I suspect that 50 years from now few will talk about him as a computer guy. They will talk of him as a philantropist. Andrew Carnegie would be the model for this. Few talk about Carnegie the businessman any more.
But Bill's legacy in the computer business will be longer lasting in many ways than Carnegie is in steel because Carnegie was "just" a manager - Bill was a worker bee. Bill was and is a programmer. He created things on his own. I also think that Bill's company is going to continue to be a pwoerful force in the industry. So that is a difference.
Bill's legacy is one of empowering non-technical individuals and breaking us out of a time when computers were just for the techno-savvy. Oh sure others tried to do this. Groups like Xerox PARC and Apple did a lot. But Microsoft succeeded beyond what those others managed. While Apple tried to control both hardware and operating system the pairing that Bill selected was operating system and applications. I would argue that making Office (the whole suite not just individual programs) work so well in the Windows operating system was key to the companies early success. Or course pairing with IBM in the early days didn't hurt either. But you'll notice that IBM doesn't make PCs anymore while Microsoft still makes PC software.
The next big legacy is the movement into the Internet in a big way. Microsoft really made it easy for ordinary people to get on the Internet. And there was a lot more to it have just IE.
Lastly I think Bill's legacy is the insistance on hiring smart people and letting them work. I think that hiring Steve Ballmer and Ray Ozzie, just to name two, and letting them have huge responsibility will be part of the legacy.
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