Yes, the hate for Gates does look a bit naive now. To be fair, at the time there was a huge amount of admiration for him in the mainstream (I still meet people convinced he “invented” this or that software alone in a garage), so the hate was really niche. Hi
I have also seen commentary over the years that his non-profit is arrogant and sometimes harms when it is trying to help. I am less able to assess those stories to know if I agree or disagree. But I do know it is not always universally praised.
I do know that MS company culture was pretty aggressive in the time I was there. Some of that has got to be rooted in his famous personal aggressiveness, setting a poor example for others. Some form of that aggressiveness stayed with the company long after he left it.
But I do think Gates himself has had a personal transformation or re-consideration of his old self. And it is a credit to him that he's done that. His commentary on the coronavirus shows it, for example. Probably his retirement from software, having more money than any one person could know what to do with, his famous friendship with philanthropy-minded Warren Buffet, has given him some perspective about what he can do with the next phase of his life, without the need for profit motive or egotistical drive for competition.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/12/business/jeffrey-epstein-...
It engrages and disgusts me it isn't a bigger deal.
On the other hand, Bill Gates is not law enforcement, is not the criminal justice system. Speaking abstractly, if someone is convicted of a crime, goes to prison, and is let out... At what point does a prominent individual need to say they'll never talk to that person under any circumstances? In some cases that would be too extreme and in the abstract, repentant ex-convicts may deserve forgiveness.
In hindsight it's easy to say Epstein wasn't that. But we don't know how he may have misrepresented himself to Gates and others. We know from the press that there was some sketchy business involved in his relatively short prison stay, which I presume Gates did not know. My guess is it's not always an easy call to make, whether or not to show forgiveness to an ex-con, whether or not you can trust them as reformed, etc. The article you cite says he regrets making the wrong call.
They've done a really good job of rehabilitating their image. Having grown up at the time, it's hard for me to see Gates and them as different than that. It does make me somewhat sad that we've embraced a future where the bad guys won, that the schoolyard bully that tried to stifle progress is now succeeding by adopting that which they tried to strangle int he cradle.