rsnider@xrtll.uucp (Richard Snider) (03/22/90)
After reading the posting about Bell Canada's ALEX system and
recovering from the laughing fit that my boss and I had I decided to
tell what I know about it.
So here I sit staring at white on black letters on a 6 inch tall
screen with my noseprints on it. Yes, I am staring into an "Official"
Bell Canada issue ALEX terminal. The company I work for (Not the one
on the Org. line in this message) is planning on being a service
provider in the Toronto area when Bell here starts it up. I suppose I
am the techie that will have to worry about how it is supposed to
work.
Let me tell you about it... The media hype session that was described
bears no resemblance to what this thing is supposed to do (There isn't
even a joystick or mouse provided with the terminal :-(. The idea is
to clone the "Minitel" system that is in use in France and artfully
reap the same sort of profits that they do over there. Bell Canada
decided that they should go one better than a text only system and
decided that they will support graphics as well using the NAPLPS
protocol.
These terminals run at 1200 baud feature a bothersome "Chicklet" type
keyboard that would remind many of the original PET computers. The
drawing rate (Not considering the data transmission rate) would not
support refreshing the screen for any sort of animation unless you are
prepared to wait about 10sec or more per page. You can get versions
of the terminal emulator for your favorite flavour of PC as well if
you wish.
Its not all bad however, they have had for some period of time
(months) run a successful trial of the system in Montreal with
services such as:
- Message boards and chat lines (The most popular of course)
- Games (two player or more + against the machine)
- All sorts of self improvement services (educational, health, sex)
- Typical information (Weather, local travel, airline flights, etc)
- Services (Do it yourself law, banking, accounting, taxes)
Actually only recently they introduced a shop at home services and the
like (without pictures of the products, or panning shots of the
grocery store). As far as I know (haven't checked this month) there
are no banks on line.
It is fairly apparent that most of the services provided are along the
message board and chat lines as a cheaper (or not) alternative to the
976 services offered for the same reasons. Lately they circulated a
letter to all service providers (or would be ones) regarding the use
of "Animators" on chat lines or message boards available who would
talk to users as if they were another user. The remainder of the
letter goes on to describe how one user talked for $32 worth of time
to someone they thought was another user and tried to arrange to meet
them. Obviously they wouldn't and then when the user found out that
this person worked for the service provider he hit the roof and phoned
up the company and caused a few heads to roll.
I guess we will have to see how this goes in Toronto. If anyone is
more interested I will be glad to describe whatever I can about it.
Richard Snider
I disclaim everything, but did I claim anything ?
Where: ..uunet!mnetor!yunexus!xrtll!rsnider Also: rsnider@xrtll.UUCP
An unbreakable tool is useful for breaking other tools.