The first scholarly book in English on Minitel, the pioneering
French computer network, offers a history of a technical system and
a cultural phenomenon. A decade before the Internet became a medium
for the masses in the United States, tens of millions of users in
France had access to a network for e-mail, e-commerce, chat,
research, game playing, blogging, and even an early form of online
porn. In 1983, the French government rolled out Minitel, a computer
network that achieved widespread adoption in just a few years as
the government distributed free terminals to every French telephone
subscriber. With this volume, Julien Mailland and Kevin Driscoll
offer the first scholarly book in English on Minitel, examining it
as both a technical system and a cultural phenomenon. Mailland and
Driscoll argue that Minitel was a technical marvel, a commercial
success, and an ambitious social experiment. Other early networks
may have introduced protocols and software standards that continue
to be used today, but Minitel foretold the social effects of
widespread telecomputing. They examine the unique balance of forces
that enabled the growth of Minitel: public and private, open and
closed, centralized and decentralized. Mailland and Driscoll
describe Minitel's key technological components, novel online
services, and thriving virtual communities. Despite the seemingly
tight grip of the state, however, a lively Minitel culture emerged,
characterized by spontaneity, imagination, and creativity. After
three decades of continuous service, Minitel was shut down in 2012,
but the history of Minitel should continue to inform our thinking
about Internet policy, today and into the future.
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