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As a non-French, I wouldn't say that being proud of the Minitel was misplaced at the beginning, as it was a great accomplishment for its time. The problem was s

As a non-French, I wouldn't say that being proud of the Minitel was misplaced at the beginning, as it was a great accomplishment for its time. The problem was sticking to it when a clearly superior alternative emerged - reminds me of the "not invented here" problem. Regarding "national preference", no EU country is big enough to make that work for these kinds of technology; maybe the EU as a whole, if there wasn't the big problem of language...

masklinn 9y ago
> The problem was sticking to it when a clearly superior alternative emerged - reminds me of the "not invented here" problem. One of the issues here is that the internet was not "a clearly superior alternative" as it had some aspects which were (and still are) significant downgrades. Monetisation is a big one, Minitel had use-time payment very early on ("kiosk" services with a 4:2 split between the service and the network operator, with multiple price points) and in the early 90s added secure standardised CC payment (new models had a CC reader/terminal built in).
- danmaz74 9y ago
  Well, if you prefer, let's say "an alternative that was obviously going to win on the market". PS As a consumer I find it very hard to say that use-time payment is better than flat access cost + many different ways to pay depending on what you use.
  - bigbugbag 9y ago
    It was not obvious that internet was going to win the market, there were barely any home computers in France vs a few millions minitel, there were pretty much no commercial ISP but local non profit ISPs and the national phone operator was raking in huge profit from the minitel and had no incentive to upgrade its inadequate infrastructure.
  - user5994461 9y ago
    You seem to assume that the internet is flat fee, that is historically not the case. The internet was pay by the hour or pay by the kB for a very long time. The flat free subscriptions only emerged around the 00's.
    - danmaz74 9y ago
      My first internet connection was through a 28.8k modem, I know very well that it wasn't flat at the time, and that's exactly why I said that "pay per minute of use" is terrible for consumers compared to today's situation, while the OP said: "...as it had some aspects which were (and still are) significant downgrades. Monetisation is a big one, Minitel had use-time payment very early on"
      - vertex-four 9y ago
        I'd say the Internet still doesn't have a very good monetisation system. Card payment is several times too much effort to use, takes a good couple of minutes, and isn't reasonable for a one-off service. PayPal and similar services are a mess, and not much better. The point wasn't that use-time is good, it's that there was monetisation integrated into the design of the system, and it was easy for the customer to use.
kalleboo 9y ago
There's one example where "national preference" worked for the EU as a whole - GSM.
- digi_owl 9y ago
  Even before GSM there was NMT, that demonstrated the possibility of a single standard for use in multiple nations. NMT was analog though and thus much more constrained in capacity. And GSM brought us the SIM card, that made switching phone or service provider as simple as moving or replacing a card.
bigbugbag 9y ago
I would argue that internet was not a clearly superior alternative. Let's just take one simple example:the minitel network had solved the problem of income for site provider, no need for a broken business model based on invading user privacy and collecting as much data as possible.
toturro 9y ago
By the time the Internet became big, Minitel was already very ingrained in french day to day life. Everyone knew the Internet was going to eventually win. But everyone also knew that it would take the Internet many many years before services matured, and became actually useful. While Minitel's technology was clearly lagging, it managed to provide a lot of very useful services that would take lots of money and work to replace. A rather good analogy would be the situation with credit cards in the US. The world has moved on to chip & pin (or contactless) while the US has stuck with magnetic stripe cards for an awfully long time

masklinn 9y ago

> The problem was sticking to it when a clearly superior alternative emerged - reminds me of the "not invented here" problem. One of the issues here is that the internet was not "a clearly superior alternative" as it had some aspects which were (and still are) significant downgrades. Monetisation is a big one, Minitel had use-time payment very early on ("kiosk" services with a 4:2 split between the service and the network operator, with multiple price points) and in the early 90s added secure standardised CC payment (new models had a CC reader/terminal built in).

danmaz74 9y ago
Well, if you prefer, let's say "an alternative that was obviously going to win on the market". PS As a consumer I find it very hard to say that use-time payment is better than flat access cost + many different ways to pay depending on what you use.
- bigbugbag 9y ago
  It was not obvious that internet was going to win the market, there were barely any home computers in France vs a few millions minitel, there were pretty much no commercial ISP but local non profit ISPs and the national phone operator was raking in huge profit from the minitel and had no incentive to upgrade its inadequate infrastructure.
- user5994461 9y ago
  You seem to assume that the internet is flat fee, that is historically not the case. The internet was pay by the hour or pay by the kB for a very long time. The flat free subscriptions only emerged around the 00's.
  - danmaz74 9y ago
    My first internet connection was through a 28.8k modem, I know very well that it wasn't flat at the time, and that's exactly why I said that "pay per minute of use" is terrible for consumers compared to today's situation, while the OP said: "...as it had some aspects which were (and still are) significant downgrades. Monetisation is a big one, Minitel had use-time payment very early on"
    - vertex-four 9y ago
      I'd say the Internet still doesn't have a very good monetisation system. Card payment is several times too much effort to use, takes a good couple of minutes, and isn't reasonable for a one-off service. PayPal and similar services are a mess, and not much better. The point wasn't that use-time is good, it's that there was monetisation integrated into the design of the system, and it was easy for the customer to use.

kalleboo 9y ago

There's one example where "national preference" worked for the EU as a whole - GSM.

digi_owl 9y ago
Even before GSM there was NMT, that demonstrated the possibility of a single standard for use in multiple nations. NMT was analog though and thus much more constrained in capacity. And GSM brought us the SIM card, that made switching phone or service provider as simple as moving or replacing a card.

bigbugbag 9y ago

I would argue that internet was not a clearly superior alternative. Let's just take one simple example:the minitel network had solved the problem of income for site provider, no need for a broken business model based on invading user privacy and collecting as much data as possible.

toturro 9y ago

By the time the Internet became big, Minitel was already very ingrained in french day to day life. Everyone knew the Internet was going to eventually win. But everyone also knew that it would take the Internet many many years before services matured, and became actually useful. While Minitel's technology was clearly lagging, it managed to provide a lot of very useful services that would take lots of money and work to replace. A rather good analogy would be the situation with credit cards in the US. The world has moved on to chip & pin (or contactless) while the US has stuck with magnetic stripe cards for an awfully long time