Usenet; What's that all about. Hasn't anyone heard of RSS feeds? hello?

[#1]

I hope the title was OK.
I have seen a lot of discussion about Usenet recently (which doesn't work as far as I can see)
What is it all about, why is it called the dark side of the internet?
newsgroups.....can't you get news from RSS feeds?
If I have missed something here I would be interested to learn if Usenet is useful

[#2]

You are missing something.
Try here:
http://www.plus.net/support/email/usenet/newsgroups_guide.shtml
It is not 'News' as such, but discussion groups for varying subjects.
It can be done off-line (which is best), so you dont need to be connected to read all of the messages.
Alan.

[#3]

Thank Alan, I will have read of that this morning.

[#4]

Quote from: darkroom

It is not 'News' as such, but discussion groups for varying subjects.

"varying" is a slight understatement!
The new servers carry over 100,000 text newsgroups, then by the time you add in all the binary groups...

[#5]

Usenet has been around since the early days of the Internet - considerably longer than the WWW in fact.
I haven't used it in years, haven't the patience.

[#6]

Google keeps a partial archive of the text groups (no binary groups).
It said that there are 1,622,239,816 articles containing the word "a".
BTW A newsgroup does not contain "news" - in the sense used by the meeja.
A newsgroup contains opinions, information, questions - rather like this forum actually.
RSS feed! 

[#7]

PlusNet does not do binary groups, but if you must have (more or less) all the groups you can, for example, look at www.forteinc.com for a newsreader and get usenet through them.
Moderator - hope you don't count this as advertising - I've no connection with forte, and presumably people can tell us of other sources.

[#8]

If you want binary newsgroups then all you need is a news server that carries binary newsgroups.
You can use any newsreader (it doesn't have to be forte).
Google for "binary news servers".
Expect to have to pay money for this service (there are some free text only news servers).
At the moment, PlusNet's text only news server appears to be broken.

[#9]

Quote

At the moment, PlusNet's text only news server appears to be broken.

There are issues but only from certain IP ranges and also I believe with authentication too - if you log in anonymously it should be fine. If it's not, the problem is still under investigation and should be picked up on Monday.

[#10]

Thanks Matt - I know PlusNet news has been outsourced for quite some time.

[#11]

One word of caution: if you do decide to use Usenet, expect to be flamed if you so much as dare to agree with someone!

[#12]

OK I have used Outlook Express as the reader
I have set up accounts for Plusnet, Microsoft and Mozilla and will have a play with it.
Thank for the advice

[#13]

Yes, you probably do have to pay to get a decent service of all newsgroups (though it is useful to have a second string to plusnet - which for me is back in action)
However, I only pay about £12 a year, much less than the cost of cup of coffee in ********* per month.

[#14]

There are still a few free text-only news servers in existence.

[#15]

Clues?