Bill Gates with the Office of the Secretary of the State of New Mexico. Gates never returned to Harvard to complete his studies. Microsoft's Altair BASIC was popular with computer hobbyists, but Gates discovered that a pre-market copy had leaked into the community and was being widely copied and distributed. In February 1976, Gates wrote an Open Letter to Hobbyists in the MITS newsletter in which he asserted that more than 90 percent of the users of Microsoft Altair BASIC had not paid Microsoft for it and by doing so the Altair "hobby market" was in danger of eliminating the incentive for
Gates Millennium Scholars Program Gates Millennium Scholars Program The Gates Millennium Scholars (GMS) Program is an academic scholarship award and program for higher education, available to high-achieving ethnic minority students in the United States. It was established in 1999 and funded by Microsoft founder Bill Gates through the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Gates Millennium Scholars are provided with a full financial scholarship to attend any U.S. college or university, and are provided with leadership development opportunities, mentoring, as well as academic, financial and social support. The scholarship was started in 1999 as a result of a $1 billion grant from Microsoft founder Bill