Teletext in Europe “At last! For years I have been looking for a book such as Teletext in Europe where in- sightful and learned scholars investigate the history of teletext, a medium most often overlooked by media research. In a number of fascinating and pioneering chapters the book succeeds in telling the history of teletext as a medium in its own right, and offers a review of teletext as a medium which paved the way to what became later the new, – digital media such as the World Wide Web. Teletext in Europe is a most welcome contri- From the Analog to Digital Era bution to the history of forgotten but important media.” Niels Brügger, Professor in Internet History, Aarhus University “Though seemingly unfashionable in a world of superfast broadband and social media apps, this volume shows teletext to be one of the hidden gems of the media sector. Hallvard Moe and Hilde Van den Bulck have skillfully brought together a range of contri- butions from prominent media scholars that shows us the essential – though until now largely forgotten – role that teletext has played in the development of audiovisual media in Europe and the broader lessons to be learned from it. Sharp, insightful and engaging throughout, this volume is required reading for anyone interested in understanding Teletext in Europe better issues related to choices about – and the application of – mass communication – technologies and services.” Hallvard Moe and Hilde Van den Bulck Seamus Simpson, Professor of Media Policy, University of Salford From the Analog to the Digital Era Hallvard Moe is Professor of Media Studies at the University of Bergen. Hilde Van den Bulck is Professor of Communication Studies at the University of Antwerp. ( Eds .) University of Gothenburg Box 713, SE 405 30 Göteborg, Sweden Telephone +46 31 786 00 00 • Fax + 46 31 786 46 55 Edited by Hallvard Moe and Hilde Van den Bulck E-mail [email protected] www.nordicom.gu.se ISBN 978-91-87957-20-8 NORDICOM 9 789187 957208 NORDICOM Teletext in Europe Teletext in Europe From the Analog to the Digital Era Edited by Hallvard Moe and Hilde Van den Bulck NORDICOM Teletext in Europe From the Analog to the Digital Era Edited by Hallvard Moe and Hilde Van den Bulck © The authors and Nordicom 2016 ISBN 978-91-87957-20-8 Published by: Nordicom University of Gothenburg Box 713 SE 405 30 Göteborg Sweden Cover by: Per Nilsson Printed by: Ale Tryckteam AB, Bohus, Sweden, 2016 Contents Acknowledgements 7 Teletext in Europe. An Introductory Guide to the Book Hilde Van den Bulck & Hallvard Moe 9 PART 1: PERSPECTIVES 13 1 Why Media Researchers Don’t Care About Teletext Hilde Van den Bulck & Hallvard Moe 15 2 Is It Just Text? Raquel Meyers 31 3 What Is Teletext? A Phenomenological Description Lars Nyre 51 PART 2: CASES 67 4 Teletext in Flanders. A Medium Hiding in Plain Sight Hilde Van den Bulck 69 5 Back to the Future. What Teletext’s Past Tells Us About the Future Relationship Between Public Service Media and Publishers in Switzerland Manuel Puppis, Samuel Studer & Edzard Schade 89 6 The Old Reliable. Teletext as a Survivor of Digitalization of TV in Finland Marko Ala-Fossi 111 7 Super Teletext. A Social Shaping of Teletext as Locating Newness in a Media Convergence Future Pernilla Severson 131 8 The Icelandic Public Service Broadcaster RÚV’s Teletext Service Textavarpið and Media Change Ole J. Mjøs 151 9 Freedom of Information and Divides in the Digital Age. Teletext and Internet Use in Norway Hallvard Moe 167 5 10 Teletext as a New Media Promoter in Croatia. Surviving War and Transition Mato Brautović & Tena Perišin 187 11 The Italian Way to Teletext. The History, Structure and Role of Televideo Rai Luca Barra & Gabriele Balbi 205 12 Teletext and Videotex in France. From Innovative Social Media to Objects of Cultural Memory Lyombe Eko 227 Postscript. Lessons from Analyses of a Forgotten Medium Hallvard Moe & Hilde Van den Bulck 241 Authors’ bios 246 Acknowledgements An edited book is nothing if not a team effort. So we take great pleasure in thanking a number of people. A warm thank you, first of all, to Erik Bolstad, then head of teletext services at NRK in Norway, for asking us over drinks why there is no academic work on teletext, thus challenging us to pursue the topic. Thank you to publishers Ulla Carlsson and Ingela Wadbring at Nordicom for their faith in our unusual project and to webmaster Ronny van der Perre for the digital support. We would further like to thank Seamus Simpson for giving us the opportunity at the ECREA Communication Law and Policy workshop in Manchester to advertise our project and scout for potential contributors. Even more gratitude goes to the contributors to this book, who each share our belief in the relevance of the topic and took time out of their busy academic schedules to delve into the wondrous world of teletext. A special thank you goes to all the interviewees and informants in the various countries, many of them teletext enthusiasts. They provided crucial insight into key evolutions and characteristics of teletext. Equal thanks to the reviewers who helped us to fine-tune the various chapters. We are also grateful to the participants of the teletext panel at the ECREA conference in Lisbon in 2014, which provided a sounding board for many of the ideas and insights presented in this book. Finally, the book would not have been possible without financial support from the Bergen University Fund, the Department of Information Science and Media Studies at the University of Bergen, and the University of Antwerp BOF GOA (project 6245). Bergen and New York February 2016 Hallvard Moe and Hilde Van den Bulck 7 Teletext in Europe An Introductory Guide to the Book Hilde Van den Bulck & Hallvard Moe This book is about teletext: a “broadcast service using several otherwise un- used scanning lines (vertical blanking intervals) between frames of TV pictures to transmit information from a central data base to receiving television sets” (http://www.nielsentam.tv/glossary). To the contributors to this book and possibly to many readers, this technical definition will feel out of place as it obscures the rich history of a formidable if forgotten medium. Nevertheless, it is the basic technology of teletext that sets it apart from other media and that, in part, has been the basis for much of what did and did not happen to teletext in terms of policy, institutional setting, content, users and scholarly interest. Many contributions in this book will provide similar definitions, but mostly as a stepping-stone to explore all that has so far been left unsaid by this technical description. It is this gap in our knowledge of teletext in Europe that this book aims to fill. The first part of the book consists of three chapters that try to provide broad and, at times surprising, perspectives on teletext as a medium. As the raison d’être of this book was our perception that teletext in Europe constitutes something of a forgotten medium, at least with media scholars, the first chapter explores this lack of interest. As a case in point, we take the original and, for a long time, leading teletext service Ceefax of the BBC and the wider development of teletext in the UK. The chapter follows a traditional mass media model of communication as structuring principle to discuss various potential reasons for the lack of interest from media scholars in European teletext. Exploring rela- tionships between teletext and the media industry and policies, characteristics of teletext content and the specifics of teletext use and users, the chapter tries to find answers to the questions regarding this absence of interest in teletext and argues why we should not ignore it. Next, combining sociological insights and artistic experiences, teletext artist Raquel Meyers makes a case for considering teletext as much more than just a medium and, even more importantly, as a medium not in decline but in the 9 Hilde Van den Bulck & Hallvard Moe middle of finding its bearing as a tool for and product of artistic endeavours. Her account of the present and future of teletext is at once highly personal and artistic and, at the same time, deeply rooted in sociological theories regarding narcissism, technology and fear, the relationship between fate and fatalism, between art and hobbyism. Meyers dares us to embrace teletext as she does and concludes that teletext’s best is yet to come. In contrast, working from a phenomenological perspective based on close readings of theorists like Merleau-Ponty, Gibson and Scannell, Lars Nyre, in Chapter 3, takes a five-step approach to understanding human perception as lived experience and comes to the conclusion that teletext – different from nature, transport technologies, social events or television watching – is not to be regarded as essential to modern human existence. At the same time, he argues that it is the phenomenological limits, the pureness of expression, that makes teletext interesting. Having provided the reader with context and food for conceptual thought, part two of the book provides various country cases of the development of teletext in Europe. In “Teletext in Flanders: A Medium Hiding in Plain Sight” Hilde Van den Bulck traces the long – if dwindling – success of Flemish teletext, which start- ed as the work of a handful of enthusiastic “volunteers” within public service broadcasting but expanded rapidly in terms of content and services provided, institutions offering teletext and audience numbers. Against this background, the chapter explores the reasons behind the lack of policy attention to teletext in Flanders, if and how teletext developments ignited societal concerns, and the way in which teletext was seen to impact on the wider media ecosystem.