Paul Allen Pens Memoir

Billionaire Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen has penned a memoir, titled “Idea Man,” due out Tuesday.

Though there is an embargo on the book until its release tomorrow, Vanity Fair magazine made a special deal with publisher Penguin to print a hefty excerpt in the magazine's April issue.

In the excerpt, Allen outlines his relationship with Bill Gates, from their teen years at the same school, to their stormy relationship while building Microsoft together.

“One day early that fall, I saw a gangly, freckle-faced eighth-grader edging his way into the crowd around the Teletype, all arms and legs and nervous energy. He had a scruffy-preppy look: pullover sweater, tan slacks, enormous saddle shoes. His blond hair went all over the place. You could tell three things about Bill Gates pretty quickly. He was really smart. He was really competitive; he wanted to show you how smart he was. And he was really, really persistent.

"I remember the first time I went to Bill’s big house, a block or so above Lake Washington, feeling a little awed. His parents subscribed to Fortune, and Bill read it religiously. One day he showed me the magazine’s special annual issue and asked me, 'What do you think it’s like to run a Fortune 500 company?' I said I had no idea. And Bill said, 'Maybe we’ll have our own company someday.' He was 13 years old and already a budding entrepreneur.”

Allen makes Gates sound, in several early passages, as if Gates is autistic, like Dustin Hoffman in the movie Rain Man:

“Where I was curious to study everything in sight, Bill would focus on one task at a time with total discipline. You could see it when he programmed — he’d sit with a marker clenched in his mouth, tapping his feet and rocking, impervious to distraction. He had a unique way of typing, sort of a six-finger, sideways scrabble.

"Rita (Allen’s girlfriend) and I had come to New England knowing two people. Then there was Bill. Rita had roasted a chicken one night for dinner and couldn’t take her eyes off him. 'Did you see that?' she said after he’d left. 'He ate his chicken with a spoon. I have never in my life seen anyone eat chicken with a spoon.' When Bill was thinking hard about something, he paid no heed to social convention.

"I’d occasionally catch Bill grabbing naps at his terminal during our late-nighters. He’d be in the middle of a line of code when he’d gradually tilt forward until his nose touched the keyboard. After dozing for an hour or two, he’d open his eyes, squint at the screen, blink twice, and resume precisely where he’d left off—a prodigious feat of concentration.”

Although he worked hard to help found the company and write the programs that would ulitimately be running a majority of the worlds computers, Allen says that Gates schemed behind his back to take control of the company while Allen was battling cancer.

“One evening in late December 1982, I heard Bill and Steve (Ballmer) speaking heatedly in Bill’s office and paused outside to listen in. It was easy to get the gist of the conversation. They were bemoaning my recent lack of production and discussing how they might dilute my Microsoft equity by issuing options to themselves and other shareholders. It was clear that they’d been thinking about this for some time.

"Unable to stand it any longer, I burst in on them and shouted, 'This is unbelievable! It shows your true character, once and for all.' I was speaking to both of them, but staring straight at Bill. Caught red-handed, they were struck dumb. Before they could respond, I turned on my heel and left.

"I helped start the company and was still an active member of management, though limited by my illness, and now my partner and my colleague were scheming to rip me off. It was mercenary opportunism, plain and simple.”

Fortunately, Allen notes later that Gates low-balled him on a price for his stocks in Microsoft, enough so that Allen refused to sell out to Gates at all. This turned out to be a boon to Allen, who would later make a fortune from his Microsoft stock.

A Penguin representative in charge of publicity for “Idea Man” said that Allen will be reading from his book and signing it at a few select venues throughout the Pacific Northwest, starting with a signing at Mercer Island Town Hall on April 22, though that date and place are unconfirmed until April 19.

Vanity Fair’s full excerpt can be found here.

Timothy Egan of the New York Times published an opinion piece outlining his belief that Allen is a lonely man who is not doing as much with his money as Gates.

Allen also appeared on 60 Minutes Sunday to discuss the memoir. The edited interview can be found here; click here for extra segments.