Gates talks up voice recognition

The computer keyboard will give way to speech recognition software, textbooks will be ditched for electronic multimedia tablets and TV will converge completely with the internet in the next few years, according to Bill Gates.

The Microsoft chairman also forecasts unlimited wireless bandwidth, including in rural areas, as the technology "just gets better and better". 

Gates told delegates at the Intel Developer Forum in Beijing: "I'm often asked whether the technology revolution is going to reach an end. [Will] the improvement in the chips and the software start to slow down? The answer is we don't see any limits. 

"We see TV changing to use the internet, because now we have enough bandwidth to do not just normal video but movies or business meetings."

Gates, who in 2004 predicted that spam emails would be eradicated within two years, added: "Five years ago we talked about music and photos on the internet, but video was not mainstream.

"Today, video is very mainstream. We are just at the beginning of what technology can do."

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