Get Ready For More Google Posters

[Mike Rivers]

Me, for one. Verizon dropped all their alt newsgroups a while back,
which didn't bother
me, but they just announced that they will be dropping all Usenet
newsgroups at the end
of September. Apparently they believe that we have newer ways to
communicate and
that Usenet has outlived its usefulness. There may be some truth to
that, and they're
helping.

Anyway, I've used Google before and for this newsgroup, it works pretty
well for me. I
don't want to pay for news service since I really only read this one
newsgroup. If you have
Google posts blocked, or you bitch every time you see one, well, I guess
I haven't
really been contributing all that much to rec.audio.pro lately so you
probably won't
miss me. But I won't go away easily.





--
If you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring and reach
me here:
double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo -- I'm really Mike Rivers
)

[hank alrich]

Mike Rivers > wrote:

> Me, for one. Verizon dropped all their alt newsgroups a while back,
> which didn't bother
> me, but they just announced that they will be dropping all Usenet
> newsgroups at the end
> of September. Apparently they believe that we have newer ways to
> communicate and
> that Usenet has outlived its usefulness. There may be some truth to
> that, and they're
> helping.
>
> Anyway, I've used Google before and for this newsgroup, it works pretty
> well for me. I
> don't want to pay for news service since I really only read this one
> newsgroup. If you have
> Google posts blocked, or you bitch every time you see one, well, I guess
> I haven't
> really been contributing all that much to rec.audio.pro lately so you
> probably won't
> miss me. But I won't go away easily.

I find Google's interface so lame that the ten Euros/year that
news.individual.net costs seems a bargain. And there are free services,
several mentioned over in RMMGA in the face of this situation, that
apparently work quite well.

--
ha
shut up and play your guitar

[Don Pearce[_3_]]

On Tue, 1 Sep 2009 07:02:33 -0700, (hank alrich)
wrote:

>Mike Rivers > wrote:
>
>> Me, for one. Verizon dropped all their alt newsgroups a while back,
>> which didn't bother
>> me, but they just announced that they will be dropping all Usenet
>> newsgroups at the end
>> of September. Apparently they believe that we have newer ways to
>> communicate and
>> that Usenet has outlived its usefulness. There may be some truth to
>> that, and they're
>> helping.
>>
>> Anyway, I've used Google before and for this newsgroup, it works pretty
>> well for me. I
>> don't want to pay for news service since I really only read this one
>> newsgroup. If you have
>> Google posts blocked, or you bitch every time you see one, well, I guess
>> I haven't
>> really been contributing all that much to rec.audio.pro lately so you
>> probably won't
>> miss me. But I won't go away easily.
>
>I find Google's interface so lame that the ten Euros/year that
>news.individual.net costs seems a bargain. And there are free services,
>several mentioned over in RMMGA in the face of this situation, that
>apparently work quite well.

I've just registered on the free service eternal-september to try it
out (my ISP has Giganews, which is fine). Anyway, I found it to be
actually quicker than Giganews with very good completion. I'll keep
trying it for a few days to see how consistent it is. I can't think of
anything that would persuade me onto Google - I'd sooner stop posting.

d

[Steve King]

"Mike Rivers" > wrote in message
...
|
| Me, for one. Verizon dropped all their alt newsgroups a while back,
| which didn't bother
| me, but they just announced that they will be dropping all Usenet
| newsgroups at the end
| of September. Apparently they believe that we have newer ways to
| communicate and
| that Usenet has outlived its usefulness. There may be some truth to
| that, and they're
| helping.
|
| Anyway, I've used Google before and for this newsgroup, it works pretty
| well for me. I
| don't want to pay for news service since I really only read this one
| newsgroup. If you have
| Google posts blocked, or you bitch every time you see one, well, I guess
| I haven't
| really been contributing all that much to rec.audio.pro lately so you
| probably won't
| miss me. But I won't go away easily.
|

I'm very happy with ... news.albasani.net .... It was a no brainer
sign-up, simply an email asking for service. It costs nothing, zero, zip,
nada. It has all the (few) newsgroups I follow. It allows me to continue
using Outlook Express as a news reader. What's not to like.

Steve King

[Mike Rivers]

On Sep 1, 10:02 am, (hank alrich) wrote:

> I find Google's interface so lame

Lots of people say that, but I've never understood it. I don't find
anything lame about it at all. It's different from Thunderbird which I
use with Verzon, but it gets me the same sort of display. I see the
topic header with threaded "tree style" posts under it. I can read or
ignore posters easily, and do selective quoting in my replies. What's
not to like?

True, I don't have the filters that I have with Thurderbird, but I
really prefer to do my filtering visually. I know what threads I'm
ignoring and which posters. And one big advantage of using Google is
that posts are always there. If I wanted that with my Thunderbird
setup, I'd have to use up my hard disk space and I'd lose them anyway
if I crashed. I just deleted posts from my computer when I read them,
and if I want to go back to an earlier post than one in the group I'm
seeing I go to Google anyway.

[Arkansan Raider]

Don Pearce wrote:

> I've just registered on the free service eternal-september to try it
> out (my ISP has Giganews, which is fine). Anyway, I found it to be
> actually quicker than Giganews with very good completion. I'll keep
> trying it for a few days to see how consistent it is. I can't think of
> anything that would persuade me onto Google - I'd sooner stop posting.
>
> d

I'm using eternal-september myself, and I'm quite happy with it.

AT&T dropped my newsreader service a li'l while back, so I had to switch.


---Jeff

[Erik M. Korte[_2_]]

On Sep 1, 12:59*pm, Arkansan Raider > wrote:
> Don Pearce wrote:
> > I've just registered on the free service eternal-september to try it
> > out (my ISP has Giganews, which is fine). Anyway, I found it to be
> > actually quicker than Giganews with very good completion. I'll keep
> > trying it for a few days to see how consistent it is. I can't think of
> > anything that would persuade me onto Google - I'd sooner stop posting.
>
> > d
>
> I'm using eternal-september myself, and I'm quite happy with it.
>
> AT&T dropped my newsreader service a li'l while back, so I had to switch.
>
> ---Jeff

The Google interface and search work great for me. It's not "old
skool" but such is life.

[david gourley]

Arkansan Raider > put forth the notion in...news:h7jjuf
:

> Don Pearce wrote:
>
>> I've just registered on the free service eternal-september to try it
>> out (my ISP has Giganews, which is fine). Anyway, I found it to be
>> actually quicker than Giganews with very good completion. I'll keep
>> trying it for a few days to see how consistent it is. I can't think of
>> anything that would persuade me onto Google - I'd sooner stop posting.
>>
>> d
>
> I'm using eternal-september myself, and I'm quite happy with it.
>
> AT&T dropped my newsreader service a li'l while back, so I had to switch.
>
>
> ---Jeff


I second that. Eternal-september has pretty good so far (text only).

david

[PStamler]

I've been reading and posting via Google for the last few months. Not
great, but it's here and I don't have to sign up for yet another
service.

Peace,
Paul

[garyvee]

On Sep 1, 6:00*am, Mike Rivers > wrote:

> ... But I won't go away easily.
>

Well, I'm hoping you won't go away so easily...

I too switched to Google Groups when my ISP discontinued usenet
support. It works fine but what I miss most is that it doesn't
remember previously read posts.

Gary V

[Michael Dobony]

On Tue, 01 Sep 2009 18:46:08 GMT, david gourley wrote:

> Arkansan Raider > put forth the notion in...news:h7jjuf
> :
>
>> Don Pearce wrote:
>>
>>> I've just registered on the free service eternal-september to try it
>>> out (my ISP has Giganews, which is fine). Anyway, I found it to be
>>> actually quicker than Giganews with very good completion. I'll keep
>>> trying it for a few days to see how consistent it is. I can't think of
>>> anything that would persuade me onto Google - I'd sooner stop posting.
>>>
>>> d
>>
>> I'm using eternal-september myself, and I'm quite happy with it.
>>
>> AT&T dropped my newsreader service a li'l while back, so I had to switch.
>>
>>
>> ---Jeff
>
>
> I second that. Eternal-september has pretty good so far (text only).
>
> david

I'll third that. No problems with any of the NG's I subscribe to and it
even has a binary I had cut off earlier by ATT,
alt.binaries.photos.original.

Mike D.

[Richard Crowley]

Mike Rivers wrote:
> On Sep 1, 10:02 am, (hank alrich) wrote:
>
>> I find Google's interface so lame
>
> Lots of people say that, but I've never understood it. I don't find
> anything lame about it at all.

1. Google Groups is MUCH SLOWER han any real NNTP server
and newsreader client. That single issue would be enough to make
me avoid it.

2. Google keeps tinkering with the user interface. Perhaps because
I use it so infrequently, it is different EVERY time I use it. But no
matter how much they tinker with it, it has NEVER been as
straightforward, powerful, and simple as plain old Outlook Express.
In fact, IMHO, the GG UI has proceeded downhill steadily from its
introduction several years ago. It is worse every time I see it.

3. There are free NNTP services like Eternal September (formerly
Mozarella), no need to torture youself with any kind of web-based
portal. I have used scores of web-based forums and NONE of
them come close to the usability of ANY newsreader client.
Did you miss the point that Eternal September is FREE? (Free!)

4. Just using GG (and posting from GG in particular) is effectively
*encouraging* their newsgroup operation which is THE major
source of spam, trash, and abuse on the Usenet today. Even if
YOU don't abuse it, you are encouraging Google to continue
supporting it (and thereby enabling the slimeball spammers).

5. (Perhaps somewhat OT) the Google Group Archives have
also been deteriorating in the last several months/years. I find
myself using it much less than I used to, simply because it has
become so unreliable. Frequently it isn't worth the time wasted
trying to use it, at least IME. I have found it frequently DOWN
(completely non-functional). And when it IS running, more than
half the time I am unable to find the posting I am seeking. And
some of them are my own messages, so I know they WERE
there, at least once upon a time.

I would be willing to give up the Google Group Archives if it
meant getting Google out of the Usenet posting business.
Google makes AOL's attempted destruction of Usenet look
like a sunday-school picnic.

[Richard Crowley]

Steve King wrote:
> I'm very happy with ... news.albasani.net .... It was a no brainer
> sign-up, simply an email asking for service. It costs nothing, zero,
> zip, nada. It has all the (few) newsgroups I follow. It allows me
> to continue using Outlook Express as a news reader. What's not to
> like.

Indeed. With so many very low-cost and FREE news servers, I
can't concieve of why ANYBODY would subject themselves to
the torture of using ANY web-based portal, and Google Groups
in particular.

[hank alrich]

Don Pearce > wrote:

> On Tue, 1 Sep 2009 07:02:33 -0700, (hank alrich)
> wrote:
>
> >Mike Rivers > wrote:
> >
> >> Me, for one. Verizon dropped all their alt newsgroups a while back,
> >> which didn't bother
> >> me, but they just announced that they will be dropping all Usenet
> >> newsgroups at the end
> >> of September. Apparently they believe that we have newer ways to
> >> communicate and
> >> that Usenet has outlived its usefulness. There may be some truth to
> >> that, and they're
> >> helping.
> >>
> >> Anyway, I've used Google before and for this newsgroup, it works pretty
> >> well for me. I
> >> don't want to pay for news service since I really only read this one
> >> newsgroup. If you have
> >> Google posts blocked, or you bitch every time you see one, well, I guess
> >> I haven't
> >> really been contributing all that much to rec.audio.pro lately so you
> >> probably won't
> >> miss me. But I won't go away easily.
> >
> >I find Google's interface so lame that the ten Euros/year that
> >news.individual.net costs seems a bargain. And there are free services,
> >several mentioned over in RMMGA in the face of this situation, that
> >apparently work quite well.
>
> I've just registered on the free service eternal-september to try it
> out (my ISP has Giganews, which is fine). Anyway, I found it to be
> actually quicker than Giganews with very good completion. I'll keep
> trying it for a few days to see how consistent it is. I can't think of
> anything that would persuade me onto Google - I'd sooner stop posting.
>
> d

You think we intend to let you do THAT?? Who do you think you ARE??

Yeah, eternal-september is one of the services mentioned in RMMGA.

--
ha
shut up and play your guitar

[Mike Rivers]

On Sep 2, 12:04 am, "Richard Crowley" > wrote:

> 1. Google Groups is MUCH SLOWER han any real NNTP server
> and newsreader client. That single issue would be enough to make
> me avoid it.

Slower how? Do you mean slower to display on the screen when I click
on a header? That's no problem for me. I can only read so fast, and
I'm accustomed to my 768 kbps download speed. Or do you mean that it's
longer from posting time to when it's available to read on Google than
on your "real" system? I can post from Verizon and see my message on
Google often faster than I can see it on Verizon.

> 2. Google keeps tinkering with the user interface. Perhaps because
> I use it so infrequently, it is different EVERY time I use it.

What I find is that it tends to forget (or maybe doesn't long-term-
store) my viewing preferences. When I've gone several weeks without
accessing Google newsgroups, I have to spend a little head scratching
time setting it up to display just the headers in tree format, but if
I access it nearly every day, that setting seems to stick for a while.
I don't have any quibbles with the GUI. Every one is different and I
can get along with it.

> 3. There are free NNTP services like Eternal September (formerly
> Mozarella), no need to torture youself with any kind of web-based
> portal. I have used scores of web-based forums and NONE of
> them come close to the usability of ANY newsreader client.
> Did you miss the point that Eternal September is FREE? (Free!)

I realize that it's free, at least for now anyway. Perhaps you can
educate me on how you use your newsreader (and newsgroups) that makes
the client so important. How many things can get in the way of reading
a message? How hard can that be? Or more important, how much easier
can it be than click and read?

I occasionally find a message that's all in one line and doesn't wrap
correctly, but I find that with Thunderbird, too. This is one place
where I'll concur that the "real" newsreader is faster. I can click on
Edit, then Rewrap, and I'll see the message in readable form. With the
browser-based interface, the best I can do is use the horizontal
scroll bar. Often I decide that the message isn't worth reading and I
just skip it.

> 4. Just using GG (and posting from GG in particular) is effectively
> *encouraging* their newsgroup operation which is THE major
> source of spam, trash, and abuse on the Usenet today.

I guess I just don't see that. In fact, I hear more complaints about
Verizon being a major source of spam. Spam is everywhere. If you can't
deal with it, you need to go back to reading magazines.

> 5. (Perhaps somewhat OT) the Google Group Archives have
> also been deteriorating in the last several months/years. I find
> myself using it much less than I used to, simply because it has
> become so unreliable.

This is a function of how much importance you put on reading
newsgroups. If I see a post that I think is really useful, I'll save
it on my computer as a text file, putting it someplace (and giving it
a useful name) where I can refer to it in the future. But I don't do
that often.

It's rare that I find Google groups inaccessible. Sometimes I'll find
no new messages since my last visit, but that's not specifically a
Google problem, it's a problem with wherever they get their feed. Just
as often, I find the same thing with Verizon. You will probably
eventually run into it with Eternal-September. It's only a newsgroup.
You aren't going to prevent a war by being able to post RIGHT NOW.

[Mike Rivers]

On Sep 1, 10:12 pm, garyvee > wrote:

> I too switched to Google Groups when my ISP discontinued usenet
> support. It works fine but what I miss most is that it doesn't
> remember previously read posts.

You mean that it doesn't remember that you've read them? I get a clue
from my web browser (Firefox) which remembers it as a previously
visited URL, and changes the color of the sender's name that I see in
the "tree" view. But that only sticks as long as I have it configured
(5 or 10 days, I think). So a post that's a month old will appear as
if I haven't read it, but if I'm following a thread, I have some idea
of where I am, and if I miss a post or two, or start reading one and
realized that i've read it before, it doesn't bother me.

If I've been away from a thread for a few days, I'll usually read the
newest posts first to see how far off topic it's drifted.

[Arkansan Raider]

Mike Rivers wrote:
> On Sep 2, 12:04 am, "Richard Crowley" > wrote:
>
>> 4. Just using GG (and posting from GG in particular) is effectively
>> *encouraging* their newsgroup operation which is THE major
>> source of spam, trash, and abuse on the Usenet today.
>
> I guess I just don't see that. In fact, I hear more complaints about
> Verizon being a major source of spam. Spam is everywhere. If you can't
> deal with it, you need to go back to reading magazines.
>

The difference between spam and advertising is very subtle IMHSO.

Carry on.

---Jeff

[Michael Dobony]

On Tue, 01 Sep 2009 13:00:06 GMT, Mike Rivers wrote:

> Me, for one. Verizon dropped all their alt newsgroups a while back,
> which didn't bother
> me, but they just announced that they will be dropping all Usenet
> newsgroups at the end
> of September. Apparently they believe that we have newer ways to
> communicate and
> that Usenet has outlived its usefulness. There may be some truth to
> that, and they're
> helping.
>
> Anyway, I've used Google before and for this newsgroup, it works pretty
> well for me. I
> don't want to pay for news service since I really only read this one
> newsgroup. If you have
> Google posts blocked, or you bitch every time you see one, well, I guess

What I "bitch" about is Google's refusal to reign in their user's abuse of
the NG's, filling them up with so much garbage that one has to hunt through
dozens of trash posts to find any legitimate posts. Therefore, many of us
block all posts from googlegroups.

[Mike Rivers]

On Sep 2, 3:20 pm, Michael Dobony > wrote:

> What I "bitch" about is Google's refusal to reign in their user's abuse of
> the NG's, filling them up with so much garbage that one has to hunt through
> dozens of trash posts to find any legitimate posts. Therefore, many of us
> block all posts from googlegroups.

I think I maybe see two or three a month on the average in this
newsgroup, with the occasional unusual outburst. It's hardly a
problem. If you had a GOOD newsreader like Google's interface you
could just skip by them without downloading or reading them. ;)

There may be other newsgroups where it's more of a problem, in fact
I'm sure there are. Feel free to block posters from Google in those
groups if you choose to do so, but you might lose some useful
information here if you have to do it globally. If you had a GOOD
newsreader, you could do it selectively (by group).