Random Kraftwerk fact that younger people might not know:
The 1981 song Computer Love or Computerliebe from the Computer World or Computerwelt album isn't about falling in love with a computer. It's about the Bildschirmtext or Btx, a videotex system that was on a test run in Düsseldorf in 1980 around the time the song was written. So Kraftwerk were aware of it. It didn't launch officially in West Germany until 1982. Bildschirmtext allowed people to communicate with others via a telephone connection using their TV. The singer in Computer Love is texting via Btx on his TV hoping to find a date. That's why he sings "stare at the TV screen" and "I call this number". In the German version he sings "I'm calling Bildschirmtext".
The English version of the song slightly obscures the meaning. Prestel in the UK was a similar service that launched in 1979. Younger people listening to the song now won't know what Bildschirmtext was. It was before public internet.
Random Kraftwerk fact about the 1981 song Computer Love or Computerliebe that younger people might not know.
(for things like this I wish you could share longer texts on Bluesky) 🦊
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