************************************************************** * * * CYBERSPACE * * A biweekly column on net culture appearing * * in the Toronto Sunday Sun * * * * Copyright 2000 Karl Mamer * * Free for online distribution * * All Rights Reserved * * Direct comments and questions to: * * * * * ************************************************************** Sic transit gloria Microsoft. Thus fades the glory of Microsoft. As many predicted, a judge ordered Microsoft split into two Baby Bills. What will become of Bill Gates? Will he pass into history like so many others. That Gates has survived more than a quarter century at the helm of a pioneering software company makes him an anomaly in computing history. Many of the patriarchs of the personal computer era surprisingly stepped aside nearly as quickly as they made their riches. Ed Roberts, Mitch Kapor, and Paul Allen all decided they made enough money creating something important and stepped back at the peak of their riches and fame. Wait, you're probably asking yourself "Ed, Mitch, and Paul who?" For what is undoubtedly the most important invention of the last half of the 20th century, so few know the names of the key figures in its creation. Everyone knows who invented the light bulb and the airplane. Well, gather round. Ed Roberts Ed Roberts is generally credit with building the first commercially successful microcomputer. Roberts founded a small electronics shop in Albuquerque, New Mexico in 1968. He started selling calculators and kits for radio-controlled model airplanes. Roberts partnered with Les Solomon, an editor at Popular Electronics, and they created the Altair computer in 1975. Solomon's daughter received the honor of naming the computer. She called it Altair because that was the planet the starship Enterprise was visiting in the episode of Star Trek the night before. Roberts sold over 10,000 of the computers before selling his electronics company. Roberts has one of the more pleasant "where are they now?" stories. In his early 40s, Roberts went back to school and got a medical degree. Today, Roberts works as a general practitioner in a small Georgia town. He still dabbles in computers and writes medical software. The Altair put Microsoft's cofounder Bill Gates and Paul Allen on the road to megariches. Roberts was Microsoft's first big customer, licensing a BASIC interpreter for his computer. Roberts has a number of less than complimentary anecdotes about dealing with Gates. Roberts describes the richest man in the world as spoiled kid who insisted on getting his way. Paul Allen Bill Gates and Paul Allen were childhood friends. Gates and Allen founded Microsoft in New Mexico to write software for the Altair computer. Allen was the respectable one who could smooth customers over when people recoiled from the socially inept and abrasive boy genius Gates. Allen was also the driving force behind Microsoft DOS. He likes to joke you have him to blame for "C:\". Despite co-founding the company, Allen's more laid back nature lost him moral control of the company. It became apparent that Microsoft was Gates' company. Allen gave up controlling Microsoft in 1983 to battle a case of Hodgkin's disease. Allen, however, didn't give up his stock. He's the second largest shareholder, owning 250 million shares worth about $20 billion. Allen recovered from his illness and began investing his massive fortune in emerging technologies and sports teams like the Seattle Seahawks and the Portland Trailblazers. While all over the world Bill Gates is a household name, Allen's fame does not extend much beyond Oregon and Washington state. In the Pacific Northwest, Allen is viewed as something like a pharaoh on the order of Ramses II. He's literally rebuilding Seattle's skyline. With what amounts to pocket change, Allen is building a new football stadium and a rock and roll museum. Allen has a number of charitable foundations handing out big bucks for arts, education, and medical research. He's become the model for a form of charity being practiced by other net billionaires known as enlightened self interest. Mitch Kapor Mitch Kapor is the founder of Lotus, makers of Lotus 1-2-3. Lotus 1-2-3 was the first really successful spreadsheet for the IBM PC. Kapor received a Masters degree in Psychology. He worked for a short time as a DJ and stand-up comedian before buying an Apple II and teaching himself programming. After a stint at business school, he formed Lotus to write a better spreadsheet program for the PC. Kapor called his company Lotus after Transcendental Meditation's lotus position. At the height of the company's power, Kapor came to hate the cut-throat nature of corporate culture and he bailed out in 1986. In 1990, he fell in with Grateful Dead lyricist John Barlow. Together they founded the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which has become the ACLU of the online world. It's a public interest group that works through the courts and political channels to safe guard people's online civil liberties.