Austext

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Austext is the former

The news pages include the latest in business, national news, international news, sport, science and technology, and showbiz. The weather pages include same day forecast capital city temperatures, same day forecast conditions and minimum/maximum temperatures as well as current temperature, humidity, dew point, wind speed, wind direction, sunrise and sunset times, and an outlook for the next five days for major centres across Australia which was all supplied by the Bureau of Meteorology. The racing pages included a national TAB racing index which ceased operation on 4 August 2009. The general interest pages included items such as lottery results, daily horoscopes and a joke of the day. The service also carried a TV guide with listings for the Seven Network in its five metropolitan markets, as well as listings for other networks, both metropolitan and regional, until 2007 when they disappeared.

Closed captioning for programs on the

Closure

In July 2009 Seven announced that Austext would shut down on 30 September 2009.^[2] This was due to claims from the network that the technology had come to the end of its useful service life and is not commercially viable to replace. Seven also noted the wide availability of alternate sources of information now accessible to viewers such as Seven's own websites. Despite the closure, closed captioning services continued to remain available.^[1][2]

The onscreen closedown notice read:

The Seven Network started providing test teletext services commencing in 1977, with live services commencing in 1982 in Brisbane and Sydney.

The Austext service today is still provided using the original 1970s technology. This equipment has now reached the end of its lifespan.
Unfortunately, it is not possible to replace the existing Austext system with new equipment except at significant cost.
Austext is a free service and does not attract advertising revenue, so this is not commercially viable.
Seven is aware that Austext has many loyal supporters and we know that many of you will miss the Austext service. We sincerely regret any inconvenience the cessation of this service may cause and we have endeavoured to provide you with as much notice as possible.
Unlike when the service started, information currently available on Austext is now freely available from a number of alternative sources including over the internet via

Yahoo7

.

CLOSED CAPTIONING SERVICES will be unaffected and continue to be available on page 801.

See also

• Ceefax
• List of teletext services

References