Bonum Certa Men Certa

A Simple English and Annotated Translation of Open [sic] Letter to Hobbyists

Original full text here

Letter as a hobby



THIS is an annotated full reproduction of the infamous letter from Bill Gates (photograph above).

February 3, 1976

An Open Letter to Hobbyists


I was born to one of the most affluent and powerful families in the US (and the world), to Bill Sr. and Mary Maxwell Gates*. I do, however, lecture the "Hobbyists"... (do I speak for them?)

To me, the most critical thing in the hobby market right now is the lack of good software courses, books and software itself.


What have I contributed towards that? Rhetorical question. But I want more good stuff available... to me.

Without good software and an owner who understands programming, a hobby computer is wasted.


I don't understand it myself. So I need someone that understands programming to do the work for me, like Jobs with Woz. Heck, I cannot even graduate from college... with a law degree.

"Which moron wrote this brainless sh*t?"

--Martin Eller, Microsoft programmer (about Bill Gates' own code)**



Will quality software be written for the hobby market?


For me to steal, as I did several times before as I fished dumpsters for other people's hard work?

Almost a year ago, Paul Allen and myself, expecting the hobby market to expand, hired Monte Davidoff and developed Altair BASIC.


We don't write code, but we hire people who wrote the code.

Though the initial work took only two months, the three of us have spent most of the last year documenting, improving and adding features to BASIC.


I supervised a couple of geeks.

Now we have 4K, 8K, EXTENDED, ROM and DISK BASIC. The value of the computer time we have used exceeds $40,000.


I also broke machines to steal computer time and I got punished for it. This was not my first crime.

The feedback we have gotten from the hundreds of people who say they are using BASIC has all been positive.


All of it. All. We do Microsoft-style statistics. Everybody is always happy.

Like I'll tell FOCUS Magazine a couple of decades later:

Gates: No! There are no significant bugs in our released software that any significant number of users want fixed.

FOCUS: Oh, my God. I always get mad at my computer if MS Word swallows the page numbers of a document which I printed a couple of times with page numbers. If I complain to anybody they say "Well, upgrade from version 5.11 to 6.0".

Gates: No! If you really think there's a bug you should report a bug. Maybe you're not using it properly. Have you ever considered that?

FOCUS: Yeah, I did..."

--Bill Gates, FOCUS Magazine, 1995



Two surprising things are apparent, however, 1) Most of these "users" never bought BASIC (less than 10% of all Altair owners have bought BASIC),


It's all about money to me. Just money. Not code. Money.

and 2) The amount of royalties we have received from sales to hobbyists makes the time spent on Altair BASIC worth less than $2 an hour.


I didn't steal enough computer time. Maybe next time I'll just arrange a loan from mom's banking family.

Why is this? As the majority of hobbyists must be aware, most of you steal your software.


Copy, not steal. Unlike computer time I actually stole, taking it away from other people by sabotaging the computer systems. Because it's all about me.

Hardware must be paid for, but software is something to share. Who cares if the people who worked on it get paid?


Software does not cost anything to copy. But I compare it to stealing, in effect calling software users "thieves" or "pirates".

Maybe a number of decades in the future I'll buy something called "GitHub", in effect stealing billions of lines of code I never wrote.

Is this fair? One thing you don't do by stealing software is get back at MITS for some problem you may have had. MITS doesn't make money selling software.


MITS also doesn't have a positive opinion of me.

"He [Bill Gates] acted like a spoiled kid, which is what he was."

--Ed Roberts, Gates' employer at MITS in the 1970's (Atlanta Journal-Costitution, 04-27-97)



The royalty paid to us, the manual, the tape and the overhead make it a break-even operation. One thing you do do is prevent good software from being written.


This is precisely what my company will do for half a century to come.

Who can afford to do professional work for nothing?


Someone born to Bill Sr. and Mary Maxwell Gates.

What hobbyist can put 3-man years into programming, finding all bugs, documenting his product and distribute for free?


Something Microsoft could not do, with a budget of several billions, for several decades.

The fact is, no one besides us has invested a lot of money in hobby software.


I pretend nobody but me exists. Or... I claim to speak on behalf of actual hobbyists (of which I'm no part).

We have written 6800 BASIC, and are writing 8080 APL and 6800 APL, but there is very little incentive to make this software available to hobbyists. Most directly, the thing you do is theft.


I got a few geeks hired to do work and I want lots of money to impress my rich parents. If you disagree with me, then you are a thief.

What about the guys who re-sell Altair BASIC, aren't they making money on hobby software? Yes, but those who have been reported to us may lose in the end. They are the ones who give hobbyists a bad name, and should be kicked out of any club meeting they show up at.


I may be young and privileged, but I am also quite blatantly a bully. If I cannot get my demands met, I will start kicking people (or maybe hire someone like dad's lawyers to do the kicking).

I would appreciate letters from any one who wants to pay up, or has a suggestion or comment. Just write to me at 1180 Alvarado SE, #114, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 87108.


Where I was arrested and my well-connected father paid bail (to ensure I end up better off than a certain Epstein).

Nothing would please me more than being able to hire ten programmers and deluge the hobby market with good software.


I want to hire people who actually write good code, unlike me, and then destroy the software industry by resuming my past crimes, sans the arrests (mom and dad have got my back, mom can get me a deal with IBM).

⁠Bill Gates ⁠General Partner, Micro-Soft


I called my company after my genitals. _____ * There are several aspects to it, but one has to dig deeper. "Her grandfather, James Willard Maxwell (1864–1951), was president of the National City Bank in Seattle from 1911 to 1929 and a director of the Seattle branch of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco." (Source: Sanitised-for reputation-laundering Wikipedia) ** Barbarians Led by Bill Gates, a book composed by the daughter of Microsoft's PR mogul

Recent Techrights' Posts

What the End of XBox Will Look Like: a Fiery Crash
XBox is the next Skype. It won't last much longer. Expect many more layoffs.
Richard Stallman is Going to Finland to Give a Talk Next Thursday
A day later he speaks in Sweden
Gemini Links 02/10/2025: SMTP Pipelining and End of ROOPHLOCH 2025
Links for the day
Slopwatch: Plagiarism, Fake Articles, and FUD About Linux
not a day goes by without Google News feeding FUD from slopfarms
Gemini Links 01/10/2025: Chat Control and End of Life
Links for the day
Links 01/10/2025: Long Covid Risk Reiterated, "Bitcoin Queen" Caught
Links for the day
Links 01/10/2025: EA $55 Billion Deal is Debt and Slop "Raises Vishing Risks"
Links for the day
Bluewashing at Red Hat Means Redundancies
The man who sold Red Hat to IBM meanwhile became a Microsoft Mono booster
After Killing OpenSource.com, IBM ('Red Hat') and OSI Told Us OpenSource.net Would Replace It (But That Didn't Happen)
Now it's time to move on, perhaps tarnishing the "Open Source" label some more (for whatever sponsor wants this)
Linux is Not a Community Project, It's a Wall Street Product
The core goal should be freedom
Bad Actors Abusing the Free Software Community, Vandalising It Using Rogue Politics and Old Tactics
Oil giants have long attempted to do this; now, the digital equivalent of Big Oil does this in technology
Social Control Media Isn't the Future, The Federation or Fediverse Isn't Growing, People's Accounts Vanish for Good
users' accounts will get deleted, not just become inactive
IBM is Failing, This Helps Show Wall Street is Entirely Detached From Actual Commercial Performance
IBM is unable to grow, it's just constantly shrinking
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, September 30, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, September 30, 2025
Clerical Aspects of Publishing and Development
In Free software, the management aspects are considerably reduced
Slopwatch: Fake Articles and Google News Promoting "Linux" Spam or Bot-Generated Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt (FUD)
These slopfarms help misplace blame
Third Wave of Microsoft Layoffs in September, This Time Many in Liverpool Affected
Be ready for more waves of layoffs ahead of the so-called "results" in late October
Gemini Links 30/09/2025: Motorcycling in Central Oregon, Protocol Styles and the Flag of Sark
Links for the day
Links 30/09/2025: Death Sentences, Internet Censorship, and Internet Shutdowns
Links for the day
Gemini Links 30/09/2025: Social Control Media and ROOPHLOCH
Links for the day
Richard Stallman About to Give More Talks in Europe, Some Confirmed Already
In Göteborg
Links 30/09/2025: CERN in "Have I Been Pwned" and More Windows TCO Blunders
Links for the day
Microsoft Canonical is Selling Mass Surveillance and Back Doors as "Security for Ubuntu"
If you are looking for a GNU/Linux distro to use, just remember that Microsoft has Ubuntu in the bag
Justice for Wildlife
animals cannot speak to humans who hate animals
Cowboys Gonna Be Cowboys (on the Internet, They're Not a New Problem)
Boys will be boys
Cowboys of the "Left" and Cowboys of the "Right"
Don't believe the lie that this is some "leftist" thing
When Codes of Conduct Serve to Protect Criminals From Much-Deserved Scrutiny
CoCs are typically unfit for purpose because enforcement lacks context and suitable understanding of the full background (the "full story")
It Took the Open Source Initiative (OSI) 4+ Years to Address the 'Data Breach' or Data Protection Violation Reported to the California Privacy Protection Agency (CPPA) in March 2025
We may never know the dialogue or its nature
Even Microsoft's Biggest Boosters (and Media Operatives) Are Turning Against Microsoft
Expect many more layoffs before the fake "results" next month
GNU Was Right 42+ Years Ago
Since then the abusive, user-hostile technology has spread like mushrooms
Old Isn't Always Inadequate
How many gadgets manufactured today (in 2025) will still work in 2075?
The Monkey Business of Rust People
Compatibility won't matter
Almost Half of the FSFE's Money (the Fake 'FSF', Misusing the Brand) Comes From Vodafone
That money always comes with strings, even if they're invisible to most of us
Microsoft Lunduke Spreads Deliberate Lies to Incite Online Mobs
Has he lost his reading comprehension skills?
Our 19th Birthday (in Just Over 5 Weeks From Now)
We meanwhile have ongoing, solid plans to cover patent-related issues when the FSF turns 40
British GNU/Linux Distro FydeOS Tops DistroWatch
That seems like a decent site and decent effort to keep an eye on
We'll Soon Have 75,000 GemText Pages
avoid many perils of today's Web
Google Used Free Software to Build a Monopoly. Now Google Kicks Free Software to the Curb
The "G" in "Google" does not stand for GNU. It never did. It's just another greedy company.
Gemini Links 30/09/2025: Retro Hardware, Federated Fragmentation, and Nex Server Written in C
Links for the day
4 More Days Till "4 decades, 4 freedoms, 4 all users"
We are now just 4 days away from the rare anniversary
Two Months After Merging to Hide GitHub Losses Microsoft is Doing It Again (This Time Windows)
Merging those two together is not a sign of strength but a tightening of budget
Speculations About the Next Large Wave of IBM/Red Hat Layoffs
the mass layoffs are likely to happen on week 3 or 4 in October
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, September 29, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, September 29, 2025