Greetings, friends!

Does anyone remember Usenet? Or, given the audience, does anyone _not_ remember Usenet?

For those of you who do, were you active? When did you join? Is there anything you miss or hated?
How does it compare to BBSes, then and now?


I was born right as it was hitting its peak, so it was well into decline before I would have been interested.
As such, there's a certain type of mythical shine to it, and it's both fascinating and charming to see the roots of
modern internet culture mixed with people's full name and address.

I'm from an area of the country where The Internet wasn't really a thing outside of universities until the late 90s, and my parents were well out of college by the time computers came around, so I don't actually know anyone from Usenet in person. Hence, well, me posting here where the old guard meets.

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þ Synchronet þ Palantir BBS * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL

Re: Usenet
By: Margaerynne to All on Thu Jan 19 2023 09:27 pm

Does anyone remember Usenet? Or, given the audience, does anyone _not_ remem

The peak of newsgroups predates me too. Internet here was not widespread until the 2000s or so, so we mostly missed it.

BY the time I checked it out, it was a shadow of what it had been. The organization that managed the es. hierarchy had disbanded and therefore was no moderation or control over it, so the place was overtaken by flooders. Newsmasters didn't help much either.

That said, the protocol is still very handy. Gmane uses nntp to serve archived mailing lists from software projects.

--
gopher://gopher.richardfalken.com/1/richardfalken

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Margaerynne wrote to All <=-

For those of you who do, were you active?

When I had access to it, yes.

When did you join?

Probably in the mid 1980's when I was in college and had access.

Is there anything you miss or hated?

Miss: The number of intelligent people to have discussions with.

Hated: The number of morons who just wanted to have fights.

How does it compare to BBSes, then and now?

BBSs then: I was on BBSs before most of them were networked to other BBSs. So the amount of traffic was different. Most BBSs could set their own tone for discussions and kick off those who didn't want to follow that tone.

BBSs now: Most BBSs today have networked message bases (but some are still "islands" in the Internet ocean) so it's pretty much the same as old Usenet.

Today, most of the message networks (Usenet, FidoNet, etc.) are empty. On this BBS, I'm subscribed to maybe 30 message areas, but only about 5 actually get traffic.


... I don't have a solution but I really admire the problem.
___ MultiMail/Linux v0.52

--- Mystic BBS/QWK v1.12 A47 2021/12/25 (Windows/32)
* Origin: cold fusion - cfbbs.net - grand rapids, mi

For those of you who do, were you active? When did you join? Is there

nything

ou miss or hated?
How does it compare to BBSes, then and now?

I was on it (and pulled it into my BBS) from the late 1980's until around
1997. Some of the newsgroups were very active and still had a low signal-to-noise ratio, and were fun to participate in.

A few years later... very few!... I got back to reading some of those
groups. Hardly no traffic in them at all. The only one that had the
same level of traffic, last I checked, was REC.SPORTS.FOOTBALL.COLLEGE, but most of the traffic was about politics and not about college football like
it used to be.

I was disappointed.

There are still a few groups that have some traffic, and that still have
low signal-to-noise ratios. A few of those are gated into FIDO. But, like others pointed out, most of Usenet traffic that is not binaries are spammers and trolls these days.


* SLMR 2.1a * Only XT users know that January 1, 1980 was a Tuesday.

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þ Synchronet þ CAPCITY2 * capcity2.synchro.net * Telnet/SSH:2022/Rlogin/HTTP

Re: Usenet
By: Dumas Walker to MARGAERYNNE on Fri Jan 20 2023 16:15:00

For those of you who do, were you active? When did you join? Is the

nything

ou miss or hated?
How does it compare to BBSes, then and now?

Usenet, Newsgroups NNTP whatever you want to call them always had too many groups. Even in the early 90's there was over 1200 of them. It would take an hour to DL them at 2400 baud. I still prefered BBS messaging even back then and still do today. Usenet was where the terms moderated and un-moderated started. Then Fidonet had to have moderated and unmoderated messaging. What a joke. It was and still is a form of communism in my book. In the US of A we call it free speech. But we're always gonna have those big heads that enjoy "moderating" what people say. That's just my opinion.....I could be wrong ;-)
Regards,
HusTler

...Freedom is for everyone. Or no one.

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þ Synchronet þ Chaotic Bliss BBS - cbliss.synchro.net

Re: Usenet
By: Arelor to Margaerynne on Fri Jan 20 2023 05:22 am

BY the time I checked it out, it was a shadow of what it had been. The organization that managed the es. hierarchy
had disbanded and therefore was no moderation or control over it, so the place was overtaken by flooders.
Newsmasters didn't help much either.

That's tragic! Platforms come and go, but tracing the trajectory from high-end telcom scientists to college students to AOL has the same feeling as watching the fall of Rome. Of course, had I been alive, I likely would have been one of the knuckleheads responsible. (Hey, just look at what I'm doing right now!)

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þ Synchronet þ Palantir BBS * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL

Re: Usenet
By: Hustler to Dumas Walker on Fri Jan 20 2023 08:48 pm

Usenet, Newsgroups NNTP whatever you want to call them always had too many groups. Even in the early 90's there was
over 1200 of them. It would take an hour to DL them at 2400 baud.

I suppose that's one aspect of it that I didn't think about. When you can flip through forty years of history in half an hour, you tend to forget about the download speeds.

Weren't BBSes also pretty slow, though? I imagine a morning/afternoon message sweep would be simpler than having
to keep track of timebanking, but, again, that's coming from someone who never had to manage a CompuServ subscription.

I still prefered BBS messaging even back then and
still do today. Usenet was where the terms moderated and un-moderated started. Then Fidonet had to have moderated
and unmoderated messaging. What a joke. It was and still is a form of communism in my book. In the US of A we call
it free speech. But we're always gonna have those big heads that enjoy "moderating" what people say. That's just my
opinion.....I could be wrong ;-)

I think the issue is that moderation isn't a one-size-fits-all approach.

There are some spaces on the internet that I enjoy particularly because they're very heavily moderated (academic mailing lists that don't tolerate spam or speculation), but small community-regulated spaces (here, forums, etc.) are
usually a lot cozier.

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þ Synchronet þ Palantir BBS * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL

Re: Usenet
By: Dumas Walker to MRO on Sun Jan 22 2023 09:39 am

the web wasn't slow on dialup until they started adding all the bullshit t

e

ages.

Exactly.

* SLMR 2.1a * Profanity, the language of computer professionals

Speaking of vintage computing, I found a search site called Frogfind that is geared towards older machines accessing the internet

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þ Synchronet þ The Cave BBS - Since 1992 - cavebbs.homeip.net

Re: Usenet
By: Margaerynne to All on Thu Jan 19 2023 21:27:39

Does anyone remember Usenet? Or, given the audience, does anyone _not_ remember Usenet?

Yes, I do.

For those of you who do, were you active? When did you join? Is there anything you miss or hated?

Mostly in the mid 90's for 10 years or so. I miss it being a useful source of information and hate the amount of spam there is now, thanks mainly to Google.

How does it compare to BBSes, then and now?

It doesn't. usenet is just a collection of articles. Bulletin boards offer that but more.

I'm from an area of the country where The Internet wasn't really a thing outside of universities until the late 90s, and my parents were well out of college by the time computers came around, so I don't actually know anyone from Usenet in person. Hence, well, me posting here where the old guard meets.

I run a usenet server. I'm trying to find a way to offer the service to other sysops (myself included) without having to import every messages into Synchronet. I have a way, but it would require the talents of a third party to code a usenet client in javascript for Synchronet so it appears to be a non-starter. I'm really not that good at JS. I can get by, but not to the level of complexity it would take.

Nelgin wrote to Margaerynne <=-

<SNIP>

I run a usenet server. I'm trying to find a way to offer the
service to other sysops (myself included) without having to
import every messages into Synchronet. I have a way, but it would
require the talents of a third party to code a usenet client in
javascript for Synchronet so it appears to be a non-starter. I'm
really not that good at JS. I can get by, but not to the level of complexity it would take.

As a former (90's and 00's) fairly heavy Usenet user, I don't think I
would want to use a BBS to access Usenet articles. Just seems like an awkward/unnecessary "middle-man" way of doing it. Any serious Usenet
user will already have a preferred client (my app of choice is Pan), and
those are much more efficient/adapted to Usenet ways than doing it
through a BBS. Just doesn't seem that it would offer any advantages
over using an external client.


... All hope abandon, ye who enter messages here.
--- MultiMail/Linux v0.52
þ Synchronet þ Palantir BBS * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL

Re: Re: Usenet
By: Gamgee to Nelgin on Wed Jan 25 2023 07:51 am

As a former (90's and 00's) fairly heavy Usenet user, I don't think I would want to use a BBS to access Usenet articles. Just seems like an awkward/unnecessary "middle-man" way of doing it. Any serious Usenet
user will already have a preferred client (my app of choice is Pan), and those are much more efficient/adapted to Usenet ways than doing it through a BBS. Just doesn't seem that it would offer any advantages
over using an external client.

Yeah, I've debated whether having newsgroups on a BBS these days ia useful or not. People can easily access a newsgroup server directly with their preferred news reader/client.

Nightfox

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þ Synchronet þ Digital Distortion: digitaldistortionbbs.com

Nelgin wrote to Margaerynne <=-

Mostly in the mid 90's for 10 years or so. I miss it being a useful
source of information and hate the amount of spam there is now, thanks mainly to Google.

How does it compare to BBSes, then and now?

It doesn't. usenet is just a collection of articles. Bulletin boards
offer that but more.

There was a ba.* hierarchy for the San Francisco bay area, I don't know
if there were other local hierarchies as busy as it. There were
culture, housing, politics, radio, nightlife, dating and more newsgroups
that got quite a following for a time. It felt like a "bridge" from
BBSes to the internet while still keeping the local flavor.


... Powered By Celeron (Tualatin). Engineered for the future.
--- MultiMail/Win v0.52
þ Synchronet þ .: realitycheckbbs.org :: scientia potentia est :.

Nightfox wrote to Gamgee <=-

Re: Re: Usenet
By: Gamgee to Nelgin on Wed Jan 25 2023 07:51 am

As a former (90's and 00's) fairly heavy Usenet user, I don't think I would want to use a BBS to access Usenet articles. Just seems like an awkward/unnecessary "middle-man" way of doing it. Any serious Usenet
user will already have a preferred client (my app of choice is Pan), and those are much more efficient/adapted to Usenet ways than doing it
through a BBS. Just doesn't seem that it would offer any advantages
over using an external client.

Yeah, I've debated whether having newsgroups on a BBS these days
ia useful or not.

It's an easy debate for me... not useful.

People can easily access a newsgroup server
directly with their preferred news reader/client.

Yes. That's what I said up there above. ;-)



... Enter any 12 digit prime number to continue.
--- MultiMail/Linux v0.52
þ Synchronet þ Palantir BBS * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL

Re: Re: Usenet
By: Nightfox to Gamgee on Wed Jan 25 2023 09:43 am

Yeah, I've debated whether having newsgroups on a BBS these days ia useful or not. People can easily access a newsgroup server directly with their preferred news reader/client.

I gate in usenet to my BBS mostly out of habit, from a day when people didn't have access to usenet. Those days, and usenet, are (mostly) long gone now.

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þ Synchronet þ .: realitycheckbbs.org :: scientia potentia est :.

Re: Re: Usenet
By: poindexter FORTRAN to Nelgin on Wed Jan 25 2023 06:29 am

There was a ba.* hierarchy for the San Francisco bay area, I don't know
if there were other local hierarchies as busy as it. There were
culture, housing, politics, radio, nightlife, dating and more newsgroups that got quite a following for a time. It felt like a "bridge" from
BBSes to the internet while still keeping the local flavor.

That's the real tragedy for me -- all the smaller hierarchies that aren't usually included in the Big 8/Alt dumps.

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þ Synchronet þ Palantir BBS * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL

As a former (90's and 00's) fairly heavy Usenet user, I don't think I
would want to use a BBS to access Usenet articles. Just seems like an awkward/unnecessary "middle-man" way of doing it. Any serious Usenet
user will already have a preferred client (my app of choice is Pan), and those are much more efficient/adapted to Usenet ways than doing it
through a BBS. Just doesn't seem that it would offer any advantages
over using an external client.

Once upon a time, before widespread internet access, it was often the only
way a person could access Usenet. That has not been true for a long time, though, so I would have to agree with you.


* SLMR 2.1a * Have a (cute) electrician check your shorts.

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þ Synchronet þ CAPCITY2 * capcity2.synchro.net * Telnet/SSH:2022/Rlogin/HTTP

Re: Usenet
By: Margaerynne to All on Thu Jan 19 2023 09:27 pm

Yep, I was a regular contributor to comp.os.unix and comp.os.linux for a few years in the early to late 90's. My usual handle was
DocAliquot :>}. And of course, like most HS and college guys, a frequent downloader of the alt binary sleaze. It's sad to see the wasteland Usenet has become. It REALLY started going to hell in a handbasket soon after UUNET was sold to Sprint around 2002, and Sprint let the spam posters run amok.

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þ Synchronet þ Vertrauen þ Home of Synchronet þ [vert/cvs/bbs].synchro.net

Re: Usenet
By: Margaerynne to All on Thu Jan 19 2023 09:27 pm

For those of you who do, were you active? When did you join? Is there anythi How does it compare to BBSes, then and now?

I was active in a few hobby related usenets that were mostly positive experiences. I think the common goal of the hobby kept people polite.
These lasted into the Google Groups era for awhile until web-based forums took slowly took over.


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þ Synchronet þ The Crack in Time BBS - crackintimebbs.ddns.net:2323

Re: Re: Usenet
By: poindexter FORTRAN to Nelgin on Wed Jan 25 2023 06:29:00

There was a ba.* hierarchy for the San Francisco bay area, I don't know
if there were other local hierarchies as busy as it. There were
culture, housing, politics, radio, nightlife, dating and more newsgroups that got quite a following for a time. It felt like a "bridge" from
BBSes to the internet while still keeping the local flavor.

DFW (Dallas-Fort Worth) had some very active newsgroups. There's still the occasional post.

I used to post on alt.games.nintendo.pokemon on Google Groups about 10 years ago or so.

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þ Synchronet þ thePharcyde_ telnet://bbs.pharcyde.org (Wisconsin)

Re: Re: Usenet
By: Dr. What to Margaerynne on Fri Jan 20 2023 07:45 am

Today, most of the message networks (Usenet, FidoNet, etc.) are empty. On this BBS, I'm subscribed to maybe 30 message areas, but only about 5 actually get traffic.

If I can ask what five message networks get any traffic at all, I know
fsxnet does but seem not see any of the others.

It would be interesting to have more that has traffic.



-*|04Hav|12o|04k|07*-



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þ Synchronet þ Anarchy BBS - The Villages,FL

Havok wrote to Dr. What <=-

If I can ask what five message networks get any traffic at all, I
know
fsxnet does but seem not see any of the others.

It would be interesting to have more that has traffic.

That's a good question. I download my messages on this BBS, so it's hard to see what networks.

There's this one. It's prefixed with "DN-", so I'm not sure what network
that is.

It looks like 3 of them are fsxnet (General, Mystic and BBS support).

I think the other two are FidoNet (Memories and Politics).


... "640K ought to be enough for anybody." (Bill Gates, 1981)
___ MultiMail/Linux v0.52

--- Mystic BBS/QWK v1.12 A47 2021/12/25 (Windows/32)
* Origin: cold fusion - cfbbs.net - grand rapids, mi

Re: Re: Usenet
By: Dr. What to Havok on Tue Jan 31 2023 07:29 am

There's this one. It's prefixed with "DN-", so I'm not sure what network that is.

It's Dove-Net.

Nightfox

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þ Synchronet þ Digital Distortion: digitaldistortionbbs.com

Re: Re: Usenet
By: Dr. What to Havok on Tue Jan 31 2023 07:29 am

There's this one. It's prefixed with "DN-", so I'm not sure what network that is.

DOVE-Net. This is DOVE-Net General.
--
digital man (rob)

Rush quote #67:
He's noble enough to win the world, but weak enough to lose it .. New World Man Norco, CA WX: 53.2øF, 17.0% humidity, 2 mph W wind, 0.00 inches rain/24hrs
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þ Synchronet þ Vertrauen þ Home of Synchronet þ [vert/cvs/bbs].synchro.net

There's this one. It's prefixed with "DN-", so I'm not sure what network that is.

This one is indeed Dovenet.


* SLMR 2.1a * Never draw fire, it irritates everyone around you.

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Re: Re: Usenet
By: Havok to Dr. What on Mon Jan 30 2023 07:53 pm

Today, most of the message networks (Usenet, FidoNet, etc.) are empty. On this BBS, I'm subscribed to maybe 30 message areas, but only about 5 actually get traffic.

If I can ask what five message networks get any traffic at all, I know
fsxnet does but seem not see any of the others.

I'm starting to build that profile:
https://clrghouz.bbs.dege.au/about



...ëîåï

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þ Synchronet þ AnsiTEX bringing back videotex but with ANSI

Re: Re: Usenet
By: Dr. What to Havok on Tue Jan 31 2023 07:29 am

That's a good question. I download my messages on this BBS, so it's hard to see what networks.

So I see it is pretty much the same for you, I'm scratching my head trying
to figure out what is up. Back in the day with two modems I noticed much
more traffic in the networks and for that matter last year was more busy.

Between Dove-Net and FSXNET they are really the only networks with any traffic
of any kind.

Hard to figure out!

Thanks for the reply...


-*|04Hav|12o|04k|07*-

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þ Synchronet þ Anarchy BBS - The Villages,FL

Re: Re: Usenet
By: deon to Havok on Wed Feb 01 2023 09:11 am

I'm starting to build that profile:
https://clrghouz.bbs.dege.au/about

Very cool I'm looking forward to seeing it when your finished.

I don't know about the other feeds but sure would be nice if they
had a search lookup for the feed your looking for.

Laughing the eyes are getting old...


-*|04Hav|12o|04k|07*-

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þ Synchronet þ Anarchy BBS - The Villages,FL

Quoting Deon to Havok <=-

If I can ask what five message networks get any traffic at all, I know
fsxnet does but seem not see any of the others.

I'm starting to build that profile:
https://clrghouz.bbs.dege.au/about

Interesting site Deon, thanks for your efforts!

Cougar


... Back in my day, 56k was high speed!

___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.20

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þ Synchronet þ Vertrauen þ Home of Synchronet þ [vert/cvs/bbs].synchro.net

A new ChatGPT project!

yeah we can see who has the oldest archive of dovenet msgs, feed them into a database and have fake users ask questions and argue. ---

It would probably create more intelligent discussions than some of the
people in the FidoNet Politics group. :)

Someone supposedly exposed that ChatGPT has political leanings of its own
by asking it to write a nice poem about Trump and about Biden.

For Biden, it composed a long, glowing poem of 12-16 lines.

For Trump, it refused on the grounds that it might be political.


* SLMR 2.1a * Be reasonable......do it my way.

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þ Synchronet þ CAPCITY2 * capcity2.synchro.net * Telnet/SSH:2022/Rlogin/HTTP

For Biden, it composed a long, glowing poem of 12-16 lines.

so instead of artificial intelligence it is artificial stupidity?

If I am correct ChatGPT and GPT-3 in general were fed articles biased towards at and they also implented filters so the AI won't learn things that they disl
e

So they built in bias? That is good. That way the AI will be no better
than people, complete with our prejudices and political beliefs.


* SLMR 2.1a * A Crucifix? Oy vey, have YOU got the wrong vampire...

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þ Synchronet þ CAPCITY2 * capcity2.synchro.net * Telnet/SSH:2022/Rlogin/HTTP

On 2023-01-20, Margaerynne <margaerynne@PALANT> wrote:

Greetings, friends!

Does anyone remember Usenet? Or, given the audience, does anyone _not_ remember Usenet?

For those of you who do, were you active? When did you join? Is there anything you miss or hated?
How does it compare to BBSes, then and now?

I was born right as it was hitting its peak, so it was well into decline before I would have been interested.
As such, there's a certain type of mythical shine to it, and it's both fascinating and charming to see the roots of
modern internet culture mixed with people's full name and address.

I'm from an area of the country where The Internet wasn't really a thing outside of universities until the late 90s, and my parents were well out of college by the time computers came around, so I don't actually know anyone from Usenet in person. Hence, well, me posting here where the old guard meets.

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þ Synchronet þ Palantir BBS * palantirbbs.ddns.net * Pensacola, FL

I connect to Synchro.net thru NNTP. Also, I follow some tech based groups
in actual Usenet, too.

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þ Synchronet þ Vertrauen þ Home of Synchronet þ [vert/cvs/bbs].synchro.net

Re: Re: Usenet
By: Gamgee to MRO on Mon Feb 13 2023 08:46 pm

to private. i'll open it back up when we have users again.

Ummmm.... quick question.

How will you get users again when .... your BBS is private?

LOL, you can't make this kind of clown show up!

I think my brain is broken.

Nightfox

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þ Synchronet þ Digital Distortion: digitaldistortionbbs.com