If Gates is the exceptional billionaire, the one-of-a-kind who became rich and now devotes his time to philanthropy and the astonishing challenge of global health (his foundation also helps fund Crosscut), Allen is the 12th Man Billionaire, the guy who does the cool stuff that you would want to do too, who follows his intellectual passions, who experiments, who seems to truly enjoy what he has. It's a life we can envy, at least from the outside, forgetting, of course, the battles with cancer that would darken any fairy tale. There's something about Allen's passions that portray a man of expansive interests, restless curiosity, the son of a librarian whose billions have opened up the book of the world for himself.

Sometimes, software isn't so magical. Even for Bill Gates.

For the opening piece in our series on Gates leaving daily life at Microsoft, one goal was to give a clear picture of the Microsoft co-founder's role inside the company, as a gauge of the impact his departure will have. As part of that, I went back through the internal e-mails turned over in the antitrust suits against the company, looking for new insights into his personality.

Read on past the jump for one of the gems that turned up, showing Gates in the role of chief rabble-rouser. (Original document: PDF, 5 pages.) It shows that even the Microsoft co-founder -- who champions the "magic of software" -- isn't immune to the frustrations of everyday computer users. Keep in mind that this was more than five years ago, so it doesn't necessarily reflect the specific state of things now.

These seventy-ish website designs based on the color blue caught my eye, not for the hue, but for their individuality in design despite the shared color traits.

Web design has come a long way since Vermeer's FrontPage.