Gates, Jobs, Torvalds: Who is Most Important? 572
Ian Wilson writes "silicon.com has launched its latest Agenda Setters poll which puts together a list of the top 50 people influencing tech. I remember Slashdot carried last year's poll - which was won by Steve Jobs. The full top 50 includes many of the usual suspects. Last year's winner Steve Jobs has slipped down to second place, but perhaps most interesting is the fact that the panel of judges couldn't separate Linus Torvalds and Bill Gates - they are tied in seventh place."
No (Score:5, Interesting)
Scary scary bloke (Score:5, Informative)
[This is possibly more 'yro' than 'it' but the consequences are truly scary for the UK if this man gets his way]
Look at number 5 - David Blunkett. This man makes all other (previously thought to be totalitarian) Home Secretaries in the UK look positively liberal. To recount:
Sure he's an agenda-setter, but Vlad the impaler had an agenda. It didn't make it a good agenda, unless you happened to be Vlad himself...
Simon.
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:5, Funny)
Simon
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:4, Informative)
Although I don't think a DNA scan would be necessary.. AFAIK the Basarab family (that of Vlad III) is not extinct.
Although the Basarab name alone is not distinctive. Moldova, which was once part of Wallachia, was named 'Basarabia' (after the family) when it was a Russian province, so there are people originating from there named 'Basarab' too.
(*An ancestor of mine (Mátyus Maróti, 1446-1476) was a brother-in-law to Vlad III.)
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:5, Informative)
Well yes. He had a novel solution to poverty as well. He invited all the poor and homeless to a huge feast. Once they were gathered inside and were enjoying their meal, he had all the doors sealed, and burned the place to the ground. After that there were no poor in Wallachia - well, no one would admit to it anyway.
Jedidiah.
Offtopic. Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:5, Interesting)
But when the hall sunk to ashes, a big tribe of mice broke out of the ruins and started to hunt Archbishop Hatto. He tried to have the mice squashed, killed, blocked, nothing helped. So he fled out of Mainz down the Rhine. Near the town of Bingen he asked a ferryman to row him over to a small island with a fortified tower built on it. He ran into the tower and blocked the door. But the mice, being millions of them, were swimming through the waters of the Rhine, reaching the island, entering the tower and eating Archbishop Hatto.
The tower at the island near Bingen can still be visited, it's called the Maeuseturm (lit.: Mice Tower) since then. For further references check a short descripton of the site [welterbe-m...heintal.de]. Other sources [tal-der-loreley.de] attribute the story to Archbishop Hatto I, a predecessor of Hatto II.
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Sounds like Moses's plan (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Sounds like Moses's plan (Score:5, Funny)
Slightly OT, but does place a precedent on mass-killing.
BTW, it was God who brought the walls down and commanded the killing. I wonder what the 4 year olds Jerichoans had done to upset God that much...
Re:Sounds like Moses's plan (Score:5, Funny)
Well, four year olds can be extremely annoying and noisy. And as you know, God has a certain habit of resting on the seventh day of the week.
Re:Sounds like Moses's plan (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Sounds like Moses's plan (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Sounds like Moses's plan (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Sounds like Moses's plan (Score:3, Funny)
Tell that to Lot's wife!
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:3, Funny)
If I were in power, my regime would have impaling. Our current methods of gently killing people don't seem to be much of a deterrent, but I bet all those violent criminals and spammers would tow the line if they knew they were risking impaling. Bruce the Im
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:5, Informative)
Let's just be clear on what impaling meant - it wasn't just getting a sharp stick rammed through you. It was getting a (usually blunt) pole inserted in your rectum, and then having the pole stood vertically supporting you so your weight inexorably pushed the pole up through you. Death took days of excruciating agony. Crucifixion is a lark by comparison.
Jedidiah.
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:4, Insightful)
I bet a good 40% of the people would approve of impaling terrorists.
Hey, as long as I get to choose the terrorists, no problem...
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:3, Interesting)
This is scary for those of us in the US too, because the UK is basically a beta test site for totalitarianism in the US. This will continue to be the case for as long as George W. Bushoco and his lapdog Tony Blair remain in power in their respective nations.
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:5, Interesting)
Rather, when they abuse them.
That's not the biggest danger! (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually, from direct personal experience, the biggest problem with massive and centralised databases isn't malicious abuse. Rather, it's old-fashioned operator error, but now of the "one wrong number typed and someone's life gets turned upside down for months" kind.
Unfortunately, there is often an implicit culture of denial: the database is "almost perfect", so the procedures for fixing the effects of imperfections are rarely fully thought through, and often far more time-consuming and error-prone than they should be.
FWIW, I was over-taxed by several hundred pounds after someone at a tax office mistyped my National Insurance number (for our US friends: like a SSN, but in the UK) by one character, and inadvertently merged me with someone on the far side of the country. The scary part wasn't so much that I lost some money for a while, but that the first time I knew about it was when my pay-cheque turned up short and I queried it with my employer's accountant; no-one thought to check with me that my status really had changed. Worse, it took three months chasing numerous tax officials and accountants in several offices to get it fixed, because they didn't believe I existed -- the linked computer records had automatically messed up all my identifying information and confused it with the other guy's.
If that could happen to me a couple of years ago, think what's going to happen when your whole life -- medical records, benefits payments, criminal record and "unofficial" black marks, etc. -- are all tied in to the uebersystem, and then that same human in that same office has to type the same hundreds of nine-digit codes perfectly every day.
Re:That's not the biggest danger! (Score:3, Informative)
Ironically, I have in my wallet my government-supplied National Insurance numbercard, which does indeed confirm my NI number. Unfortunately, it was in my wallet when some probably tired and underpaid office worker on the far side of the country mistyped the number, too. Glad that helped, then.
Re:Scary scary bloke (Score:3, Interesting)
Most likely, they know the law is illiegal and would be struck down by the courts so they just try to BS people into following their wishes.
Well, of course (Score:5, Funny)
Even more depressing (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Even more depressing (Score:5, Insightful)
Pamela Jones (Score:5, Insightful)
This despite the fact that she might not ever have written a line of code in her life.
Please rig our poll (Score:4, Interesting)
To commit heresy, though: should Linus be that high on the list? Sure, he's influential in linux, and linux should be represented, but in the happy world of IT shouldn't some Red Hat or Suse guy be higher?
In case you care, I voted for Hu Jintao. I don't share the judges' belief that vendors will dominate in China, and I reckon that Hu could well in years to come cause geeks much angst as they support his open source policies while being less fond of his oppression policies.
Re:Please rig our poll (Score:3, Interesting)
I was using Firefox to view the poll. Then I opened up IE and was able to vote with no issues and also see the vote results.
Google (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Google (Score:5, Funny)
From the blurb: (Score:5, Funny)
Is there any difference between the two men? Don't they both more or less control an operating system that is freely distributable, freely modifiable, strongly based on standards, with rock solid performance?
Re:From the blurb: (Score:3, Funny)
I see you are like me. Your copy of windows is securely on the shelf right between "Computers for Dummies" and "How to speak AOL".
Me (Score:5, Insightful)
I am the most important...
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Only one way to figure this pressing question out. (Score:5, Funny)
Karma to anyone who can actually call the match.
Bleh - we all know the outcome of that! (Score:5, Funny)
From pictures, I'd say that Linus has a physical advantage over Gates; but Bill would probably play dirty and get someone else (Balmer, perhaps) to fight for him (he never doesn anything for himself.) That would give Linus the excuse to play tag-team with Tove, and she'd kick the ass of Bill, Melinda, *and* Balmer (remember Tove is a six-time Finnish National karate champ!)
I'm appalled. (Score:5, Funny)
Worst [Reasoning] Ever... (Score:3, Insightful)
whether that be seamless computing, the much-awaited Longhorn OS or the promise of 64-bit chips.
Gates continues to make security an agenda
I realize PHBs suck this crap up, but you'd think there would be good _technical_ reasons to give Gates such a high placement. The article read more like it was apologizing for the man.
The site is slow. Here's the list. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:The site is slow. Here's the list. (Score:3, Interesting)
# 1. Ashley Highfield
# 3. Niklas Zennstrom
# 5. David Blunkett
# 6. Richard Granger
# 9. Eric Schmidt
# 10. Marc Benioff
# 11. Sir Peter Gershon
# 12. Marten Mickos
# 13. Meg Whitman
# 14. Sir David Tweedie
# 15. Jonathan Ive
# 16. James Murdoch
# 17. Arun Sarin
# 19. Sven Jaschan
# 20. S Ramadorai
# 21. Karen Price
# 25. Joe McGeehan
#
John Connors (Score:5, Funny)
It doesn't get much more technology-influencing than that.
The funniest slashdotting message. Ever. (Score:5, Funny)
You have been redirected to this page during a temporary period of planned downtime. We apologise for any inconvenience this work may have caused you. silicon.com should be available shortly and we encourage you to visit us again soon.
-The silicon.com Team
Well.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Before I get modded down to oblivion (or up, this is slashdot), look at where the real innovations come from; it isn't Microsoft, unless you count the small companies that it assimilates once they come up with something promising.
An example: with the iPod, Apple is setting a new standard for mp3 players, and there's healthy competition. What is Microsoft setting the standard in? (apart from it's own standards..)
I don't think Mr Gates can be considered influential, next to others who are actually shaping rather than strangling the industry. My opinion, YMMV etc.
Re:Well.. (Score:4, Interesting)
He did make it affordable to get a useable computer on mom's desktop, and easier to get it infected. Some of the most ingenious programming *IS* viruses and trojans, which Windows has provided a viable platform to run on. Try writing your own smtp server and remote control server, all in a few K of space, from scratch. Not child's play.
I don't mean to bash him, not everything he has done is bad. You don't become the most successful software company by doing everything wrong, after all. But he IS one of the most influential persons in the industry, if for no other reason than his methods inspiring others to provide an alternative to his products.
Re:Well.. (Score:3, Funny)
Try strangling yourself and see if the shape of your throat doesn't change.
Re:Well.. (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't either, but then again I don't consider Michael Dell any more influential either. He just owns a mail order company that sells computers.
Re:Well.. (Score:3, Insightful)
From wordnet:
1. influential (vs. uninfluential) -- (having or exercising influence or power; "an influential newspaper"; "influential leadership for peace")
If the man who created the company whose OS runs 90% of the worlds computers in addition to having a total monopoly on office software is not considered to be influential, than no one is. Influential does not mean "innovative". Gates most certainly does have influence, LOTS of it.
If Microsoft made Office for Linux, bang, linux
Re:Well.. (Score:3, Informative)
MS has made computing cheap and ubiquitous
False. That was the IBM-PC cloners. Even at MS's inflated profit margin, the cost of buying the OS is irrelevant compared to the cost of the hardware.
500??? (Score:5, Funny)
So they EXPECTED to get slashdotted?
My vote goes to... (Score:5, Funny)
Where ever you are, whoever you are, thank you.
Re:My vote goes to... (Score:3, Funny)
influence on tech (Score:4, Insightful)
Then this all should go to Bill Gates. Why ? Because usually (and sadly) it's mostly not the guy who has the largest influence, but the money. This meaning if you can't persuade them, buy them or pay them.
Re:influence on tech (Score:3, Informative)
Actually Bill Gates or Microsoft as a company are being influenced in big ways by people with much less money.
Think about how Open Source and Linux has changed the way Microsoft conducts its business. Would things like XP starter edition or "shared source" or even "trusted computing" be on the agenda if it wasnt for FOSS/Linux ethics and its proliferation ? Howabout all those virus writers exploiting the flaws and bugs in the operating system. These people are influ
In order of importance (Score:5, Insightful)
Torvalds - Still visionary, still a good coder. Still has influence over Linux kernel, but not so much as he used to. Linux will continue without Linus. Linux is what it is because he started it and gave it to the community.
Gates - Bill Gates and Microsoft are no longer synonymous. The culture at Microsoft won't notice when Bill is gone. The only thing significant about Bill now is his bank account. Microsoft is what it is today because of lawyers, marketing, more lawyers, other people in MS, and even more lawyers. Bill Gates hasn't been relevant to Microsoft for some time.
Shouldn't this be modded funny? (Score:3, Insightful)
Obviously Jobs are most important... (Score:5, Funny)
Why Linus? (Score:3, Insightful)
Every interview I've read with him gives the impression that Linus has no plan to achieve world domination, or even knock Microsoft down in the marketplace. He's just an engineer who's trying to make the best operating system he can.
Credit for "the Linux agenda" (if any) more rightly belongs to the RMS'es and ESR's of the world, the business brains at IBM and RedHat and Fedora and the other companies that have taken Linus's work and packaged it as something that's enterprise-ready.
Re:Why Linus? (Score:4, Interesting)
And, truthfully, Linux is the architect of the Linux *kernel*, which is stable and reliable and all of that, but it's a very small part of the Linux user experience. Actually, it's an insignificant part of the Linux user experience. If the Linux kernel were replaced with, say, BSD, then what impact would that have on someone who spends all of his time in the KDE desktop? This is not to belittle Linus's achievement, but at some point who matters more: the guy who builds guitars or the people who use those guitars to make amazing music? It's not like people say "Oh, my favorite band XXX is so completely enabled by the man who invented the electric guitar."
Ashley Highfield is #1? (Score:3, Funny)
Architects over Vendors (Score:4, Insightful)
Gates was influenced by technology more then he influenced it. He'll be remembered as the guy who made a lot of money from technology not as someone who created anything.
Where is Bruce (Score:5, Insightful)
Its someone we've never heard of. (Score:4, Insightful)
Bah! - technologys figureheads (Score:4, Insightful)
Technology isn't a one-person effort. It is the total combined efforts of a wide variety of companies, engineers, technicians, and other people doing what they do best. It is a symbiotic relationship that crosses almost any boundary put in front of it. If the plastic's people can't find an answer to a problem, maybe the ceramic's people can.
Think of the progression of the Intel processor and the hundreds or thousands of people who have had a hand in it's development along the way. Sure there are names that rise to the top, but litterally hundreds of engineers, technicians, and probably even janitors have contributed different ideas and insights into how to grow that little calculator chip into the massive CPU that we have today.
It doesn't stop there though. Someone had to take that computer chip and make it do something. Along came the hundreds of engineers from IBM and many, many other companies. They built the box that housed the chip and then found that they had something.
But what they had wasn't complete. Along came the boys from Microsoft, Digital Research and other companies. They cobbled together something that made the box do something.
What they had was a genuine invention. But someone thought they could make it do something else. They tinkered and hacked and low and behold, it did something else. And then another thing and so on and so on and so on.
By now millions of people in almost every country in the world are involved. Someone decided to make a list of the most influential people?
Isn't that like picking a few hairs out of your scalp and calling then your favorite?
I want to take my hat off and salute every single person and every single company who has ever endevoured to make something better! It is this insatiable need to improve that has taken mankind to where we are today and it is this same compulsion that will make tomorrow possible. In the grand scheme of things, Names like Torvalds, Gates, and whoever else are just figureheads for countless nameless and faceless people out there making things better.
"Planned Downtime" (Score:3, Interesting)
Look at it another way . . . (Score:5, Insightful)
Jobs: most influential in fashion.
Torvalds: most influential in *actual* technology.
I'm not saying that Microsoft or Apple don't have any effect on technology, but anyone who thinks that Jobs or Gates are ubergeeks are deluding themselves.
Hah! (Score:3, Funny)
I emailed them (Score:4, Funny)
Stallman Made It (Score:4, Insightful)
It is good to see that RMS made the rankings this year. But one odd thing is this:
I think it is important to remember that if it were not for RMS, Linus could not be on the list. RMS's influence cannot be understated, and most (if not all) of the freedoms currently associated with Linux were his ideas. He should have been on the list since its creation.In any case, more exposure for him means more freedom for me and everyone, so I am happy he has finally been recognized by this ranking.
Re:Linus (Score:3, Insightful)
Steve just fills a role? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Steve just fills a role? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Linus (Score:5, Insightful)
Please, please, this post isn't meant to start a flamewar of Richard Stallman vs. Linus Torvalds, I'm just saying OSS would probably exist without Linus.
Re:Linus (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Linus (Score:4, Insightful)
The biggest advantage Linus had at the beginning was the ability to get others to pitch in and help, building a very large network of contributors. It appears he was better organized back when Linux was less developed than the Hurd, and organization matters.
Part of this may be because (right or wrong) people see Linus as non-political, whereas RMS's views seem to be more political. My bet is this attracted people who were neutral about the GPL and Free software, as well as the zealots. A bigger tent attracts more contributors.
Re:Linus (Score:5, Insightful)
But I think Jobs and Linus should be tied, and higher on the list. Everything you said about Linus is true - he has helped spearhead the OSS movement. But Jobs has generally set the agenda that others follow. Linux has made great strides in making computers accessible to the extremely computer litterate who know what they want their computers to do. Macs have done an equally good job of making computers accessible to those who don't know so much about computers, but would really like to use them. Both men are equally committed to their respective causes.
I get the sense that Microsoft is not necessarily the reflection Bill Gates or his ideas. I think it does whatever amounts in the most profit. On the other hand, I think Jobs and Torvalds are both driven by idealogies. When asked why they made decisions, they respond with the term "should." As in: computers should do this, or operating systems should not behave like this.
I think that makes both of them better leaders and very high on this list.
Re:Linus (Score:3, Insightful)
The guy who is "only there because he owns a monopoly large enough that it can bastardize standards" obviously wields lots and lots of influence. There's a reason why Microsoft has been called the "800 pound gorilla" of the industry for the last 15 years or so.
Re:Linus (Score:5, Interesting)
Bill's case is far from obvious - if it wasn't him in particular, his place would be most likely taken by Gary Kildall [about.com]. The history of personal computing would look entirely different, as Kildall was far from being a monopolist egomaniac like Gates and Ballmer. Kildall's company, Digital Research, could easily be the Microsoft of the 8-bit computers. Their system [z80.de] was just _the_ system for 8-bit machines, but Kildall did not try to use his advantage as a vehicle for building monopolist empire. Quite contrary, he was sticking to the principle that the company that makes OS should not take part in the application market. That's actually how Microsoft has found its niche - as a key vendor of the CP/M applications. So if it wasn't Bill, CP/M-86 would be the MS-DOS, and GEM Desktop would be Microsoft Windows - but there would be NO equivalent of Internet Explorer, Microsoft Outlook or Microsoft Office, and that would be probably good news (we would have various competing office suites instead).
The case of Steve Jobs is even more obvious - Apple with Steve and Apple without Steve (1985-1997) are just different companies. No Steve - no iPod. Period.
Planned slashdotting (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Exception (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Linus Is much more important than Bill Gates (Score:5, Insightful)
Why?
I'd say Gates is more important. Mostly because if Gates died tomorrow, it would affect the economy a lot more than if Linus died tomorrow. Plus, Gates has given more to charitable organizations than Linus will ever make in his life.
Whom do I prefer? Linus. Whom do I think is a nicer guy, and a better tech? Linus. Who is more important to a larger percent of the population? Gates.
Re:Linus Is much more important than Bill Gates (Score:4, Insightful)
I'll grant you that Gates has *had* more of an effect on the impact of the computer industry than Linus has in the past. But, Gates is a dinosaur. I'll grant you that he is a really cool dinosaur. He is a great big Tyranasauros Rex. But he is still a dynasaur.
If Gates died tomorrow, more people would sell shares of Micorosft stock, out of Fear that the company could not perform without their glorious leader. And that would impact them. But, in reality, Gates has stepped aside, a long time ago.
Linus is a like a great big meteorite that came from outer space. And right now, we are just beginning to see this dust cloud forming... So, when you ask, which is more important, the T-Rex, or the meteorite, I would got with the meteorite.
But that's just me.
The fact that all the other dinosaurs are still looking around saying,"We all live in awe and fear of the T-Rex and we have never even heard of the meteorite," is hardly a convincing argument to the contrary...
Re:Linus Is much more important than Bill Gates (Score:3, Insightful)
All right, I will bite. Why would BG's death affect the economy? He headed the company, but now adays it is in Balmer's hands. As to the technology of MS's, they are notorious for either stealing or buying it. It is only in recent time that MS has really built up a power house
Re:Linus Is much more important than Bill Gates (Score:5, Insightful)
"who is more important, bill gates or linus torvalds"
bill was the winner because none of the people knew "the other guy".
It's more than clear bill has had more influence in our world at this moment than linus has (though linux/oss might influence the world to new business models, but thats tomorrow and maybe)
Re:Linus Is much more important than Bill Gates (Score:3, Interesting)
Instead of much of the reality TV bullshit, we need the 5-minute spot of Linux and F/LOSS personalities to be rotated. Not just Linus, tho, but ALL the major voices from the foreground to the average code contributor.
Surely, some will want to lay low for employment reasons, but others who have contributed code could as well be
Re:Linus Is much more important than Bill Gates (Score:5, Insightful)
The issue is this: Linus may have ushered in the creation of a better product than Bill Gates. But quality doesn't necessarily correlate to influence. The very fact that the Linux-loving Slashdot crowd grumbles about how everyone uses MS even though Linux is better should be the first indication that Bill Gates is more important. He may be ugly, and he may have created the most evil company with the worst software, but his work has been influential. Without him and DOS/Windows, I'm not sure computers would have become a common household appliance until much later.
Re:Linus Is much more important than Bill Gates (Score:4, Insightful)
Come to think of it, it can't be Linus. (Score:5, Insightful)
Otherwise, it would be prety easy to aruge that Tim Berners-Lee is more important than Linus.
Re:Come to think of it, it can't be Linus. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:No, it's Gates now, and maybe... (Score:4, Insightful)
The metric is not popularity. It's bringing the most to technology. You don't need to be well-known to bring anything to the technological state of the world. For example, the average user doesn't know anything about Oracle or DB2. Chances are, though, that their money is tracked in one (or both) of these. Technologically, they are very important, but both would fail your popularity contest.
They forgot someone! (Score:5, Funny)
Darl McBride (Score:3, Interesting)
I can think of one thing (Score:4, Funny)
Re:downtime?! (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Where are we on this list? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Oh, boy! It's "Let's Adore the 'Geek Elite' Day (Score:3)