Original artwork, not a still
The idea that Bill Gates has appeared like a knight in shining armour to lead all his customers out of a mire of technological chaos neatly ignores the fact that it was he who by peddling second-hand, second-rate technology, led them all into it in the first place.
Behind the line
What it means
Our interpretation.
Adams, who loved computers and wrote about them often, turns the standard story of Microsoft as saviour inside out: the firm sold the problem and then the cure. It is quoted whenever a tech company is praised for fixing a mess it made, and it shows the sceptical, comic voice he used outside the Hitchhiker's books.
Context reviewed
In context
Spoilers for 'Douglas Adams on Microsoft'Show the scene
This is a passage of Douglas Adams's writing on Microsoft, not a line from a book. Wikiquote gives its source as The Guardian, with a 1995 appearance and a later one under the headline "Biting back at Microsoft" on the Guardian letters page of 5 June 2001. Adams's argument is that Bill Gates's firm created the technological chaos it then claimed to rescue customers from. The wording circulates in slightly different forms; the version on Wikiquote runs shorter and ends by saying Microsoft continues to do so today.
Sources (1)
- Wikiquote: Douglas AdamsEntry on Bill Gates and the knight in shining armourReference checked
Context reviewed
