Usenet is a segment of the Internet created for the pre-web purpose
of establishing and sustaining text-only discussions...sort of a
sprawling, anything-goes bulletin board. I'd guess that far more
Internet users than not with less than 10 years experience have never
heard of, or at least never used it, since its functions are easily
duplicated on the web.
Long long ago, somebody figured out how to encode things like
applications, photos, movies, etc. into plain text, so that people
could post them in chunks in text discussions and other users could
download the text and reassemble it into a functional whole on the
other end. Usenet discussions are organized into a hierarchy where
their origins are part of the group name, and "alt." (probably short
for "alternative") is the beginning prefix for all the catchall
groups that don't fit in any other area. So, living alongside
discussions of TV shows, geneaology, hard science and Aunt Edna's
cobbler recipe are split binary files of software, pirated movies,
porn and lots of other unsavory things. Not surprisingly, "alt." is
also the largest and most-used section of Usenet.
AT&T has, I'm sure, precise metrics of how much use the various
groups get (I don't fiddle with Usenet these days but last time I
looked it had well in excess of 50,000 different discussion groups,
most of them long-abandoned) and has apparently decided Usenet has
become more trouble than it's worth, at least from the standpoint of
the alt. groups. So, they've removed access to a large chunk (or
possibly all, I don't know because I'm not on AT&T and haven't fired
up a Usenet reader in some time) of them.
If you want to go exploring Usenet, search 'Usenet' on
versiontracker.com and it'll give you a selection of newsreader
applications. In my experience, the various flavors of Newswatcher
were the easiest to work with (you'll primarily need to know the
address of the Usenet server at your provider so it can access that)
and expect it to take a while downloading the group list before you
can actually access any groups. Not as long as you would have in the
past, however. Alternatively, there are a number of third parties who
provide access to Usenet (usually by subscription) via their own
servers over the web.
On Jul 12, 2008, at 12:29 PM, Edie Marta wrote:
Riddles to me--usenet? And what was cut off, and what did AT&T do
again?
Clarification need for a woman with a small brain.
Marta
On Jul 12, 2008, at 12:25 PM, Ed Wiser wrote:
Yes, Russ the web got a little smaller yesterday. Many not realize
it yet as most have never used usenet but a lot was cut off
yesterday.
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:macgroup-
[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of R. D. Preston
Sent: Saturday, July 12, 2008 10:25 AM
To: Macintosh topics
Subject: Re: [MacGroup] Bellsouth drops newsgroups
…just more of the same: simply glorious and thoroughly
complete customer service provided by AT&T.
*PLONK*
--russ
On Jul 12, 2008, at 7:52 AM, Ed Wiser wrote:
As an old school intertube user I grew up on newsgroups and
yesterday Bellsouth dropped the bomb.
They dropped all the alt.** groups. Thought I would post for other
Bellsouth users wondering why their favorite newsgroup is not
popping up in Unison. This new fangled Web page business stuff .
Read here.
http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r20772682-Is-ATT-removing-alt-
newsgroups
_______________________________________________
The next Louisville Computer Society meeting will
be September 23 at MacAuthority, 128 Breckinridge Lane.
Posting address: MacGroup@erdos.math.louisville.edu
Information: http://www.math.louisville.edu/mailman/listinfo/macgroup
_______________________________________________
The next Louisville Computer Society meeting will
be September 23 at MacAuthority, 128 Breckinridge Lane.
Posting address: MacGroup@erdos.math.louisville.edu
Information: http://www.math.louisville.edu/mailman/listinfo/macgroup
_______________________________________________
The next Louisville Computer Society meeting will
be September 23 at MacAuthority, 128 Breckinridge Lane.
Posting address: MacGroup@erdos.math.louisville.edu
Information: http://www.math.louisville.edu/mailman/listinfo/macgroup
