Power On Self Test: Discus

[via FFFFound]

1. [Chrs]

   Indeed, a classic from the dawn of an era. The screen summons memories of the infamous Blue Screen of Death, which has now long outlived its operating system source, much like the young Bill Gates here.

2. [strider_mt2k]

   DOS boot.

3. [zuludaddy]

   “I’m Bill Gates, and I’m gonna rock your world, baby…”

4. [ben]

   Take me now, Bill.

5. [Patrick Austin]

   Why YES you can have some VC funding, young man!

6. [Category]

   Does anybody else hear pr0n-funk in their head whilst looking at this picture?

7. [WalterBillington]

   I monopolise this desk. I love this style, baby! Just so I know who fed what style to whom, did The Breakfast Club precede or … whatever, come after … this photo?

8. [paboo]

   Just noticed the flying 5.25!

9. [dross1260]

   I’d hit that!

10. [oohShiny]

    Floppy disks are no longer floppy — discuss.

    oh. oh you said discus.

    sorry.
    

11. [Blue]

    Smell My Fingers

12. [tw15]

    This was in the days when Bill Gates would jump over the backs of chairs. I think there’s a shot of him doing that from the same photo shoot.

13. [tw15]

    So a quick search on Google to find the source of the photo revealed that this was posted to BoingBoing in 2005, but the image isn’t on the cached file.

    Then I found a page saying “The photo is real, but it has never appeared in the Teen Beat magazine – “These pictures were taken in 1985 by celebrity photographer Deborah Feingold shortly after the release of Windows 1.0. This information comes from Corbis.com, which has these photos in their database. There’s no evidence that they ever appeared in Teen Beat.”

    So Corbis owns the copyright on this photo. I’m guessing copyright issues were why it disappeared from the 2005 BoingBoing page.

    What are the odds this will get pulled again?

14. [ROSSINDETROIT]

    This is the geek equivalent of a nude starlet on a bearskin rug in front of a fireplace.

15. [Jimmy]

    Oh, you sexy, sexy beast.

16. [dculberson]

    Diskette fight!!!

    (I have actually had one of those. and it was a blast.)

17. [Rob Beschizza]

    Regarding the origin of this image, I have no idea. You know the drill: whoever actually owns it gets to decide whether it stays or goes.

18. [Anonymous]

    Hitting the bong a little hard, are we Bill?

19. [DeWynken]

    Opening scene for some bad 80s porn?

20. [mrmiesta]

    All I can say is lolz

21. [OM]

    …Heh, I’m reminded of a memo circulated while I was working at the Texas AG’s Child Support Enforcement division telling the people working in the field offices to not toss 5.12″ floppies around because the corners could put someone’s eye out.

22. [Anonymous]

    #14: ummmm…no. This photo actually makes me ill.

23. [ridl]

    Is he wearing scrubs?

24. [buttoncat]

    Clean hair and no glasses with tape? Imposter, for sure. Unless you count darkly scheming countenance and aggressive floppy toss. It does, however, look like Microsoft campus.

25. [umgrego2]

    @#23 RIDL: No. They are, in fact, slacks. Altogether now; slacks.

26. [ridl]

    I’m pretty sure those are scrubs.