Microsoft founder Bill Gates and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg undoubtedly have a lot in common. So it was only a matter of time before the two tech-leaders crossed paths. This seminal moment was re-enacted as part of the 2010 biographical movie, The Social Network. While the movie version of Bill Gates certainly looks and sounds like the real deal, many people are wondering whether it’s actually him?
Bill Gates did not make a cameo in The Social Network (2010). The role is played by a lookalike Steve Sires, who often goes by the name ‘Bogus Bill’. Sires has been impersonating Bill since 1998, and in an interview with mynorthwest he confirmed: “it was me on screen, and that was my voice. […] They’ve certainly done some audio tweaking to it”.
Speaking to Bloomberg back in 2013, Mark Zuckerberg revealed: “When I was growing up, Bill Gates was my hero […] I think he’s one of the greatest visionaries our industry has ever had”. So what happened when Gates and Zuckerberg crossed paths all those years ago? Keep reading to find out!
Bill on the Big Screen
In February 2004, during the early ‘Thefacebook’ days, Mark Zuckerberg and co-founder Eduardo Saverin attended Bill Gates lecture at Lowell Lecture Hall, Harvard University. At this point, ‘Thefacebook’ was popular but far from global, since it was only being used by Harvard students.
The movie re-enactment of this pivotal moment involves around 2 minutes of screen time.
While Bill is delivering his talk, Mark and Eduardo are captured in the audience listening on.
After around 30 seconds, a fellow member of the audience, Christy Lee (played by Brenda Song), leans over to Eduardo and says “Facebook me when you get home, maybe we could all go and grab a drink”.
It may seem like a trivial interaction, but “Facebook me” resonated with Eduardo and Mark, and eventually resulted in them changing the name of ‘Thefacebook’ to ‘Facebook’. The star-studded movie features Jesse Eisenberg as Mark Zuckerberg and Andrew Garfield as Eduardo Saverin.
Although Bill Gates is played by lookalike, Steve Sires, you may be wondering if the producers ever tried to get the real Bill Gates to make a cameo? Unfortunately, the answer is unclear. But using an impersonator definitely saved the team a lot of money. In a conversation with Entertainment Weekly, director David Fincher said:
“He’s known as the number one Bill Gates impersonator in the world”.
Sires has also played Bill in Nothing So Strange (2002) and Roboshark (2015).
Microsoft and Facebook
So what happened next, did the Microsoft story create somewhat of a blueprint for Facebook?
As I’m sure you’re aware, Facebook quickly became one of the biggest tech companies in the world. And the similarities between Gates and Zuckerberg don’t end there!
Both Bill and Mark came up with their multi-billion dollar ideas while attending Harvard University. Bill enrolled as a Law major in 1973, and Mark enrolled as a psychology major in 2002. Their interests may be slightly different, but Bill served as an example for Zuckerberg. It was the success of Gates and Microsoft that ultimately gave Mark the confidence to drop out of college and work on Facebook full time.
In addition to this, Microsoft was one of the first investors in the Facebook platform. In 2007, after a bidding war with Google, Microsoft bought a 1.6% stake in Facebook. This was before the company had even gone public on the stock exchange.
Mark also asserts that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation was the primary inspiration behind his own philanthropic organization, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative.
“Being one of the world’s best philanthropists has absolutely influenced me. Not only to try to follow in his footsteps and do something hopefully one day that will be as impactful as what he has done”, Zuckerberg told Recode.