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When you're rich, the rules don't apply. You don't have to argue with the guy behind the counter when he tells you the brakes need replacing and it's going to cost you $500. You just buy the guy behind the counter and the building that goes with him.
   technofile
Al Fasoldt's reviews and commentaries, continuously available online since 1983

Bill Gates and his big giveaway: To you, me and Gene, it's just life as usual


By Al Fasoldt
Copyright © 1999, The Syracuse Newspapers

   Bill Gates says he's going to give his money away.
   Bill's got a lot of it. Maybe $100 billion. It came from you, from me, from your brother-in-law, from your mother. From your company. From your school. From your local tax office. From your church. From anybody who's ever bought a PC that came with Windows, from anybody who ever bought Microsoft Office or Microsoft Word or PowerPoint or MS-DOS or a Microsoft Intellimouse or Flight Simulator or the Encarta Encyclopedia. Or, for Pete's sake, a Microsoft telephone. Bill's company even makes telephones now.
   Bill's very rich. My radio buddy Gene Wolf drives an old Saturn. Gene doesn't make $1 million a year, but if he did, he'd be able to buy a new Saturn. EVERY WEEK he'd be able to buy a new Saturn. That's how much $1 million is. Quite enough, as they say.
   Bill's really rich. Bill could buy a new Saturn more often than my buddy Gene could. He could buy 960 a week. He could buy 960 a week for 100 years. Did you hear me? He could buy 960 new cars every week for a century.
   Bill's very, very rich. He could make you a millionaire without realizing the money's missing. He could send you a million smackers tomorrow. A million is a small part of a billion - one-thousandth of a billion, in fact. Imagine how tiny it is compared to 100 billion. It's just one-hundredth of one-thousandth of Billy's fortune.
   Bill would never know it was gone. Hey, where'd that million go? He'd forget all about it. Like you would if you dropped a quarter behind the couch.
   So Bill's going to give it away. Bill's still a kid, more or less, so he still has a dad who tells other folks what his son's going to do. And dad said Bill was going to give it all away. Poof! From riches to rags in an instant. Oh, Bill would keep a billion or two for himself and his wife and his own kid. A guy's gotta have a security blanket.
   But Bill's dad was speaking out of turn. Bill says he's going to give it all away over his lifetime. Bill's got a life expectancy of maybe 35 or 40 more years, so that's a big stretch. It gives him plenty of time to change his plans. He might decide to give it all away sooner. Or maybe later. Or maybe not at all.
   Who knows?
   When you're rich, you're rich. The rules don't apply. You don't have to argue with the guy behind the counter when he tells you the brakes need replacing and it's going to cost you $500. You just buy a new car. Every week. Or you buy the guy behind the counter and the building that goes with him. You've never been able to do something dramatic with money. I've never been able to. We both never will. We're not rich like Bill is. But it's fun to imagine. "$500, eh? Well, guess what, you white-smocked smarty-pants! Now you're working for me. And I want THAT car over there, the white one with the sunroof. NOW."
   Funny, eh?
   But I have some bad news. Bill's not like that. He doesn't have a sense of humor like that. He doesn't think like we do. He's too busy making money. That's what made him rich. He's very busy making money. And more bad news. You'd never get the million smackers. Bill can't give his money away unless he knows how much he's got to give. So somebody's got to start counting it. I mean really counting it, down to the last quarter behind the couch. Somebody will be keeping track of Bill's bucks. Bill wouldn't miss the million, but his accountants would. They'd snitch.
   So you're just going to have to stand there at that counter and look that guy in the eye and ask him why you have to pay $500 if the brakes are supposed to last 40,000 miles and you've only gone 24,000. And be ready to lose the argument. And go home and wonder how this all got started, how one guy can own half the world while the rest of us live ordinary lives, and maybe be thankful you still have that sense of humor.