I like to read general biology - things about the immune system and advances in that area - because it lays the foundation for my part of the dialogue at the foundation about what things we ought to pursue.
Bill GatesWhenever there is hard work to be done, I assign it to the laziest man as he is sure to find an easy way of doing it. Be lazy, think crazy.
Bill GatesWell, jobs are a great thing. You have to be a bit careful: If you raise the minimum wage, youโre encouraging labor substitution and youโre going to go buy machines and automate things - or cause jobs to appear outside of that jurisdiction. And so within certain limits, you know, it does cause job destruction. If you really start pushing it, then youโre just making a huge trade-off.
Bill GatesTypically, your corporate e-mail account is not, today, that spam-targeted. It's more the free e-mail accounts that are spam-targeted.
Bill GatesThe ideal thing would be to have a 100 percent effective AIDS vaccine. And to have broad usage of that vaccine. That would literally break the epidemic.
Bill GatesIt's pretty incredible to look back 30 years to when Microsoft was starting and realize how work has been transformed. We're finally getting close to what I call the digital workstyle.
Bill GatesNow, if you're rich, you can spend a lot of money, Netherlands-style, and reduce that. But Bangladesh or parts of India, like Calcutta, they just simply won't be able to afford that kind of protection.
Bill GatesContrary to Pikettyโs rentier hypothesis, I donโt see anyone on the [Forbes 400 list of the wealthiest Americans] whose ancestors bought a great parcel of land in 1780 and have been accumulating family wealth by collecting rents ever since. In America, that old money is long gone - through instability, inflation, taxes, philanthropy, and spending.
Bill GatesSo on the demand side [for energy], there have been a variety of policies that globally have been way over $50 billion a year of tax credits, raising the price of electricity through things like renewable portfolio standards, so the total amount of money that's gone into sending a price signal to push up demand versus what would happen without it has been gigantic.
Bill GatesApple has always leveraged technologies that the PC industry has driven to critical mass - the bus structures, the graphics cards, the peripherals, the connection networks, things like that - so they're kind of in the PC ecosystem and kind of not.
Bill GatesFrom the day Microsoft was started, the only constraint to our growth has been attracting ah, more great programmers, very smart, committed, ah, people. And so we're always on... on the look for ah, that kind of person.
Bill GatesThe two areas that are changing... are information technology and medical technology. Those are the things that the world will be very different 20 years from now than it is today.
Bill GatesWith the states release today of a set of clear and consistent academic standards, our nation is one step closer to supporting effective teaching in every classroom, charting a path to college and careers for all students, and developing the tools to help all children stay motivated and engaged in their own education. The more states that adopt these college and career based standards, the closer we will be to sharing innovation across state borders and becoming more competitive as a country.
Bill GatesSuccess is a miserable teacher. It tempts intelligent people to believe they cannot lose. And it is an unreliable guide to the future.
Bill GatesI think it makes sense to believe in God, but exactly what decision in your life you make differently because of it, I don't know.
Bill GatesKenyaโs M-Pesa proves that when people are empowered, they will use digital tech to innovate on their own behalf.
Bill GatesSoftware innovation, like almost every other kind of innovation, requires the ability to collaborate and share ideas with other people, and to sit down and talk with customers and get their feedback and understand their needs.
Bill GatesThe US spends more on energy R&D than all other countries put together, and I personally consider it quite inadequate.
Bill GatesNow, we put out a lot of carbon dioxide every year, over 26 billion tons. For each American, it's about 20 tons. For people in poor countries, it's less than one ton. It's an average of about five tons for everyone on the planet. And, somehow, we have to make changes that will bring that down to zero.
Bill GatesIf you're a guest [at my $113 million house], you'll be able to call up on screens throughout the house almost any image you like - presidential portraits, reproductions of High Renaissance paintings, pictures of sunsets, airplanes, skiers in the Andes, a rare French stamp, the Beatles in 1965.
Bill GatesWhat are the top 20 universities in the world that do good materials research that might create carbon fibers to do jet stream kites or new magnets that will allow [energy] generation to be done up there and you just bring the electricity down. You either have to bring down rotational energy, which is hard, or you have to have the generator up there and bring down the electricity. Well, putting the generator up there is hard to do because it's too heavy.
Bill GatesThe U.S. and Canada are two generous governments and we reach out and partner with anyone who believes in foreign aid.
Bill GatesI've always been amazed by Da Vinci, because he worked out science on his own. He would work by drawing things and writing down his ideas. Of course, he designed all sorts of flying machines way before you could actually build something like that.
Bill GatesIn 80% of the world, energy will be bought where it is economic. You have to help the rest of the world get energy at a reasonable price.
Bill GatesThe world won't care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself.
Bill GatesI have seen firsthand that agricultural science has enormous potential to increase the yields of small farmers and lift them out of hunger and poverty.
Bill GatesThere is a difference between what technology enables and what historical business practices enable.
Bill GatesI'm an investor in a number of biotech companies, partly because of my incredible enthusiasm for the great innovations they will bring.
Bill GatesYou always overestimate what you can get done in a year and underestimate what you can get done in 10 years.
Bill GatesOur current expectations for what our students should learn in school were set ๏ฌfty years ago to meet the needs of an economy based on manufacturing and agriculture. We now have an economy based on knowledge and technology.
Bill GatesOnline education is pretty special for two reasons. One is that you can get the very best lecture in the world and wherever you are, whenever you want, you can connect to that lecture. The other is this interactivity, where if you know a topic, you can kind of skip over it. Or if you're confused about it, [the area] where you're confused can be analyzed by software.
Bill GatesUntil recently, over 98 percent of teachers just got one word of feedback: Satisfactory. If all my bridge coach ever told me was that I was 'satisfactory,' I would have no hope of ever getting better.
Bill GatesCapitalism has shortfalls. It doesn't necessarily take care of the poor, and it underfunds innovation, so we have to offset that.
Bill GatesRobotics and other combinations will make the world pretty fantastic compared with today.
Bill Gates(On being the world's richest man) I wish I wasn't ... There's nothing good that comes out of that. You get more visibility as a result of it.
Bill GatesImagine the disincentive to software development if after months of work another company could come along and copy your work and market it under its own name...without legal restraints to such copying, companies like Apple could not afford to advance the state of the art.
Bill Gates