[OT] Usenet to be shut down?

I found this way too disturbing, and hope its a prank. Please, someone, tell
me its a prank.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-99...?tag=nefd.lede

Yowie

On Fri, 13 Jun 2008 07:50:12 +1000, Yowie wrote:

I found this way too disturbing, and hope its a prank. Please, someone, tell
me its a prank.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-99...?tag=nefd.lede

Yowie

My reading is the the 3 ISP mentioned are essentially removing the alt
hierarchy from their own NNTP servers.

I don't anticipate this will have any effect on RPCA. It's kind of sad
that they're knuckling under, but nobody every accused big telecom
companies of having balls. I'm sure that the big Usenet players (n.i.n,
giganews, supernews, etc) will keep serving up the groups that the others
are deleting. And if anyone ever tries to block or delete the rec.pets
tree, then people with smaller servers (like me) will just take up the
slack.

Dan

"Daniel Mahoney"
On Fri, 13 Jun 2008 07:50:12 +1000, Yowie wrote:

I found this way too disturbing, and hope its a prank. Please, someone,
tell
me its a prank.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-99...?tag=nefd.lede

Yowie

My reading is the the 3 ISP mentioned are essentially removing the alt
hierarchy from their own NNTP servers.

I don't anticipate this will have any effect on RPCA. It's kind of sad
that they're knuckling under, but nobody every accused big telecom
companies of having balls. I'm sure that the big Usenet players (n.i.n,
giganews, supernews, etc) will keep serving up the groups that the others
are deleting. And if anyone ever tries to block or delete the rec.pets
tree, then people with smaller servers (like me) will just take up the
slack.

Dan

Oh geez, I read that article too. Well, maybe there goes my Pink Floyd
group maybe too. I just don't know.
Will it have any effect on rpcc I wonder?
This is totally nuts!!
Kyla

Daniel Mahoney wrote:

On Fri, 13 Jun 2008 07:50:12 +1000, Yowie wrote:

I found this way too disturbing, and hope its a prank. Please, someone, tell
me its a prank.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-99...?tag=nefd.lede

Yowie

My reading is the the 3 ISP mentioned are essentially removing the alt
hierarchy from their own NNTP servers.

Actually, it said that Time Warner Cable will eliminate all of Usenet,
Sprint is eliminating the alt.* hierarchy, and it's not clear what Verizon
is planning to do.

I don't anticipate this will have any effect on RPCA. It's kind of sad
that they're knuckling under, but nobody every accused big telecom
companies of having balls.

One of the comments to this post said that it's nice to still be able
to read discussions without blinking GIFs and flashing ads. I thought
that was telling. Usenet doesn't bring in any money because there's no
advertising. So who cares about it, except a few geeks? The ISPs certainly
don't.

And if anyone ever tries to block or delete the rec.pets
tree, then people with smaller servers (like me) will just take up the
slack.

Cool!

--
Joyce

To email me, remove the triple-X from my user name. ^..^

"Yowie" wrote in
:

I found this way too disturbing, and hope its a prank. Please,
someone, tell me its a prank.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-99...?tag=nefd.lede

Yowie




While Mr Cuoma _is_ a piece of work I expect these providers are more than
happy to stop providing a costly service which a small portion of their
subscribers utilize. Let's see if they drop all of alt.

Daniel Mahoney wrote:
On Fri, 13 Jun 2008 07:50:12 +1000, Yowie wrote:

I found this way too disturbing, and hope its a prank. Please, someone, tell
me its a prank.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-99...?tag=nefd.lede

Yowie

My reading is the the 3 ISP mentioned are essentially removing the alt
hierarchy from their own NNTP servers.

I don't anticipate this will have any effect on RPCA. It's kind of sad
that they're knuckling under, but nobody every accused big telecom
companies of having balls. I'm sure that the big Usenet players (n.i.n,
giganews, supernews, etc) will keep serving up the groups that the others
are deleting. And if anyone ever tries to block or delete the rec.pets
tree, then people with smaller servers (like me) will just take up the
slack.

Dan

How would that affect those of us who subscribe to newsgroups through
servers like "NewsGuys"? And those whose ISP is NOT a telecom company,
and not "broadband"?

Personally, I object to ANY curtailment of free speech on the Internet.
If your individual TV can be programmed to block material individual
subscribers consider objectionable, can't similar checks and balances be
set up for the individual Internet user? I agree with psychotherapist
Viktor Frankl (who spent time in a Nazi concentration camp, and
witnessed events like Hitler's Brown Shirts closing down performances of
plays and operas and musical works they did not approve of). "Liberty
is indivisible - today it is a play or a book, tomorrow a religion or
political party." That's what the ACLU is all about - the rights of
people to hold different viewpoints, ant to be free to EXPRESS them!

"EvelynVogtGamble(Divamanque)"

Daniel Mahoney wrote:
On Fri, 13 Jun 2008 07:50:12 +1000, Yowie wrote:

I found this way too disturbing, and hope its a prank. Please, someone,
tell me its a prank.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-99...?tag=nefd.lede

Yowie

My reading is the the 3 ISP mentioned are essentially removing the alt
hierarchy from their own NNTP servers.

I don't anticipate this will have any effect on RPCA. It's kind of sad
that they're knuckling under, but nobody every accused big telecom
companies of having balls. I'm sure that the big Usenet players (n.i.n,
giganews, supernews, etc) will keep serving up the groups that the others
are deleting. And if anyone ever tries to block or delete the rec.pets
tree, then people with smaller servers (like me) will just take up the
slack.

Dan

How would that affect those of us who subscribe to newsgroups through
servers like "NewsGuys"? And those whose ISP is NOT a telecom company,
and not "broadband"?

Personally, I object to ANY curtailment of free speech on the Internet. If
your individual TV can be programmed to block material individual
subscribers consider objectionable, can't similar checks and balances be
set up for the individual Internet user? I agree with psychotherapist
Viktor Frankl (who spent time in a Nazi concentration camp, and witnessed
events like Hitler's Brown Shirts closing down performances of plays and
operas and musical works they did not approve of). "Liberty is
indivisible - today it is a play or a book, tomorrow a religion or
political party." That's what the ACLU is all about - the rights of
people to hold different viewpoints, ant to be free to EXPRESS them!

I add a hearty AMEN to that Evelyn!
Hug
Kyla

"Matthew"
I want to see how long before some one sues them for not allowing freedom
of speech

I can understand eliminating the child porn sites but the rest is moronic

Yup, it is.
Hug
Kyla


"Yowie"
I found this way too disturbing, and hope its a prank. Please, someone,
tell me its a prank.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-99...?tag=nefd.lede

Yowie

"EvelynVogtGamble(Divamanque)" wrote:

If your individual TV can be programmed to block material individual
subscribers consider objectionable, can't similar checks and balances be
set up for the individual Internet user? I agree with psychotherapist
Viktor Frankl (who spent time in a Nazi concentration camp, and
witnessed events like Hitler's Brown Shirts closing down performances of
plays and operas and musical works they did not approve of). "Liberty
is indivisible - today it is a play or a book, tomorrow a religion or
political party." That's what the ACLU is all about - the rights of
people to hold different viewpoints, ant to be free to EXPRESS them!

I agree with you 100% in principle. But when it comes to child porn, it's
not just a matter of expressing an opinion - they are contributing to an
industry that harms children. (Not to mention that it's illegal.)

That said, there's a tremendous amount of paranoia and overkill in response
to it. Yes, we do need to shut down child porn. But we don't have to become
hysterical about it. Are they too lazy to look through the newsgroups to
figure out which ones are actually providing the objectionable material?
Actually, I guess they did look through them, if they were able to come up
with the "88 newsgroups" figure (ie, they found 88 newsgroups - out of
tens of thousands of newsgroups internationally - that post material which
could be called child porn).

Actually, I'm not sure if it's possible for an ISP to block individual
newsgroups. Don't they have to block the entire hierarchy that those
newsgroups are part of? On the other hand, I have occasionally asked my
ISP to add a newsgroup to the ones they provide access to, and they have
done so without adding any hierarchies. The only thing I'm sure of is
that I don't know what I'm talking about. Could a more knowledgeable
person please clear this up?? Thanks!

--
Joyce

To email me, remove the triple-X from my user name. ^..^

Yowie wrote:
I found this way too disturbing, and hope its a prank. Please,
someone, tell me its a prank.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-99...?tag=nefd.lede

Yowie

Not a prank. We just subscribed to usenetmonster.com, which takes binaries
if you want to look at animal pictures.

kili