XPost: alt.free.newsservers

Yevgeniy S and Linux <linuxisthebestchoice@gmail.com> posted:

Hello users of Usenet... .

Do you use any replacement of Google Groups? I use Usenet Archives
sometimes, website is usenetarchives.com. Is there other alternatives???

I operate a web interface to Usenet at https://newsgrouper.org/ (text only). This supports reading/posting current discussions, and also has searchable archives of most groups going back to 1987.

Some other web interfaces to Usenet are listed at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web-based_Usenet#Web-based_sites_and_popularity

--
Colin Macleod ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ https://cmacleod.me.uk

Please rate your Usenet experience today: :-D :-) :-/ :-( :-O

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Colin Macleod <user7@newsgrouper.org.invalid> wrote:

Yevgeniy S and Linux <linuxisthebestchoice@gmail.com> posted:

Do you use any replacement of Google Groups? I use Usenet Archives
sometimes, website is usenetarchives.com. Is there other
alternatives???

I operate a web interface to Usenet at https://newsgrouper.org/ (text
only). This supports reading/posting current discussions, and also
has searchable archives of most groups going back to 1987.

Elsewhere you mention you will block UK visitors to circumvent kowtowing
to the UK Online Safety Act requirements and dangers thereof. Here, and
at your web site, I missed any mention that UK visitors would get
blocked from using your service. Maybe geofencing is something
mentioned when trying to register to use your service.

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VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> posted:

Elsewhere you mention you will block UK visitors to circumvent kowtowing
to the UK Online Safety Act requirements and dangers thereof. Here, and
at your web site, I missed any mention that UK visitors would get
blocked from using your service. Maybe geofencing is something
mentioned when trying to register to use your service.

Are you in the UK? If your IP address indicates you are in the UK
(according to Cloudflare) you will get a warning about the impending block
as soon as you log in, either as a guest or as a registered user.

--
Colin Macleod ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ https://cmacleod.me.uk

Please rate your Usenet experience today: :-D :-) :-/ :-( :-O

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On Sat, 22 Feb 2025 17:03:00 GMT, Colin Macleod wrote :

I operate a web interface to Usenet at https://newsgrouper.org/ (text only).

Sweet!

I think it's great to have a web interface to Usenet as it serves multiple purposes, particularly for those who don't know anything about Usenet:
1. Anyone can click on a link to any article or thread (even your mom)
2. The retention usually is excellent for web-based archives
3. The web-based archives generally have a decent search engine

I know about <https://groups.google.com/g/alt.free.newsservers> which
stopped adding articles just about a year ago (Feb 22nd, 2024).

At that time, RetroGuy added his news service at my request (and others).
<https://www.novabbs.com/computers/search.php?group=alt.free.newsservers>

Looking at yours... I get the dark blue page... then I "click as guest"...
so I get the limegreen page... and then I click "Continue"...
which takes me to the light-blue page... where I search for this ng.

Searching for "alt.free.newsservers" gets me the logical URI which is a
sign that the admin designed the page with the human reader in mind.
<https://newsgrouper.org/alt.free.newsservers>

I notice that the "source" button allows the full header, which is nice as
the main things you need are the message id & email which Google used to provide but then stopped providing it.

What's MOST important (other than the search engine which I didn't test),
is the ability to provide your mom (or whomever) with a clickable link.

I tested a clickable link for a random article and that worked nicely.
There's no button there called "Search" but there is a button which does
that search; it's called "Find Articles" (which is fine).

For the most part, that's what matters to me.
I'll put it in the Usenet tutorials so that others can benefit, which is
what I do every day, all day - so that others benefit from the efforts.

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Colin Macleod <user7@newsgrouper.org.invalid> wrote:

VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> posted:

Elsewhere you mention you will block UK visitors to circumvent kowtowing
to the UK Online Safety Act requirements and dangers thereof. Here, and
at your web site, I missed any mention that UK visitors would get
blocked from using your service. Maybe geofencing is something
mentioned when trying to register to use your service.

Are you in the UK? If your IP address indicates you are in the UK
(according to Cloudflare) you will get a warning about the impending block
as soon as you log in, either as a guest or as a registered user.

I don't have a newsgrouper account. Apparently the block is when
attempting to login. Seems a warning should be mentioned in the web
pages BEFORE logging in to then find you are blocked. In fact, with consideration of other regions/countries establishing their own
censorship laws, might need a FAQ or note at your web site noting which
regions will get geofenced; i.e., give a heads up before login. A door
with an "Open" sign (the web site) should have warning of geofencing
rather than users yanking on the door handle to then find the "open"
door is locked to them. Much like a "No shoes, no shirt, no service"
sign on a door. As you add more geofencing, users would have something
to identify why beforehand. Just a suggestion.

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Marion <marion@facts.com> posted:

On Sat, 22 Feb 2025 17:03:00 GMT, Colin Macleod wrote :

I operate a web interface to Usenet at https://newsgrouper.org/ (text only).

What's MOST important (other than the search engine which I didn't test),
is the ability to provide your mom (or whomever) with a clickable link.

Thanks for the comments. One flaw at present is that the historical search "Find Articles" gives you articles with URLs which cannot be saved or sent
to someone else. I'm looking at how to fix this.

--
Colin Macleod ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ https://cmacleod.me.uk

Please rate your Usenet experience today: :-D :-) :-/ :-( :-O

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VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> posted:

Colin Macleod <user7@newsgrouper.org.invalid> wrote:

VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> posted:

Elsewhere you mention you will block UK visitors to circumvent kowtowing >> to the UK Online Safety Act requirements and dangers thereof. Here, and >> at your web site, I missed any mention that UK visitors would get
blocked from using your service. Maybe geofencing is something
mentioned when trying to register to use your service.

Are you in the UK? If your IP address indicates you are in the UK (according to Cloudflare) you will get a warning about the impending block as soon as you log in, either as a guest or as a registered user.

I don't have a newsgrouper account. Apparently the block is when
attempting to login. Seems a warning should be mentioned in the web
pages BEFORE logging in to then find you are blocked. In fact, with consideration of other regions/countries establishing their own
censorship laws, might need a FAQ or note at your web site noting which regions will get geofenced; i.e., give a heads up before login. A door
with an "Open" sign (the web site) should have warning of geofencing
rather than users yanking on the door handle to then find the "open"
door is locked to them. Much like a "No shoes, no shirt, no service"
sign on a door. As you add more geofencing, users would have something
to identify why beforehand. Just a suggestion.

The block is not yet in place. What you get on logging in is a warning
that it will be activated on 16th March. The reason I do that after the
user logs in is so I can record which users have seen the message so I
don't keep spamming them with it. It will be repeated after a week though.

When the block is activated, anyone connecting from the UK will just get
http error 451 (blocked for legal reasons), no login page at all.

--
Colin Macleod ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ https://cmacleod.me.uk

Please rate your Usenet experience today: :-D :-) :-/ :-( :-O

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Marion <marion@facts.com> posted:

On Sat, 22 Feb 2025 17:03:00 GMT, Colin Macleod wrote :

I operate a web interface to Usenet at https://newsgrouper.org/ (text only).

2. The retention usually is excellent for web-based archives
3. The web-based archives generally have a decent search engine

Let me clarify these points. I don't run an nntp server with its own news spool, I just pull articles on demand and then cache them locally.
I use three sources:
- nntp to eternal-september.org for current articles and uucp for posting.
But E-S now has less than a year's worth of history.
- nntp to blueworldhosting.com for historical searches from 2003 to now.
- downloaded archive files from https://archive.org/details/usenet
for historical searches from 1987 to 2013.

This means the search I can do on blueworldhosting is limited to the capabilities of the nntp XPAT command - pattern matching on a single
header line. For the archive.org files I can do full-text search.

--
Colin Macleod ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ https://cmacleod.me.uk

Please rate your Usenet experience today: :-D :-) :-/ :-( :-O

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Colin Macleod <user7@newsgrouper.org.invalid> wrote at 11:50 this Monday (GMT):

Marion <marion@facts.com> posted:

On Sat, 22 Feb 2025 17:03:00 GMT, Colin Macleod wrote :

I operate a web interface to Usenet at https://newsgrouper.org/ (text only).

What's MOST important (other than the search engine which I didn't test),
is the ability to provide your mom (or whomever) with a clickable link.

Thanks for the comments. One flaw at present is that the historical search "Find Articles" gives you articles with URLs which cannot be saved or sent
to someone else. I'm looking at how to fix this.

Best of luck! As someone who has used your site occasionally, it's
pretty useful.
--
user <candycane> is generated from /dev/urandom

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Colin Macleod <user7@newsgrouper.org.invalid> writes:

VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> posted:

Elsewhere you mention you will block UK visitors to circumvent kowtowing
to the UK Online Safety Act requirements and dangers thereof. Here, and
at your web site, I missed any mention that UK visitors would get
blocked from using your service. Maybe geofencing is something
mentioned when trying to register to use your service.

Are you in the UK? If your IP address indicates you are in the UK
(according to Cloudflare) you will get a warning about the impending block
as soon as you log in, either as a guest or as a registered user.

I haven't understood why the block. Could you clarify? I gave a look
at the newsgrouper website, but didn't see any obvious notice there.
Thanks!

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Colin Macleod <user7@newsgrouper.org.invalid> writes:

Yevgeniy S and Linux <linuxisthebestchoice@gmail.com> posted:

Hello users of Usenet... .

Do you use any replacement of Google Groups? I use Usenet Archives
sometimes, website is usenetarchives.com. Is there other alternatives???

I operate a web interface to Usenet at https://newsgrouper.org/ (text only). This supports reading/posting current discussions, and also has searchable archives of most groups going back to 1987.

I looked into gnu.emacs.help. There were very few articles there. Is
that right? I'd believe it doesn't go back to 1987, but it surely had a
lot of traffic in a not so distant past.

Thanks for writing the system and offering to the world.

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Salvador Mirzo <smirzo@example.com> wrote:

Colin Macleod <user7@newsgrouper.org.invalid> writes:

VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> posted:

Elsewhere you mention you will block UK visitors to circumvent kowtowing >>> to the UK Online Safety Act requirements and dangers thereof. Here, and >>> at your web site, I missed any mention that UK visitors would get
blocked from using your service. Maybe geofencing is something
mentioned when trying to register to use your service.

Are you in the UK? If your IP address indicates you are in the UK
(according to Cloudflare) you will get a warning about the impending block >> as soon as you log in, either as a guest or as a registered user.

I haven't understood why the block. Could you clarify? I gave a look
at the newsgrouper website, but didn't see any obvious notice there.
Thanks!

See Colin's thread over in the eternal-september.support newsgroup
titled "Newsgroups and the UK Online Safety Act".

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Salvador Mirzo <smirzo@example.com> posted:

I looked into gnu.emacs.help. There were very few articles there. Is
that right? I'd believe it doesn't go back to 1987, but it surely had a
lot of traffic in a not so distant past.

Yes there are few current articles, but clicking "Find Articles" or going
to https://newsgrouper.org/gnu.emacs.help/search will let you find many more.

--
Colin Macleod ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ https://cmacleod.me.uk

Please rate your Usenet experience today: :-D :-) :-/ :-( :-O

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VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> writes:

Salvador Mirzo <smirzo@example.com> wrote:

Colin Macleod <user7@newsgrouper.org.invalid> writes:

VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> posted:

Elsewhere you mention you will block UK visitors to circumvent kowtowing >>>> to the UK Online Safety Act requirements and dangers thereof. Here, and >>>> at your web site, I missed any mention that UK visitors would get
blocked from using your service. Maybe geofencing is something
mentioned when trying to register to use your service.

Are you in the UK? If your IP address indicates you are in the UK
(according to Cloudflare) you will get a warning about the impending block >>> as soon as you log in, either as a guest or as a registered user.

I haven't understood why the block. Could you clarify? I gave a look
at the newsgrouper website, but didn't see any obvious notice there.
Thanks!

See Colin's thread over in the eternal-september.support newsgroup
titled "Newsgroups and the UK Online Safety Act".

The support group is 24hoursupport.helpdesk. It has little retention.
I also tried searching on newsgrouper itself, but it seems to mention
that the group is from blueworldhosting. I searched anyway and found nothing---used your keywords in quotes (but without quotes). Thanks in
any case!

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Salvador Mirzo <smirzo@example.com> posted:

VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> writes:

See Colin's thread over in the eternal-september.support newsgroup
titled "Newsgroups and the UK Online Safety Act".

The support group is 24hoursupport.helpdesk. It has little retention.
I also tried searching on newsgrouper itself, but it seems to mention
that the group is from blueworldhosting. I searched anyway and found nothing---used your keywords in quotes (but without quotes). Thanks in
any case!

What VanguardLH is referring to is https://newsgrouper.org/eternal-september.support/18568/18810
and the rest of that thread.

--
Colin Macleod ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ https://cmacleod.me.uk

Please rate your Usenet experience today: :-D :-) :-/ :-( :-O

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Salvador Mirzo <smirzo@example.com> wrote:

VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> writes:

Salvador Mirzo <smirzo@example.com> wrote:

Colin Macleod <user7@newsgrouper.org.invalid> writes:

VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> posted:

Elsewhere you mention you will block UK visitors to circumvent kowtowing >>>>> to the UK Online Safety Act requirements and dangers thereof.

I haven't understood why the block. Could you clarify?

See Colin's thread over in the eternal-september.support newsgroup
titled "Newsgroups and the UK Online Safety Act".

The support group is 24hoursupport.helpdesk.

No, the newsgroup with Colin's discussion on his block is in the
specified newsgroup: eternal-september.support. I haven't wasted time
with the 24hoursupport.helpdesk for many years.

I don't know if Colin bothers to visit 24hoursupport.helpdesk. I did
many years ago, but it became so polluted with unwanteds and uber-boobs
that I left. If it died, well, I considered it a garbage newsgroup long
ago. Way too many rotten apples in the barrel to waste trying to find unspoiled ones.

I just took a look, and saw very few articles (that survived my
filters), and most were very old. The article counts (before filtering)
were very low:

8 at Eternal-September
253 at Individual (my primary server)
1253 at Paganini
86 at Solani

That is also before my age-out rules since I purge articles older than
120 days. It is not my intention to operate an archive, and importance,
to me, dies with age. Looks like 24hoursupport.helpdesk died from
attrition.

More likely you'll find Colin posting in alt.free.newsservers, and over
in the ES support newsgroup since he peers from ES and converses with
Ray, the ES admin. He said he also peers from BlueWorld and
archive.org, the latter of which I didn't know archived anything Usenet.

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VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> wrote in news:h2mql5p5nkrj$.dlg@v.nguard.lh:

Salvador Mirzo <smirzo@example.com> wrote:

VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> writes:

Salvador Mirzo <smirzo@example.com> wrote:

Colin Macleod <user7@newsgrouper.org.invalid> writes:

VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> posted:

Elsewhere you mention you will block UK visitors to circumvent
kowtowing to the UK Online Safety Act requirements and dangers
thereof.

I haven't understood why the block. Could you clarify?

See Colin's thread over in the eternal-september.support newsgroup
titled "Newsgroups and the UK Online Safety Act".

The support group is 24hoursupport.helpdesk.

No, the newsgroup with Colin's discussion on his block is in the
specified newsgroup: eternal-september.support. I haven't wasted time
with the 24hoursupport.helpdesk for many years.

I don't know if Colin bothers to visit 24hoursupport.helpdesk. I did
many years ago, but it became so polluted with unwanteds and
uber-boobs that I left. If it died, well, I considered it a garbage newsgroup long ago. Way too many rotten apples in the barrel to waste
trying to find unspoiled ones.

I just took a look, and saw very few articles (that survived my
filters), and most were very old. The article counts (before
filtering) were very low:

8 at Eternal-September
253 at Individual (my primary server)
1253 at Paganini
86 at Solani

That is also before my age-out rules since I purge articles older than
120 days. It is not my intention to operate an archive, and
importance, to me, dies with age. Looks like 24hoursupport.helpdesk
died from attrition.

More likely you'll find Colin posting in alt.free.newsservers, and
over in the ES support newsgroup since he peers from ES and converses
with Ray, the ES admin. He said he also peers from BlueWorld and archive.org, the latter of which I didn't know archived anything
Usenet.

24hoursupport.helpdesk was pretty good until the assholes from AUK decided
to turn it into a shithole.

https://archive.org/details/usenet-24hoursupport.helpdesk (2014)

https://archive.org/download/usenet-alt

https://www.usenetarchives.com/

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VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> writes:

Salvador Mirzo <smirzo@example.com> wrote:

VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> writes:

Salvador Mirzo <smirzo@example.com> wrote:

Colin Macleod <user7@newsgrouper.org.invalid> writes:

VanguardLH <V@nguard.LH> posted:

Elsewhere you mention you will block UK visitors to circumvent kowtowing >>>>>> to the UK Online Safety Act requirements and dangers thereof.

I haven't understood why the block. Could you clarify?

See Colin's thread over in the eternal-september.support newsgroup
titled "Newsgroups and the UK Online Safety Act".

The support group is 24hoursupport.helpdesk.

No, the newsgroup with Colin's discussion on his block is in the
specified newsgroup: eternal-september.support. I haven't wasted time
with the 24hoursupport.helpdesk for many years.

I had no idea all of this went on. I had never heard of eternal-september.support before. Thanks for the information. I found
the thread

Newsgrouper and the UK Online Safety Act

beginning at

<1734376730-7@newsgrouper.org.uk>

Thanks! (I see what's going on now. Thanks very much!)

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