Microsoft co-founder
Bill Gates recently shared a fascinating anecdote about his relationship with the late
Steve Jobs, revealing that Jobs once suggested he try LSD to enhance his design sensibilities. Recalling the moment, Gates said, “Steve Jobs once told me that he wished I’d take acid—maybe then I would have had better taste in designing my products.”
Gates humorously responded, “Look, I got the wrong batch. I got the coding batch, and this guy got the marketing-design batch, so good for him2.” He acknowledged that while Jobs had a talent for marketing and design, his own strengths lay in coding and software development.
Gates admitted that he envied Jobs' design skills, saying, “Jobs wouldn’t know what a line of code meant, and his ability to think about design and marketing… I envy those skills. I’m not in his league.” Despite their differences, Gates admired Jobs' visionary approach to product design, which revolutionised the tech industry with iconic products like the iMac, iPod, iPad, and iPhone.
Microsoft founder Bill Gates: I told Steve Jobs…
Meanwhile, in another interview recently, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates recently shared candid thoughts about his relationship with Steve Jobs. Reflecting on Steve Jobs, Gates called the late
Apple co-founder a "singular figure" who had an extraordinary ability to captivate people. "He should have been an actor," Gates said. "He really ran the reality distortion field like no one else."
While Gates admired Jobs' "messianic" skills in marketing and leadership, he also noted the late Apple co-founder’s lack of technical expertise. "Steve's achievements are all the more impressive when you know that he couldn't look at a piece of code and know what it was," Gates said. "He was never an engineer. Woz [Steve Wozniak] was a real engineer — I mean, a hardcore engineer," he further added.