A first-generation fortune is the most likely to be given away, but once a fortune is inherited it's less likely that a very high percentage will go back to society.

(In response to Java) Anybody who thinks a little 9,000-line program that's distributed free and can be cloned by anyone is going to affect anything we do at Microsoft has his head screwed on wrong.

I've been studying how quickly we can get energy out to the poor countries - a lot of which are in Africa - and how little progress we've made there. There's no more electricity today in sub-Saharan Africa per person than there was 20 years ago.

This social-networking thing takes you to crazy places.

[Warren Buffett ] met with all sorts of different groups about a lot of different things, but yes, he took the time, he listened and he wanted to understand about some of the different diseases and the strength of the American role in doing all these things.

Legacy is a stupid thing! I don't want a legacy.

If we [Microsoft Corporation] weren't still hiring great people and pushing ahead at full speed, it would be easy to fall behind and become a mediocre company. Fear should guide you, but it should be latent. I have some latent fear. I consider failure on a regular basis.