- China in 1999 had only three million homes on the Internet, but 310 million homes with TV sets.

- Now Hong Kong's richest family and Intel are linking for a giant new television/Internet venture.

- This will turn millions of TV sets into low-cost network computers.

- Thus hundreds of millions of Asians, even in poor homes, will have access to email, the World Wide Web and distance learning.

- The project will include voicemail for the majority of Asians who cannot type because they write in ideograms or phonograms.

Empire of the Son in May, 1999, issue, on "Richard Li's Intel deal that could crack the Great Firewall of China". McGill quotes Avram Miller, Intel's business-development chief, as saying: "The scale of this will be bigger than anything else that exists in the world."

DOUGLAS C. McGILL. Wired magazine