Bill Gates: My Plan to Fix The World's Biggest Problems

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Bill Gates on the Importance of Measurement - WSJ.com
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  • Measurement of success is a difficult thing that is HEAVILY corrupted! Why doesn't he FIRST try it in the US!?!?!?

    Steve
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    • We need a lot more than measurements to change the world's biggest problems. It's not the be all, end all.
    • Many people ask that question - I myself ask that question from time to time, but I think what Gates is trying to do here is not a test, or experiment to achieve the measurement that will take it forward, but more as a triage, to assign degrees of urgency to the problems he is working on. He does invest in homeland problems, they just don't seem to get as much exposure.

      I myself have gone from disliking this guy as a head of a controlling evil empire (MSFT) - to what he has taken what he has, and become a philanthropist with it, and seems genuinely trying to make a change (who knows? maybe it is all an evil plot) and for that, I have come to admire what he is doing...

      Even 'retired', he will still have the title: 'King of the Nerds' :p (he made nerds what they are today! )
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  • Very well written article with good ideas that, of course, cast his foundation in only the most heroic light.

    However, I wonder if Bill is promoting and implementing his strategies for the "good of all mankind", or just control and money ...

    Bill Gates, Monsanto, and eugenics: How one of the world's wealthiest men is actively promoting a corporate takeover of global agriculture

    I guess we'll find out soon.
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    • Thanks - that was interesting and enlightening...who knows, as I surmised, maybe he has ulterior motives after all...(We've got to keep an eye on these Bilderberg / Davos / NWO types! )
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  • No wonder Steve Jobs hated him so much.
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    • From Job's biography, that didn't seem to be the case as the public sometimes saw it. Sure they started out as fierce competitors, but as two warriors that respect the other for their skill, they grew to become friends who just occasionally disagreed - albeit on a very large scale from time to time. I think they may have admired each other for some part of their personality that they lacked - and both were known for being difficult (to say the least), but that is the mark of a driven person - they often don't care if they are.
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  • Yeah, I hated steve jobs, but he didn't go as far as microsoft to gain control of everything. Microsoft DID try to take over the internet. They DID create cracks that even TODAY they are trying to use to get control. But the methods they were using aren't open to them anymore. At this point, Microsoft has virtually NOTHING going for it other than the platform acceptance(that is showing cracks), official package acceptance(like office), and partnerships and developer things for that. Otherwise, NOTHING!!!!!! And you know.... if they made a version of windows for tablets, they could milk this for more. What they DID was make an OS for laptops that they CALLED windows. Windows RT, to be exact. It could end up hurting them MORE!

    As for buffet? He has used every tax shelter and even berkshire hathway is created to be a tax shelter. If you bought a share in 1999 you would today have added assets of about $138,000 TAX FREE!!!!!!!! You wouldn't have to pay a PENNY until you sell it. The way it is now, with Apple, you would have to pay taxes on about 10% of your apple assets every single year, if you DON'T sell it! If you sold the apple stock, you would ALSO have to pay tax on any increase in sales price, as you would on berkshire hathway as well.

    And with increased tax rates and inheritance taxes, he can buy some companies for a song! I don't know if buffet has a company like aflac, but these times ALSO help things like THAT.

    Steve
  • That is something I never really thought about. If woz were never born, and everything else ran as I heard it did.....

    1. Apple would not exist! No original product.
    2. Jobs might have worked at atari until it went bankrupt, and never gotten rich.
    3. Bill gates and paul allen would have broken up, and Microsoft would probably be GONE!
    4. IBM would likely have started MUCH later, if at all, and probably used UNIX.
    5. Kildall would probably be a houshold name, if unix took too long.


    Who knows what else could have happened. You know, the story goes that IBM tried to reach kildall FIRST! HIS company wrote an MSDOS like system. IBM went to bill who claimed they had a similar system, and they licensed a knockoff of kildalls system.

    But Woz WAS born, so a friend named Jobs decided that woz's computer would be sellable, so apple existed, and they licensed basic from MS which caused MS to stay in business, the Apple and some competitors made it clear to IBM that they BETTER do something, so they came up with the PC. They snubbed kildall and became competitors. Kildalls company was bought be Novell in 1991.

    Steve
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    • What he is doing is a step in the right direction, but he really needs to do something radical to really save the poor, or give the poor a better life!!!

      Investing heavily into free energy systems, would be a good place to start. Some actually do work, but it seems that he wants to keep in good with his political, etc friends in high places?

      So, he tends to clean up the floor but leave all the old furniture in place!

      Shane
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  • Bill Gates should focus on eradicating poverty from various nations. The amount of money he has, if he spends 20% of his money many poor people can get benefits from it.
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    • YOUR DREAMING! 100s of billions have been spent! BGs whole "networth" is 61 Billion. SO, if he wanted to become destitute and maybe brake some laws, he might squeeze out maybe 50Billion. It is more likely it is like 30Billion. In either case, t is LESS than the 100s of billions sent out, so don't think half cocked effort will work. That is INCREDIBLY rare, and I have NEVER heard of it working on a large scale. NOT ONCE!!!!!

      BTW Warren buffet is an ACTIVE CEO with a company with NO dividends, etc... and ANY sale is significant, so he is likely to find it harder to extract that much from his smaller "net worth"!

      Steve
  • I guess when you have that much money, it's hard not to become a megalomaniac. I would be very cautious about anyone who claims to be able to fix all of the world's problems -especially if he's connected to companies like Monsanto!

    As for the article, it's true if rather obvious that measuring important data can be useful. In that way, it's like an introductory IM article telling you to test everything. However, if you take this principle too far (as someone like Gates inevitably does), you end up with the typical technocratic/bureaucratic mentality that thinks everything can be quantified.

    In my opinion, this mindset is revealed in most Windows products. They are functional (though with lots of glitches) but lack imagination and inspiration for the most part. Inflicting this sensibility on the whole world doesn't sound like the greatest idea to me. But then I'm a Mac user, so I'm probably biased
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    • Bingo. Only half sane response here.

      Forget his words, go by actions.

      This guy is part of the New World Order , he joined either willingly or unwillingly. He is under the power of combined Trillionaire families that could easily crush him.

      He is a Duke, Baron, Earl, Count, Land Lord , King, NOT an EMPEROR class, thats all billionaires are.

      This "who is the richest man in the world" crap is a purposeful distraction to hide the REAL power behind The Presidency and other world governments.

      You got a system, in addition to a world system, with so many corrupted holes of so many sizes and shapes that is looks like glass....and he wants to worry about one hole that he thinks is important when the ship has so many that the total is still incalculable because NEW one's are being created daily......, by his bosses and ego-powercentric people like him.

      The solution will come from the FORCED unity of the people, one way or another because they want to cull the population by 80% or so, and have the rest as permanent stock cattle.

      The Patriot Act forever destroys the Constitution and he has ideas...., brilliant....., rich idiot.


      The 13th Warrior
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    • Yep, agree, he has 40 billion but seems to do a token amount! You would think that someone like that would be like the Virgin founder. He has created a record breaking deep sea sub, and the worlds first commercial space ferrying service, or zero grav, service!


      And Bill Gates just seems to flounder around????

      With his brains and money, he could set up a research dept, and develop real tech, to help the poor. The gravity globe, (developed by others) is a good example.


      Not sure about the culling the population, sounds a bit Sci-Fi to me!


      Bill Gates may develop good OS, but he seems to be Full of S*** for the "helping the poor bit"!

      Shane
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    • This is a man who wants forced vaccinations. I don't trust his "charity" one whit. I've listened to him talk enough. He needs to shut up and let us and our gov run things. I'm not getting forcibly vaccinated because some dude that got rich being a techy whiz wants me to.
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  • Microsoft founder BIll Gates has spend the last 18 years giving away his billions. He talks to Matt Lauer about the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation's progress, saying its vaccine effort has contributed to eradicating polio around the world, but there is still much more to be done.
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    • How easy it is to bash people who do donate a lot of time and money to help others. Gates wife is fully involved in his foundation work as are other members of his family.

      To say someone else would do it better is a bit silly. They either do it or they don't. I think most of the criticism of Gates work in third world countries comes from people who don't give to any charity except themselves. Can't imagine any other reason to diss ANYONE who provides help for those who need it...except jealousy, envy, greed.
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  • And instead of just talking about it, I decided to make a small micro loan through Kiva.

    Since I'm an ex cab driver and into green energy, I selected Dugersuren who lives in Mongolia. He needs money to buy a hybrid taxi that runs off both gas and electricity.

    Kiva - You're invited to Join Kiva
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  • 13th,

    Corn predates that kind of technology. It is a natural hybrid. MOST vegetables are in SOME way. But they didn't use a virus or genesplicing or special chemicals to do it. It was selective grafting, polinating, cross breeding, etc.

    And YEAH, corn grew from something similar to wheat to something like what we have today. There are, as I recall, 3 main types of corn often used in the US, and each has many types within it. And that isn't even accounting for blue corn, or indian corn.

    But NONE were created as you imply, and they ALL have LOTS of history behind them. Some people believed the tomato was poisonous! It IS related to a plant that can be very poisonous. We now it generally ISN'T now because it has SO much history behind it.

    And YEAH! world wars were caused because one LARGE group had to fight against another. That is generally because one was the aggressor. There is NO way that could happen without someone coordinating it. The only questions are who and why.

    Steve
  • Banned
    Bill Gates supports Eugenics and GMOs. That is all that needs to be said. It is very, very sad.
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    • Having an interest in or supporting research in both these areas of study can lead to advances in disease and germ resistant strains which could be beneficial to mankind if properly administered. Not everyone is Hitler - or Monsanto (which I do know he has worked with, they are one of the world's leading GMO companies) - and every experiment does not have to turn into a Frankenstein monster - whether we like to admit it or not, organisms and germs modify on their own, and we constantly need to develop ways to be resistant to them, or eradicate them.

    • That's where I fall out on Gates. Charity is supposed to be done to help people - "forced vaccines" isn't "help". It's not "charity". It's an attempt to rule, and I don't like it. Promoting farming would be great - but not when it's Monsanto style farming. This guy is duping everyone calling his work "charity".

      There are a lot of people that are involved with REAL charity. I am more respectful of Kurt's charity that actually helps someone get a substainable life, than of Gates manipulations that go under the guise of charity. Charity isn't always charity just because someone is pouring money into it under a legal financial spigot. There are people that really deserve admiration and respect for what they are doing. Gates isn't one of them in my view. Sorry if people don't like that. I don't feel that respecting someone just because they have money and power is all that great a boast either.
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  • As the article below points out, GMOs have the potential to quickly bring about mass contamination of crops. If it's proven a couple of years from now that they are dangerous, it will be hard to turn back. This can also be seen as a type of colonialism, as Monsanto and other large companies will be in control of much of the world's food supply.
    Op-ed: Gates Foundation should step away from funding genetically modified crops in Africa | Opinion | The Seattle Times

    Genetically modified crops threaten conventional and organic production as well as the autonomy of African producers and nations. In 2002, Emmy Simmons, then-assistant administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, stated that, “In four years, enough (genetically engineered) crops will have been planted in South Africa that the pollen will have contaminated the entire continent.” Biotechnology cannot coexist with agro-ecological techniques and traditional knowledge.
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    • Sal - Interesting. You are always posting about the need to reduce population. Gates is promoting the right to and education about abortions (and is a big supporter of Planned Parenthood) and the need to produce less population in areas where people are struggling to survive. He is promoting childhood shots to prevent common diseases in the countries with the goal of keep kids alive and leading to a healthier population in that country.

      Melinda Gates has written about eugenics and the resurgence - read the last couple of paragraph of the page below and you'll find it doesn't support your claim:

      Articles: Melinda Gates Talks Eugenics


      Of course, some will form opinions based on slanted opinions on sites like
      Bill Gates, Monsanto, and eugenics: How one of the world's wealthiest men is actively promoting a corporate takeover of global agriculture

      That site claims Planned Parenthood is eugenics. It frequently prints some very "out there" ideas and most are "out to get us" articles.

      Now - because the words are used, it is assumed Gates supports all these "bad" things. What he is doing is trying to find ways to support huge population of people living at starvation level. Currently, Monsanto (bad as it is) is the leader in GMO research.

      GMOs as currently exploited by Monsanto - is bad. That doesn't mean there is not a future potential of increasing crop production with future GMO research. Things can always be done better - but not if there is a knee jerk reaction that anything associate with GMO is horrendous.

      For generations farmers have increased yields in this country through using methods and hybrids and cross-strains of crops where research found ways to produce more food per acre. Yet the idea of "hybrids" was argued when they were first developed. They were called unnatural and potentially dangerous...but there was no internet to make them into a cause or world conspiracy so the research continued and succeeded.

      When dealing with an entire population of people that are living at subsistence level, you can't afford the luxury of eliminating research and development that could potentially offer solutions. You can't base what you do on a rich country where people are quick to abandon ideas after labeling them based on one corporation. You can't use a US-based mindset of judgment of corporations and conspiracies to feed hungry people.

      No one needs to approve of what Gates or other charitable foundations do. But argue from a position of knowledge rather than from pushing your own beliefs on the charitable work done by someone else. I don't get the point in the complaints - would it really be better if Gates shut down his charitable work?

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  • I'm certainly not against hybrids. But the idea of forcing them, putting in pesticides and the like, and monopolizing and bribing, etc.... I am very much against THAT! The idea of suing miners because your invention TRESPASSED on THEIR property? They should sue YOU for stealing THEIR property, and endangering their livelihood! Monsanto has done PLENTY of bad!

    Steve
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