40 Busy Years Later, Paul Allen, a Microsoft Founder, Considers His Creation

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/05/03/40-busy-years-later-a-microsoft-founder-considers-his-creation/?_r=0

by camurban • 11 years ago

92 31 11 years ago

bits.blogs.nytimes.com

nostromo• 11 years ago

I liked Paul Allen more before he decided to become a patent troll.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB100014240527487032949045753852...

higherpurpose• 11 years ago

The upside is that he became one only after Microsoft itself turned into one.

WalterGR2• 11 years ago

With the recent many posts about Microsoft I've seen several people accuse MS of this.

I don't remember patent trolling being in the laundry list from my days reading Slashdot. Can anyone shed some light on what these comments may be referring to?

pilsetnieks• 11 years ago

Aren't you confusing Paul Allen with Nathan Myhrvold? It seems that Allen's company actually developed the concepts it holds the patents for; Myhrvolds' Intellectual Ventures is the one buying up patents and making a business of licensing them under threat of lawsuit.

Just because a company is suing someone for patent violation doesn't make them a patent troll.

joslin013• 11 years ago

I'm confused about this distinction between Paul & Nathan?

Mr. Allen's lawsuit comes amid high-profile successes of firms such as NTP Inc., which enforce patents without making products and have been called "patent trolls" by critics.

What is this distinction supposed to serve? I see "Mr. Allen's lawsuit" and I also see that he purposefully kept Amazon & Microsoft out, which means he must be involved somehow personally.

Another Microsoft veteran, former chief technology officer Nathan Myhrvold, has amassed thousands of patents and secured hundreds of millions of dollars in patent-licensing deals from telecommunications companies and others. Mr. Myhrvold's Seattle-based firm Intellectual Ventures patents some of its inventions but also acquires patents to license.

Ok... yes Nathan is doing that separately. This is about Paul.

jfuhrman2• 11 years ago

He also gave at least $100 million to Ebola, $500 million to charity, and funded several health science and general science initiatives.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Allen#Paul_G._Allen_Family...

Paul Allen has given more than $1.8 billion towards the advancement of science, technology, education, wildlife conservation, the arts and community services in his lifetime.[28] In 2010, Allen became a signatory of The Giving Pledge, promising to give at least half of his fortune to philanthropic causes.[29] In December 2014, Inside Philanthropy named Allen as their "Philanthropist of the Year;"[27] Allen's direct giving in 2013 totaled $206 million.[30]

People are not one dimensional creatures.

jestinjoy12• 11 years ago

Why not he release Microsoft products for free! Instead of doing like US govt (Killing people on one side and doing charity on another side), he could do something best he could do in his field.

simonebrunozzi• 11 years ago

Not that I want to dismiss his contribution, but sometimes there are huge tax implications behind these donations, and I know of at least one occurrence where a half-billionaire SAVED money by donating some to charity.

chambo622• 11 years ago

Odd puff-piece with little substance.

yitchelle• 11 years ago

I agree, and I am also amused why it got so many upvotes?

edit: grammar

adventured• 11 years ago

Paul Allen - correctly so in my opinion - gets a lot of respect from hackers.

WorldWideWayne• 11 years ago

My guess is that it's part of the campaign to make developers love Microsoft by reminding them that Microsoft was once a startup too and like Apple, it has it's own folk heroes. I guess they overlooked the fact that people on HN apparently don't like this guy.

jacquesm• 11 years ago

http://www.groklaw.net/articlebasic.php?story=20100829012006...

mercurial• 11 years ago

403.

sp332• 11 years ago

I'm not getting a 403, but anyway here's an archive. https://web.archive.org/web/20140830224034/http://www.grokla...

M8• 11 years ago

Is it his creation still? What makes it so - several thousand lines of legacy code or the name of the product?

joslin013• 11 years ago

You might be wondering why you got down-voted. I'll help you out. To create something is to give birth to it kinda like how I imagine you have parents who birthed you. I imagine with all your success and hard work, you don't really feel like your parents "own" you but you wouldn't say to them, "you didn't create me" because that would be illogical. Same thing for Paul. He created Microsoft with Bill Gates. You can't take that from him.

hsnewman• 11 years ago

Anybody else have an issue with Microsoft starting out using Harvard's computer to develop their first product (for free)? Theft of services to me...

joslin013• 11 years ago

Yea, seriously! Harvard should sue. If it wasn't for Harvard providing that computer (FOR FREE!!), Microsoft wouldn't even exist. These guys man. They just show no respect. Harvard deserves at least 10% -- maybe even 20% -- of M$ for their seed investment of a (FREE!!) computer to hack on. And if you tell Harvard this and they go ahead and sue and get 20% I'm gonna sue the shit out of you if you don't somehow get Harvard to give me some of that percentage because they wouldn't have even thought to do it if it wasn't for this (FREE!!) comment.

bruceb• 11 years ago

Harvard's endowment is $36billion. I think they are doing ok.

morganvachon• 11 years ago

No, because a computer is a tool, and if you lend your tools to someone who then makes money from their own creations, they don't owe you a dime. Now, if you rent your tools to them and they don't pay rent you can probably sue them for it, but it still doesn't entitle you to ownership of their IP. That's simply not how the world works.

40 Busy Years Later, Paul Allen, a Microsoft Founder, Considers His Creation

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