Level 2 was not that well liked hence EN 300 706 introducing Level 2.5 as its replacment
As well as decumenting basic teletext (AKA level 1.5 or FLOF) which the EBU SPB492 did not do
and of course WST did by means of a few scraps of additional paper ..
(I still have mine stuffed in the Green book )
...... and Siemens with their Megatext chip were keen on even more graphics hence level 3.5!
(Did any TV use it??)
IBC Technical Review 20 goes up as far as level 4 in explaining things!!! (like the banana!)
u.pcloud.link
The BBC used Level 2 from time to time for Ceefax invision but it was not easy to template
so pages tended to have to be hand crafted or at least tweaked!
Level 2.5 was quite liked for its putting pastel shades in place of the black Background!
and although DRCS and Object should have meant station logos were better
- the complexity in encoding and decoding meant it was not really taken up,
... and as all Teletext Broadcasters other the Teletext ltd (& Swisstext) all Cost money,
there was not the commercial imperative to make it more attractive for advertisers
(I remember one Year when Teletext Ltd Tax bill was more than the entire Ceefax budget)
In the USA there were really three challenges
As the NTSC line was shorter (And system bandwidth less) you only got 32 Charecters per TV line
the remaining 8 charecters for the preceding 4 rows were all together on the fifth line
and had to stiched back together
There was no obivous way of making money out of it!!! and it cost money and editorial input to operate
- and may take eyeballs away from TV Commercials!
For it to take off all TVs needed to have it - and the FCC was not keen on any mandation for a host of reasons
and manufacturers were not going to put European technology in their sets !!
![[-]](https://pres.cafe/images//collapse.png)
