Are you being driven slowly mad by your keyboardless iPad? Bill Gates feels your pain. If you can’t use it to open up an Excel sheet and do a little quick work in bed, what’s even the point of any gadget? Read More
Say what you will about techies and charitable giving, but Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates has established himself as one of the most important philanthropists in the world, even nabbing a spot on Businessweek’s list of most generous people. Through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Mr. Gates and his wife work to eradicate poverty and increase access to healthcare.
Now, with a $100,00 grant offered through the Grand Challenges in Global Health Program, the Gateses are hoping to find “anyone — students, scientists or entrepreneurs” to reinvent the condom. It’s your time to shine, Ballmer. Read More
Agitprop about “coding as the new literacy,” lost momentum last year somewhere around the time adults felt compelled to issue public apologies to Codecademy for ignoring their email tutorials. But with President Obama shouting out high tech high schools in the State of the Union–and Chinese hackers inspiring a possible “Sputnik moment“–the cause of educating young minds in the ways of coding seems to have taken on new urgency.
Witness, for example, this video produced by Code.org, a nonprofit devoted to enhancing computer programming education. ”Learn about a new ‘superpower’ that isn’t being taught in in 90% of US schools,” the description advertises. Wait, America still has a chance at staying a superpower? Tell me more! Read More
We just realized something: He doesn’t have the same ease with a zinger, but at this point in the history of Microsoft, Bill Gates is basically the company’s Dowager Countess.
Think about it. As chairman, he’s long since removed himself from the day-to-day running of the estate, preferring to focus full-time on his philanthropic projects. But like the grand Lady Grantham, he’s still kicking around, keeping one eye on how his successor is faring and forming his own opinion on the troubling remodel of the guest bedrooms, not that you asked (which you should have).
Hence, this exchange with Charlie Rose, during a recent interview with CBS News: Read More
Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, were at the top of the list of the biggest U.S. philanthropists for the second consecutive year. The couple donated $500 million to the Silicon Valley Community Foundation in December, making them the country’s second largest donors, behind Warren Buffett, who gave away $3.1 billion last year. [CNET]
Twitter and American Express announced a plan to turn the microblogging service into an ecommerce platform: Details are vague, but it sounds like the partnership will allow users to link their Amex to their Twitter feeds, than make a purchase by posting a message. What will you buy with your subtweets? [WSJ]
We guess Michelle Obama won’t be buying a Surface Pro anytime soon. Apple CEO Tim Cook will be a guest of the FLOTUS during President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address this evening. Last year, Steve Jobs’ widow Laurene Powell Jobs joined Ms. Obama for the State of the Union. [Mercury News]
The residential real estate website Trulia crunched some numbers ahead of Valentine’s Day. If you’re looking for a man, try Las Vegas, Honolulu, Palm Bay, Florida, San Jose or Gary, Indiana; if you want the highest percentages of women living alone, try Bethesda, Maryland, Washington, D.C., Boston, New York or Raleigh, North Carolina. [NYT]
What do you get a tech billionaire for his birthday? Books, apparently. But of the electronic or dead tree variety? [Business Insider]
This crisp weather says it’s fall, which means it’s time for another round of the NYC Tech Talent Draft. [Wall Street Journal]
Third-party image hosts like Twitpic and yfrog are reportedly the next services to get the ax from Twitter. [BuzzFeed]
Your favorite educational puppet show was once a startup, and its founders were told the concept would never work. And yet here we are, an entire generation taught to count by the Count. [New York Daily News]
Some master thief drove his BMW into an Apple store and started stealing, only to find his getaway impeded by flat tires. [ABC News]
Marissa Mayer is giving everyone at Yahoo an electronic leash smartphone. [Business Insider]
Meet your iPhone 5 early birds: “Hazem Sayed, 54, and his marketing manager Sage (short for Sagittarius), 31, set up camp Thursday at 8 a.m. — eight days early — to promote a social media startup called Vibe.” [Fortune]
Here’s a little blast from the past, in the form of Bill Gates introducing Microsoft Excel, circa 1987. [History]
Yesterday, Bill Gates announced $3.4 million in new funding to innovate on a technology that hasn’t been updated since 1775: the flush toilet. In the developing world, 1.5 million children under the age of five die each year from sanitation problems caused by defecating in the open, says Reuters. Western-style toilets, however, require complicated sewer Read More
Microsoft introduced Windows 8 Consumer Preview in Barcelona today. It’s not the final version of the system so perhaps not for the faint-of-heart when it comes to doing scary new things with your tender home PC. Still, the Consumer Preview trended for most of the morning on Twitter, which can be the modern barometer of whether something is a big deal or not.
Kent Walter, writing about the new operating system in Microsoft’s Windows Experience Blog, calls this a “reimagined” Windows: Read More
