Connectivity Providers Database

From: Steve Huter <sghuter@igc.apc.org> To: randy@psg.com Date: Mon, 9 Oct 1995 13:50:43 -0700 /* Written 4:53 AM Sep 19, 1995 by researchdesk in igc:gen.internet */ /* ---------- "France on the Internet" ---------- */ From: IGC Research Desk <researchdesk@igc.apc.org> From: Jack Kessler <kessler@well.com> Subject: FYI France: France on the Internet -- telnet minitel.fr FYI France: France on the Internet -- telnet minitel.fr I would like to recommend to anyone interested in either France or the Internet that they try: telnet minitel.fr , or http://www.minitel.fr. The French Minitel now offers -- to 20 million users -- 25,000 online services, including online library catalogs, telephone directories, political action groups, hotel and rental and home - buying services, services for French trout fishing and mountaineering and pen - pal clubs, and acres of retail selling. On the Minitel you can find and reserve a book at the Bibliothe`que municipale de Lyon, argue about poetry with the folks at Lisie`re, buy a chemise at Trois Suisses, and shop for a lyce'e for your teenagers (or let them do it). And now Minitel connects to the Internet. >From any Internet account, using a Minitel account which you can obtain from telnet minitel.fr , you simply use telnet to get to all of the above. Without a Minitel account you still can telnet in and try out a free trial search service (option 8). Some interesting 1994 Minitel statistics: to add to the worries of those Internauts who still are trying to digest the magnitudes mentioned above (20 million users and 25,000 online services sounds perilously - close to our previously - assumed - to - be - the - most - gargantuan Internet, doesn't it?) -- 6.5 million Minitel terminals These are dedicated terminals, which you get in France with your telephone. They are supplied by France Te'le'com and come in a variety of models, ranging from plain little tty boxes, available at nominal rates, to more expensive computers and even a laptop. 600,000 personal computers using emulation software This seems to be a suspect figure: my own guess is that it is many times larger. The software has been distributed for free for several years now, as "freely copiable"; so many hard disks not counted in the above figure now have it, perhaps dialing in several - pcs - to - a - single - Minitel - account, as has been the case with the Internet. Traffic: number of hours: 110 million Traffic: number of calls: 1,913 million Phone book: number of calls: 784 million French phone book use is a subtotal here: the French phone book, being called by telephone users in France, constitutes about 40% of total Minitel calls -- something less than that in total connect hours, phone book calls tending to be shorter than others. This still leaves a respectable non - phone book total of 1,129 million calls in 1994. Total sales: 6.6 billion francs (exVAT) = $1.29 billion This is a large industry. Any reliable figures yet on the dollar - volume of Internet business? Any way of calculating same, in fact? $1.29 billion makes Minitel a fair - sized service in anyone's economy. Provider payments: 3.1 billion francs (exVAT) = $ .61 billion Some part of this total is what you get from the phone company in France if you mount your own service on the Minitel. Some of it then goes to your own overhead -- connection wholesalers, service bureaus, and so on -- but Minitel service provision is becoming an increasingly - lucrative profession, as newsgroup and "Forum" service provision is becoming on the Internet. The Minitel maintains a free multi - lingual services guide online, MGS / Minitel Guide des Services, which currently reports the details on 19,223 online services, among which now are the following: some of the online library and other catalogs -- | 1 |3617 BIBENSPTT |Catalogue des ouvrages du reseau |documentaire de l'ENSPTT. | 2 |3617 BIUP |Bibliotheque Inter-Universitaire |de Pharmacie : catalogue, prts. | 3 |3615 BPI |Catalogue et infos de la Biblio- |theque Publique de Beaubourg. | 4 |3615 CHINEINFO |Infos economiques, politiques et |culturelles sur la Chine. | 5 |3614 MEDVIL |Catalogue de la Mediatheque de |la Villette (acces restreint). [etc.] and some of the online commercial book services -- | 1 |3615 123LIVRE |Livre-Livre : catalogue et com- |mande de livres,disques,videos. | 2 |3615 1LIBRAIRIE |Alir : recherche et commande de |livres. Idem 3615 ALIR. | 3 |3615 ALAPAGE |Livre-Livre : catalogue et com- |mande de livres,disques,videos. | 4 |3615 ALCYONE |Catalogue et commande de livres, |disques et objets esoteriques. | 5 |3615 ALIR |Alir : recherche et commande de |livres. Questions/reponses. [etc.] A bug? and a question -- the project is "en cours": I cannot get the "F7" or "page down" functions, which correspond to "suite" on the standard Minitel, to work on my laptop: F1 and F2 work, but the others don't. Much also is missed for lack of the color and alpha - numeric graphics of Minitel, in a vt100 telnet session: these are supplied via an emulator, available from France Te'le'com, which I will get and test for its easy operation in Windows95 (has anyone done this? I'd like very much to hear if you have) and report on later. One general observation: Some time ago, echoing the thoughts of many others, I suggested here that the technologies of Minitel and the Internet would be merging. The report made here bears witness to this trend. There still are great underlying differences between the giant Internet and the at - least - as - gargantuan Minitel. But, increasingly, these differences are becoming transparent to the user. If I can telnet to the Minitel from the middle of my daily email session on the WELL... What this portends for the technology, and for networked information generally, could be even more enormous than its component parts hitherto have been: global villages which now span the Atlantic, increased international information - sharing and general prosperity and happiness -- also vastly increased net security problems, multi - lingual information overload (imagine that! and you thought it was bad just in English!), multi - cultural pornography possibilities, and a propensity to overload routers which suddenly has doubled, and all this before MicrosoftNet really has gotten started. But it still is neat at last to be able to flip -- quickly and easily, cutting and pasting in Windows95 on my laptop -- from my morning email to the Bibliothe`que municipale de Lyon online catalog, and back again. XXX FYIFrance e - newsletter ISSN 1071 - 5916 * | FYIFrance is a monthly electronic newsletter, | published since 1992 as a small - scale, personal, | experiment, in the creation of large - scale | "information overload", by Jack Kessler. Any material / written by me which appears in FYIFrance may be ----- copied and used by anyone for any good purpose, so // \ long as, a) they give me credit and show my e - mail --------- address and, b) it isn't going to make them money: if // \ if it is going to make them money, they must get my permission in advance, and share some of the money which they get with me. Use of material written by others requires their permission. FYIFrance may be found via gopher to infolib.berkeley.edu 72 and gopher.well.sf.ca.us , and it is in various online archives: the easiest to use is the PACS-L archive, reached via telnet to a.cni.org , login brsuser . Suggestions, reactions, criticisms, praise, and poison - pen letters all will be gratefully received at kessler@well.sf.ca.us . XXX end