Date   : Fri, 17 Jul 2009 15:30:44 +0100
From   : robert@... (Rob)
Subject: Fw: Fwd: ITV Teletext to shut down in January

..And on a related note, I decided recently that since viewdata.org
has been lost already, I'd better grab viewdata.org.uk.   As and when
I have time, I'll be working on getting my paper and digital archives
of various online services up there, along with as much else I can
find, stories and histories, etc, I can manage.   Anything anybody
wants to do on teletext would certainly be appropriate to put there
too, if somebody wants to volunteer to manage a site.. Ian?

Just got to design the site properly ... if only I could <font="viewdata" ..



On 17/07/2009, Rob <robert@...> wrote:
>>
>> I think it's more that the broadcasters don't want to devote the
>> manpower to producing content in what they perceive (not entirely
>> unjustly) as an obsolescent format.
>
> Close ... the report I read about Teletext (the company who do ITV's
> teletext) said they were closing because it was on longer profitable -
> I imagine they get most of their revenue from advertising, and if
> fewer and fewer people are using it, they'll not get the revenue in.
>
> With the BBC, I'm sure it is more that technology has moved on..
>
>>
>> Technologically speaking I imagine it would be possible to produce a
>> reasonable facsimile of a teletext display using MHEG if the content was
>> there, but once the analogue signal is switched off (and hence there are
>> no "legacy" teletext receivers to worry about), the people generating
>> the content presumably won't want to be constrained by the 40x24 format
>> anymore.
>
> I can't say I'm impresed by MHEG and digital text services in general.
>  They are slow and clumbersome and I've yet to find anything usefull
> on them.  Analoge teletext, particularly in modern TVs with Fastext
> and big caches, was quick and easy to use.
>
> As far as capturing the data now goes ... do any of the client/server
> applications out there for sharing teletext on an econet cache the
> pages?
>
> Certainly somebody should ask if it's possible to get a dump of the data ..
>
> Rob
>