Bill Gates bans iPhones for his kids

Bill Gates bans iPhones for his kids, no-one is surprised, Completely unsurprising news, now, from the pages of The Register, where they’re reporting that Bill Gates has put a blanket ban on his kids (or his wife, for that matter) owning either an iPod or an iPhone.

What that’s you say? The former CEO of Microsoft saying that his family can’t have things made by Steve “I’m Bill Gates’s arch-nemesis” Jobs? Surely not!

You have to admire the way people are saying that his kids should have some say in whether they get an iPod or not, without first researching the subject and finding out that his kids are, in fact, aged approximately 13, 10 and 5, and therefore, will get what they’re given, and lump it. They should think themselves lucky they don’t get a lump of coal and half an orange each at Christmas! And as for his wife, Melinda, she is quoted as saying, “Every now and then I look at my friends and say, ‘Ooh, I wouldn't mind having that iPhone.”

Yikes, in the house of the former CEO of Microsoft, that be banishment talk, surely?

But hey, the iPhone is and always was a triumph of style over substance, and quite frankly, there are a lot of phones that’ll outclass it (and if we’re talking just Windows Mobile, have the Toshiba TG01 as an example, for starters…). Of course, there’s always the possibility some might argue that Windows Mobile is a triumph of substance over any kind of style whatsoever, and in a way, they’re right.

That’s fixable by adding on a new interface, just like the did with the HTC Touch HD (and I know I’ll get flamed to a crisp about this, but can people please stop saying Windows Mobile is still rubbish, even with TouchFLO on? Actually use one, then try to convince me it’s rubbish…)

Can you fix the iPhone’s shortcomings by adding a new camera on, on top?

Anyway, I’m straying away from the central point of my ramblings here, which is this: er, it’s his house, and the kids are all under 13. No they can’t have a say in what gifts they get bought. That’s the parents’ job.

Besides, with a dad who’s worth in the region of $58 billion, and who could probably ring up HTC and say, “Make me a brand new version of the Diamond, NOW,” and who is making a multitouch, touchscreen table, I don’t think they’re exactly gonna come off badly out of the dea.

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