On the closing day of the Sun Valley Media Conference, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett held court with individual speeches about — what else — money.

Gates spoke about collecting it for his Gates Foundation, while Buffett discussed how it could be spent to help the country, according to people who listened.

“Bill said amazing things,” said James Robinson III, former chairman of American Express. “He had all sorts of things to say about raising money for such things as medicine and diseases. He was very engaging and interesting, as he is every year.”

About 200 of those left at the conference attended the speeches, which had a ridiculously inordinate amount of security, with every entrance and exit to the speakers’ hall watched by four guards. Mediabistro, which was kept out by at least three different guards at entrances, thinks that’s what billionaire-type money brings.

But a few who stuck around to listen to billionaire mentality included William Morris Agency’s Jim Wiatt, Yahoo!’s Sue Decker, ICM’s Chris Silbermann, Page1Media’s Isaac Lee, Google’s Sergey Brin and Larry Page, Starr & Co.’s Ken Starr, News Corp.’s Rupert Murdoch, Time Warner’s Richard Parsons, media chef Rachael Ray, Scripps Co.’s Ken Lowe, former Disney chair Michael Eisner, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman and CNN’s Anderson Cooper.

Though almost half the invitees departed on Friday night, some stuck around to celebrate host Herb Allen with a special dinner last night. And, as every year, a special outdoors ice show (in the middle of summer!!!) took place behind the Sun Valley Lodge.

Friday night, Murdoch and Parsons were secluded at a table in the Sun Valley Lodge bar, discussing either some pending deal or the mixed drinks they wanted to order.

Parsons, who stepped down as Time Warner chair a few months ago, earlier told a reporter he was happy to be an observer at the conference this year rather than a corporate participant.

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As studio chairmen and agency heads all attempt to escape the jowls of Hollywood and its labor problems, the Screen Actors Guild has a bright marketing executive. SAG bought an full-page ad in the local paper for Sun Valley, the Idaho Mountain Express, that said simply: “We Want a Deal.”

It was aimed at the studio heads up here, including Universal’s Ron Meyer, DreamWorks’ Jeffrey Katzenberg, Sony’s Sir Howard Stringer, Disney’s Robert Iger and agency senior executives like ICM’s Jeff Berg, CAA’s Richard Lovett and Bryan Lourd, UTA’s Jim Berkus and William Morris Agency’s Jim Wiatt.

Unfortunately for SAG, as Sony chairman Stringer told mediabistro: “Unfortunately for the Screen Actors Guild, we don’t see that newspaper up here. It’s not delivered to us.”

Also seen in the valley: IAC chairman and CEO Barry Diller who had to stop riding his bike after almost running into Wendi Deng, wife to billionaire media mogul Rupert.

“Where are you going, Wendi,” Diller asks.
“I’m going to get some Yoga pants,” she replies.
“What are yogurt pants?” Diller persists.
“No, yoga pants, you know to do yoga in.”
“Yogurt pants?”

Hubby Rupert was later cornered by an AP reporter who asked about the markets. Murdoch’s simple yet eloquent reply: “I’m a bear.”

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Lowe was keen however on discussing the mega-investment Scripps has in chef extraordinaire and rising media starlet Rachael Ray, who ironically was at the other end of the bar drinking up the joint with her agent, William Morris’s Jim Wiatt.

Wiatt had just left a table with deposed Viacom exec Tom Freston (who is here with a company called Firefly 3).

Luckily for the bar hoppers, Viacom chief Sumner Redstone was nowhere to be seen, otherwise fisticuffs at dawn.

In another corner Rupert Murdoch‘s kid James, former head of Sky TV, was mingling with journos, one of whom came back to our group explaining how young Murdoch had been roommates in college with Post managing editor Jesse Angelo. So the Post has a nice in with young Murdoch.

Forget that dad owns the paper.

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As Hollywood mavens drifted into Sun Valley, a few were eager to talk.

Universal Studios COO and President Ron Meyer, asked whether Hollywood was making too many movies, said: “I’m part of that Hollywood, so I’d be criticizing myself.”

Meyer, a regular at Sun Valley, said he’s just staying for a couple of days this time. While holding court before about a dozen reporters and photographers, Meyer smiled when CAA agents Bryan Lourd and Richard Lovett complained that he was blocking there way as they exited the Sun Valley Lodge driveway.

“Ronnie, get out of the way,” Lourd yelled.

Asked for a comment himself, Lourd said: “Why would you ever want to talk to me? There are much more important people here.”

Lourd is one of a handful of Hollywood agents, including William Morris Agency’s Jim Wiatt, United Talent Agency’s Jim Berkus and ICM agent Jeff Berg.

Wiatt was the first to introduce former Viacom chief Tom Freston to the assembled media. “We rode in on the plane together,” Wiatt said.

• In the strange bedfellows department, the New York Times and the New York Post, always bitter enemies in the news arena, ended up splitting the cost of a Sun Valley Lodge suite for Times reporter Tim Arango and his girlfriend, Post photographer Victoria Will. The couple, who ironically met at Sun Valley four years ago, have been dating ever since.

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