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Wired Interviews Bill Gates (1996) [video]

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Re: Wired Interviews Bill Gates (1996) [video]

#41

Post by patrickaljord »

jtr_47 wrote: post #31
Torwald wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neither FB nor GOOG have become such monopolies in that type of business they were talking about. What Gates said hold true today. Think for example about a one person business like daringfireball.net, that was the type of business Gates was envisioning. Or Drudge report.

This ISPs have, or will become the true monopolies that will be the gatekeepers of all access to the internet. They are entrenched and are not expanding their services, instead, they are digging in and keeping their foothold within their regions, limiting/eliminating competition, both from a rules/laws (like preventing municipal ISPs from forming) and limiting their service footprint to maximize their "profits" withi…

ISP have so far been pretty neutral and have not been acting as gatekeepers. I'm more worried about Google's Youtube, Facebook, Twitter and Apple who've been acting as gatekeepers, banning people they do not like from entering their de facto monopolies. If ISPs start acting this way one day, I will start worrying about them too but so far, it's these social networks that are the real gatekeepers.

Re: Wired Interviews Bill Gates (1996) [video]

#42

Post by Torwald »

tjoff wrote: post #30
Torwald wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it didn't have to. The journos ask Gates why he enters into that field (with MSNBC) if he can't see a 4$ billion business in it. He then says: while we won't make those 4 billions (we are making with software), we believe we still can have a profitable business. I don't know if MSNBC was profitable at that time, but many such businesses were (and still are.) The question was about the overall size of the industry…

> The question was about the overall size of the industry. And to me it seems he was spot on. The whole world and industry had to change before anyone could achieve that. Your own links tell how much the growth has been in recent years. The interview was in 1996 .

Yes, he assessed the situation back then correctly. That was not hard to do. He said it himself in the interview "do the math" to indicate how this was a no brainer.

What he didn't foresee was that the world would change in a way that makes a +4$ billion "content club" business viable.

The journalists don't put their cards on the table. Were they pressing him so much because they thought a +4$ billion "content club" was possible? This is not clear from the video.

If they thought so, was this out of naiveté or foresight? Of course I can't tell, but back then Wired was much better than today, to say the least.

Re: Wired Interviews Bill Gates (1996) [video]

#43

Post by leesalminen »

adventured wrote: post #40
nickthemagicman wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The internet in the middle of Monteverde rain forest in Costa Rica was faster than the internet at your average coffeeshop in L.A. That shocked me.

The US ranks in the top 10 to 15 globally on average consumer Internet speed. Costa Rica is below #100. About 1/5 to 1/6 the average speeds in the US, with US speeds increasing faster year-over-year despite the difference. Costa Rica is comparable to what you see in Iran or Nigeria, around four to five mbps. Your premise comes across as dramatically overstated (even if you did encounter a coffee shop in LA with poor…

> around four to five mbps

Or, my only non-satellite option in rural Colorado.

Re: Wired Interviews Bill Gates (1996) [video]

#44

Post by fapjacks »

patrickaljord wrote: post #41
jtr_47 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This ISPs have, or will become the true monopolies that will be the gatekeepers of all access to the internet. They are entrenched and are not expanding their services, instead, they are digging in and keeping their foothold within their regions, limiting/eliminating competition, both from a rules/laws (like preventing municipal ISPs from forming) and limiting their service footprint to maximize their "profits" withi…

ISP have so far been pretty neutral and have not been acting as gatekeepers. I'm more worried about Google's Youtube, Facebook, Twitter and Apple who've been acting as gatekeepers, banning people they do not like from entering their de facto monopolies. If ISPs start acting this way one day, I will start worrying about them too but so far, it's these social networks that are the real gatekeepers.

That's only because nobody's gone after an ISP for the same kinds of things that they go after Google for, with respect to the stupid Section 230 changes. When the outrage mob discovers it can bully an ISP into shutting off political opponents, then the ISPs will be exactly like Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc. You already see echoes of this for example with Jeff Atwood's misfire on Twitter recently, going after Azure because he thought Gab was still being hosted there (it wasn't)[0]. Incidentally this is one reason why Section 230 was so important. The change is new, so it's probably just a matter of time before the outrage mob starts going after the T-Mobile and Comcast accounts of its enemies.

[0] https://twitter.com/codinghorror/status/1056426165274009600

Re: Wired Interviews Bill Gates (1996) [video]

#46

Post by kolanos »

Torwald wrote: post #42
tjoff wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The question was about the overall size of the industry. And to me it seems he was spot on. The whole world and industry had to change before anyone could achieve that. Your own links tell how much the growth has been in recent years. The interview was in 1996 .

Yes, he assessed the situation back then correctly. That was not hard to do. He said it himself in the interview "do the math" to indicate how this was a no brainer. What he didn't foresee was that the world would change in a way that makes a +4$ billion "content club" business viable. The journalists don't put their cards on the table. Were they pressing him so much because they thought a +4$ billion "content club"…

Considering Gates was referring to "content clubs" as akin to "record clubs" and the Wired interviewers were instead bringing up the cable companies and Disney, I would say the Wired team had a good read on the future. Although other commenters here bring up a good point that Gates may have been downplaying the potential market for content creation/delivery on the internet. Also his dismissal of internet advertising is likely the gap Google needed.

Re: Wired Interviews Bill Gates (1996) [video]

#47

Post by traskjd »

adventured wrote: post #37

I always find it fascinating to compare just how large the tech industry has become since this era, when Microsoft was already regarded as something close to a giant in the industry. Microsoft sales 1995: $6.1 billion ($10b today) Google is about 12x larger. AWS by itself is about 3x larger. Facebook is 5x larger. Salesforce is similar in size. Oracle is 4x larger. SAP is 2x larger. VMWare is closing in on 1x that si…

It was considered more than something close to a giant. If anything, it was considered scarier than anything we have now.

Back then there was nobody else. We've gone from a monopoly to an oligopoly (ish) which in some ways feels less scary.

It's hard to overestimate Microsoft dominance in the 90s. If there was a wiff of them entering a category, the players in that space would be in trouble (similar to Amazon today, though Microsoft followed through more in decimating their rivals).

Re: Wired Interviews Bill Gates (1996) [video]

#48

Post by abvdasker »

santiagobasulto wrote: post #21

I've just watched the first 10 mins, but it's amazing how he's incredibly aware all of the technical details, and combines a strategy perspective ("unified email client") with all the technical details (low level networking details) to make those strat decisions a reality.

Yeah and he demonstrates both a complete and precise knowledge of everything his company is doing in nearly every arm of the business (not to mention his encyclopedic knowledge of business Microsoft is not in). It's easy to forget why Microsoft was so dominant in this era of computing, but listening to him it begins to make more sense.

Re: Wired Interviews Bill Gates (1996) [video]

#49

Post by aasasd »

patrickaljord wrote: post #41
jtr_47 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This ISPs have, or will become the true monopolies that will be the gatekeepers of all access to the internet. They are entrenched and are not expanding their services, instead, they are digging in and keeping their foothold within their regions, limiting/eliminating competition, both from a rules/laws (like preventing municipal ISPs from forming) and limiting their service footprint to maximize their "profits" withi…

ISP have so far been pretty neutral and have not been acting as gatekeepers. I'm more worried about Google's Youtube, Facebook, Twitter and Apple who've been acting as gatekeepers, banning people they do not like from entering their de facto monopolies. If ISPs start acting this way one day, I will start worrying about them too but so far, it's these social networks that are the real gatekeepers.

> ISP have so far been pretty neutral and have not been acting as gatekeepers

Vodafone in Egypt blocks Skype because it has its own voip app. That's what I'm remembering when I hear of ‘net neutrality‘—not even arbitrary blocking of torrent sites in various countries.

Re: Wired Interviews Bill Gates (1996) [video]

#50

Post by projectramo »

Something to keep in mind: the DoJ consent decree was 1994, and the lawsuit was filed in 1998.

This was right around the time that Microsoft’s monopoly power was under intense scrutiny.

In that environment, it makes sense for BG to push back against the notion that they could use their desktop OS market share into some kind of content market share.

If you notice he gets particularly vehement whenever someone asks if they can use their control of the OS (or tools or the browser) into control of the content.

He emphasizes that the distribution platform has to be neutral.

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