If somebody is working on a new medicine, computer science helps us model those things. We have a whole group here in Seattle called the Institute for Disease Modelling that is a mix of computer science and math-type people, and the progress we're making in polio or plans for malaria or really driven by their deep insights.

People who say they don't see the acceleration of innovation is a wilful blindness. We are innovation at a wonderful speed for the basic things we think everyone should get.

If you're smart, you often want a feedback loop so you know if what you've done is... is right.

You know, development sometimes is viewed as a project in which you give people things and nothing much happens, which is perfectly valid, but if you just focus on that, then you'd also have to say that venture capital is pretty stupid, too. Its hit rate is pathetic. But occasionally, you get successes, you fund a Google or something, and suddenly venture capital is vaunted as the most amazing field of all time. Our hit rate in development is better than theirs, but we should strive to make it better.

The way to be successful in the software world is to come up with breakthrough software, and so whether it's Microsoft Office or Windows, its pushing that forward. New ideas, surprising the marketplace, so good engineering and good business are one in the same.

China is certainly an important player in the global economy, and a widespread AIDS epidemic would threaten that growth.

We are seeing pioneers moving out to the Internet, banks that are taking transactions, retail shopping on the Internet, and although it's going to take most of a decade before most adults are turning to the Internet for a high percentage of their act