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Bill Gates once stated, “We are crossing a technology threshold that will forever change the way we learn, work, socialize, and shop. It will affect all of us and businesses of every type in ways far more pervasive than most people recognize” (Microsoft.com 1994) in a speech, in which he described his vision of the future. His statement, given many years ago, is now a reality as seen in the boom of the computer industry. From government organizations to business enterprises to libraries and to suburban homes, computers are seen and used everywhere playing a big role in the lives of many throughout the world. Gates’s company, Microsoft, has led this sudden escalation over the past 20 years through its computer software development and technology research. It may seem that Bill Gates is not a punk because of his huge contributions to society. However, it was because of Bill Gates’s punk attitude that permitted him to revolutionize computing and to become what he is today, the co-founder of Microsoft. Gates is a punk because he challenged the educational system, monopolized the computer industry, and set new standards for the computer industry. Bill Gates did not conform to the educational system from when he was a child to an adolescent, from skipping class to program computers to dropping out of college to start a business. Furthermore, he established monopoly control over PC operating systems, violating the anti-trust law. Finally, Gates’s ambitions for advancing technology and new standards for the computer industry led to the sudden increase of computers allowing for new companies to spring up and jobs to be created. Bill Gates’s subtle but obvious opposition against education is proof that he is a punk. Born in 1955, Gates attended public elementary school, and enrolled in the private Lakeside School at age twelve. The following year, Gates wrote his first computer program, at a time when computers were still room-sized machines run by scientists in white coats.
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