Today in Apple history: Steve Jobs and Bill Gates talk ‘future of the PC’

August 26, 1991: In their first joint interview, Steve Jobs and Bill Gates trade barbs and debate “the future of the PC” in Fortune magazine.

The spirited discussion marks 10 years since the first IBM PC shipped. The piece also looks at what the future holds for both men — described as the former “boy wonders of computing, now thirtysomething.”

Steve Jobs and Bill Gates: Joint interview on ‘future of the PC’

The intriguing interview shows the technologists at very different phases of their careers. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates was still a few years away from the launch of Windows 95, which marked the true ascendancy of Microsoft. However, he was already enormously successful.

Steve Jobs, on the other hand, was floundering with NeXT and Pixar Animation Studios, the two companies that set up the remarkable second act of his career.

The momentous meeting of the minds where Jobs and Gates discussed the future of the PC went down at Jobs’ new home in Palo Alto, California.

This was no accident. As Brent Schlender, who conducted the Fortune interview, wrote in his book Becoming Steve Jobs, the Apple co-founder “played hard to get” for the interview. Jobs insisted that the conversation take place on his home turf. Unlike virtually all of Jobs’ other interviews, this one did not promote his latest product. (At the time, Jobs was building computers at NeXT).

Jobs and Gates take shots at each other

Aside from discussing the future of the PC, Jobs and Gates sniped at one another throughout the interview in a way that’s difficult to imagine, say, Apple CEO Tim Cook and Google co-founder Larry Page doing today. Jobs referred to Microsoft as a “small orifice.” Gates responded, “It’s a very large orifice!”

Gates also accused Jobs of being jealous of Microsoft’s popularity.

Jobs insisted that the Mac laid the groundwork for excellence in personal computing.

“Windows is bringing to PCs great new technologies that Apple and others pioneered,” he said. “But in the meantime — and it’s been seven years since the Macintosh was introduced — I still think that tens of millions of PC owners needlessly use a computer that is far less good than it should be.”

Oh, and Jobs stuck to his guns about how Apple should build its own computers and software.

One of only two interviews the pair ever gave together, it makes for a compelling read. Particularly when compared with the pair’s chummier sit-down interview at the D5 Conference in 2007.

Read the entire Fortune interview with the Apple and Microsoft leaders — headlined “Jobs and Gates Together” — for a great slice of tech history. It’s a great reminder of how bitter the rivalry between Jobs and Gates was.

Luke Dormehl

Luke Dormehl is a U.K.-based journalist and author, with a background working in documentary film for Channel 4 and the BBC. He is the author of The Apple Revolution and The Formula: How Algorithms Solve All Our Problems … and Create More, both published by Penguin/Random House. His tech writing has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, Techmeme and other publications.