With all the techworld's eyes turned on him, Bill Gates stepped to the podium yesterday to give what will likely be his second-to-last keynote at the iconic Consumer Electonics Show in Las Vegas. In the audience, tech bloggers were poised to transmit his every word in real time, even as Microsoft's PR machine queued up a streaming web feed. The lights dimmed, out came the world's richest man, and...on came the head nods. Rob Wright at TG Daily expected more of the keynote which he said, "turned out to be a mostly boring, uninspired and listless event. Gates talked much about the importance of digital connectivity, which isn't exactly a new development." And Wright was not alone. Asked one CNET reader: "Did anyone else have trouble staying awake for it?"

When it comes to public speaking, Gates is no Jobs. And perhaps we should be thankful the man has some limitations, though one worries the lack of charisma at the podium could prove to be problematic in his second career as a philanthropist and global health activist. Fortunately, money talks.