Although Steve Ballmer has long taken over as the most prominent figure at Microsoft, Bill Gates' role with the company has not diminished substantially. As long as Gates was around, there couldn't really be a Ballmer era at Microsoft even though Gates had become almost invisible from the outside.

Gates started the year with his last keynote at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Bill Gates, bidding farewell to a trade show he has opened for the last decade, predicted a more human side to computing in the next decade and announced partnerships between Microsoft and Ford NBC, ABC and Disney.

During the CES 2008 keynote, Bill Gates has proven to have maintained his sense of humor, as he ended his tech reign with a spoof home video, which depicted how Bill Gates was trying to pursue a new career. Gates wanted to be a rap star, but Jay Z turned him down. After he tried to pursue a rock star career but U2’s Bono is very clear: "I can't replace Edge because you got a high score on Guitar Hero, Bill."

In the spoof, Gates next calls Steven Spielberg about an audition reel showing Gates as a horror film figure. Spielberg in turn calls George Clooney about a Bill Gates movie. "I can't play Bill Gates. I just can't ... ask Russell Crowe," says Clooney.

Next, the Daily Show's Jon Stewart turns Gates down as a co-anchor after showing a clip of Gates running off the Daily Show set. As Microsoft colleagues comment that it may not be a coincidence that Gates is leaving in an election year, we see him turned down as running mate in separate phone conversations with both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

So what will Gates actually do, considering this would be the first time since he was 17 without his full-time job at Microsoft?

Gates will not be fully outside the company, as he will remain Microsoft’s chairman. But from now on, his time will be 80 percent dedicated to his Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. There’s no doubt about it, Microsoft will enter a new era with Gates’ three officers in charge of the company’s best interests: Steve Ballmer, Craig Mundie and Ray Ozzie.

As Gates pointed out in an interview, his decision was hard to make, but he truly believes that Microsoft, which is strongly positioned at the moment, has a bright future ahead.