Bill Gates Gives Reddit User An 81-Pound 'Secret Santa' Gift (cnn.com) 42
"A Michigan woman got the Secret Santa gift of a lifetime this Christmas -- an 81-pound package from Bill Gates," reports CNN:
The gifts included an original manuscript of "The Great Gatsby," signed by Gates; books; toys for her cat and Harry Potter and "Twin Peaks" memorabilia, according to her post on RedditGifts.com. It arrived in a box lit up inside by Christmas lights...
"It's well documented that Bill Gates has been participating for years, but I never, ever thought he would be my Secret Santa," Shelby said. "It's really surprising." A spokesperson for Reddit confirmed that Gates sent the package. The billionaire has participated in the exchange since 2013...
When she showed up at the FedEx office the next day to pick up the package, she said the employees were excited, shouting "You're the Bill Gates package!" according to her post.
"It's well documented that Bill Gates has been participating for years, but I never, ever thought he would be my Secret Santa," Shelby said. "It's really surprising." A spokesperson for Reddit confirmed that Gates sent the package. The billionaire has participated in the exchange since 2013...
When she showed up at the FedEx office the next day to pick up the package, she said the employees were excited, shouting "You're the Bill Gates package!" according to her post.
and IRS will give them an nice Gift Tax bill for t (Score:2)
and IRS will give them an nice Gift Tax bill for that!
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You don't pay gift tax for receiving a gift (nor is there any chance this exceeds the threshold).
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You can give up to $15,000 tax free as a gift [smartasset.com] to any person. The person receiving the gift does not owe any taxes so long as the gift does not exceed that amount. As mlyle said, this did not exceed that amount.
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There's also a $11.4 million lifetime exemption for amounts over $15K.
autographed Gatsby! (Score:5, Funny)
Wait, he wrote windows and the great Gatsby?
Re: autographed Gatsby! (Score:4, Insightful)
No, he defaced the original manuscript of The Great Gatsby, then gave it away after realising it had been rendered worthless by his vandalism. What sort of narcissist does it take to do that?
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Yeah, I got all outraged by that too, except that it doesn't make sense. Bill Gates is not a grade-A idiot - 'original manuscript' means the hand-written/typed original text done personally by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Whatever you think of Bill, he's not going to graffiti his name on that.
Go to the link:
"It’s really unique because it’s a manuscript book, so inside the pages are scans of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s actual handwriting and all of his notes when he was making this book.”
"Manuscrip
Re:autographed Gatsby! (Score:5, Funny)
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Heh heh, well done, sir, most likely, but plausibly madame.
There's been an uptick in the frequency with which noble folks pay off the Walmart layaways or the school lunch balances of poor. What drives this phenomenon?
Giving to those less fortunate is the charity that equalizes without government interference. It is said that "There is no exercise better for the heart than reaching down and lifting people up.
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It was nice of him (Score:2)
but I would rather have 81 pounds of $100 bills
Re: It was nice of him (Score:2)
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If you're wishing, why not wish for $10,000 bills (they are still legal tender, though it's probably really hard to find 81# of them), or just a Microsoft stock certificate for 100,000 shares?
Two thoughts (Score:2)
1) it’s nice that Bill Gates participates in something fun and silly like this.
2) Why do we care? Why is this news?
Re:Two thoughts (Score:4, Insightful)
Why do we care? Why is this news?
Because it's the 21st century and the bastards of the 20th are now our benevolent and loving gods to whom we owe our devoted allegiance.
Re: Two thoughts (Score:4, Insightful)
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'bastards of the 20th are now our benevolent and loving gods'
And roll models. Who would have thought a virus software designer would be such an upstanding citizen.
John McAfee https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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cheapskate - could've bought her at least a car instead of cleaning up his attic or doing garage sale.
Re:Two thoughts (Score:5, Insightful)
Did it include... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Ruined it (Score:5, Insightful)
an original manuscript of "The Great Gatsby," signed by Gates;
Worthless, now that it's been vandalized.
Re: Ruined it (Score:2)
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Well, he bought it and put his name on it, so I'm sure IBM would pay top dollar to license it.
Hey bill (Score:2)
How about a donation to the FSF? Or EFF?
Re:Hey bill (Score:4, Informative)
First, Richard M. Stallman resigned as head of the FSF. Second, he never supported pedophilia. Stallman commented on a possible interaction between a prostitute who was an alleged victim of Epstein who wrote a tell-all book decades later, one that her own attorneys describe as "fictionalized" and claimed to have slept with Marvin Minskey, one of the leading AI scientists of the world and someone RMS had met on many occasions. Asked about the accuation:
Stallman argued that "the most plausible scenario" is that "she presented herself to him as entirely willing"
The accuser was 17 at the time of the alleged sex with Marvin Minsky, among the other dozens of clients she claims to have serviced for Mr. Epstein while working as a "masseuse" in his mansion. While a 70 year old man like Marvin Minsky engaging in sex with a 17 year old prostitute is considered loathsome by many, there seems no evidence that it happened. Minsky's wife was reent with him on the island and vehemently claims it never happened. And while 17 is below the age of consent in the Virgin Islands, there is no suggestion that Mr. Stallman ever did or encouraged anything of the kind himself.
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Second, he never supported pedophilia.
Actually yes he did (though he stopped). As with most Stallmanisms it's a bit somewhat more nuanced than many people realise. He was critical of the idea that there's a magic moral consent switch that flips at whatever the local age of consent happens to be (a fair point) and tried to draw logical conclusions from that. However he failed to take reality into account with his logic and on consulting with some specialists he realised his conclusions with respect to child
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_Lawrence Lessig_ defended the Media Lab laundering the gifts from Epstein. Richard M. Stallman is one of the most sanctimonious people in software, he would in fact criticize people for taking money from criminal and especially from a slave holder and rapist like Mr. Epstein was believably accused of.
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Stallman did great things for free software. Some of what he did, you'd have to be crazy to even try it. He tried it and succeeded. You'd have to be crazy to even try - he tried because he is a little crazy.
Like any human, there are good and bad things about Stallman. He has, one more than one occasion, said some pretty off-the-wall stuff about sex with teenage girls. Like "everybody over the age of 14 should be having sex", for example. He believes it should be legal for him to have sex with 14 year
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Stallman did great things for free software. Some of what he did, you'd have to be crazy to even try it. He tried it and succeeded. You'd have to be crazy to even try - he tried because he is a little crazy.
I think this is a point most people miss. No one who is both sane and nice is going to dedicate their life to a cause. Its hypocritical to like the cause but dislike precisely the type of people who are the only ones who would create the cause in the first place.
Like any human, there are good and bad thi
That's called fanboi (Score:2)
Hypocritical is pretending to believe something that you don't actually believe.
Ignoring someone's faults and defending inappropriate behavior because you like the way they throw a ball or write a license is called being a fanboi, or "fan" for short.
Stallman's work on Gnu is orthogonal to his beliefs about and advocacy of sexually exploiting minors. They two very separate things. One can appreciate his work in one area and find his position on the other abhorrent without being inconsistent.
One can even dis
He has given us so much already... (Score:2)
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