First, Lets define what a communist government is.
I define a communist government as a government that
A. Determines what you buy, and how much it costs.
B. Determines how much you make, and what job you do.
C. Limits your freedom of speech.
D. Makes the economy very inefficient.
E. Has a few high ranking government officals that live quite well while the rest of us slave for them.
True, Bill Gates is the richest man alive, and probably considers himself very capitalist, but lets put him to the test.
A. Sorry Bill, but you don't quite make the passing grade for category A. Microsoft determines what you buy, at least in the software market. They can make any OS they want, and pressure every PC company into bundling its OS with the PC. As for the price, it charges hundreds of dollars for NT. You'll see a patern that a lot of MS products are either free, to kill the competiters, or incredibly expensive. I am giving Microsoft an "F" for this part.
B. Well Bill doesn't directly control how much you make (unless you work for MS), but we can look at this in a different light. Microsoft does control what it charges other PC companies for it OS. Here's a suprise, it charges more for companies that it doesn't like, such as IBM and Gateway, than companies that it likes, such as Dell and Compaq. So, it actually affects how large a company is. I know its a stretch, but they actually affect a large portion of the tech industry. I am giving Bill a "B" for this secton.
C. I can't see anything that Bill is doing to limit free speech, so he gets an "A"
D. They do however make the economy slightly less efficient. By charging different amounts of money to different companies, they are making different companies less efficient. Any wonder why IBM is losing a billion dollars a year on thier PC bussiness, at least one of the reasons is because they are being charged extra money for a product that is sold at a cheaper price to other companies. IBM would probably be making money on thier PC bussiness if there were two companies that made OS's. I am giving Bill a "D" for this category.
E. Bill = $70 billion, You = much lower than $70 billion. Bill gets an "F" in this category.
Well, we can see here that Microsoft is at least slightly communist, just be glad that they only control the OS market, or we might as well move to Cuba.