Bill Gates reckons the cost of broadband is holding back the development of home digital entertainment services but predicts good things for broadband Britain.

Speaking yesterday at the Fifth Annual Microsoft CEO Summit in Redmond, Gates said: "There is no hardware limitation that will hold this (digital home entertainment) back - with one exception, and that's the cost of broadband communications primarily to the home and that's an area where progress continues to be very slow.

"Yes, cable modems are selling better; yes, DSL is starting to get together, but even if you took a reasonably optimistic forecast over the next four years, you'd still only see perhaps 20 percent of US homes connected up to broadband and in very few other countries, maybe Korea or the UK, would you see anything close to that level."

Is Bill off his head or something? Too much sun perhaps? ®

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