Bill Gates

There are people that have inspired many, influenced many, helped many and who have expected nothing in return. I think these people fit the description of a hero. To me, the person that has done all of these things is Bill Gates. I have found him quite inspiring. He has donated a lot of money towards charity and created Microsoft with his friend, Paul Allen. Bill Gates is a very unique person who inspires me.

Bill Gates was born on October 28, 1955, in Seattle, Washington. He demonstrated that he liked to program computers from the age of 13. When he went to Lakeside School, he met Paul Allen, the guy with whom he later formed Microsoft. Bill Gates grew up with a father that was a lawyer and with an outgoing mother. He had two siblings - an older sister Kristianne and a younger sister Libby. Bill Gates had a normal childhood.

One of the things he did when he was younger was create a tic-tac-toe program that allowed you to play against the computer. He wrote this program in the BASIC computer software language. Later, Bill and Paul created Traf-o-Data and netted $20,000. I find that to be a pretty big accomplishment. By the time he graduated from high school he had scored a 1590 out of 1600 on the SAT test. Later, Gates and Allen began to write software for a computer company and soon after they created the partnership called Micro-Soft (a blend of the words "Micro-computer" and "software"). Sadly, many people did not pay for the software. Gates wrote a letter to users of his software saying, "By not paying, you prevent good software from being written. In essence, pirating software discourages developers from investing time and money into creating quality software." Many people did not like that letter, but Gates did not get discouraged. A few years later, Gates placed himself at the top of Microsoft. At the time, it was grossing 2.5 million dollars per year. Gates was only 23. When IBM wanted software for their computers, they asked Gates and Microsoft to provide it. Later Microsoft got much bigger. The staff number increased from 25 to 128 and revenue grew to 4 million dollars per year. Microsoft was also powering 30 percent of the world's computers at the time. From there, Microsoft grew to be a size never thought imaginable. But, Bill Gates was able to make it work as the C.E.O of the company.

I admire Bill Gates' work because he has done so much for the world. He has created the Bill Gates Foundation. Gates began his foundation in 1994, which, at this time, focused on global health. Three years later, he and his wife, Melinda, created the Gates Library Foundation, which brought public access computers with Internet connections to libraries. The Gates Library Foundation's name changed to the Gates Learning Foundation in 1999 and changed its focus to making sure that low-income minority students are ready for college. In 2000, to increase productivity, the two charities combined to make the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The main reason I like Bill Gates so much is what he has done for society. He has created the Bill Gates Foundation. He has created a great software company. If he had not done that I would not be able to type this on my Dell, which runs Microsoft Windows. He was able to start all of this by writing computer programing software in a computer lab at school. That is what really amazes me. He also did all of this at a really young age. So, that is why Bill Gates is my hero and the one person I admire most of all.
Source:
http://www.biography.com/people/bill-gates-9307520?page=1
http://www.gatesfoundation.org/who-we-are/general-information/leadership/management-committee/bill-gates