A billion PCs have rolled off the world's production lines according to Gartner Dataquest today. No, more, the milestone was reached in April this year. So that would translate into how many thousands of tonnes of lead and hundreds of tonnes of cadmium? How many water supplies destroyed, how many tens of thousands of poisoned acres of Chinese farming land? Gartner's not saying. But imagine the transformation of economies, as the world presses forward to two billion PCs. Especially when true broadband (i.e fat pipes in excess of 10Mbps) becomes ubiquitous.

In Sub-Sarahan Africa 3 per cent have access to a phone