GTE mainStreet
Encyclopedia
GTE mainStreet, also known as mainStreet USA, was one of the first interactive television projects.
Internet
style content was available through this television service before the internet was widely accessible. mainStreet started in the mid-1980s and matured technically with rich new content from 1990 to 1998. The explosive popularity of Netscape
and the World Wide Web
in the late 1990s made mainStreet obsolete. The product worked via a Set-top box
and utilised the local cable television provider's infrastructure and the customer's telephone line
.
Internet
Internet
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...
style content was available through this television service before the internet was widely accessible. mainStreet started in the mid-1980s and matured technically with rich new content from 1990 to 1998. The explosive popularity of Netscape
Netscape
Netscape Communications is a US computer services company, best known for Netscape Navigator, its web browser. When it was an independent company, its headquarters were in Mountain View, California...
and the World Wide Web
World Wide Web
The World Wide Web is a system of interlinked hypertext documents accessed via the Internet...
in the late 1990s made mainStreet obsolete. The product worked via a Set-top box
Set-top box
A set-top box or set-top unit is an information appliance device that generally contains a tuner and connects to a television set and an external source of signal, turning the signal into content which is then displayed on the television screen or other display device.-History:Before the...
and utilised the local cable television provider's infrastructure and the customer's telephone line
Telephone line
A telephone line or telephone circuit is a single-user circuit on a telephone communication system...
.
External links
- GTE mainStreet (Web Archive)