could kick a few back-sides and create the opportunity for that change!”

Dez summed things up nicely, with a bit of a back-handed-compliment: “Bill Gates' influence on the world is by no means destined for obscurity: the emergence of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is sure to have as powerful, if not greater influence of the governments of the world.”

Dez added: “Perhaps this is the greatest legacy he will leave on the planet, and it couldn't have come about without the success of Microsoft, for all its bullying and underhand tactics.”

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