Bill Gates and Steve Jobs Share Same Stage once Again – Apple vs M$

Posted • June 1, 2007 • Comments Off

No one expected fists to fly when Micro$oft chairman Bill Gates and Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs appeared on stage together this week. But it’s clear there’s no love lost between Apple and M$.

Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates and Apple CEO Steve Jobs took the stage Wednesday night, May 30th at The Wall Street Journal’s D: All Things Digital conference.

Jobs and Gates at times seemed to be overcome about their history together. Indeed, by the end, both men seemed choked up by the emotion of the moment.

Even after being praised for his recent philanthropic efforts, Gates talked more about what he did in the technology industry than what his charitable foundation is doing now.

“The most important work I got a chance to be involved in – no matter what I do – is the personal computer,” Gates said. “That’s my life’s work.”

Of course this appearance wasn’t all “lovey dovey”. At one point Jobs tried to convince Gates that Apple isn’t trying to be mean by poking fun at the “PC guy,” the lovable loser who stands in sharp contrast to Apple’s cool “Mac guy” in the popular series of commercials.

Gates in an interview with Newsweek earlier this year, he’d even questioned the ads’ veracity.

“I’d give a lot to have Steve’s taste – in terms of intuitive taste for people and products,” he said. “The way he does things, it’s just different. It’s magical.”

Similarly, Jobs said that Apple could have learned a lot from Microsoft’s penchant for partnering with other companies in the industry. Partnering simply wasn’t in Apple’s DNA, and the company didn’t learn how to do it until decades after its founding, he said.

“The funny thing is Microsoft’s one of the few companies we were able to partner with (where) that actually worked for both companies,” he said.

The event was the first time Jobs and Gates have made a joint public appearance since the 1997 Boston at Macworld, when Gates joined Jobs via teleconference to announce a landmark deal between their two companies. The previous time the two appeared together at a public event was in the early 1980s.

Jobs is well known for taking pot-shots at his company’s bigger rival. And he didn’t disappoint on Wednesday. The company’s iTunes software is one of the most popular programs on computers running Micro$oft’s Windoz operating system, Jobs noted in his conversation earlier in the day with Mossberg. Indeed, he said, some users have written to tell Apple that iTunes is their favorite Windoz application.

“It’s like giving a glass of ice water to somebody in hell,” he said.

Steve Jobs and Bill Gates at The Wall Street Journal Executive Conference, D: All Things Digital at the Four Seasons Resort Aviara in Carlsbad, California.

late,
Gary

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