Quote
"You can make sure wind turbines can deal with the cold"
"Sometimes we do get taken by surprise. For example, when the Internet came along, we had it as a fifth or sixth priority. It wasnt like somebody told me about it and I said, "I dont know how to spell that." I said, "Yeah, Ive got that on my list, so Im okay." But there came a point when we realized it was happening faster and was a much deeper phenomenon than had been recognized in our strategy."

William Henry Gates III is an American businessman and philanthropist. A pioneer of the microcomputer revolution of the 1970s and 1980s, he co-founded the software company Microsoft in 1975 with his childhood friend Paul Allen. Following Microsoft's initial public offering in 1986 and the subsequent increase in its stock price, Gates became the world's then-youngest billionaire in 1987, at age 31.
"You can make sure wind turbines can deal with the cold"
"Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning."
"Im a big believer that as much as possible, and theres obviously political limitations, freedom of migration is a good thing."
"We always have to be serious about public health in a global sense and surveillance for "the next one", because we dont know where it will emerge."
"Youve got to be willing to read other peoples code, and then write your own, then have other people review your code. Youve got to want to be in this incredible feedback loop where you get the world-class people to tell you what youre doing wrong..."
"I see little commercial potential for the internet for the next 10 years."
"In the life of the mass-order, the culture of the generality tends to conform to the demands of the average human being. Spirituality decays through being diffused among the masses when knowledge is impoverished in every possible way by rationalisation until it becomes accessible to the crude understanding of all."
"I say this to you because we Spaniards are a forgetful people, because we are used to living for the moment, because we do not look back, because we do not know how to see the chain of heroes, because we do not contemplate the sum of sacrifices."
"Sharon Tate was my best friend. Once, we were roommates. She introduced me to my husband. She was the godmother to my baby daughter who is named for her. In the six years time that I knew her, she never said an unkind word about anyone."
"Long time to see. (VS: Tapion)"
"Most mathematicians prove what they can, von Neumann proves what he wants." Once in a discussion about the rapid growth of mathematics in modern times, von Neumann was heard to remark that whereas thirty years ago a mathematician could grasp all of mathematics, that is impossible today. Someone asked him: "What percentage of all mathematics might a person aspire to understand today?" Von Neumann went into one of his five-second thinking trances, and said: "About 28 percent."
"Children must be free to think in all directions irrespective of the peculiar ideas of parents who often seal their childrens minds with preconceived prejudices and false concepts of past generations. Unless we are very careful, very careful indeed, and very conscientious, there is still great danger that our children may turn out to be the same kind of people we are."