ORACLE - BROADCASTING THE WRITTEN WORD.

ORACLE is a system for the assembly transmission and reception of written material, using the existing television transmission facilities and the ordinary domestic television receiver to display the text. The television transmission is entirely standard. The receiver, however, requires adaptation, either by means of an independent add-on unit or, more cheaply, by an internal modification. The system now undergoing test allows for the transmission of 50 pages of text, each consisting of 22 lines of 40 characters, and the experimental receiver adapter enables the user to select any one of these pages for display. The text may be displayed superimposed on the television picture, like a subtitle, or the viewer may choose to switch the picture off, so that the text is displayed on a neutral background. At the sending end, the text of a page is prepared in advance on a computer terminal unit. The various pages are then entered and held in the memory of a small computer which allows the information to be inserted into the television signal in the correct format at the appropriate time. When the page has been completed it can be transmitted, the time required by the present experimental system being approximately 1 one-half seconds, so that the total time for transmitting all 50 pages, in effect a booklet of written material, takes about one minute. At the receiver the viewer can, if he wishes, hold the text indefinitely rather than allowing it to be up-dated.