Gates waxes philosophical
eWeek | at | by Mike
Wrapping up his company's annual investor conference, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates waxed philosophical and discussed a range of topics with a host of dinner guests gathered round his table. Gates reiterated that he is in the business for the long haul. "I expect to do this for a long time," he said. "We change configurations and we do that to get into a stable configuration for the next decade or so," Gates said, referring to the changes in Windows and the .Net initiative to deliver XML Web services.
Gates rounded out the second day of discussions regarding Microsoft's technological and financial situation by entertaining a dinner crowd of hangers on. He said he hopes for a favorable ruling in the antitrust case pending in federal court against the software giant. Barring a favorable ruling, Gates said Microsoft is prepared to push on to the Supreme Court.
"The things we don't like are permanent," he said of the issues separating Microsoft's views and those of the non-settling states in the case. "It's either a favorable ruling or it's like, oh, my source code is gone," Gates said to the delight of his audience. When asked about Linux and the Mono project to clone the .Net Framework, Gates said: "they can do quite a bit, but never what we do." He said Microsoft could innovate much faster.