"France and French culture must occupy their rightful place in the global information society," Prime Minister Lionel Jospin declared in an August speech to university students. To do this, however, France must wean itself off the Minitel, a French-only network-computer array. Nearly 14.5 million businesses and homes use the Minitel, but only 1 million Frenchmen are plugged into the global Internet. To reverse this trend, Jospin is calling on his country's telecom authorities to make Net access more affordable and widespread, and for the media to get more French-language content online. Of course, embracing the Internet means opening the door to all manner of nonfrancophone material. "It's not going to be a problem as long as we have enough French sites on the Internet," says Frederic Paruta, a spokesman for the French Embassy in Washington. "Finally, the French understand that the Internet is more than a big Minitel."
- David Lazarus
ELECTRIC WORD
Microsoft Morphs into a Service Company
Death of Minitel
