Date   : Sun, 11 Oct 2009 21:12:33 +0100
From   : robert@... (Rob)
Subject: Electric Dreams last night.

On 11/10/2009, Rick Murray <rick@...> wrote:
> You know what I remember about Prestel? How almost every page had a
> little notice up top that was like "ding! this page just cost you 20p".

Well, that depends on what circles you swam in ... I rarely if every
incurred a frame charge, and I was usually online every waking moment
...

>
> Ah, but could you effectively Prestel from a Spectrum? :-)

Most definitely - there was a thriving community.  ditto commodore and
amstrad users ..


> So's the Internet. Yesterday mom wanted to look up a type of cupcake she
> remembered as a child. Yeah... um... Americans like cupcakes like the
> like baseball, and "list of cupcakes" with all sorts of permutations
> returned more links than is viable in a person's lifetime.

Indeed ... there is now too much choice!!

>
> Nothing changes. Look at BBC (to a degree). Look at the Daily Mail. New
> York Times. Whatever. You'll see lots of places where people can comment
> on stories. Okay, most probably shouldn't, but at least they're a level
> up from the drilling sex-obsessed lunatics that comment on YouTube stuff
> (I wish there was a "turn off comments" option).

lol

>
> Anyway, point is, you have to involve the audience.
>

yups.. even the old print media has "letters to the editor" sections..

>
>> *90#
>
> *BYE
>
> Works on Econet too! :-)

:-)

>
> PS: Can anybody explain why viewdata uses '#' to mark Return? And for
> clueless newbs, does pressing '#' do the same thing?

because early sets only had a telephone-style keyboard to command the
server! 0-9, star and hash.  Hence pressing a number took a route,
hash went to the next frame on a page, and star introduced a command.
(*# went back a page, *00 refreshed in chase line noise interfered,
*09 ditto but included updates, but charged you again... *anything
else# went to that page number,)

For convenience, computer viewdata terminal emulators mapped return to
# because computer users were used to terminating commands with that
rather than the hash.  Sending a return character didn't work,
although it was accepted in the frame editors (to return the cursor to
the beginning of the line!)