This was a funny era. A few years later (early 2000s), I somehow got sent to the Microsoft developer conference because I was the closest, geographically. There were so many sessions focused on open source and inter working with Linux. It was shocking that Microsoft had so quickly embraced this world.

Then in the closing keynote, Gates spoke passionately about how Microsoft would eradicate Linux and crush open source. It was hilarious how out of touch the left hand was from the right hand.

I also made a bit of a splash because I came to the conference with a MacBook. A journalist even wanted to interview me because it was so unusual. I declined.

The best part of the conference was the passes to company store, buying a lot of shwag for dirt cheap and a bunch of OS licenses, which they practically gave away in the store (to run in Parallels of course) lol.