When technology outpaces needs: how did they think about IT development in 1985

The possibilities of using personal computers in business are enormous. As practical proof of these possibilities, word processors and table editors can be presented - they have become not just widespread tools of professionals, but also the means on which the daily conduct of business begins to depend. However, in the process of strengthening the current situation, difficult times are coming for our modern electronic applications.

These applications include teletext, video text and email. The first two of them are likely to cease to exist, and the latter is clearly suffering from much slower growth than its supporters predicted. The reason for not being fast enough is that in each particular case, advances in technology far exceed the needs of users.
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Consider teletext, the most primitive of the three above-mentioned applications. Teletext - continuous transfer of information on the TV screen. At the same time, the data is transmitted through framing blanking pulses that separate the fields that make up the video broadcast images.

The effect is approximately the same as if you were looking through the window with the blinds lowered, but not closed. You see the landscape outside the window, but do not pay attention to the blinds. When transmitting teletext, the so-called “grid” transmits text signals — although text, as a rule, appears in the form of a narrow strip at the bottom of the screen. The consumer, using a special decoder, can switch from a football match to a text message about the weather forecast or the latest news from Beirut.

Companies spend millions of dollars on teletext-related projects - these amounts could bring much more profit if they were simply placed at the bank at interest. Because users are ultimately interested in football. Teletext turns into unnecessary and unnecessary information.

The only exception is when this excess information is addressed to people with hearing impairments. Teletext technology originates from the transmission of subtitles simultaneously with the usual broadcast of the TV program, so that you can listen and read the story of the host. This is a great use case - and the only one, within which teletext capabilities can be used for a long time.



Videotex is a slightly different technology because it is interactive. This is a bi-directional system that allows the user to select the information or task he wants to perform. Initially, the choice could be made using a special terminal or keyboard, used in conjunction with a standard TV. Both methods included the need to spend a lot of money on something that users really didn't need, and both of these methods did not become popular. Over the past year or so, video teens have become actively interested in the world of personal computers. This change in the marketing course is aimed at promoting services - and, by the way, helps to justify the reason for acquiring a home PC.

Central to the new videoteks is the concept of home banking. For the overwhelming majority of people and companies, however, banking from a computer is hardly more convenient than picking pickles from a barrel with a toothpick. Programs for home banking, even the advertised program Pronto, sponsored by Chemical Bank, grow much slower than it was predicted. According to their creators, videotex services will continue to support such activities as brokerage operations in the stock market, tourism services, buying goods from catalogs, and even housing search services. However, I doubt that many will be willing to exchange real shopping for the opportunity to buy a new refrigerator or washing machine, simply by pressing a few buttons on the computer.

We are the nation of those who come to the store to “gaze” at the goods. With all due respect, I can only shake my head, thinking of the millions of dollars that are being spent on the development of videotext applications by companies that do not seem to understand the fundamental principles of using personal computers. PCs are needed to save money and time and for entertainment. Videotex has nothing to do with it. “We have been waiting for a lot from information services that are not supported by either teletext or video text,” says Michelle Preston, technology industry analyst at investment company LF Rothschild. "They simply do not provide enough value to come to success."

Now consider the e-mail, this new scion of mail services and numerous firms from the conglomerate of the Telephone Company Bell. Currently, companies promoting this service, called e-mail, also provide related services such as connecting a subscriber to the Telex network and delivering documents in letters to many points in the United States within two hours. They all discovered that by itself, e-mail now cannot attract enough users to exceed the cost of business from investing in this technology.

E-mail allows you to type letters on a PC or from a terminal, and then send them via cable, telephone modem or using satellite communications to a PC or receiver terminal. One of the so-called benefits of this system is the ability to save and forward messages. The user can send messages at any time and, unlike communication by phone, e-mail does not require the presence of the recipient at the other end at the time of the transfer. But after all in this plan and old kind mail works in the same way.

Considering all this, e-mail in most cases is no more effective than ordinary mail or telephone communication, which the first is intended to displace. In addition, it does not provide opportunities for the delivery of parcels, as it does another innovative system - express delivery service from Federal Express.

In addition, e-mail is facing a compatibility issue that has plagued the entire PC industry since its inception. At the moment, there are about a dozen services, including: MCI Mail, EasyLink from Western Union, Dialcom from the ITT Corporation and Quick-Comm from General Electric - none of these services can be associated with others.

The situation is comparable to the emergence of a dozen different postal services, each of which can or may not deliver messages to a particular company for which this message was intended. Before sending a letter, companies will have to determine whether it can actually be delivered.

The problem is exacerbated by the fact that e-mail does not have a central sending system. And there is no one-stop guide for subscribers of different services, which could help companies determine which potential email recipient to which service they belong to. Today, the solution to the dilemma for e-mail is seen in a hybrid consisting of half the e-mail, half the traditional e-mail, the embodiment of which are now the orange MCI orange envelopes.

There is a high probability that even before the general network of e-mail, e-mail, together with teletext and videotex, will be transformed into a handful of specialized applications. In general, from the point of view of technology, these concepts of information exchange seem interesting. But from an economic point of view, such ideas are naive and, more importantly, no more convenient than existing alternatives.