Channel 9 Forums - Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Jonathan Merriweather — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 06:51:57 GMT

Was just reading this interview Bill Gates did with LiveSide.net

This part was in relation to transparency and Microsoft:

Bill Gates wrote:

Now, there are people who deserve credit, like coming up with Channel 9, which in retrospect is an obvious thing of, okay, you have somebody with a random camera go around, film the person, put it up on the Web, and that's a neat thing that got a certain critical mass and a certain kind of cache to allow us to connect our developers down in the trenches with people who care about their work, and cut out all the stuff in the middle that tends to be so headline oriented and so narrowing the message about how this person is making tradeoffs of how they want to improve the product, you know, not get that feedback, not share, hey, you think we blew it, well, we're sorry, here's why we made that mistake, here's how we're going to make it better, really see the human at the other side of that interaction. But I think the desire, at least relative to our business model, has always been there.

Link to interview (Word Document)

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Massif — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 09:25:08 GMT

It's nice that not only does he namecheck C9 but he understands precisely why it works. That we get to see the people on the other side of the fence, and learn why things aren't perfect.

Which is good, because it's nearly always for a good technical reason that we can all understand, which transforms: "bloody MS and their useless software" into "OK, I can see why they had to do this, but I'd rather they'd done something else" which is a huge difference in terms of perception.

Now, if only there was a way to communicate the same "it was a compromise (and or mistake based on faulty assumptions / information) we had to make" message to the rest of the populace.

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Herbie Smith — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 09:31:46 GMT

Hi Bill! *waves at computer screen*

Herbie

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Lloyd Humphreys — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 14:28:28 GMT

Has Bill G ever visited C9?

Has he even done a video? Charles...

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Bas — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 14:34:31 GMT

Lloyd_Humph wrote:

Has Bill G ever visited C9?

Has he even done a video? Charles...

There's a video interview Scoble did with him, a while ago.

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

PerfectPhase — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 14:35:38 GMT

Lloyd_Humph wrote:

Has Bill G ever visited C9?

Has he even done a video? Charles...

http://channel9.msdn.com/Showpost.aspx?postid=163166

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Lloyd Humphreys — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 14:41:30 GMT

Cool. I reckon he should definately interact with C9 more, I know he's probably busy but in the 11 months I've been here, I've not seen a single post by him, so...

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Massif — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 14:50:44 GMT

Lloyd_Humph wrote:

Cool. I reckon he should definately interact with C9 more, I know he's probably busy but in the 11 months I've been here, I've not seen a single post by him, so...

That would be funny, just imagine the reaction that you'd get if BillG actually posted unanonymously, (non-anonymously?).

It'd be slashdot central in about 30 seconds, with hundreds of posts about obscure things the NSA is supposed to have added into windows.

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Lloyd Humphreys — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 15:02:53 GMT

Massif wrote:

Lloyd_Humph wrote:
Cool. I reckon he should definately interact with C9 more, I know he's probably busy but in the 11 months I've been here, I've not seen a single post by him, so...

That would be funny, just imagine the reaction that you'd get if BillG actually posted unanonymously, (non-anonymously?).

It'd be slashdot central in about 30 seconds, with hundreds of posts about obscure things the NSA is supposed to have added into windows.

Hehe... still, it'd be interesting. Maybe an interview and another "What do you want to know about Vista" style thread but what do you want to know about MS in general?

/pipe dream

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Christian Liensberger — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 15:22:14 GMT

Is he the "niner in hiding"?

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

GoddersUK — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 18:27:21 GMT

Massif wrote:

Lloyd_Humph wrote:
Cool. I reckon he should definately interact with C9 more, I know he's probably busy but in the 11 months I've been here, I've not seen a single post by him, so...

That would be funny, just imagine the reaction that you'd get if BillG actually posted unanonymously, (non-anonymously?).

It'd be slashdot central in about 30 seconds, with hundreds of posts about obscure things the NSA is supposed to have added into windows.

They could create a special thread/forum where only niners registered for say, 12 months, could post.

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Lloyd Humphreys — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 18:29:58 GMT

GoddersUK wrote:

Massif wrote:

Lloyd_Humph wrote:
Cool. I reckon he should definately interact with C9 more, I know he's probably busy but in the 11 months I've been here, I've not seen a single post by him, so...

That would be funny, just imagine the reaction that you'd get if BillG actually posted unanonymously, (non-anonymously?).

It'd be slashdot central in about 30 seconds, with hundreds of posts about obscure things the NSA is supposed to have added into windows.

They could create a special thread/forum where only niners registered for say, 12 months, could post.

Oh but genius.... and a forum where niners who're only proven to be sensible could post... oh wait... I've said all this before

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Jonathan Merriweather — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 18:39:47 GMT

GoddersUK wrote:

Massif wrote:

Lloyd_Humph wrote:
Cool. I reckon he should definately interact with C9 more, I know he's probably busy but in the 11 months I've been here, I've not seen a single post by him, so...

That would be funny, just imagine the reaction that you'd get if BillG actually posted unanonymously, (non-anonymously?).

It'd be slashdot central in about 30 seconds, with hundreds of posts about obscure things the NSA is supposed to have added into windows.

They could create a special thread/forum where only niners registered for say, 12 months, could post.

As much as I want Bill Gates to start posting on this forum creating a special elite forum would go against the idea of Microsoft having an open conversation with its customers. I'd much rather Bill Gates just post under a blue badge anonymous username and not let us know.

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Mike Sampson — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 19:37:43 GMT

Bill engages in quite the "who invented it first" smackdown near the end.

Best example of my favorite game I've ever seen.

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Charles — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 19:56:14 GMT

And this one: http://channel9.msdn.com/Showpost.aspx?postid=205005

C

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Jason Olson — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 01:00:06 GMT

Sampy wrote:

Bill engages in quite the "who invented it first" smackdown near the end.

Best example of my favorite game I've ever seen.

Yeah, that was utterly hilarious. I laughed out loud when I read that part.

Another thing I wasn't aware of until I read that interview was http://www.teach12.com. Anybody have any of these lectures? They are pretty spendy, but they look awesome. I also find it funny that billg even knows what "pretty spendy" is, considering he is worth a jazillion dollars (too bad that's only like 5 euros nowadays).

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

kettch — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 02:03:59 GMT

JasonOlson wrote:

Sampy wrote:

Bill engages in quite the "who invented it first" smackdown near the end.

Best example of my favorite game I've ever seen.

Yeah, that was utterly hilarious. I laughed out loud when I read that part.

Another thing I wasn't aware of until I read that interview was http://www.teach12.com. Anybody have any of these lectures? They are pretty spendy, but they look awesome. I also find it funny that billg even knows what "pretty spendy" is, considering he is worth a jazillion dollars (too bad that's only like 5 euros nowadays).

You don't build a corporation the size of Microsoft and end up worth a jazillion dollars without being keenly aware of how you spend your money.

That's one of the reasons why the Gates Foundation is so well respected, he runs it like a corporation. He's very particular about who he gives money to, and expects to see results if he is going to put the Foundation's money towards some program.

Coffeehouse - Bill Gates talks about C9

Custa1200 — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 12:31:27 GMT

Unfortunately after reading Molly H's blog it appears he has no idea what is going on in the land of one of MS's most used products in IE. I really hope the IE team start talking more openly about IE8, maybe they do need Bill to go down there and smack them around a bit to open channels again.