Did France invent the music video?

The French might have a case that they invented the music video. In the early 1960s, French companies developed the Scopitone, a large machine with a bank of short film clips. You dropped in your coins and the film clip, always a song, played for you on the screen.

Scopitone machines were imported into the U.S., but the genre didn't quite take off. However, they left a legacy of sometimes cheezy music clips (Everybody does The Twist!). You may enjoy some Scopitone snippets posted here, if you have Quick Time on your computer.