iRiver’s tiny PMP

Brian Lee

iRiver’s super slim Clix 2 multimedia player has hit the UK thanks to specialist retailer advancedmp3players.co.uk. The tiny PMP is packed with feature such as video playback and an FM tuner, yet still manages to be ridiculously slim measuring just 13mm at its thickest point.

The tiny tot’s main claim to fame is that it can show videos on its 2.2inch OLED screen. And the videos it shows aren’t of the usual jerky variety you find on most flash-based PMPs. Oh no, this little fella will show MPEG4 and WMV movies at a smooth 30 frames per second. Naturally it can also pump out tunes in MP3, WMA and OGG formats.

Navigating the menus should be a breeze as the player retains the D-click system used on the previous model where the front of the screen acts as a four way rocker switch for moving through the menus. There’s also a built-in FM tuner and you can even setup timed recordings so it’ll automatically grab your favourite radio shows to memory.

Another neat feature is its support for Flash content downloaded from websites. It even comes with some Flash games as standard.

More news

Inventors turn creations into cash

Lily Baik
http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/04/20/geneva.inventions.ap/index.html

GENEVA, Switzerland (AP) -- What do the automatic fish catcher, the easy sushi-maker, and the body-shaping petticoat all have in common? They're creations of some of the world's most innovative minds for the world's laziest bodies.
Hoping to turn their contraptions into capital, some 700 inventors from 42 countries have gathered at the International Exhibition of Inventions to show off gizmos ranging from a multifunction umbrella that contains an anti-mugger alarm to personal armor made of coconut-fiber.
The fair -- the world's largest of its kind -- features some 1,000 new inventions by industrial and commercial companies, independent researchers and even amateurs like one who offers a way to eat spare ribs without burning your fingers.
Solutions for those resistant to exertion seem to be a recurring theme at this year's 35th edition, which runs until Sunday.
One notable invention is the spring-loaded fish hook -- the equivalent of an underwater mouse trap. After attaching the float to the fishing pole, the "sportsman" lowers a lever into the set position. The fish has only to nibble on the bait to trigger the spring and find itself with a dart through the lips. (Caution: Do not bait the hook while the device is cocked, the pamphlet warns).
But isn't that considered cheating?
"Well, it could be," admitted inventor Michael Adcock, the only U.S. entry at the fair. "It's a lazy-man's way of fishing. That way you can drink more beer. That's what more fishermen are really out there for anyway. ... Normally, you've got to be watching the float. With this, you can look away, take a sip, do whatever."
He said the fish catcher is most effective for pan fish such as bream, crappie, bass and catfish.
Once they've nabbed their fresh fish, chefs who like to cut corners might be interested in Easy Sushi, a contraption that resembles a cigarette roller and allows any clumsy cook to whip up a masterful-looking maki in just minutes.
Couch potatoes who are disinclined to diet can turn to custom-made body-shaping underwear.
To parade her product, 47-year-old Taiwanese inventor and designer Pi-Yu Chuang donned one of the stylish body corsets, instantly reducing her waist from 29 to 23 inches (74 to 58 centimeters). The outfit, which costs around $800 (&euro590), encases the torso and legs, is also bust-enhancing and has a handy full bottom snap-on flap.
Mix indolence and the environment and you get the Standby Plug.
According to inventor Karl Dorn's brother Aaron, a television in standby mode still uses up to 85 percent of the power it does when switched on. Leaving a TV on standby 16 hours a day in Britain can cost users an extra £17 ($34) a year, he added. But he claimed the Standby Plug shuts down appliances completely after they go into standby mode, preventing the needless consumption of electricity.
The environment is a hot topic at this year's exhibit and not all entries are aimed at the lazy.
The portable MacStrap, a lightweight emergency power pack for handheld portable appliances such as cell phones, digital cameras, MP3 players and iPods, seems like a must for hikers and campers. Worn outdoors for 35-40 minutes, the MacStrap can power a three-minute cell phone call. About 20 hours are needed to fully charge a phone, says creator Roark McMaster.
A crematable funeral ornamentation called Memopack is another eco-friendly gem.
Made from paper but resembling a standard marble or wood plate, Memopack can be personalized with pictures, drawings, a lock of hair or letters before being placed on the coffin, and can be burned or fully biodegraded.
Inventions can only be entered only once at the Geneva show and must be patented. However, entries are not necessarily tested or screened by national authorities and cover a range from wonderful to wacky.
Some far-out ideas included scented socks; an automatic food distributor for animals that includes a medical check up; and the Q-Grip, a utensil designed to hold hot pieces of meat by the bone.
The PAP Ion Magnetic Inductor -- also known as the Papimi -- claims to increase the efficiency of the body on a cellular level through rapid electromagnetic pulses to help relieve pain. Austrian promoter Gernot Augustin also says he cured his mother of breast cancer with the apparatus.
A 75-member jury will select the best invention and award prizes in 45 other categories on Sunday. The "Oscar of Inventions" is also awarded on the basis of a popular vote from visitors.

Ancient Rainforest Revealed in Coal Mine

Scientists exploring a mine have uncovered a natural Sistine chapel showing not religious paintings, but incredibly well preserved images of sprawling tree trunks and fallen leaves that once breathed life into an ancient rainforest. Replete with a diverse mix of extinct plants, the 300-million-year-old fossilized forest is revealing clues about the ecology of Earth’s first rainforests . The discovery and details of the forest are published in the May issue of the journal Geology. “We’re looking at one instance in time over a large area. It’s literally a snapshot in time of a multiple square mile area,” said study team member Scott Elrick of the Illinois State Geological Survey (ISGS). Forest findOver millions of years as sediments and plant material pile up, layer upon layer, the resulting bands become time indicators with the newest, youngest layer on the top and the oldest layer at the bottom. Typically geologists peel away a vertical slice of rocky material to look at material, including fossils, over a period of time. A coal mine offers a unique view of the past. Instead of a time sequence, illuminated in the layer upon layer of sediments, the roof of an underground mine reveals a large area within one of those sediment layers, or time periods. Miners in Illinois are used to seeing a few plant fossils strewn along a mine’s ceiling, but as they burrowed farther into this one, the sheer density and area covered by such fossils struck them as phenomenal, Elrick said. That’s when they called paleobotanist Howard Falcon-Lang from the University of Bristol in the United Kingdom and William DiMichele, a curator of fossil plants at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. "It was an amazing experience. We drove down the mine in an armored vehicle, until we were a hundred meters below the surface,” Falcon-Lang said. “The fossil forest was rooted on top of the coal seam, so where the coal had been mined away the fossilized forest was visible in the ceiling of the mine.”Forest snapshotHere’s what the miners and other scientists saw underground: Relatively narrow passageways wind through the “cave,” marked off with stout 100-foot-wide pillars to ensure the roof doesn’t collapse. “It’s like in some bizarre Roman temple with tons of Corinthian pillars that are 100 feet across and only six feet tall,” Elrick told LiveScience. “As you’re walking down these passageways you see these pillars of coal on either side of you and above you—imagine an artist’s canvas painted a flat grey and that is sort of what the grey shale above the coal looks like.”The largest ever found, the fossil forest covers an area of about 40 square miles, or nearly the size of San Francisco. This ancient assemblage of flora is thought to be one of the first rainforests on Earth, emerging during the Upper Carboniferous, or Pennsylvanian, time period that extended from about 310 million to 290 million years ago. A reconstruction of the ancient forest showed that like today’s rainforests, it had a layered structure with a mix of plants now extinct: Abundant club mosses stood more than 130-feet high, towering over a sub-canopy of tree ferns and an assortment of shrubs and tree-sized horsetails that looked like giant asparagus.Flash freezeThe scientists think a major earthquake about 300 million years ago caused the region to drop below sea level where it was buried in mud. They estimate that within a period of months the forest was buried, preserving it “forever.” “Some of these tree stumps have been covered geologically speaking in a flash,” Elrick said.Because the spatial layout of the forest has been maintained, the scientists can learn about entire plant communities, not just individual plants. "This spectacular discovery allows us to track how the species make-up of the forest changed across the landscape, and how that species make-up is affected by subtle differences in the local environment," Falcon-Lang said.

David Hyun
URL:http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20070423/sc_livescience/ancientrainforestrevealedincoalmine;_ylt=AnqOC3Bvt6vHXd_tCJWhz8N7hMgF

Study: Violent Video Games Don't Make Kids Violent

Lily Baik
http://www.foxnews.com/printer_friendly_story/0,3566,266811,00.html
Wednesday, April 18, 2007

LONDON —
Players of violent video games believe they are just "exhilarating" escapism which does not desensitize them to real-life mayhem, according to a new survey of one of the entertainment industry's fastest growing sectors.
However, gamers do concede that people "who are already unhinged in some way" may be pushed over the edge if they play violent games obsessively.
Responding to public and political concern about video games, the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) commissioned the survey, interviewing gamers, parents and industry figures about their effect.
• Click here to visit FOXNews.com's Video Gaming Center.
The Board, which classifies up to 300 games a year, concluded that for gamers, "the violence helps make the play exhilaratingly out of reach of ordinary life."
But it added, "gamers seem not to lose awareness that they are playing a game and do not mistake the game for real life."
Video games tend to polarize opinions, with some games demonized for their graphic portrayals of violence.
But one survey participant insisted they were not all living in a fantasy world that tempted them to turn violent: "I no more feel that I have actually scored a goal than I do that I have actually killed someone. I know it's not real."
Another gamer said "Sometimes when I get really angry, I go upstairs and play some games and it calms me down."
But some young gamers under the age of 15 said they found some of the violence upsetting. Uncomfortable about the level of gore portrayed in the graphics, they admitted to having nightmares.
That prompted BBFC Director David Cooke to urge parents to be vigilant. He said it was vital to ensure children were protected from games with adult content.
The survey canvassed reaction to a wide range of popular games from "Manhunt" and "Grand Theft Auto" to "World of Warcraft."
One "Manhunt" fan admitted, "I was quite addicted to it. You really were sticking an axe in someone and taking a couple of chops to their neck until their head fell off."
As for the attractions of "Grand Theft Auto" games, the survey concluded, "The sex makes a contribution to the exhilarating sense of trashing the tedious constraints of everyday life."
But with fast developing technology, today's "cool" game soon becomes outdated.
"It's like when you have a puppy, everyone wanted to know you. When it grows a year older, they don't want to know," one gamer concluded.

Ruby Tuesday - Your own MIRACLE

Your Own MIRACLE - Ruby Tuesday [DJMAX PORTABLE 2 Opening Theme]
Lyrics & Vocal by Christine Jones

Close your eyes.. Take some time just to center your soul and be at one..
With the sky.. You can fly if you unfurl your wings to face the sun..
In your mind, You will find all the power you need to get things done..
And your dreams.. They can seem like mere shadows of brighter days to come...

Shoot for the moon!!
If you miss you will still be among the stars..
Don't ever stop!!
If you never give up you are guaranteed to go far..

Be your very own miracle..
You can win a race standing still.. Go on! (Go on!)
Pick those beautiful feel up from off the floor rise and soar..
Be your very own miracle..
Just believe you can, and you will.. Have faith! (Have faith!)
Every goal that you make is a chain you break to set your spirit free!

Every page you have turned in this book of your life has led you here..
Every step that you take you grow closer to conquering your fear..

Dreams can come true!!
but they depend on you and how strong you are..
Don't ever stop!!
If you never give up you are guaranteed to go far..

Be your very own miracle..
You can win a race standing still.. Go on! (Go on!)
Pick those beautiful feel up from off the floor rise and soar..
Be your very own miracle..
Just believe you can, and you will.. Have faith! (Have faith!)
Every goal that you make is a chain you break to set your spirit free!

------------------------------------------------------------

Ruby Tuesday is a music artist who is very famous in Korea, Japan, and other country for making OST musics in Djmax.

New Robot Eyes People With Human-Like Eyes By Paul Lee

A new breed of robots could soon break free of assembly-line duties to assist human living in myriad ways.
MIT researchers recently demonstrated the capabilities of such a robot, named Domo, which, like the robot in a recent General Motors ad, can transcend mass-production's repetition.
It is designed to interact with humans and adapt to its environment in ways previously only imagined in science fiction.
• Click here for FOXNews.com's Patents and Innovation Center.
Presently, Domo can identify objects, reach for them and place them on shelves. Unlike an assembly-line robot, Domo can sense its surroundings using a pair of video cameras for eyes; they are connected to 12 computers.
The cameras are built into remarkably human-looking "eyeballs" for a reason, said Domo's developer, Aaron Edsinger.
"I found that, by making them immediately understandable as eyes, it was very easy to read [Domo's] eye-gaze direction, which is important when working with it," Edsinger said. "They also greatly increase people's comfort level with the robot."

Study: Teens protecting their

profileshttp://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/internet/04/19/internet.youths.ap/index.htmlLily Baik
NEW YORK (AP) -- Teens generally don't think twice about including their first names and photos on their personal online profiles, but most refrain from using full names or making their profiles fully public, a new survey finds.
The Pew Internet and American Life Project reported Wednesday that two-thirds of teens with profiles on blogs or social-networking sites have restricted access to their profiles in some fashion, such as by requiring passwords or making them available only to friends on an approved list.
The study comes amid growing concerns about online predators and other dangers on popular online hangouts like News Corp.'s MySpace and Facebook, which encourage their youth-oriented visitors to expand their circles of friends through messaging tools and personal profile pages.
Social-networking sites have responded by offering users more controls over how much they make public and warning them about revealing too much.
According to Pew, fewer than a third of teens with profiles use their last names, and a similar number include their e-mail addresses. Only 2 percent list their cell phone numbers.
But 79 percent have included photos of themselves, with girls more likely to do so. Eighty-two percent use their first names, and half identify their schools.
"Teens are manifesting the tension between wanting to keep themselves safe online and wanting to share themselves with their friends and potentially make new ones," said Amanda Lenhart, a senior research specialist at Pew. "Teens, particularly girls and younger teens, have gotten the message about protecting themselves on social networks, but the fun of these networks is the ability to share yourself with others on them."
Dashiell Feiler, a 16-year-old high school junior, said he keeps his profiles open, but uses at most his first name and last initial. He said people who find him tend to be friends anyway, but he left off his full name as a precaution.
"I just thought I didn't want anybody to figure out where I live," he said.
According to Pew, 45 percent of online teens do not have profiles at all, a figure that contradicts widespread perceptions that the nation's youths are continually on MySpace. Lenhart said younger teens, in particular, tend to stay away, some because they fail to meet a site's minimum age requirements.
Most of the teens with profiles say they use the sites to stay in touch with existing friends. Only half of teens with social-networking profiles say they use the sites to make new friends.
A third of teens online say they have been contacted by strangers, not necessarily through social-networking sites. Of those, 21 percent say they responded to learn more about that person, and 23 percent say they felt scared or uncomfortable by the encounter.
The telephone study of 935 American youths, ages 12 to 17, and their parents was conducted October 23 to November 19 and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

U.S. billionaire returns from space trip

David Hyun

KOROLYOV, Russia - An American billionaire who won a junior cosmonaut contest as a child returned Saturday from a dream voyage to the international space station, riding a Russian capsule to a soft landing on the Kazakh steppe
Charles Simonyi, a 58-year-old native of Hungary who helped design Microsoft Word and Excel, smiled and chatted with rescuers who helped him gingerly out of the Soyuz capsule and appeared energized by his $25 million, two-week trip.
The capsule carrying the space tourist, a Russian cosmonaut and a U.S. astronaut touched down after a more than three-hour return trip from the orbital station.
Simonyi looked delighted after rescuers helped him from the rounded capsule, which lay askew on the bleak grassland, and into a chair covered with fur for warmth. He smiled, grinned broadly and spoke animatedly with members of a support crew who greeted him with hugs and handshakes.
He then bit enthusiastically into a green apple — a traditional offering for space crews touching down in Kazakhstan, which is famous for the tasty fruit.
Asked about his first impressions back on Earth, a smiling Simonyi said in Russian, "The sun is shining, the weather is good," in footage broadcast on state television. Simonyi had studied Russian in school in his native Hungary and took another language course in preparation for the flight.
Cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin looked pale and tired, but soon managed a smile in a video link with Mission Control. "The first thing I felt on Earth was the smell," he told the television network.
Spanish-born U.S. astronaut Michael Lopez-Alegria, the last out of the capsule, sighed with relief, smiled and talked to the support crew as doctors monitored the men's vital signs.
The astronaut set the U.S. record for continuous space flight by spending 215 days in orbit, and set another U.S. record — 10 space walks over his career.
The capsule raced down to Earth after separating from the two other sections of the Soyuz TMA-9 craft following its departure from the station, where one of the final tasks the travelers performed was to move containers with biological experiments from refrigerators on the station into the Soyuz.
Russian space agency chief Anatoly Perminov said all the cosmonauts "feel wonderful."
"But of course, Charles Simonyi feels the best, which is understandable," he said. "He is already giving interviews left and right."
Simonyi arrived at the station on April 9 — also courtesy of a Soyuz, which flew into space atop a Russian rocket from the Russian-leased launch facility in Baikonur, Kazakhstan — along with two other cosmonauts, who will remain on the station for about six months.
Also staying in orbit was Sunita Williams, an American astronaut who arrived in December.
Simonyi amassed the fortune that made his costly voyage possible through his work with computer software, including helping to develop Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel.
Another household name, his friend
Martha Stewart' watched his launch from Baikonur and was at Russian Mission Control outside Moscow when the Soyuz docked. She also spoke to him during a video linkup after he boarded the station.
Simonyi followed in the footsteps of Dennis Tito, Mark Shuttleworth, Gregory Olsen and Anousheh Ansari — all "space flight participants" who have traveled to the international space station aboard Russian rockets in trips brokered by U.S.-based Space Adventures Ltd.
Alexei Krasnov, head of the manned missions at the Russian space agency, praised Simonyi's determination, recounting that he won a trip to Moscow to meet with a Soviet cosmonaut as a prize in a space contest at age 13.
"So many years have passed and the dream he had has been fulfilled," Krasnov said. "It costs dearly to realize your life's dream."

URL:http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070421/ap_on_sc/russia_space;_ylt=Ap0lISDatAIx15ArnIMAFjWHgsgF

Free PlayStation 3 .net Announces Industry First Guide That Shows You How to Get PlayStation 3 for Free

URL: http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/070420/20070420005728.html?.v=1
Brian Lee

LOS GATOS, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Free PlayStation 3 .net released the industry's first free guide today that shows you how to get your own PlayStation 3 for free. The free PlayStation 3 guide details what industry websites provide the PlayStation 3 for free and how anyone in the world can acquire one without spending a cent.

Most free PlayStation 3 websites require you to participate in two or more "sponsor offers" before you can receive your free PlayStation 3, resulting in you having to spend up to $200 before you can receive your PlayStation 3. However, Free PlayStation 3.net's new guide shows you how to get the PlayStation 3 for free, without having to participate in any of these sponsor offers.

Free PlayStation 3 .net has researched and reviewed over fifty free PlayStation 3 web sites and have discovered that a few of them ask you to participate in their sponsor offers, but if you simply ignore their requests and proceed to the end of their sponsor offer pages, you will still get your free PlayStation 3.

Most visitors to these free PlayStation 3, free Wii, free XBOX 360 and free PSP websites, that decide not to participate in the sponsor offers, never proceed past the sponsor offer pages to the final page where they are asked to confirm their email address one last time and told that their game console will be mailed to them shortly.

Little do they know that on a few such web sites, that Free PlayStation 3 .net identifies, that simply proceeding to the last page will still result in them receiving their PlayStation 3 for free.

"Thanks for showing me how to get a free PlayStation 3 and free Wii without having to spend a penny!" said recent website visitor, Ashley Parks of Chicago, Illinois.

About Free PlayStation 3 .net

Free PlayStation 3 .net has been helping people acquire the PlayStation 3 for free since May 2005. Learn more at www.FreePlayStation3.net.

Nintendo Wii Still On Top In Console Sales

url: http://www.slipperybrick.com/2007/04/nintendo-wii-sales-march/
Hyeon Chung

According to a report Thursday by NPD, the Nintendo Wii led the sales of current generation game consoles by once again beating out the Microsoft Xbox 360 and Sony Playstation 3. Nintendo sold 259,000 of the Wii game consoles with their new fangled controller last month, followed up by the Xbox 360 with 199,000 units sold and the PS3 selling 130,000 units. The Nintendo Wii has led unit sales in January and February, as well.
This certainly doesn’t mean that Sony and Microsoft aren’t trying, however. Microsoft has been flaunting a new Xbox Elite with a larger 120GB internal hard drive to entice more customers by holding more media, and Sony has abandoned their 20GB PS3 in the US and may be coming out with larger capacity console as well with rumors of an 80GB PS3 in the near future.
You might have noticed that we had to specify that Nintendo led sales in the CURRENT generation of game consoles. That’s because a little game console from a previous generation called the Sony PS2 selling at around $130 continues to leave all the others in its wake. The Playstation 2 sold 280,000 units in March, making a total of over 38 million units sold since the console was original launched back in Q4 of 2000.According to a report Thursday by NPD, the Nintendo Wii led the sales of current generation game consoles by once again beating out the Microsoft Xbox 360 and Sony Playstation 3. Nintendo sold 259,000 of the Wii game consoles with their new fangled controller last month, followed up by the Xbox 360 with 199,000 units sold and the PS3 selling 130,000 units. The Nintendo Wii has led unit sales in January and February, as well.
This certainly doesn’t mean that Sony and Microsoft aren’t trying, however. Microsoft has been flaunting a new Xbox Elite with a larger 120GB internal hard drive to entice more customers by holding more media, and Sony has abandoned their 20GB PS3 in the US and may be coming out with larger capacity console as well with rumors of an 80GB PS3 in the near future.
You might have noticed that we had to specify that Nintendo led sales in the CURRENT generation of game consoles. That’s because a little game console from a previous generation called the Sony PS2 selling at around $130 continues to leave all the others in its wake. The Playstation 2 sold 280,000 units in March, making a total of over 38 million units sold since the console was original launched back in Q4 of 2000.According to a report Thursday by NPD, the Nintendo Wii led the sales of current generation game consoles by once again beating out the Microsoft Xbox 360 and Sony Playstation 3. Nintendo sold 259,000 of the Wii game consoles with their new fangled controller last month, followed up by the Xbox 360 with 199,000 units sold and the PS3 selling 130,000 units. The Nintendo Wii has led unit sales in January and February, as well.
This certainly doesn’t mean that Sony and Microsoft aren’t trying, however. Microsoft has been flaunting a new Xbox Elite with a larger 120GB internal hard drive to entice more customers by holding more media, and Sony has abandoned their 20GB PS3 in the US and may be coming out with larger capacity console as well with rumors of an 80GB PS3 in the near future.
You might have noticed that we had to specify that Nintendo led sales in the CURRENT generation of game consoles. That’s because a little game console from a previous generation called the Sony PS2 selling at around $130 continues to leave all the others in its wake. The Playstation 2 sold 280,000 units in March, making a total of over 38 million units sold since the console was original launched back in Q4 of 2000.According to a report Thursday by NPD, the Nintendo Wii led the sales of current generation game consoles by once again beating out the Microsoft Xbox 360 and Sony Playstation 3. Nintendo sold 259,000 of the Wii game consoles with their new fangled controller last month, followed up by the Xbox 360 with 199,000 units sold and the PS3 selling 130,000 units. The Nintendo Wii has led unit sales in January and February, as well.



This certainly doesn’t mean that Sony and Microsoft aren’t trying, however. Microsoft has been flaunting a new Xbox Elite with a larger 120GB internal hard drive to entice more customers by holding more media, and Sony has abandoned their 20GB PS3 in the US and may be coming out with larger capacity console as well with rumors of an 80GB PS3 in the near future.



You might have noticed that we had to specify that Nintendo led sales in the CURRENT generation of game consoles. That’s because a little game console from a previous generation called the Sony PS2 selling at around $130 continues to leave all the others in its wake. The Playstation 2 sold 280,000 units in March, making a total of over 38 million units sold since the console was original launched back in Q4 of 2000.

Bill Gates says China to remain largest broadband market

url: http://www.turkishpress.com/news.asp?id=172269

Hyeon Chung

China is set to remain the world's largest broadband market after recently overtaking the US, Bill Gates, chairman and co-founder of Microsoft Corp, told a forum in Beijing.

"China has surpassed the US in the number of broadband users. And once this is the largest market, it will stay the largest market. There's an advantage to having 1.3 billion people," Gates said.
He noted that price constraints for fast, reliable Internet access were falling by the wayside.

"The price of broadband has been a limiting factor, but competition is bringing the price down," he said.

According to the state-controlled China Internet Network Information Center, China had 104 million broadband users at the end of last year.

China, currently a global leader in hardware, would soon become a leader in software, he added.
"Innovation here is really growing at a rapid pace. I give a lot of credit here to the universities. China will be a leader ... it's already true for hardware, but it will also be true for software," Gates said.

He added that Microsoft had China's affection for mobile communications in mind when it recently signed a joint research deal with China's leading computer maker Lenovo.