So the Daily Show got an interview with Bill Gates. You can watch Billy Boy’s sit-down on YouTube, or you can just load nine minutes of static onto your iPod and listen to it while you read the steaming pile of press release. The end effect is the same: random noise interspersed with sound bites about how amazing Vista will be. I’m very disappointed. Here is a sampling of what John threw at him over the course of almost ten minutes of interview.

• What does the F12 button do? (Nothing, you n00b.)
• What is a “beta version”? Will that make me sterile? (No.)
• What if I don’t know how to use Vista? (Call Bill, apparently.)
• What’s your password? (Is it “Gates”?)
• Do you hire people that can outsmart hackers? (Yes.)
• When are we going to get jetpacks? (Don’t know.)

Jon Stewart is an intelligent guy, I’ve been a fan of The Daily Show for years, and I’ve seen him do plenty of great interviews. But with ten minutes to interview the richest man on the planet, and one of the most influential philanthropists we’ve known, Jon turns into a clown. There are so many things Bill Gates could comment on that would’ve been even slightly interesting:

• What does he think of the One Laptop Per Child project?
• What are some longer-term goals on the table for the Gates Foundation, now that they’ve got billions of Warren Buffet’s money to spend?
• Does Bill Gates think that mobile technology will ever totally antiquate the desktop PC?
• Where does Gates see the biggest opportunities for Microsoft to compete with Google, since they’re clearly being trounced on “search”?
• What does Bill think about the problems in the Middle East? Bill’s PR reps would probably hate to see him start talking politics on the eve of a huge launch, but I’m sure Jon Stewart could get something out of him.
• Engadget had a great suggestion that should’ve come naturally to The Daily Show: team up Bill Gates with John Hodgman. It writes itself!

Maybe Bill’s people told Jon’s people that he needed to stay away from anything serious. Bill was in a rush to leave once the interview was up (he walked completely off-stage before the fade to commercial). Was he hurrying to the London launch, or was he just sour at having such a crap interview?

But not all of tonight’s YouTubing has been a waste. I didn’t get to watch the Colbert v. O’Reilly interviews when they aired, so I just caught up with them tonight. Steven Colbert definitely owned O’Reilly, twice – once on the Factor, and again on the Report. I can’t get enough of O’Reilly screaming about whether the “T” in “Colbert” is silent.

This week, I’d say Colbert’s “perched dragon” style interview-fu has proven far superior to Stewart’s “drunken hamster” style.