Europeans will soon be as adept as Americans, buying cars and stocks, booking holidays, banking, and downloading software at the click of a computer mouse, they say. But some European information professionals say that although progress is being made, it is painfully slow. Even the much touted telephone market liberalisation is a sham.

They say a range of obstructions are inhibiting European Internet use. This includes the charge that a European culture of envy is behind high taxation and crippling regulation. This will cramp potential European entrepreneursand ensure them a permanent role as second-raters to the Americans.

"We need to change Europe's culture, where creating wealth is attacked as an activity that is somehow anti-social. If I succeed in the United States and come home in a Ferrari, people will gather around and admire it and congratulate me.

In Europe, they will mutter about greed, and vandalise it if I don't put it in a garage at night," said Marco Landi, president of Britain's BMC Software. Landi was addressing a session of an electronic commerce conference organised this month by US high technology researcher IDC entitled "What's wrong with Europe". IDC told the conference that its evidence pointed to a powerful rally by Europe in the race to match America.

"The US-centric Internet is history. We see Europe as big as the US in 2003," said IDC president Roberto Masiero. Masiero said the United States dominated electronic commerce last year. In 1998, about half the world's 150 million Internet surfers were in the United States while Europeaccounted for about 25 per cent. "By 2003, worldwide Internet users will hit 500 million and Europe will account for about one third of that, virtually the same level as the US," Masiero said.

According to British researcher Inteco, 37 per cent of US households were Internet users in 1998, compared with eight percent of Europeans. Inteco believes 23 per cent of European households will be online in the next four years, still some way behind the projected US figure of 58 per cent in 2003. The trend is pointing in the right direction for Europe, but experts wonder whether it is moving quickly enough.

According to Kurt Bertone, chief technology officer of Nortel Networks Europe, there is great potential for growth in Europe, but many handicaps must be overcome first. "If you have a great Internet idea and you get $ 10 million to invest, and you say to a US venture capital guy, I'm going to build the business in some country in Europe', he'll say 'why did you do that?'."

"In the US, there is a tremendoustalent pool, labour law is very favourable to start up companies, taxes are low on salaries and stocks, profits, social security and that stuff is all really low," said Bertone. "Things are changing in some European countries".

"Israel, and the UK is a place where you can do start-ups," Bertone said. Bertone believed that telecommunications deregulation was also spurring Internet use in Europe.

That's not quite how Laurence Blackall, chief executive of Internet Technology Group Plc, sees it. Blackall was asked what steps he would take to help Europeans exploit the Internet. ``I'd take out all those (telephone) regulators and I'd shoot 'em. Those monopolists at Deutsche Telekom, France Telecom and BT (British Telecommunications) have solidified their positions in the market place because of weak and ineffective regulators," Blackall said.

BMC Software's Landi had a longer list. Landi said he detected a reluctance to embrace informationtechnology and listed other barriers.