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Prodigy Game Family Membership: A Journey Through Time

In September 1990, Walter Thompson and sister company JWT Direct (New York) launched Prodigy, a revolutionary online service that would change the way people interacted with technology. The nationwide launch was meticulously planned by ad agency J., closely following IBM's Systems Network Architecture (SNA) network backbone.

Prodigy's journey began in 1984 as Trintex, a joint venture between CBS, computer manufacturer IBM, and retailer Sears, Roebuck and Company. Initially, the company conducted a market test of 100 homes in Ridgewood, New Jersey to gauge consumer interest in a Videotex-based TV set-top device that would allow consumers to shop at home and receive news, sports, and weather.

The roots of Prodigy date back to 1980 when broadcaster CBS and telecommunications firm AT&T Corporation formed a joint venture named Venture One in Fair Lawn, New Jersey. The company's headquarters were later moved from White Plains, New York to Austin, Texas in 2000.

By the early 1990s, Prodigy had become the second-largest (and later largest) online service provider with over 465,000 subscribers, trailing only CompuServe's 600,000. The company claimed to be the first consumer online service, boasting its graphical user interface and basic architecture as differentiation from CompuServe.

Prodigy's host systems used regionally distributed IBM Series/1 minicomputers managed by central IBM mainframes located in Yorktown Heights, New York. To provide faster service and stabilize the diverse modem market, Prodigy offered low-cost 2,400 bit/s internal modems to subscribers at a discount.

Initially, subscribers accessed the Prodigy service using personal computers via copper wire telephone (POTS) service or X.25 dialup. Prodigy was described by the New York Times as 'family-oriented' and one of 'the Big Three information services' in 1994.

Throughout its history, Prodigy offered a range of networked services to its subscribers, including news, weather, shopping, bulletin boards, games, polls, expert columns, banking, stocks, travel, and many other features. From its humble beginnings as Trintex to its eventual closure in 2001, Prodigy played an important role in shaping the online landscape for decades to come.

Prodigy game family membership