Bill Gates right infront of my eyes!!!

14 km of wiring, 800 tons of steel and 10000 tons of air conditioning then suddenly there was a flash of light. Out came the persona inspired, Bill Gates. People who had gathered there from both the IT & student community gave a standing ovation to the man who redefined the PC. Bill spoke about the upheaval that’s taking place after the advent of XML Web Services and .NET. As for me, never in my wildest dreams I thought I would see him in person and sometimes it still seems a fantasy to me. Folks from all over the country were watching it LIVE on their PCs and the official figures crossed over 35000. Then demos on VS.NET 2005, SQL Server 2005 and BizTalk Server 2006 were shown.
Then once again Bill made a comeback onto the stage, this time around for a tête-à-tête with Sheila Gulati, Microsoft India Director. Here are some excerpts from that conversation:

Sheila: What’s your favourite food in India Idly or Dosa?
Bill:”Upma”

Sheila: When was the last time you wrote a complete program?
Bill: The last program written by me for a product was in 1983 and on the chipset it was in the early ‘90s.

Sheila: What would have you become if you hadn’t become a software programmer?
Bill: I am interested in things that are constantly changing, so I would have become a biologist (I am not sure about this answer)

Sheila: Had you ever thought what you were going to do with all this money?
Bill: I was pretty amazed at what I am going to do with this money…..but there are a set of diseases that affect the developing countries like Malaria, TB and eradication of these would bridge the gap between rich and poor countries.

Sheila: What do you think about cricket?
Bill: Cricket certainly thrilled me as the Indian cricket team is using its MediaCenter PC to analyse the other teams. (Bill even signed a bat for them)

Sheila: What is your advice for future entrepreneurs?
Bill: Very simple. Pick up something which you enjoy doing and be constantly updated with new happenings in technology as price alone will not be a differentiator and ultimately quality matters.

Sheila: What have you got for the Indian developers?
Bill: They are very talented and Microsoft has launched a nation-wide talent competition to identify the best student technologists in India pursuing various technical streams. The best participant will get an opportunity to work directly with the Bill Gates Technical Assistants Team for a year at Redmond. (For more on this visit: www.code4bill.com)
There were a lot of goodies given to the attendants including trial edition of the three softwares and hip-pouches. Finally, at the end of the day, whether it was really worth it? Yes. I was able to meet and interact with top-notch professionals from Microsoft.