No biggie. Looks like the handlers didn't tell Gates to hang around in his seat until the break.

He's leaving because he has to get to work on the next new operating system, Windows codename: "Here we go again"

i hear, now this is just a rumor, that bill gates does whatever the hell he wants to.

This happens every third night. You'd think Jon's crew would get the point across to the guests by now.

Regardless, that show is still the pinnacle of television.

I watched this as it happened last night, and I gotta tell you that this was the Battlefield Earth of television interviews. Stewart's witticisms fell flat, Gates seemed put off.. I could tell that Gates was not a man accustomed to being interrupted.

He was in a rush, he just heard that Apple released new color shuffles and he wanted to snag one before they sold out.

When your guest can buy your network with his personal bank account... he can just leave.

misleading headline alert! You make it seem like there was some sort of confrontation and that Gates stormed off the set. Sensationalist crap, even for Valleywag.

Yeah echo that essequemodeia... it was a terribly boring show.. Why is Stewart whoring out the daily show to Microsoft?

Well, aside from that moment (I'd guess no one at the Daily Show dared to tell Bill Gates what to do, lol), I thought it was a good interview. There wasn't too much corporate-speak and the questions that Jon asked weren't half-bad (sometimes they can be lame).

I don't particularly like Microsoft and its business practices, but I kinda like Bill Gates as a person. He appears a lot more normal than Steve Jobs... and does a heck of a lot more charity work too. And he has some sense of humor, like telling Jon to call him if he has any troubles with Vista :)

Rusdude, I'm pretty sure that 'call me' line he's been palming off for years now. He reportedly said the same thing to Britney Spears once. But she didn't know who he was so the joke went off even flatter than usual.

He was probably looking for John Hodgeman to give him a "Vista Upgrade" in person.

It was a pretty slow show last night... Generally John is good in bringing the not-boring out of duds but I guess sitting in front of a guy who could "shut off the power" with a flick of his finger is slightly daunting. The talk of his money was and trying to get his password was a bit silly and I think that's not what Billy wanted to talk about. I think John was a tad too "dumbed-down" for Billy on this one. I'm a Stewart fan generally but he (or his writers)messed this one up a tad. The fact that Billy left early was an oops - doubt it was intensional, and if it was, probably kinda' deserved...

Yawn.

But, I like him as a person? WTF! You don't know him. Yea, like I think JLo is so kind and has a big heart, I just think she is great! She is like in the top ten people I would have at my next sleepover. WOW!

lol, in my opinion its not a big pr issue. BTW hes the richest man on the planet, he can walk out on anybody he wants!

Agreed- I don't watch enough to confirm it happens every third night, but between being very busy and having just shook Stewart's hand, what Gates did seemed very reasonable.

Watching it, he wasn't a Steve Jobs, but Gates has always been a businessman with a technical background, not a salesman. He wasn't the most charismatic guest, but that's him. For being the richest person in the world, he seemed surprisingly not arrogant, down to earth, and kinda shy.

It's definitely not uncommon for guests to leave like that. The Daily Show crew must not do a very good job telling them to stay until the commercials roll. This probably happens at least once a week.

The only part I found amusing was the "what's your dog's name?" for the password. Jon and his staff can usually pull out one or two good questions outside of the lame one-liners and things totally out of context but this interview fell flat.

I agree with all non-news/mis-labeled headline comments. He definitely did not storm out to make a statement.

Also, I don't know if blame could be put on Stewart for whoring out his show to Gates and M$. I watched the Dimitri Martins 1 hour stand-up show just before Stewart, and literally ALL the commercials were for Vista under the guise of clearification.com. Dimitri was even in the commercials, so M$ clearly spent a lot of cash at the network level to get the coverage they did.