Once upon a time, way back in 1984, the Mac was new. Let us travel back to the past for another look into the amazing first issue of MacWorld, which I acquired two weeks ago at a family reunion.
This week, let’s turn to “Polishing the Mac,” an extraordinarily long interview by David Bunnell (almost 4,000 words) with Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates that is basically just about the Mac’s greatness. I’ll tease with a choice quote, then click through for some more of Chairman Bill’s still-prescient (and now hilarious and ironic) praise for the Mac. Also, dig the hair and glasses. Could he look more like his Anthony Michael Hall doppelganger if he tried?
On the Mac’s Ease of Use: “The Mac heralds a major change in how people view and interact with application programs. That’s why I’m so excited about it. There’s no question that I’ll let my mom try it out.”
Much, much more after the jump.
On PCs compared to Macs: “You couldn’t get performance or graphics like the Mac’s out of the PC at a comparable price. … “The Mac has easily twice (the horsepower) of a PC. That’s a lot of power, and that power can be exploited in many ways, including moving bits around on the screen.”
On Microsoft’s Involvement in the Mac’s Development: “Whenever you get involved with prototype machines that early on, you are essentially part of the engineering team… We’ve learned a great deal about doing graphics applications, and we’ve made sure that their subsystem, dialog boxes and memory manager fit in properly.” (Editor’s Note: That is surprisingly incriminating, given the development of Windows so soon after…)
On the Mac’s Place in the Industry: “The Mac will mean that there’s at least one company besides IBM in the personal computer business that doesn’t have to do everything the iBM way. … I’ve always said that the Mac is an ideal machine for office use, but it’s also a great general purpose machine. We think it will address several markets and remind people that the pace of innovations hasn’t slowed down in the industry.”
On the Mac as Gateway Drug: “I’ll enjoy having some people I know who are new to computers play with the Mac and see if it doesn’t draw them into the excitement of interactive personal computing.”
On the Mac’s Place in History: “The Mac is fun and exciting, and it fulfills Apple’s image of producing very personal, interactive, state-of-the-art computers. It’s a blend of Apple’s knowledge of what personal computing should be and what the semiconductor industry has made possible. It’s a great mixture, and it’s something that Apple is perfectly positioned to sell to people. The Mac will be remembered as one of the great classic machines.”
There you have it, ladies and gentlemen: Bill Gates, leader of the anti-Mac charge, singing its praises to the high heaven, even as Microsoft was making Windows to try to steal its thunder. Absolutely shameless.
16 responses to “State of the 1984 Art: Bill Gates Raves About the Mac”
Absolutely shameless is right. And please, “There’s no question that I’ll let my mom try it out.â€ÂÂ?!?!?!?! It sounds like he pulled that quote out of his double-speaking nether regions to appease the magazine. By the way, nice reference to Pirates of Silicon Valley. This interview looks like it was ripped from that movie. I guess life imitates art, eh? (Or is it the other way around?)
He actually looks like the love child of Anthony Michael Hall and of Andrew McCarthy (St. Elmo’s Fire-era)… And interesting quotes!
Love it. Adding this to my collection of Gates quotes on my site.
Is it just me, or do all of Bill’s answers read like standard-issue PR press release fare? He doesn’t really SAY anything about the Mac.
The money he has probably makes up for it, but Anthony Michael Hall certainly got the better in at least one department
http://www.sliceofscifi.com/up…
One telling inference I get from the quotes is that Gates learned a lot from the Mac. Perhaps most important was to not pull out of cooperative development too soon. I guess he thought he had stolen enough from the Mac when he set out to make Windows. He didn’t make the same mistake when he ransacked and then screwed IBM on OS/2, and then magically producing Win95 in short order (with the advanced GUI that was allegedly the MS part of the partnership). And he remembered the lesson of letting the real experts do the programming when he scrapped Longhorn and likely decompiled OS X to make Vista.
He’s the consumate businessman for our age. He creates nothing new, he claims credit for others’ work, he disparages his competitors by spreading FUD and smears, and he denies his past when it doesn’t serve his current agenda. Were it not for the money, I’d say he missed his calling; he could be President of the United States.
Bill Gates wishes he could be Steve Jobs. And every prodcut his company puts out is the most sincere form of praise for Apple, plagiarism.
Bill Gates wishes he could be Steve Jobs. And every prodcut his company puts out is the most sincere form of praise for Apple, plagiarism.