5 hours ago, heybruce said:

And what did Bill Gates have to do with either of these laws?

 

If you want to believe that it was just coincidence that the increased enforcement of copyrights benefitted a company that has been spending at least eight to ten million dollars per year in lobbying the government that write the copyright laws and trade policies, you are welcome to do so.

On 2/8/2021 at 3:17 PM, heybruce said:

I know about the Gini coefficient and wealth disparity and how lobbyists influence government.  However this is not proof that Bill Gates is influencing how copyright laws are written.  It is possible to get rich working with existing law.

 

You seem to take success in business as evidence that a person is corrupt, and altruism by the wealthy as proof of this corruption.

I think CM_Marshall makes fair points about Gates. He was ruthless and dishonest in the early days of Microsoft. And the way Microsoft and corporations in general have abused patent and copyright laws in the US is disgraceful. Until Microsoft was called out on it, it particpated in ALEC. ALEC was a right wing organization funded by the Koch brothers that wrote laws to favor entrenched interests and then submitted those laws to state legislatures. Often they survived virtually intact.

On the other hand, Gates is now doing lots of good work. For instance how to safely safely dispose of human waste. I won't go into any more details about this because the usual elderly juveniles won't be able to resist commenting about this.

3 hours ago, cmarshall said:

 

If you want to believe that it was just coincidence that the increased enforcement of copyrights benefitted a company that has been spending at least eight to ten million dollars per year in lobbying the government that write the copyright laws and trade policies, you are welcome to do so.

 

2 hours ago, placeholder said:

I think CM_Marshall makes fair points about Gates. He was ruthless and dishonest in the early days of Microsoft. And the way Microsoft and corporations in general have abused patent and copyright laws in the US is disgraceful. Until Microsoft was called out on it, it particpated in ALEC. ALEC was a right wing organization funded by the Koch brothers that wrote laws to favor entrenched interests and then submitted those laws to state legislatures. Often they survived virtually intact.

On the other hand, Gates is now doing lots of good work. For instance how to safely safely dispose of human waste. I won't go into any more details about this because the usual elderly juveniles won't be able to resist commenting about this.

I'm not arguing that Bill Gates is a saint.  My back and forth with cmarshall began with his posts making it cleat that he thought Bill Gates should have single handedly prepared the world for the current and future pandemics.  In challenging this he made it clear that he doesn't like wealthy people, or at least not those that make their wealth by being successful in business.  He assumes these people always make their wealth through corruption.  He offers no proof, but he sticks by his assumption, as the post above makes clear.

4 minutes ago, heybruce said:

 

I'm not arguing that Bill Gates is a saint.  My back and forth with cmarshall began with his posts making it cleat that he thought Bill Gates should have single handedly prepared the world for the current and future pandemics.  In challenging this he made it clear that he doesn't like wealthy people, or at least not those that make their wealth by being successful in business.  He assumes these people always make their wealth through corruption.  He offers no proof, but he sticks by his assumption, as the post above makes clear.

Actually, he became rich....by luck!

 

The origin of Microsoft's success originates in the decision by IBM to use its OS for the first IBM PCs. At this time, IBM was in a hurry because it was late on this market, and also did not realise how important the OS would be. So it used Microsoft OS without even requiring an exclusivity clause. IBM became the world leader, then producers of IBM PC clones also adopted the same OS and made the market for Microsoft even bigger. That's how Microsoft became dominant, despite its OS being inferior to Apple Macintosh OS.

Just now, candide said:

Actually, he became rich....by luck!

 

The origin of Microsoft's success originates in the decision by IBM to use its OS for the first IBM PCs. At this time, IBM was in a hurry because it was late on this market, and also did not realise how important the OS would be. So it used Microsoft OS without even requiring an exclusivity clause. IBM became the world leader, then producers of IBM PC clones also adopted the same OS and made the market for Microsoft even bigger. That's how Microsoft became dominant, despite its OS being inferior to Apple Macintosh OS.

No argument.  How many wildly successful people didn't achieve their success by being in the right place at the right time with the right idea, skills, or product?  That does not make them corrupt, or make them responsible for solving all the world's problems on their own.

1 hour ago, heybruce said:

No argument.  How many wildly successful people didn't achieve their success by being in the right place at the right time with the right idea, skills, or product?  That does not make them corrupt, or make them responsible for solving all the world's problems on their own.

Right! He didn't even need to be corrupt!

.... And now I think it's time to get back to the topic of pandemic conspiracies.