Wired Interviews Bill Gates 1996

Why HN readers recommended it

People recommend it as a rare, unpolished look at Gates's mid-90s thinking, including predictions that aged well and badly.

This is a summary from the source dataset, not an endorsement by Hacker News or the video creator.

Video & recommendation details

Creator / channel

Kevin Kelly

Topic

bill gates 1990s interview

Format

interview

Level

general

HN recommenders in dataset

3

HN mentions in dataset

3

Recommendation years in dataset

2020–2025

These counts and years describe the included Hacker News records; they are not YouTube views or the video’s publication date.

From the original HN conversations

Excerpts from the recorded comments. Follow each source for the full comment and surrounding discussion.

• I strongly recommend watching the impromptu interview Bill Gates gave back in the 90s while visiting the Wired office, for gaining some valuable perspective on his thinking, and how comically wrong he's been before. My internet is too flaky here at the moment to verify, …

• This. This [1] wired interview provides an insight into the structured thinking at Microsoft/Gates even back in 1996. I'm sure this kind of thinking permeates any successful company, to have a video of this depth, and now available for public viewing, is really unique. [1] …

• I believe it is in this interview from 1996 where I saw Bill Gates saying the same thing about Microsoft products, he saw them as subscriptions. It’s a long but interesting interview. [VIDEO]