$ cat ./records/microsoft-accused-of-destroying-evidence-through-a-30-day-email-d-2005.txt
Microsoft Accused of Destroying Evidence Through a 30-Day Email-Deletion Policy
[RECORD.TXT] · cat --full
In litigation with the small streaming-media firm Burst.com — which accused Microsoft of misappropriating its technology — Microsoft was alleged to have destroyed evidence via a policy of deleting employee email after 30 days. Burst pointed to a January 2000 message from Windows chief Jim Allchin instructing staff: 'Do not archive your mail… 30 days.' Microsoft said it had complied with discovery and that the deletions were routine policy, but the dispute fed broader concerns that the company purged records sought in lawsuits. Microsoft settled with Burst.com for $60 million in 2005.
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2026
Gates Foundation Trust Sells Off the Last of Its Microsoft Stock
In the first quarter of 2026, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust sold its remaining Microsoft shares, fully exiting a position in the very company that created Gates's fortune — capping a long, deliberate diversification away from the stock. The endowment that funds Gates's philanthropy, managed separately from its grant-making through Cascade, is now anchored instead by Berkshire Hathaway, Waste Management, railroads, and heavy-equipment makers. The sale underscored how thoroughly Gates's giving had decoupled from Microsoft's day-to-day fortunes.
2026
Gates's Charitable Endowment Is Now Led by Berkshire, Not Microsoft
By 2026, the publicly disclosed stock portfolio of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust — the endowment that funds Gates's philanthropy — was led not by Microsoft but by Berkshire Hathaway, Waste Management, Canadian National Railway, Caterpillar, and Deere. Decades of diversification, plus Warren Buffett's stock gifts, left it concentrated in railroads, waste, heavy equipment, and Buffett's conglomerate, while Microsoft — the source of the original fortune — had largely been sold down. The unglamorous, value-oriented mix reflects the long stewardship of Gates's money manager, Michael Larson, through Cascade Investment.
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