Bill Gates
DES MOINES, Iowa -- Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates and CEO Steve Ballmer will not be called to testify during the plaintiffs' presentation in a high-profile $330 million class action lawsuit currently being heard in the Iowa Supreme Court, according to a recent Associated Press report. The lawsuit claims Microsoft violated Iowa's competition laws. Plaintiffs' attorney Roxanne Conlin, who had earlier won a judge's order forcing the two to travel to Des Moines to submit to direct questioning from their own attorneys in the middle of the plaintiffs' case, decided the experience would be too confusing for jurors. Gates and Ballmer will instead be called as witnesses in the case later next year. Conlin will instead be allowed to play an unflattering 1998 videotape of a Gates' deposition in an earlier lawsuit. The case is expected to last around six months.