> So, you know, the greatest mistake ever is the whatever mismanagement I engaged in that caused Microsoft not to be what Android is, [meaning] Android is the standard non-Apple phone form platform. That was a natural thing for Microsoft to win.
It's not quite a sense of entitlement, but Gates definitely thinks Microsoft could have won mobile if Microsoft made better decisions. He doesn't seem to be leaving much room for the idea that Google would have won even if Microsoft had done its best.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Pocket_PC_Devices
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Windows_Mobile_devices
It took them three years after iPhone to pivot to something multi-touch, (Windows Phone 7 in late 2010) and on release it had the limitations of the original iPhone release - no copy/paste, no custom rintones - and five years to get something with Windows NT kernel to compete with Apple's "It runs OS X".
If Microsoft had made better decisions, i.e. done what Apple did, and released a multitouch full-not-hobbled-software device as soon as the hardware was up to it, tuning Microsoft hardware and software together like they do now with the Surface range, there wouldn't have been a market gap for Google to enter.
And when Google did enter, the first Android released was the HTC Dream - coming out 18 months after iPhone release - and 6 months after iPhone had been discontinued and superceded - and being designed like a device from 2003. - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTC_Dream
If you'd asked people in 2005 who were the contenders for dominating the next decade of consumer mobile computing, what would they say? Would anyone seriously suggest Google anymore than Yahoo! or AOL or Compuserve?
Words you're putting in his mouth. He did not say anything about deserving or certainty; when he says "we did screw up" that's an acknowledgement they had to compete for it, and failed to do that. People who think they deserve things, don't think they have to work hard and compete for them, and they don't reflect on what they did wrong but instead get affronted that the universe didn't simply hand them what the still feel they deserve.