Gates’ Source Code

Today, Bill Gates is known more for his sage-like utterings on global development and the groundbreaking work of his foundation than for his technological prowess. But for someone who grew up in the ’90s, Gates was undoubtedly the towering giant of the tech world. The PC revolution that had been underway since the ’80s, the rapid succession of Windows versions (3.1, NT, 95, 98, ME, XP), the endlessly fascinating MS Office suite, and his high-profile legal battles over monopoly practices ensured that he was a constant presence in the news.

So, reading his memoir Source Code, which chronicles his journey from childhood to the launch of Microsoft, was a bittersweet experience. When someone revisits their formative years and recounts the creation of what is arguably the greatest piece of software (on which I’m typing these very words), the emotions stirred are bound to be rich with nostalgia.

For me, while the book brought to life Gates’ journey, the meta-message was simply about the greatness of American liberalism that allowed a Microsoft to be birthed on its shores. In the 1960s, an American private school provided its students access to a computer, a teenage Gates tinkered with it and eventually got recruited to develop payroll software, Harvard allowed him to drop in and out of semesters to sell his modified BASIC programme to the MITS Altair 8800 – one of the earliest PCs aimed at DIY hobbyists, companies could be formed with zero government interference and property rights were sacrosanct; all of these contributing to making him ‘the’ Bill Gates we know of.

Gates himself acknowledges the privilege to which he was born and the fortune of being surrounded by specific corporations both in Seattle and Boston that contributed to his rise. In addition to his grit, the precocious Gates also had loads of stamina, allowing him to code and remain engaged in finding solutions to complex projects. (In school, when assigned a project on Delaware, he churned out a 177-page report with a cover carved out of wood to boot).

Looking back at that report, I can see hints of the adult I would become, my intellectual interests starting to take root. With a little effort I could—much to my amazement—assemble in my head models of how the world operated, whether it was how sound traveled or the inner workings of the Canadian government (another report). Each bit of knowledge I accrued added to a sense of empowerment, the feeling that by applying my brain, I could solve even the world’s most complex mysteries.

And:

Often success stories reduce people to stock characters: the boy wonder, the genius engineer, the iconoclastic designer, the paradoxical tycoon. In my case, I’m struck by the set of unique circumstances—mostly out of my control—that shaped both my character and my career. It’s impossible to overstate the unearned privilege I enjoyed: to be born in the rich United States is a big part of a winning birth lottery ticket, as is being born white and male in a society that advantages white men.