Chandrababu Naidu, Bill Gates win CIOL Millennium Poll

When it comes to polls, you cannot beat the politicians. The young IT savvy
chief executive officer of Andhra Pradesh has ousted the founding fathers of IT
in India as the CIOL IT Man of the Decade (Indian). Despite a series of
setbacks, Microsoft and its founder continued to be the favourites in their
respective categories. However, the fast growing operating system Linux narrowly
pipped Windows to emerge as the CIOL Product of the Decade.

In a Internet poll conducted by Cyber India Online Ltd. (CIOL), India’s No.
1 IT Portal, Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu was adjudged the
person who mattered most during the 90s of the last century in the field of
Indian information technology. In the global scene, the richest man in the
world, Microsoft chairman Bill Gates was the choice.

The poll, which ran for 100 days, received nearly 35,000 votes in the eight
categories. One of the most popular Indian IT company, Infosys Technologies, has
been voted as the CIOL Company of the Decade (Non-MNC).

Interestingly, Infosys chief N.R. Narayana Murthy came in second to Mr Naidu.
HCL Group chairman Shiv Nadar came in a close third for the title of CIOL Man of
the Decade (Indian).

Mr Gates polled the maximum votes across all categories for the title of CIOL
Man of the Decade (Global). Significantly, while Mr Gates faced no competion
whatsoever in his category, Microsoft archrival Sun Microsystems gave tough
competition to the former. It should be noted that during the time that the CIOL
Millennium Poll ran, both Microsoft and its chairman Bill Gates were neck deep
in trouble with the findings of Judge Jackson going against them. This, however,
seems to have made no impact on the popularity of both.

In the CIOL Product of the Decade, it was a fight between Microsoft Windows
and Linux. The tried and tested lost to the one holding potential. The World
Wide Web took the title of CIOL Technology of the Decade.

Among the biggest failures of the decade, OS/2 and Microsoft Xenix were the
popular choices in the product category, while Artificial Intelligence and
ActiveX made it in the technology category.