(27-07-2022, 06:53 PM)telebox2001 Wrote: That's the first I've heard about it. Ah, the interactive card. Wonder what was the initial idea?
Part of the early financing for the Sky digital boxes, because they were new and terribly expensive, was that they were heavily subsidised by the "Open..." consortium who were hoping that these set top boxes would become a major gateway for home banking, online shopping, etc.
As such the 'interactive' card slot was intended to be Mondex compatible (i.e. chip-and-pin long before they called it that) and backers like HSBC and others each contributed what became known as the 'interactive discount' which brought the cost of a Sky digital box down to something which people were hopefully more able to afford and more likely to be interested in. (This is also a large part of the reason why people were expected/required to keep their box attached to the telephone line - so that the convenient on-screen interactive services would be easy to discover and use without any friction.)