Google Groups is not Usenet.

[Orson Wells as CitizenCain]

Usenet is slowly but surely becoming "Google Groups"

No, it is not.

You can't know for sure, either...

Yes you can. You're just a moron.

[Orson Wells as CitizenCain]

Just as a fork cannot replace the meal, or a car cannot
replace the road, Google's Google Groups cannot replace
Usenet. Again, Google's Google Groups is an "interface"
to Usenet just as Internet Explorer is an interface to
the World Wide Web. BTW, the WWW is not "the Internet";
instead, the WWW servers are accessed via the Internet,
just like the SMTP, FTP, and Usenet servers are.

I'll put it to you this way, then... if Usenet ceased to exist, and
you can't claim to know it will survive "forever", then newsgroups
like alt.arts.poetry.comments will continue on through Google Groups,
as will the archives.


(Dockery the fool dances in the public square)




Neither of us knows what the future holds... who knows, Google could
cease to exist someday.


(People have wished the same on Dockery)

Google already has the Usenet archives, you know.

Not "the", "a". Yes, Google has "a" Usenet archive,
but so do hundreds of other servers around the world.

Do you have any links to anything close to Google's Usenet archives?

Usenet does not have "links", "links" are URLs used by
web browsers to access web pages on the World Wide Web.
Usenet servers are accessed directly via an IP address
and a port number, which is what a newsreader enables
you to do and what Google does for you through its web
page called Google Groups, except in a limited manner.

So, over twenty years of Usenet archives can be accessed somehow , but
not through links? Doesn't sound as permanent, or even possible, as
Google Groups.


(Dumbass)

I'd love to see something else that complete.

Then get a real newsreader and a Usenet server account,
keeping in mind you get what you pay for: free equals
few groups and low retention, and many dollars equals
many groups and high retention.

Any with over twenty years of Usenet archives, as is fround at GG?

Google Groups isn't Usenet, never was and never will be.
Google Groups is an extremely poor web browser interface
for accessing Usenet.

When Google Groups is all there is left, it will be "Usenet".

I was just noting what looks like a trend, being a Usenet lover,
I hope you're right.

I know I'm right. Google's Google Groups is a group of
web pages and Usenet is a world-wide infrastructure of
servers that Google's web pages cannot replace.

Again, are the archives accessable as they are at Google Groups/

I have two NSPs (Newsgroup Service Providers) and
neither have dropped any newsgroups, in fact they
are continually adding newly created newsgroups
(not to be confused with Google's "groups").
It is sad that ISPs (Internet Service Providers)
are buckling under the pressure from organizations
such as RIAA to limit or completely stop providing
their customers access to Usenet, but fortunately
most all NSPs are not.
Through Google's Google Groups you only have access
to a limited number of selected text-based newsgroups,
about 58,000, and no access to any binary newsgroups
(which is a real tragedy for you because if you could
access them the spamming of your stumbling-drunkard
videos could be increased beyond your wildest dreams),
whereas one of my NSPs presently allows me to access
109,193 newsgroups, and that's the smaller of my two.

No, I don't really want to get involved with all that binary stuff,
maybe one of these days.

That is not the point. The point is through Google Groups
you cannot directly access Usenet, you can only limitedly
interface with the newsgroups Google allows you to access
in a very poor manner.

Oh, wait, I have a third NSP, the one I'm using now,
news.eternal-september.org, which is small but free.
Like Google, it only allows access to text-based
newsgroups. Its current count is 31,185 newsgroups,
but increasing quickly; it's new and still building.
Get yourself a real newsreader and a NSP account and
access Usenet directly, the difference between that
and Google's Google Groups will cause you to orgasm.

I use the one that comes free with my internet service, but maybe some
of these others you mention might be worth looking at, thanks.

You use what that I mentioned? A newsreader? I mentioned
none. A Usenet server or a NSP? I mentioned only one.
Knowing that you are barely surviving on a limited income,
what you want to "look at" is a newsreader like Gravity,

Which is different, somehow, than the one my ISP provides me through
my email account?

which is free to use under a GPL or BSD license, depending
on the version you use. I recommend that you use Al Choy's
Super Gravity version 2.6 which is very stable, unlike the
"improved" yet unstable version 2.8.1 found at SourceForge.
http://gravity.tbates.org
And for accessing the newsgroups you have been accessing,
sign up for an account with Eternal-September at
http://www.eternal-september.org
which provides free access to text-only Usenet newsgroups.
Using a newsreader like Gravity to access a Usenet server
like Eternal-September will virtually blow your mind when
you experience the difference in speed and how newsgroups
and their articles (messages) are displayed.
--
Cm~

Thanks, I'll try that, perhaps.

--
"She Sleeps Tight" by Will Dockery & Brian Mallard (video):

(Horrible video that should be a crime in North Korea)

[Orson Wells as CitizenCain]

By the pricking of my thumbs, something stupid this way comes...

Well, I already know quite a bit about Usenet and Google groups, but
I
was interested in what you might have to add. You never quite got to
showing me where there's a better Usenet archive than the one
provided
by Google Groups, though, which is mainly what this discussion was
about, not just that "Google Groups is not Usenet."
Since you didn't understand my statement on Google Groups and Usenet
(although I did enjoy all your bits of information on Usenet), I
wonder about you sometimes myself, Cat.
Here's what I wrote to Cythera in response to her statements about
deleting her messages off of /Google Groups/, which I was pointing
out
wound delete them from the Google archives of Usenet, but not
completely, since there are some incomplete archives of Usenet out
"...Since Usenet is slowly but surely becoming "Google Groups", as
more
and more providers are cancelling Usenet service (Stuart Leitchter
just announced yesterday that his ISP had ended the service), that
will probably be true more and more over time."

Well old buddy Usenet cannot become anything. It will always be Usenet
as will Google Groups always be Google Groups no matter how you happen
to interpret it. Thing is Usenet is a name for a specific function and
segregation of the Internet using a specific transport protocol. This
cannot be likened to, compared with or morphed into an HTTP based
interface nor will Usenet exist if and when the last dedicated NTP
service bites the dust. Such need for a transport backbone will cease
and the end will occur. But since Google Groups to Google Groups
messages mirror differently you will still be able to use Google
Groups.
I really hope this enlightens you a bit.

Yes, the point I was making to Cythera was that removing her posts
from Google Groups wouldn't remove them completely from /Usenet/, but
only from GG.
But, since Google Groups holds Usenet archives going back past twenty
years -and seems to be the only location with such a complete archive
of Usenet-, and with more and more ISPs cancelling their Usenet
service, deleting Usenet posts from GG would be pretty effective,
since eventually, it looks possible that Google Groups will be the
main record, and place to post, for newsgroups like
alt.arts.poetry.comments.

Well if and when Usenet succumbs to whatever it succumbs to I suppose
GG will eventually become the 'only' record. Google Groups archives
date back about 28 years thanks to Google's acquisition of Deja News
archives. Deja at one point in the timeline hosted private groups and
the layout was not that dissimilar to GG.

With major ISPs no longer offering Usenet to customers, I wonder if Google
will
dump the service too. Everyone is making cuts these days, supposedly due
to the
economy. Though, I recall ISPs getting rid of full service packages back
when
the economy seemed to be booming. I used to have one of those accounts and
could
telnet into my shell from work because the firm I was working for didnt
restrict
telnet access. I learned the commands to access email, Usenet and even do
some
web searching. It's impossible to get an affordable full service account
like
that anymore. Back to the Usenet - I recall that a couple of rap members
archived rap to their own personal servers. And I am pretty sure they
referred
to other sources besides deja who archived all of Usenet. I may have a
contact
to the dark side of the net who knows something about that.
Karla

Perish the thought that our beloved Usenet would ever completely
vanish.

(Because if it DID, where would Dockery post his drunk videos?)




More likely, Google will continue to pretend that Usenet was
always "Google Groups", since they don't exactly proclaim too strongly
otherwise.


(Moron)



--
"Corning Town" by Dockery & Mallard: