Wow Paul Allen made a billion dollars in 15 years just by holding onto them.

Rich people really do get richer. 

Mr. Allen certainly has diverse interests:  football, gastronomy and neuroscience.

And Jimi Hendrix. And basketball -- he owns the Trail Blazers. 

10 things you (maybe) didn't know about Paul Allen:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/clareoconnor/2014/01/31/10-things-you-didnt-know-about-microsoft-billionaire-paul-allen-seattle-seahawks-owner/

Whoa:

6. Computer programming won’t be Allen’s sole scientific legacy. To date, he’s poured over $500 million into the Allen Institute for Brain Science. His goal, as my colleague Matthew Herper masterfully explained in a 2012 Forbes magazine story: to reverse-engineer the human brain.

As Herper wrote: “His first $100 million investment in the Allen Institute resulted in a gigantic computer map of how genes work in the brains of mice, a tool that other scientists have used to pinpoint genes that may play a role in multiple sclerosis, memory and eating disorders in people. Another $100 million went to creating a similar map of the human brain, already resulting in new theories about how the brain works, as well as maps of the developing mouse brain and mouse spinal cord. These have become essential tools for neuroscientists everywhere.”