Smash Notes
Melinda Gates (live!) on stopping climate change, ending malaria, and the problems money can’t solve

The Ezra Klein Show

Melinda Gates (live!) on stopping climate change, ending malaria, and the problems money can’t solve

Melinda Gates is the co-founder and co-chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the largest private foundation in the United States. With more than $40 billion in assets, the Gates Foundation works on a dizzying array of issues, from eradicating polio to feeding the world to treating HIV to stopping climate change to reforming the US education…

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Notes

  1. What Is the Origin of Comic Sans at 1:55

    Microsoft Bob was one of the biggest failures in Microsoft at the time when Melinda Gates was working there, but one of the surviving components was the font… Full answer

  2. What Was It Like to Build an Encyclopedia From Ground Up at 2:26

    One of the products Melinda Gates was working on was Encarta, a digital encyclopedia product that Microsoft ran for a over a decade. Full answer

  3. What Is the Best Way to Have an Argument at Work at 3:38

    Intellectual arguments are great, but when arguments become personal they create an off putting atmosphere that can drive employees away for the fear of being… Full answer

  4. How Do You Create a Culture Where Employees Do Not Fear to Speak Up at 6:32

    As a leader, you have to be honest with yourself. Full answer

  5. Why Don't Young Founders Understand Elder Tech Users? at 8:22

    When products are built by young people in their 20s and 30s, it is very likely they do not fully understand the needs of older people. Full answer

  6. Why Is Diversity in Workplace So Important at 10:13

    The Silicon Valley right now is at the point of cultural friction. Full answer

  7. Why Are Women More Likely to Join a Team That Already Has Women on It at 14:51

    Having other women around makes an enormous difference to how women feel and how they perform. Full answer

  8. How Can We Encourage More Women to Study Computer Science and Math at 17:45

    We have to create pathways by which more women are encouraged to enter computer science. Full answer

  9. Does Political Correctness Threaten the Country's Growth? at 20:51

    That's just an old boy's club thinking. Full answer

  10. Are Globalism and Technology Threatening Our Way of Life at 21:58

    These fears are very dangerous and also completely not true. Thanks to innovation, the world has grown many-fold in the last decades. Full answer

  11. What World Is Possible in 2030 at 25:59

    All the countries of the United Nations have already set out their goals for 2030 and the ideas is to imagine what is possible and work towards that. Full answer

  12. What Does Warren Buffet Think of Climate Change at 32:10

    Back in the day when we just started to have modern cities, and it was still just horses and buggies on the streets, you "would have thought we would drown in… Full answer

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