I have to point out the public telephone company one in France: the Minitel [1]. This really could have achieved global interconnectivity, but for the stupidity

I have to point out the public telephone company one in France: the Minitel [1]. This really could have achieved global interconnectivity, but for the stupidity of telephone companies. Minitel was a terminal you could rent from the phone company, and its original intent was to reduce the need for human information operators. It was available in 1982. But it grew to have all sorts of services on it, even a dating service. It wasn't a "fraction of a fraction of a fraction" of the population, either - there were millions in use. I saw one in 1989. I even mention Minitel in The Big Bucks (https://www.albertcory.io/the-big-bucks https://www.albertcory.io/the-big-bucks), only mildly satirically. They "solved" the money problem: the charges would appear on your monthly phone bill. The execs were actually embarrassed that there were things like dating services -- that wasn't their plan at all. So what do I mean by "the stupidity of telephone companies"? All the other phone companies in the world, who were already connected both physically and administratively (through CCITT) could have easily jumped on it and made their systems interoperate. They already did through phone calls and payments between each other. They didn't see it, or if they did, they let the perfect be the enemy of the good. There were infinitely many papers on the "proper" way to do "videotex." Would a global "internet" run by the phone companies be better than what we have? Discuss. [1] https://history-computer.com/minitel/ https://history-computer.com/minitel/