This reminds me of Microsoft Comic Chat, arguably the greatest contribution Microsoft made to computer science:

https://chrisgliddon.com/a-trip-down-memory-lane-microsoft-c...

Ah, didn't know about that. The concepts seem to be very similar, though. In US Videotel at least, there was a community function in addition to the various other functions the system provided (stocks, weather, etc).

Thanks for the info!