Bill Gates and the Philosopher's Stone
Can you picture the founder of Microsoft as a thief of time? How did climbing high mountain peaks shape his biggest successes in the software world? Why was the dream of beating his grandmother at cards among the ideas that made him the richest man on the planet? Hardly anyone would accuse Bill Gates of being a brilliant storyteller, yet the stories told by one of the most important people of our time (like him or not) are certainly impressive. I chose eight of them to tell you…
02The Dreamer Who Should Have Been Bill Gates
“It was not a happy moment when I realized that computers were being built to make money, not to make minds,” says Gary Kildall. He wrote the first operating system for personal computers. And, according to legend, he let slip the golden contract with IBM that could have put him at the top of the software world—the place Bill Gates and Microsoft won instead. He is, without a doubt, a legend of the computer age. He died at just 52, but left an enormous mark on computer history.
03Where Is AI Taking Us? Five Key Points of View
Is AI the beginning of the end for humanity—or are we simply witnessing a giant marketing trick? Whose jobs will it take, and will it destroy us or grant us immortality? Here is what Elon Musk and Bill Gates, Sam Altman and Jaron Lanier, Noam Chomsky and Yuval Noah Harari have to say.
04A Generational Question: Digital Leaders and the Cult of Personality
Who have been the most striking figures in public life over the past few decades? The ones we would least expect, if we believe the stereotypes—the people of technology. From Bill Gates, whom the whole of conspiracy-minded humanity turned into the chief culprit behind the pandemic, to Elon Musk, who, while “saving” our freedom of speech, is our last real hope of rising to the stars as a civilization… Yes, the cult of personality is going through a rather strange apogee in the digital age. Politicians long ago lost their magic as interesting personalities, artists tend to stay focused on their particular audiences… while the celebrities of technological progress have become the powerful figures of the new era. Is it because technology is today’s magic? Incomprehensible to many, transformative, alluring… Are the powerful figures of the digital age supermen? Do the innovators get the fame they deserve, or do the idea thieves thrive? What do the representatives of different generations share, and what sets them apart? We meet some very different digital stories…
05What Do the World's Tech Titans Read?
Do the world's tech leaders read books? What are the favorite reads recommended by Elon Musk, Sam Altman and Mark Zuckerberg? Will you find some overlap with your own literary taste, or is there no such topic at all? In Bulgaria it isn't fashionable to talk in the media about what we read. Journalist and translator Daniel Penev got me thinking about this during his visit. Yes, you'll probably remember the notorious Winnetou as someone's favorite book and… that's it. It isn't like that everywhere. In both West and East, the people who end up in the spotlight love to talk about books, about their favorite authors, about the literature that helps us keep going. Well, it's time we started doing it here too!
06Paul Allen: The Other Face of Microsoft
Two kids become friends over their shared fascination with computers. Then they start their first company together. Less than a decade later, that same company is the first giant of the modern computer age. And while we know a great deal about one of those kids, who for a long time was the richest man on the planet, the story of the other is far less familiar. None other than the computer specialist Paul Allen, the “godfather” of Microsoft, turned out to be the owner of the most expensive private art collection ever sold. And this happened in November 2022, four years after he left this world. A connoisseur of art, a man smitten with sports, a huge donor to scientific research. He is also the rich man who awakened the modern interest in spaceflight. At just 29 he learned that he had a deadly illness, and he decided to live the rest of his life the way he had always dreamed. There is a lot we can learn from the story and the worldview of this unconventional figure. And, even more, we can ask ourselves what today’s tech world would look like if its other leaders shared his outlook.
0732 Digital Stories Between Two Covers: What Lies Ahead?
The book Digital Stories brings together 8 big questions of our time and 32 stories in search of the answers. You may have read some of them on this site, and here you will find them updated and enriched; others were written especially for the book. Perhaps you have already drawn back the curtain of the cover? Then I would be absolutely delighted to read your thoughts here. If not, here is what awaits you behind it!
08We Won't Eat Animals. We'll Talk to Them?!
Will the future really force us to give up meat? Or will we simply eat meat that… was made without killing an animal? Will technology soon let us understand more about how our best animal friends see the world? Will it let us talk to them… Our relationships with the other species on the planet have always been more layered than we realize. The most fascinating remain our ties with our closest “relatives”—the mammals and the other links that have climbed high up the food chain. We give them souls and make them part of our daily lives… while the vast majority of the planet's inhabitants rarely pass up a chance to snack on them. Our relationships with the other species on Earth are yet another field where technology promises striking news, and in the foreseeable future at that.
09Artificial Intelligence and Ethics: 10 Big Questions
The astonishing progress in artificial intelligence is a fact: technologies like ChatGPT have made it clear that scientists have taken giant strides, and these will go on producing big news. This has pushed the ethical side of such work to the forefront, and the answers may prove vital for each of us and for us as a species. While the European Union and the major powers prepare some form of regulation, the AI revolution is already unfolding before our eyes. What are 10 of the most important questions we should be asking more and more often?
10Who Are You, ChatGPT? 5 Masterpieces, 5 Flops and 5 Big Questions
Which camp are you in? The skeptics, for whom ChatGPT is much ado about nothing? Or the fans, who believe it is leading us into an incredible future? ChatGPT is an undisputed superstar, and everyone has been tempted to try it. Our feeds are overflowing with astonishingly accurate answers, with the algorithm's spectacular blunders and with news about it. Let's try to gather the most interesting and important of it all. We begin with 5 impressive digital stories born of the chatbot, continue with 5 of its remarkable flops, and end with 5 big questions our famous conversation partner puts to all of us and to our civilization…
11Start…Up! What on Earth Is That?
How does an investment with a return of… 200,000 percent sound to you?! One that is perfectly legal and has nothing to do with mythical figures like pyramids and pharaohs. Only with fairy-tale heroes. Modern technology is like a fairy tale. It has created a huge new economic sector where miracles happen. Yes, quite literally: unicorns fly, angel investors stroll about, and millions of dollars are the smallest unit of measurement. We are talking, of course, about the world of startups. Let's sum up the most important things worth knowing about it.
12The Cat and the Quantum Computer
Quantum computers have been one of the most talked-about technology topics of recent years, and the biggest companies in the IT world are locked in a furious race to build working prototypes. More and more people say that they are the next step of the technological era. Yes, the subject is rather complicated, especially when you try to explain it in plain language, but let's give it a go!
