Re: *pressure Google to put Groups back on main page...*

In comp.os.linux.misc David L. Johnson <david.johnson_at_lehigh.edu>:
> On Tue, 12 Sep 2006 07:19:05 -0700, Ed Prochak wrote:

>>> > Actually, I was wondering when groups might go away. My impression is
>>> > many groups are dead or dying. With blogs and other dynamic web
>>> > content, the days of newsgroups may be numbered.

> Actually, usenet is dead, and has been for some time. We just don't seem
> to know it yet.

;-)

Honestly I don't think so. Colm receives about 500-800 articles per week since long time. Most spam, annoying cross-posting idiots already removed.

Though it might be true for other groups. Sometimes I fear it is intentional that Usenet isn't known to many people. Reason might be the uncontrollable way usenet works. You just can't sue any one responsible as it seems to get more and more common with web forums.

On the other hand this might drive people back? To me it is hardly understandable why people prefer to use some html forum?

Only reason imaginable, they just don't know about Usenet/Newsreader and the fact that this protocol was exactly designed for discussions...

> My university had been receiving a newsfeed -- without paying for it --
> for some years. The provider eventually checked its records, and cut us
> off. For some weeks, I was the only one to complain, so the U never
> bothered to reinstate them.

Indeed this is a problem. New users especially M$ users don't have the slightest clue about usenet and it seems to hard for them configuring a newsreader, even after telling them how to go about it.

Many think this would be a groups.google forum, as this is the only interface to Usenet they have ever seen. Some even post as if people answering here would be paid by google to serve them asap...;(

>> Oh I agree. It is just that even though the number of people using
>> groups has increased, it has nowhere near increased at the same rate as
>> people using the internet. 

> I sincerely doubt that, if you look at recent years. Neglecting trolls
> and spam, I would say that usenet traffic, even on the technical groups I
> follow, has decreased substantially.

At least in this ng, (comp.os.linux.misc) traffic seems somehow constant. There was just a switch some time ago, as AOL closed their nntp server and asked people to use groups.google.com instead.

-- 
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