Ending the Paper Chase

He conquered the computer industry. Now Bill Gates is taking on a daunting new challenge: creating the office of the future.

There is plenty of clutter in the spacious office of William Gates. Overlooking a 260-acre campus dotted with magnificent fir trees, the room contains a forest of paper. His desk is completely covered by scattered piles of documents; next to it the matching beige credenza is buried under small mountains of loose letters, memos and newspaper clips. Even the floors are littered with the stuff. But if the co-founder and chief executive of computer-software powerhouse Microsoft has his way, this pulp potpourri will soon recede. "I don't want to get rid of all paper," says Gates in his Redmond, Washington, headquarters....

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