[Ologn]

Regarding the commercial BASIC project mentioned in this letter - Gates facilitated non-student Allen coming onto the Harvard campus, to use a computer they did not have permission to use for their commercial project. The computer they were using without authorization was one which was being used by the US military. Like Mark Zuckerberg in later years, Gates was called up before the Harvard Ad board for this.

From Paul Allen's book "Idea Man" -

"Returning to Aiken late one night after a fast-food run, we were stopped by the campus police and asked for our IDs...Harvard split the computer’s maintenance costs with the U.S. Defense Department, based on usage. I’d relied on Bill’s password account for my work on the simulator, which ate a lot of processor time. When the January bills came due, Harvard’s share was up conspicuously, with one student the prime culprit: William Henry Gates III. (he appeared before the university’s administrative board that summer...)"

[adventured]

At the time of that letter, how much of their software being sold was developed at Harvard? And did they specifically sell any software they developed while at Harvard (and on Harvard's dime)?

Gates of course has given Harvard tens of millions of dollars. Harvard got an amazing return on its computing bills.