The document provides biographical information on four prominent figures: Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, and Julian Assange. It discusses their early lives, careers founding major technology companies (Microsoft, Apple, Facebook, and WikiLeaks), and contributions to the technology industry. Key events and roles for each person are summarized, such as Gates founding Microsoft, Jobs' roles at Apple and Pixar, Zuckerberg launching Facebook, and Assange's work as editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks.

1. Submitted to. Sir. Aftab.
Prepared By. Bilal Maqbool.
Department SE-I
Roll no. 10
University University of Azad Jammu
And Kashmir.
Date: 31/10/2011
Topics:-
Bill Gates
( Former CEO and current chairman of Microsoft )
Steve Jobs
( Co-founder, Chairman, and Chief Executive officer of Apple Inc.)
Mark Zuckerberg.
( Chief executive and president social networking site Facebook )
Julian Assange
(Editor in chief of WikiLeaks )
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2. William Henry "Bill" Gates III (born October 28, 1955) is an American business magnate,
investor, philanthropist, author, and former CEO and current chairman of Microsoft, the software
company he founded with Paul Allen. He is consistently ranked among the world's wealthiest
people and was the wealthiest overall from 1995 to 2009, excluding 2008, when he was ranked
third. During his career at Microsoft, Gates held the positions of CEO and chief software
architect, and remains the largest individual shareholder, with 6.4 percent of the common stock.
He has also authored or co-authored severalbooks.
Early life
Gates was born in Seattle, Washington, to William H. Gates, Sr. and Mary Maxwell Gates. His
parents are of English, German, and Scotch-Irish descent.[10][11]
His father was a prominent
lawyer, and his mother served on the board of directors for First Interstate BancSystem and the
United Way. Gates's maternal grandfather was J. W. Maxwell, a national bank president.
Microsoft
After reading the January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics that demonstrated the Altair
8800, Gates contacted Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS).
IBM partnership
In 1980, IBM approached Microsoft to write the BASIC interpreter for its upcoming personal
computer, the IBM PC. When IBM's representatives mentioned that they needed an operating
system, Gates referred them to Digital Research (DRI), makers of the widely used CP/M
operating system.
Windows
Microsoft launched its first retail version of Microsoft Windows on November 20, 1985, and in
August, the company struck a deal with IBM to develop a separate operating system called OS/2.
Although the two companies successfully developed the first version of the new system,
mounting creative differences undermined the partnership. Gates distributed an internal memo on
May 16, 1991, announcing that the OS/2 partnership was over and Microsoft would shift its
efforts to the Windows NT kernel development.
Post-Microsoft
Since leaving Microsoft, Gates continues his philanthropy and, among other projects, purchased
the video rights to the Messenger Lectures series called The Character of Physical Law, given at
Cornell University by Richard Feynman in 1964 and recorded by the BBC. The videos are
available online to the public at Microsoft's Project Tuva.
In April 2010, Gates was invited to visit and speak at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
where he asked the students to take on the hard problems of the world in their futures.
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3. StevenPaul "Steve" Jobs February 24, 1955 – October 5, 2011) was an American inventor and businessman
widely recognized as a charismatic pioneer of the personal computer era. He was co-founder, chairman, and chief
executive officer of Apple Inc. Jobs was co-founder and previously served as chief executive of Pixar Animation
Studios; he became a member of the board of directors of the Walt Disney Company in 2006, following the
acquisition of Pixar by Disney.
In the late 1970s, Jobs—along with Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, Mike Markkula and others—designed, developed,
and marketed one of the first commercially successful lines of personal computers, the Apple II series. In the early 1980s,
Jobs was among the first to see the commercial potential of Xerox PARC's mouse-driven graphical user interface, which led
to the creation of the Apple Lisa and, one year later, the Macintosh.
Early life
Jobs was born in San Francisco and adopted at birth by Paul Jobs and Clara Jobs (née Hagopian).
They moved from San Francisco to Mountain View, California when he was five years old. His adoptive mother
was an accountant, who taught him to read before he went to school.
Career
Apple Computer
In 1976, Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne founded Apple, with later funding from a then-semi-retired Intel
product-marketing manager and engineer A.C. "Mike" Markkula, Jr. Prior to co-founding Apple, Wozniak was an
electronics hacker. In the early 1980s, Jobs was among the first to see the commercial potential of Xerox PARC's mouse-
driven graphical user interface, which led to the creation of the Apple Lisa and, one year later, the Macintosh.
NeXT Computer
After leaving Apple, Jobs founded NeXT Computer in 1985, with $7 million. A year later, Jobs was running out of
money and with no product on the horizon, he appealed for venture capital. Eventually, he attracted the attention of
billionaire Ross Perot who invested heavily in the company. NeXT workstations were first released in 1990, priced at
$9,999.
Return to Apple
In 1996, Apple announced that it would buy neXT for $429 million. The deal was finalized in late 1996, bringing Jobs
back to the company he co-founded. Jobs became de facto chief after then-CEO Gil Amelio was ousted in July 1997. He
was formally named interim chief executive in September. In March 1998, to concentrate Apple's efforts on returning to
profitability, Jobs terminated a number of projects, such as Newton, Cyberdog, and OpenDoc.
The company subsequently branched out, introducing and improving upon other digital appliances. With the introduction of
the iPod portable music player, iTunes digital music software, and the iTunes Store, the company made forays into
consumer electronics and music distribution. On June 29, 2007, Apple entered the cellular phone business with the
introduction of the iPhone, a multi-touch display cell phone, which also included the features of an iPod and, with its own
mobile browser, revolutionized the mobile browsing scene. While stimulating innovation, Jobs also reminded his employees
that "real artists ship".
Death
Jobs died at his California home around 3 p.m. on October 5, 2011, due to complications from relapse of his previously
treated islet-cell neuroendocrine pancreatic cancer.
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4. Mark Elliot Zuckerberg (born May 14, 1984) is an American computer programmer and Internet entrepreneur. He is best
known for co-creating the social networking site Facebook, of which he is chief executive and president. It was co-founded
as a private company in 2004 by Zuckerberg and classmates Dustin Moskovitz, Eduardo Saverin, and Chris Hughes while
they were students at Harvard University. In 2010, Zuckerberg was named Time magazine's Person of the Year. As of 2011,
his personal wealth was estimated to be $17.5 billion.
Personal life
Zuckerberg was born in 1984 in White Plains, New York to Karen, a psychiatrist, and Edward Zuckerberg, a dentist. He and
his three sisters, Randi, Donna, and Arielle, were brought up in Dobbs Ferry, New York. Zuckerberg was raised Jewish and
had his bar mitzvah when he turned 13; he has since described himself as an atheist.
At Ardsley High School, Zuckerberg had excelled in the classics before transferring to Phillips Exeter Academy in his
junior year, where he won prizes in science (math, astronomy and physics) and Classical studies.
Software developer
Early years
Zuckerberg began using computers and writing software as a child in middle school. His father taught him Atari BASIC
Programming in the 1990s, and later hired software developer David Newman to tutor him privately. Newman calls him a
"prodigy," adding that it was "tough to stay ahead of him." Zuckerberg also took a graduate course in the subject at Mercy
College near his home while he was still in high school.
Harvard years
By the time he began classes at Harvard, he had already achieved a "reputation as a programming prodigy," notes Vargas.
He studied psychology and computer science as well as belonging to Alpha Epsilon Pi, a Jewish fraternity. In his sophomore
year, he wrote a program he called CourseMatch, which allowed users to make class selection decisions based on the
choices of other students and also to help them form study groups. A short time later, he created a different program he
initially called Facemash that let students select the best looking person from a choice of photos. According to Zuckerberg's
roommate at the time, Arie Hasit, "he built the site for fun." Hasit explains:We had books called Face Books.
Facebook
Zuckerberg launched Facebook from his Harvard dormitory room on February 4, 2004. An earlier inspiration for Facebook
may have come from Phillips Exeter Academy, the prep school from which Zuckerberg graduated in 2002. It published its
own student directory, “The Photo Address Book,” which students referred to as “The Facebook.” Such photo directories
were an important part of the student social experience at many private schools. With them, students were able to list
attributes such as their class years, their proximities to friends, and their telephone numbers.
In 2010, Steven Levy, who authored the 1984 book Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution, wrote that Zuckerberg
"clearly thinks of himself as a hacker." Zuckerberg said that "it's OK to break things" "to make them better." Facebook
instituted "hackathons" held every six to eight weeks where participants would have one night to conceive of and complete a
project.
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5. Julian Paul Assange (born 3 July 1971) is an Australian publisher, journalist, computer programmer and Internet activist.
He is the editor in chief of WikiLeaks, a whistleblower website and conduit for worldwide news leaks, with the stated
purpose of creating open governments. Assange was a hacker in his youth, before becoming a computer programmer. He
has lived in several countries and has made public appearances in many parts of the world to speak about freedom of the
press, censorship, and investigative journalism.
Early life
Assange was born in Townsville, Queensland, and spent much of his youth living on Magnetic Island.
His biological father was John Shipton, and his mother Christine was the daughter of Scottish-born principal of Northern
Rivers College, Warren Hawkins. Assange claims that his "grandfather was a Taiwanese pirate". When Julian was one year
old, Christine married theatre director Brett Assange, who gave him his surname.
Hacking and conviction
In 1987, after turning 16, Assange began hacking under the name "Mendax" (derived from a phrase of Horace: "splendide
mendax", or "nobly untruthful"). He and two other hackers joined to form a group they named the International Subversives.
Assange wrote down the early rules of the subculture: "Don't damage computer systems you break into (including crashing
them); don't change the information in those systems (except for altering logs to cover your tracks); and share information".
Child custody issues
In 1989, Assange started living with his girlfriend and they had a son, Daniel Assange. They split up during the period of
Assange's arrest and conviction. They subsequently engaged in a lengthy custody struggle and did not agree on a custody
arrangement until 1999.
Computer programming and university studies
In 1993, Assange was involved in starting one of the first public internet service providers in Australia, Suburbia Public
Access Network. Starting in 1994, he lived in Melbourne as a programmer and a developer of free software. In 1995, he
wrote Strobe,the first free and open source port scanner. He contributed several patches to the PostgreSQL project in 1996.
He helped to write the book Underground: Talesof Hacking, Madness and Obsession on the Electronic Frontier (1997),
which credits him as a researcher and reports his history with International Subversives.
After founding WikiLeaks
WikiLeaks was founded in 2006. That year, Assange wrote two essays setting out the philosophy behind WikiLeaks: "To
radically shift regime behavior we must think clearly and boldly for if we have learned anything, it is that regimes do not
want to be changed. We must think beyond those who have gone before us and discover technological changes that
embolden us with ways to act in which our forebears could not."
On 10 June 2010, it was reported that Pentagon officials were trying to determine his whereabouts. Based on this, there were
reports that U.S. officials wanted to apprehend Assange. Ellsberg said that the arrest of Bradley Manning and subsequent
speculation by U.S. officials about what Assange may be about to publish "puts his well-being, his physical life, in some
danger now."
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6. Public appearances
In addition to exercising great authority and editorial control within WikiLeaks, Assange acts as its public face. He has
appeared at media conferences such as New Media Days '09 in Copenhagen, the 2010 Logan Symposium in Investigative
Reporting at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism, and at hacker conferences, notably the 25th and 26th Chaos
Communication Congress. In the first half of 2010, he appeared on Al Jazeera English,MSNBC,and Democracy Now!, RT,
and the Colbert Report to discuss the release of the Baghdad air strike video by WikiLeaks. On 3 June he appeared via
videoconferencing at the Personal Democracy Forum conference with Daniel Ellsberg.
Release of U.S. diplomatic cables
On 28 November 2010, WikiLeaks began releasing some of the 251,000 American diplomatic cables in their possession, of
which over 53 percent are listed as unclassified, 40 percent are "Confidential" and just over six percent are classified
"Secret". The following day, the Attorney-General of Australia, Robert McClelland, told the press that Australia would
inquire into Assange's activities and WikiLeaks. He said that "from Australia's point of view, we think there are potentially a
number of criminal laws that could have been breached by the release of this information. The Australian Federal Police are
looking at that". McClelland would not rule out the possibility that Australian authorities will cancel Assange's passport, and
warned him that he might face charges should he return to Australia. The Federal Police inquiry found that Assange had not
committed any crime.
The United States Department of Justice launched a criminal investigation related to the leak. U.S. prosecutors are
reportedly considering charges against Assange under several laws, but any prosecution would be difficult. In relation to its
ongoing investigations of WikiLeaks, on 14 December 2010, the U.S. Department of Justice issued a subpoena ordering
Twitter to release information relating to Assange's account, amongst others.
Recognition as a journalist
Assange received the 2009 Media award from Amnesty International for Kenya: The Cry of Blood – Extra Judicial Killings
and Disappearances, and he has been recognized as a journalist by the Centre for Investigative Journalism. Assange has
been a member of the Australian journalist union, the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance, for several years, and in
2011, was made an honorary member. Alex Massie wrote an article in The Spectator called "Yes, Julian Assange is a
journalist", but acknowledged that "newsman" might be a better description of Assange.
Financial developments
On 6 December, the Swiss bank, PostFinance, announced that it had frozen assets of Assange's totalling 31,000
euros, because he had "provided false information regarding his place of residence" when opening the account.
MasterCard, Visa Inc., and Bank of America also halted dealings with WikiLeaks. Assange described these actions
as "business McCarthyism". The English-language Swedish newspaper web-site "Local" quoted Assange on 27
December 2010, as saying that legal costs for the whistleblowing website and his own defence had reached
£500,000. The decisions to halt donations to WikiLeaks by Visa, MasterCard and PayPal had cost it £425,000, the
same amount it costs the website to publish for six months. Assange said WikiLeaks had been receiving as much
as £85,000 a day at its peak.
Political and economic views
According to Assange, "It’s not correct to put me in any one philosophical or economic camp, because I’ve
learned from many. But one is American libertarianism, market libertarianism. So as far as markets are concerned
I’m a libertarian, but I have enough expertise in politics and history to understand that a free market ends up as
monopoly unless you force them to be free."
Awards
He won the 2009 Amnesty International UK Media Award (New Media), for exposing extrajudicial assassinations in Kenya
by distributing and publicizing the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR)'s investigation The Cry of
Blood – Extra Judicial Killings and Disappearances. Accepting the award, Assange said, "It is a reflection of the courage
and strength of Kenyan civil society that this injustice was documented."
He also got awards in 2010, FEB 2011, April 2011 & June 2011.
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