Gates buys Feynman's "Messenger" lectures
June 22, 2009 | 1:26 pm
Bill Gates recently bought the rights to a series of lectures by legendary Caltech physicist Richard Feynman. The former Microsoft head’s purchase shows that the cultural and scientific legacy of Feynman remains strong even 21 years after his death.
The lectures, given in 1964 as part of Cornell University’s Messenger Lecture Series, were filmed by the BBC, who had retained the rights since. Gates purchased the lectures for an undisclosed amount.
But what would the former Microsoft head want with the copyright to lectures by the revered physicist? In a recent interview with the CERN Bulletin, Gates said that his only plan is to make the footage freely available to the public.
Add to that Gates’ reverence for Feynman, and it makes sense. The lectures are only the latest addition to Gates’ personal collection of Feynman-related material, which includes original manuscripts of some of Feynman’s best known work.
“I have heard that Gates really respects and admires Feynman. They exchanged a few calls back in the 1980s,” said author and cognitive neuroscientist Al Seckel, who became a close friend and student of Feynman’s.
Feynman is perhaps best known for his series of autobiographical books and for the transcriptions of lectures he gave as a faculty member at Caltech, The Feynman Lectures on Physics.
California-based photographer Joe Decker, who took several classes from Feynman while studying for a mathematics degree at Caltech, remembers Feynman as being unparalleled as a teacher.
“Feynman had an uncanny ability to convey the essence of an idea,” Decker said. “That, in addition to his incredible abilities of storytelling…was why he was so incredibly loved.”
Although Gates has yet to announce how the lectures will be made available, anyone too anxious to wait can catch segments on YouTube. The lectures are also available in Feynman’s book The Character of Physical Law.
Update: The Messenger lectures are now available online. Our story about it here.
By Nicholas Bock
Guest author
Posted in Uncategorized |
15 Comments »
June 22nd, 2009 at 2:44 pm
these lectures were up on google video approx. two years ago. and then the videos were removed. i hope it becomes free for public-viewing soon.
June 27th, 2009 at 2:24 pm
[...] Symmetry Breaking magazine: Bill Gates recently bought the rights to a series of lectures by legendary Caltech physicist [...]
June 27th, 2009 at 8:25 pm
[...] Gates Buys Feynman’s “Messenger” Lectures to Become Freely Available for Publicsymmetrymagazine.org [...]
June 27th, 2009 at 11:12 pm
[...] Symmetry Magazine: Bill Gates recently bought the rights to a series of lectures by legendary Caltech physicist [...]
June 28th, 2009 at 2:35 am
What really annoys me is that being a citizen of the UK I pay a television licence fee which funds the BBC. So what right do the BBC have to restrict, sell and profit from content that I have already paid for. It should be free and unrestricted to all.
June 28th, 2009 at 2:43 am
Interesting that the BBC (which is funded by the UK taxpayer and has a public service remit) sold the rights to Bill Gates so he can make them freely available. Why doesn’t the BBC make the rest of its archive freely available?
June 28th, 2009 at 5:32 pm
Gates has good taste. He bought Leonardo da Vinci’s “Leicester Codex” and I wish he would make that public also.
Excellent thing to do with money.
July 1st, 2009 at 10:27 am
@mike Economics is the allocation of scarce resources. The BBC needs funds to operate, Gates has those funds.
July 1st, 2009 at 12:48 pm
[...] Messenger Lectures, the ones which became the book The Character of Physical Law (1965), and plans to make them available ontube for free. That’ll be [...]
July 1st, 2009 at 12:49 pm
[...] Messenger Lectures, the ones which became the book The Character of Physical Law (1965), and plans to make them available ontube for free. That’ll be [...]
July 15th, 2009 at 3:35 pm
[...] reported in symmetry breaking on June 22 that the head of Microsoft had purchased the rights to Feynman’s Messenger Series [...]
July 16th, 2009 at 2:33 pm
[...] this is pretty cool. Microsoft (Bill Gates secured the rights using personal funds) is presenting a series of lectures on physics by Richard Feynman. [...]
July 17th, 2009 at 7:03 am
[...] is presenting a series of lectures on physics by Caltech legend Richard Feynman. Bill Gates, using personal funds, help secure secure the rights to these. Bravo, Microsoft. Awesome [...]
July 19th, 2009 at 9:08 am
[...] anda dando vueltas en todos los blogs, por lo que no podría faltar por acá: hace casi un mes se supo que Bill Gates compró los derechos de las Messenger Lecture Series, una serie de clases [...]
July 21st, 2009 at 12:59 am
[...] στην ζωή του αποφάσισε να κάνει κάτι για το κοινό καλό: αγόρασε τα πνευματικά δικαιώματα της σειράς διαλέξεων του Καθηγητή Richard Philips Feynman ο [...]