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An exclusive interview with Bill Gates in which the Microsoft founder
and world's richest man talks to Ian Burrell in New York - and
identifies the gadget that he thinks will one day provide media
consumers with their every need. [And yes – it is the tablet! -JO]
Alongside waxwork images of Michael Jackson, Jerry Springer, Whoopi
Goldberg and other famous Americans, a life-size replica of Bill Gates,
sat on a metal stool and wearing a red V-neck sweater and the semblance
of a smile, is among the exhibits in New York's Madame Tussaud's,
halfway along 42nd Street.
Just around the corner, the real-life version, as diminutive as the
waxwork, climbs out of a hulking black Yukon XL SUV and steps on to the
pavement before passing, quite inconspicuously, through the crowds of
workers headed for their offices in the spitting early morning rain.
Bill Gates is, by a long measure, the richest man in the world. This
month Forbes magazine valued his personal wealth at $50bn (£29bn). It
was the 12th year running that he had topped the rich-list. His company
Microsoft, which supplies the software for 90 per cent of the world's
computers, is worth $280bn. He is also the chairman and founder of the
the media services company Corbis, which claims to have the most
comprehensive photographic collection on the planet.
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