Re: Minitel
It was used for more than that, but yes it was a large part of it.
There's a few important things to know about the minitel.
It was basically a VT100 with a modem that you connected to a phone line.
Then you dialed the (in)famous 3615 ( or other numbers in case of private servers, like the one we used to have at work ) and entered a code. ( there was also 3616 and 3617 services. 3615 were free the other two were pay services and in some cases quite expensive )
It could be CUM, it could be SNCF ( to buy a train ticket ), it could be lots of things... from the weather forecast, to being able to send emails, to checking your bank account, and much more.
Minitel was free for anybody that asked for it as long as they had a phone line, so it was in many houses.
That's one of the reasons why Internet didn't really appear in France before ADSL showed up.