AHC: Make Bill Gates homeless

More interestingly Apple could keep Jobs and have had a more diverse amount of hardware in the 90's, keeping it in competition with Microsoft. Couple that with Gates getting into a serious accident around that time and you could kill Microsoft. That assumes a lot though so this could be ASB sans not having Gates have some sort of addiction.
 
To showing the world his seriousness to really back up the research for Aids' cure, Bill and Melinda Gates donate half of their assets to Aids research, and put half of their assets, including homes, to their Children.

From 1 Jan 2014 - 31 Dec 2014, they both living and sleep on the streets of Seattle, all while remind everyone else of Aids awareness.
 
Maybe have Gates partners buy him out early on and then he developed a meth addiction. Or as an alternative to the homelessness scenario have him just end up teaching computer science, find out he has cancer and then start dealing meth to support his family.
 
To showing the world his seriousness to really back up the research for Aids' cure, Bill and Melinda Gates donate half of their assets to Aids research, and put half of their assets, including homes, to their Children.

From 1 Jan 2014 - 31 Dec 2014, they both living and sleep on the streets of Seattle, all while remind everyone else of Aids awareness.

He'd probably end up getting criticized for being a tourist to poverty and begging for money in that scenario. I can picture Gates wearing an oversized Seahawks jacket while warming his hands over a garbage can in an ally though.
 
More interestingly Apple could keep Jobs and have had a more diverse amount of hardware in the 90's, keeping it in competition with Microsoft. Couple that with Gates getting into a serious accident around that time and you could kill Microsoft. That assumes a lot though so this could be ASB sans not having Gates have some sort of addiction.

Maybe have him develop a painkiller addiction after the accident and end up getting prosecuted for doctor shopping. His reputation is ruined and he's bankrupted in court.
 
Your challenge should you choose to accept it is to make Bill Gates homeless, living on the streets of Seattle in 2014.

I would’ve said “He decides not to steal Mac OS” but Microsoft would still be marginally successful at selling applications.

So let’s say he’s convicted for doing so. Windows is forcibly changed, no one buys it, Microsoft flounders, boom.
 

jahenders

Banned
Hard to make him homeless since he came from a moderately well off family and clearly had programming skills and some business acumen, but ....

A few potential PODs:
1) The clubs at his school never buy a computer, which sparked his interest.

2) When he (and 3 others) are banned from using CCC's computer lab for getting free computer time by exploiting bugs, he's offended and pursues other interests

3) He never meets Paul Allen with the idea of forming a business

In all the above, he pursues other interests and does poorly because he's not good at working for other people (who he considers stupid)

4) IBM doesn't buy Microsoft's BASIC and chooses to use either CPM or UNIX for the PC. Microsoft fails as do a few other business attempts. Jaded and angry, he leaves computing.

5) The Big Bang hypothesis (like Dennis Kim in season 1, ep 12) -- he's better looking or otherwise gets involved with girls and the "fast crowd" in school. He becomes more interested in hanging out and having fun and eventually gets involved in drugs and other self-destructive behavior.
 
Hard to make him homeless since he came from a moderately well off family

His parents were extremely well-off, but there are people from even better backgrounds who have fallen into the gutter. All you need is an addiction and mental illness.
 

GeographyDude

Gone Fishin'
I think we might be trying too hard. Bill Gates is a creative person who marches to his own drummer. Often, that is not an advantage in the corporate world. Plus, the percentage of middle-class wage jobs compared to the working age population has been declining since the early 70s, hasn't it?

I think Bill and Paul Allen's first business was selling an operating system for the MITS assemble-at-home computer. Maybe for whatever reason is that endeavor just doesn't work out. The baseline statistic is that 80% of new businesses fail, typically because of undercapitalization. It's not just a matter of being good. There's a lot of luck factors and a lot of external factors.
 
Maybe have Gates partners buy him out early on and then he developed a meth addiction. Or as an alternative to the homelessness scenario have him just end up teaching computer science, find out he has cancer and then start dealing meth to support his family.

Hmmm.... Where have I heard that last part
 
I think we might be trying too hard. Bill Gates is a creative person who marches to his own drummer. Often, that is not an advantage in the corporate world. Plus, the percentage of middle-class wage jobs compared to the working age population has been declining since the early 70s, hasn't it?

I think Bill and Paul Allen's first business was selling an operating system for the MITS assemble-at-home computer. Maybe for whatever reason is that endeavor just doesn't work out. The baseline statistic is that 80% of new businesses fail, typically because of undercapitalization. It's not just a matter of being good. There's a lot of luck factors and a lot of external factors.

A genius who enters maturity just as a revolutionary period, which distinctly benefits his talents, emerges. You have to work incredibly hard to make him homeless.

Even if Microsoft fails, there are untold numbers of companies that need programmers. IBM, Hewlett Packard, Motorola, Apple, Data General, Wang Labs, Cray, Sun Microsystems, Oracle, etc, etc. Best career advice you can follow is to enter a rapidly growing industry. Warm bodies not only have jobs but promotions.

Now Steve Jobs is a different story. One can almost imagine him choosing to be homeless if his partnership with Woz doesnt work. But his personality is very different from Gates.
 
I would’ve said “He decides not to steal Mac OS” but Microsoft would still be marginally successful at selling applications.

So let’s say he’s convicted for doing so. Windows is forcibly changed, no one buys it, Microsoft flounders, boom.

Or on the flip side Apple doesn't go with their decision to be as uptight about software and goes for an approach more like Microsoft OTL but earlier, Microsoft never takes off because Apple's machines and OS are everywhere, and Bill Gates ends up going bankrupt when his venture goes under.
 
Or on the flip side Apple doesn't go with their decision to be as uptight about software and goes for an approach more like Microsoft OTL but earlier, Microsoft never takes off because Apple's machines and OS are everywhere, and Bill Gates ends up going bankrupt when his venture goes under.

The benefit Microsoft had was IBM selling all those computers to corporate customers. Even if Apple opens up more to third party software they still dont have a sales force for getting into corporate america. The phrase "nobody ever got fired for hiring IBM" mattered in the 80's.
 
I would’ve said “He decides not to steal Mac OS” but Microsoft would still be marginally successful at selling applications.
when did he steal macOS? if something the concept of GUI and the mouse came from rank xerox. apple is the company that got big by using lawyer bombardment on other companies. And microsoft got big before it developed the windows gui versions
 
William Gates comes from a long line of rich lawyers, tbh even if he was a complete failure as a programmer or as his original intention a lawyer (he learned to program while attending Harvard, as school his dad made him attend) his parents would make sure he had some stability before they passed.

Damn near ASB actually...
 
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