One of the things that Bill confessed to is not getting much exercise. "I have an excerise bike, which I don't use very often," he said about the matter. I guess, like many of us computer geeks, he figures that one can get enough exercise typing. Maybe this has something to do with the fact that he isn't a very good golfer, by his own confession. Presumably, there are techies at Microsoft working on some revolutionary new way to debug his golf swing, which they can then sell to everybody for a rather, uh... reasonable cost.
Gates also said that he is an afficianado of computer games. He mentioned Doom in particular. In his words, "I liked Doom, but I haven't got very good at that." I'm a Descent person myself, but if Bill ever needs some practice at Doom, I'm sure that he'd have no problem finding someone willing to challenge him to a deathmatch. After all, I know several people (execs from Apple, IBM, Corel, and other companies of that ilk) who would jump at the chance to (virtually) blast Bill Gates to kingdom come. Now if the Justice Department were numbered among those, then he'd have a problem.
Despite his affinity for computer games, Bill's favorite program is Windows. I don't know whether to be surprised or not about this one. After all, there is no shortage of people who consider Windows their favorite program to hate (especially my friend, an OS/2 fanatic.) But this is a new one. I think that Bill Gates may be the only one who considers Windows their favorite program, except maybe a few scattered members of the Win95 development team. Then again, they probably know Win95 better than any of us common folk, which would be reason enough to hate it. I guess if a program can turn you into a multi-billionaire, it would be your favorite.
Although it may never occur to some computer geeks that CD's can hold music instead of data, Bill has a collection of music CDs. Most of these are old musicals. Bill said that he enjoys old movies, since they have better plots than modern movies, many of which have no plot whatsoever, according to my "research." Bill did enjoy "Independence Day," however, mostly for the effects. I saw a cartoon somewhere on the Internet (presumably by a Mac extremist) that showed one of the UFO's blowing up the White House, with someone saying that since 85% of the world's computers can run Windows95, the aliens determined that they'd have no problem destroying the planet. Personally, I believe that the 15% of the computers run MacOS is proof of deep deficiencies in our planetary readiness in the event of an extraterrestrial attack. I'd hate to imagine the consequences if Bob had caught on...
The reactons (and attention spans) of the kids were mixed. Some of the kids wore "Bill Gates Unplugged" shirts (some people could only wish someone would unplug him,) while some left early, getting bored with the whole thing. One kid was heard to say "I want to leave. These people are geeks." Uh, kid, You don't exactly become a multi-billionaire in the high-tech industry by being a party animal. Afterward, Bill talked to reporters, who asked if he was aware that parents sent their kids to get a few financial pointers. Bill said that he didn't think any "fairy dust" would wear off. He was right. I have seen Bill Gates in person once, and I'm stil just as broke as usual.
Bill also commented on the e-mail he receives from kids with ideas for new uses for computers, many of which are pretty wild. One example he cited was a computer that can "make broccoli taste like candy." At this very moment, I'd be willing to bet that Sun is building a computer that can make broccoli taste like filet mignon, but only 5% of the time. The rest of the time, of course, it makes the broccoli taste like java.