Under an experimental license issued in 1978, KSL-TV in Salt Lake City, Utah, provided 120 pages of teletext information to its viewers. In choosing this system, the station had to decide between it and a videotext system. Although videotext systems permit two-way communication, usually over telephone lines, teletext broadcast technology is much cheaper. The cost for a decoder, a critical factor in the consumer's acceptance of either system, is expected to decline for both technologies. In teletext, access cost is zero, while in videotext the information provider has the option of charging users. It is possible that videotext's interactive capability and superior graphics will increase its penetration into paying households. Although teletext and videotext provide similar mass market services, videotext has substantially more flexibility and speed. Since systems currently being used in different countries are incompatible, establishing technical standards in the areas of data format, transmission, and display is of key importance. Current trends and the growing home computer market favor the growth of videotext, but KSL-TV's experiment showed the value of teletext as an interim information system. (JL)