Bill Gates and Warren Buffett share a laugh while answering questions from students at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's College of Business Administration, in Lincoln, Neb., in 2005.

Microsoft's Bill Gates says the best advice he's ever gotten from his friend and fellow billionaire Warren Buffett is to keep things simple.

Fortune magazine asked a "host of influential leaders" for the "wise words that changed their lives forever."

Fortune's Andy Serwer interviewed Gates and his father, Bill Gates Sr.

"Q: What's the best advice Warren Buffett has ever given you?

Gates Jr: Well, I've gotten a lot of great advice from Warren. I'd say one of the most interesting is how he keeps things simple. You look at his calendar, it's pretty simple. You talk to him about a case where he thinks a business is attractive, and he knows a few basic numbers and facts about it. And [if] it gets less complicated, he feels like then it's something he'll choose to invest in. He picks the things that he's got a model of, a model that really is predictive and that's going to continue to work over a long-term period. And so his ability to boil things down, to just work on the things that really count, to think through the

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The annual charity auction of a steak lunch with billionaire investor Warren Buffett, which raised a record $2.11 million last year, is off to a good start.

The high bid was $50,200 as of noon EDT Monday in the 10th annual fundraiser, which began Sunday on eBay Inc's (EBAY) website and runs through June 26. The starting price was $25,000.

As in recent years, the winner and up to seven friends may dine with the world's second-richest person at the Smith & Wollensky steakhouse in New York.

The auction benefits the Glide Foundation, a nonprofit in San Francisco's Tenderloin district that offers housing, job training, health and child care, and meals for the poor.

It was unclear how the recession will affect this year's bidding. In previous auctions, a flurry of activity typically drove the winning bid higher in the last couple of hours.

"You have clashing dynamics: in this economy, there is a heightened sense of rationality where people won't spend huge amounts of money, juxtaposed with the prospect of auction fever and competitive arousal where irrational bidding could take place," said Jonathan Carson, chief executive of BiddingForGood.com, an online charity auction platform.

"In the Buffett case," he went on, "I would think the latter is likely to continue. It is unlikely, though, that

Oil prices were down by more than $2 to below $68 a barrel Monday as the World Bank said the global economy would shrink by 2.9 percent this year, much worse than its March prediction for a contraction of 1.7 percent.

Concerns over a weak U.S. economy and the dollar's rise, which tends to pull investors away from commodities, also pushed the market lower.

Benchmark crude for July delivery fell $2.25 to $67.30 a barrel by afternoon in Europe in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. On Friday, it dropped $1.82 to settle at $69.55

The July contract expires later Monday. The August contract dropped $2.19 to $67.83.

Crude rose to an eight-month intraday high of $73.23 a barrel earlier this month on investor optimism that the U.S. economy, suffering through its worst recession in decades, may grow by the end of the year.

However, recent economic data has been mixed and reflects an economy still struggling to right itself. The Dow Jones industrial average fell 3 percent last week.

"Oil may have peaked in the short-term," said Victor Shum, an energy analyst with consultancy Purvin & Gertz in Singapore. "The market is overripe for a correction. Eventually the laws of supply and demand will re-exert themselves."

In its report on the global economy, the World Bank also said it expected global trade to plunge by 9.7

NEW YORK (AP) -- Apple Inc. sold more than a million units of its latest iPhone model in the first three days, making it the most successful debut for a smart phone yet.

The iPhone 3G S went on sale Friday in the U.S. and seven other countries.

When Apple Inc. launched the previous model last year, it also sold one million units in the first three days, but that model launched simultaneously in 22 countries.

Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster had expected the Cupertino, Calif., company to sell half a million 3G S in the first three days.

"Customers are voting and the iPhone is winning," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. It was the first time he was quoted in a company statement since he went on leave for unspecified medical reasons in January. The company has said that Jobs, who has battled pancreatic cancer, is returning to work at the end of the month.

The Wall Street Journal reported Saturday that Jobs had a liver transplant two months ago in Tennessee and that he will likely work part-time, at least initially. Apple has not commented on the report.

The launch of the iPhone 3G last year turned messy, as Apple and phone company servers failed to cope with the load of new customers trying to activate their phones. That problem recurred Friday with the launch of the 3G S, but to a smaller extent. Some customers who tried to activate the phone at home got