Mr. Gates. (Photo: Flickr, ToddABishop

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?

Business Insider reports that the baby-faced billionaire appeared on CNBC this morning to chat about the blurred lines between tablets and PCs. That, of course, led to a brag about the Surface, which he boasted offers both the "portability of the tablet but the richness of the PC."

Unlike, let's say, those bricks made by his rivals down in Cupertino:

"He then said of people using iPad-like devices, 'A lot of those users are frustrated, they can't type, they can't create documents, they don't have Office there.'"

Gonna be awkward when Melinda tells him about Google Docs.

(Photo: Core77)

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.

The contest, spotted by Gothamist, is looking for one genius inventor to develop "the next generation of condom." Though condoms are the most reliable contraceptive method to protect against pregnancy and STIs, it doesn't take your ex-boyfriend to tell you how much they kind of suck (oh, and will he tell you). So the foundation is requesting proposals for a next-gen condom that "significantly preserves or enhances pleasure, in order to improve uptake and regular use."

If that's too much of an undertaking for you, the foundation offers other ideas:

 Additional concepts that might increase [condom usage] uptake include attributes that increase ease-of-use for male and female condoms, for example better packaging or designs that are easier to properly apply. In addition, attributes that address and overcome cultural barriers are also desired.

If you manage to develop a condom that guys won't complain about having to wear, you will win $100,000 from the Gates Foundation, help contribute towards a healthier world and also achieve deity status among anyone who has ever heard or uttered the phrase, "But it feels so much better without one."

(Photo: Code.org)

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!

The five-minute spot attempts to make coding seem more approachable--you don't have be a genius is the commercial's refrain--by equating it with other creative, challenging disciplines like learning an instrument and playing sports. Not sold? Here, let Miami Heat's Chris Bosh convince you. Mr. Bosh, whose bio reads "NBA All-Star, Coded In College," tells the camera about the after-school program called Whiz Kids (ok, legit adorable) where he first learned to write code. "People found out. They laughed at me and I was like, man I don't care, I think it's cool and I'm leaning a lot and some of my friends have jobs."

The whole thing ends with Will.i.am ("Created the Black Eyed Peas, Now Taking Coding Classes") calling coders the new rock stars.

The video gives nod to all the different disciplines where knowing programming can help: Banking! Agriculture! Entertainment! But Code.org's donors since corporations like Microsoft, Google, and Facebook provided support for the video and Code.org's advisors include investors like Marc Andreessen and Ron Conway, there are plenty of shots of cushy startup cafeterias, scooters, music rooms, and other amenities.

The only thing we can't believe is that self-appointed Glass Ambassador Sergey Brin missed an opportunity to show off his new toy.

(Photo: Screencap)

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:

Charlie Rose: "Are you happy with [current CEO Steve Ballmer's] performance?"

Bill Gates: "Well, he and I are two of the most self-critical people you can imagine."

After rattling off a couple examples of what he considers recent successes (Bing and the Surface, if you're wondering), Mr. Gates concluded: "He and I are not satisfied that in terms of, you know, breakthrough things, that we're doing everything possible."

Also, that new carpet in the foyer is just ghastly, and didn't he recommend you hire the other footman?

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]

Tech talent from Sesame Street. (Photo: flickr.com/libertygrace0)

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]

The top prize in Mr. Gates' "Reinvent the Toilet Challenge," says Reuters, went to California Institute of Technology for a "self-contained, sun-powered system" that "breaks down feces and urine into hydrogen gas, which can be stored in hydrogen fuel cells to provide a back-up energy source for night operation or use in low-sunlight conditions." Better still, water recovered from the process can be pumped again to provide water to flush the toilet. That, my friends, is a lean startup.

image via the Windows Experience Blog

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:

With Windows 8, the whole experience of Windows has been reimagined. It’s designed to work on a wide range of devices , from touch-enabled tablets, to laptops, to desktops and all-in-ones. We’ve designed Windows 8 to give you instant access to your apps, your files, and the information you care about most so you can spend less time navigating and more time doing what you actually want to do. You can move between Windows 8 PCs easily and access your files and settings from virtually anywhere.

There are several caveats for the eager Windows fan willing to give this new software a shot:

• The Consumer Preview is prelease. What does that mean, really? According to Microsoft, "hiccups and bugs." Because Microsoft has never had problems with those, they had to warn us.
• Microsoft says you should be "comfortable with new technology," which will make anyone with older relatives who own Windows PCs happily just keep those machines parked on Windows 7. Or 95, whichever.

Downloaders of the new system will also need the right hardware. Per Microsoft, the "right" hardware is:

• 1 GHz or faster processor
• 1 GB RAM (32-bit) or 2 GB RAM (64-bit)
• 16 GB available hard disk space (32-bit) or 20 GB (64-bit)
• DirectX 9 graphics device with WDDM 1.0 or higher driver
• 1024 x 768 minimum screen resolution

Additionally, the touchscreen features in Windows 8 won't work if you don't have a touchscreen computer. That's probably obvious to most, but Microsoft is being thorough.

Of course Windows 8 is linked to The Cloud, but it also introduces a feature called "Charms," which sounds a little on the Harry Potter side of things. It's really just Windows being cute, according to PC Magazine: "This is just a cute Microsoft term for the icons that appear when you swipe from the right side of a touch screen or move your mouse cursor to the bottom-left corner of a mouse-and-keyboard PC."

There are five Charms and they include Settings, Devices and Search. (Combined, they unlock Bill Gates's horcruxes.)

A couple of features are aimed directly at tablet users: switching apps and snapping. The Windows Experience blog explains: "If you’re using touch, just swipe in from the left edge to go back to your last app, or keep swiping to go back through several apps. If you’re using a mouse, just move it to the upper-left corner to see your last app."

"Snapping" is what it sounds like, the ability to slide an app to one side of the screen and snap it there, in case you're monitoring something like streaming video.

There is apparently much more, including a "new" Internet Explorer, but if you're feeling brave you can go ahead and download Windows 8 Consumer Preview here.  Good luck and Godspeed. Leave the horcruxes alone, though.