[HN Gopher] A Global Look at Teletext
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A Global Look at Teletext
Author : aqua_worm_hole
Score : 61 points
Date : 2025-08-11 11:01 UTC (11 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (text-mode.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (text-mode.org)
| mvdwoord wrote:
| Thanks for sending me down a little mini rabbit hole, this
| triggered some memories on old teletext decoders for Amiga back
| in the 90s.
|
| Anyway, I distinctly remember my father getting a new TV with
| teletext around 1987, and I could play endlessly with that. Also
| amazing that up until way in the 2000s I knew people who relied
| on it as the primary source for basic headlines, weather, but
| also traffic information on trains as well as expected landing
| times for airplanes. Of course the football standings in the
| Dutch Eredivisie was possibly the most viewed page of all.
| Completely wiped out by the internet, but all in all a
| surprisingly long run for any tech.
|
| p.s. online still available (Dutch)
|
| https://teletekst-data.nos.nl/webplus?p=100-01
| clydethefrog wrote:
| >Completely wiped out by the internet
|
| It's not at all, although we can discuss the nature of the
| medium.
|
| >Last year, the Teletekst app was used daily by an average of
| 690,000 people. They opened the app an average of 2.4 million
| times per day. The news index on page 101 was accessed 1.9
| billion times in 2024, making it the most visited page,
| followed by the football index 801, with 530 million visits.
|
| https://nos.nl/artikel/2561892-informatief-en-zonder-poppenk...
| (Dutch news article)
| mvdwoord wrote:
| Still that many! Incredible. I do remember reading about
| Dutch teletext being maintained (content wise) by only one or
| two people. Fascinating phenomenon.
| duckerduck wrote:
| I just found out today that the Dutch teletext can be viewed
| through ssh:
|
| `ssh teletekst.nl`
| NoboruWataya wrote:
| That looks quite nice. A lot cleaner than the Irish teletext I
| remember with its very blocky text. I assume it is benefiting
| from modern fonts on that page and didn't look like that in the
| 90s?
|
| It re-confirms my view that the terminal can be a great way to
| consume news if the content is specifically created for that
| format. Just using elinks to browse news websites doesn't
| really work well these days. I wonder if there are any telnet-
| based news services (or similar) out there still.
| VagabundoP wrote:
| Irish Teletext no mentioned :'(:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RT%C3%89_Aertel
|
| I don't have terrestrial TV (saorview) anymore to test, but
| apparently its still broadcast according to the wiki.
|
| Teletext was very handy pre-internet, weather, news, TV listings,
| flight times etc, all on a feed.
| JdeBP wrote:
| In case anyone wants to dispute VagabundoP's chronology:
|
| The Internet was invented in 1973 and testing began of the new
| protocols in 1975.
|
| Teletext, in the form of Ceefax, was pioneered by the BBC in
| 1972.
|
| So yes, Teletext was indeed pre-Internet. (-:
| VagabundoP wrote:
| And in Ireland home internet dial up didn't really appear
| until the mid 90's outside of very dedicated ISDN setups.
| tgaj wrote:
| "Poland started with teletext broadcasts in 1988, the year before
| they exited the USSR."
|
| It's a small detail but Poland was never a part of the USSR.
| Could be changed to "exited the Eastern Bloc".
| MrDavros wrote:
| I remember getting my first TV with Teletext (and CEEFAX)
|
| I'd use it to look up Movie times at the local cinema and the
| weather forecast. We've came a long way since then !!
| benchly wrote:
| Nice article! I had rediscovered teletext for myself a few years
| ago, only vaguely remembering it existed (or something similar)
| in select cities in the US when I was a kid, but it was not
| something I paid much attention to. Getting interested, I began
| to wonder if you can set up your own teletext service.
|
| Naturally, you can: https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/create-your-
| own-teletext-se...
|
| For those like me who weren't familiar with the service or lived
| in a country that really didn't have it, there's this informative
| site: https://teletextarchaeologist.org/
|
| Edit: Sorry all, it looks like teletextarcheologist.org went
| dormant, so the archive no longer seems to be working.
| Kuraj wrote:
| Polish person here, I can confirm that x-rated stuff on teletext
| was very much a thing. I have no reason to believe the ad is fake
| layer8 wrote:
| Teletext still exists, and you can browse it online, for example
| via this page: https://sites.google.com/view/teletextonline
|
| In case you're unfamiliar, three-digit numbers on Teletext pages
| serve as hyperlinks. On a TV you would enter them on the remote
| control, in the browser you can just click or tap on them.
|
| There are also mobile apps for accessing Teletext.
| scoopr wrote:
| Probably mentioned on every teletext related submission, but the
| Finland's public broadcaster YLE still has an avid teletext
| userbase, if not through a proper TV, then through the website
| [0] (and there are mobile apps for that too).
|
| Some of the news listings are perfect, given confined space, but
| no need to be click-baity. See, f.ex. the news-in-english page
| [1]
|
| [0] https://yle.fi/aihe/tekstitv
|
| [1] https://yle.fi/aihe/tekstitv?P=191
| xvilo wrote:
| I'd like to add that Dutch state news broadcaster NOS now offers
| Teletext though SSH. Just type `ssh teletekst.nl` and you can
| browse through all their pages.
|
| They fully revamped their Teletext backend a couple of years ago
| to their own solution. They had archaic hardware still, and had
| to fly in some one from the UK (fully pensioned and well) to
| service it
| 5pl1n73r wrote:
| This stuff is cool as hell. I'd break out a CRT TV and try to get
| it working, but it feels not worth it without official NTSC or
| PAL broadcasts. Straight from the analog VBI on air or bust.
| horizion2025 wrote:
| I think teletext is what triggered my interest in computers etc.
| It was one of my first experiences with anything computer like.
| When I was around 9 years old I was visiting my grandmother just
| the day she was having her new TV delivered. This must have been
| in the late 80s and we didn't have a computer or anything. I
| didn't care that much for the TV itself but then he the TV
| installation guy wanted to show this cool new thing "Tekst TV"
| (Text TV) as it was called here. It was like a completely new
| world opening. I sat the whole weekend playing with it. They had
| satellite TV in the complex she lived, so there were 20-30
| channels and lots of cool graphics to explore. Back at home: No
| teletext, just 1-2 channels.
| cryo wrote:
| That was a nice read. I didn't know there were vector graphics in
| these systems. Found Canadian description of the Telidon "Picture
| Description Instructions (PDI)"
|
| https://publications.gc.ca/collections/collection_2020/isde-...
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(page generated 2025-08-11 23:01 UTC)