M$ Ending Open Discussion Newsgroups!

[LVTravel]

"El Kot" wrote in message

news:4be21f0e$0$286$14726298@news.sunsite.dk...

> Michael wrote:

>> wrote in message

>>> Dhu Pin Yoo wrote:

>>>

>>>>

>>>> Joining the leagues of censorship activists, obviously.

>>>>

>>>> -

>>>> "Microsoft said it plans to end support for more than 4,000 old-style

>>>> newsgroups starting next month, pushing users instead to discussion

>>>> forums such as those found on the Microsoft Answers, TechNet and MSDN

>>>> sites.

>>>>

>>>> Although venerable, Microsoft said that so-called NNTP newsgroups have

>>>> past their time in terms of being usable and secure."

>>>>

>>>> More at

>>>>

>>>> http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-20004109-56.htm

>>>

>>>

>>> I'm curious. How is MS going to remove these newsgroups? The way I

>>> was told, years ago, is that newsgroups CAN NOT be removed. Once

>>> they're created, they're there forever. In some ways this is a good

>>> thing. On the other hand there are many newsgoups that are completely

>>> useless, something like alt.david.smith.sucks.his.mothers.tits. If

>>> you look at the list, there are many such groups. So, I have often

>>> wished they could be removed.

>>>

>>> Anyhow, since MS can not remove newsgroups, what effect will that have

>>> on these groups? Does MS ever really post to these groups? From what

>>> I've seen, I can not recall even one time I saw a response from MS,

>>> unless some MS employee replies to posts under their own handle. With

>>> that in mind, what will stop any of us from continuing to use these

>>> newsgroups?

>

> Nothing. We'll continue using them, just like we do now.

>

>

>> These newsgroups are on Microsoft servers. All they need to do is pull

>> the plug.

>

> No they're not. They got started on M$ servers, but now they are all

> over the place. Pulling the plug of the M$ servers will stop just these

> servers, and nothing else. The groups will live on.

>

> --

> No, no, you can't e-mail me with no no.



When MS pulls the plug you will no longer be able to post to these newgroups

that are "microsoft.public......." Anything already propagated to another

news server will live on. Those on techarena, newegg, etc. will not longer

have access to the free hard drive space on MS's servers.

 

[David H. Lipman]

From: "LVTravel"







| When MS pulls the plug you will no longer be able to post to these newgroups

| that are "microsoft.public......." Anything already propagated to another

| news server will live on. Those on techarena, newegg, etc. will not longer

| have access to the free hard drive space on MS's servers.



That all depends. It certainly won't be propogating from msnews.microsoft.com but might

still be usable from various NSPs.



That is unless a control message is sent to remove the groups from Usenet and all peers

adhere to that.



--

Dave

http://www.claymania.com/removal-trojan-adware.html

Multi-AV - http://www.pctipp.ch/downloads/dl/35905.asp

 

[mister_friendly@the-newzgroups.c]

On Wed, 5 May 2010 22:44:16 -0400, "David H. Lipman"

wrote:



>From: "LVTravel"

>

>

>

>| When MS pulls the plug you will no longer be able to post to these newgroups

>| that are "microsoft.public......." Anything already propagated to another

>| news server will live on. Those on techarena, newegg, etc. will not longer

>| have access to the free hard drive space on MS's servers.

>

>That all depends. It certainly won't be propogating from msnews.microsoft.com but might

>still be usable from various NSPs.

>

>That is unless a control message is sent to remove the groups from Usenet and all peers

>adhere to that.



It's not the end of the world. There are other newsgroups for every

windows version, such as "alt.windows-xp". So we all move there.

That newsgroup is not the most active, but if we move there, then it

will be. I come here to discuss XP, I really dont care whether the

group has "microsoft.public" in the name. The only reason I use this

group more than "alt.windows-xp" is because there is more activity

here. So we all move to that newsgroup, the group gets more activity

and we continue on as always. And also, new newsgroups can be created

too. We'll survive. We just need to make plans where to move, while

MS plans to destroy this group and their other ones. To be perfectly

honest, there are too many groups for each OS. Why do we need a dozen

or more XP groups? If we all go to the same place there will be less

newsgroups we all have to visit. And there are a hell of a lot of

microsoft.public groups.



I do wonder what google.groups, giganews, and the other main news

servers will do. Will they kiss MSs ass or not?

 

[Bob I]

John John - MVP wrote:



> pip22 wrote:

>

>> ... Having to download headers is a pain, followed by downloading the

>> posts you want to read, especially on slow, rural connections.

>>

>> Web-based forums are much easier to access and navigate, and far less

>> littered with cr*p whereas NNTP is awash with it.

>

>

> Now that is quite an oxymoronic statement! Who's leg are you trying to

> pull telling us that web forums are faster than text based newsgroups?



I suppose it is for those who can't actually navigate newsgroups. -)

 

[Tim Slattery]

mister_friendly@the-newzgroups.com wrote:



>I'm curious. How is MS going to remove these newsgroups? The way I

>was told, years ago, is that newsgroups CAN NOT be removed.



You're right. MS can turn off its servers, but there are zillions of

Usenet servers all over the world that carry the microsoft.public.*

hierarchy. They will continue to exist.



> Once they're created, they're there forever.



Just about. If you read news.newgroups, you see postings proposing new

groups as well as questions about groups that are apparently no longer

used. The Big8 Management Board will remove groups when they

determined that they are no longer used.



But all that means is that they request sysops all over the world to

delete those groups from their systems. They can't force anything.



Then there's the alt.* hierarchy, which is anarchic. By which I mean

that anybody (who has access to an NNTP server, anyway) can create a

group. Whether other sysops pick it up is, of course, up to them. Just

as there's no "process" for creating a new alt.* group, there's no way

to get rid of one either. It's a free-for-all. Still, there are many

very good groups there. There's also trash.



--

Tim Slattery

Slattery_T@bls.gov

http://members.cox.net/slatteryt

 

[milt]

On 5/6/2010 7:05 AM, Bob I wrote:

>

>

> John John - MVP wrote:

>

>> pip22 wrote:

>>

>>> ... Having to download headers is a pain, followed by downloading the

>>> posts you want to read, especially on slow, rural connections.

>>>

>>> Web-based forums are much easier to access and navigate, and far less

>>> littered with cr*p whereas NNTP is awash with it.

>>

>>

>> Now that is quite an oxymoronic statement! Who's leg are you trying to

>> pull telling us that web forums are faster than text based newsgroups?

>

> I suppose it is for those who can't actually navigate newsgroups. -)

>



Yeah, you can't just "click here" to get newsgroups. It actually takes

some thought and effort to do so. However, its hilarious to infer

graphics-laden message boards are faster than pure-text. As for it being

archaic. So is SMTP, does that mean we should get rid of that as well?

If its not broke, don't fix it! Yeah, newsgroups have their issues but

there are ways to get around those as well.

 

[milt]

On 5/5/2010 8:44 PM, El Kot wrote:

>

> No they're not. They got started on M$ servers, but now they are all

> over the place. Pulling the plug of the M$ servers will stop just these

> servers, and nothing else. The groups will live on.

>



No, the groups will die because they started out on the microsoft

servers. What other servers carry these groups? None that I can think of.

 

[El Kot]

milt wrote:

> On 5/5/2010 8:44 PM, El Kot wrote:

>>

>> No they're not. They got started on M$ servers, but now they are all

>> over the place. Pulling the plug of the M$ servers will stop just these

>> servers, and nothing else. The groups will live on.

>>

>

> No, the groups will die because they started out on the microsoft

> servers.



Nonsense. Will a river stop flowing, if you cut off the spring? Of

course not, and it will be the same here.





> What other servers carry these groups? None that I can think of.



I can't think of one that doesn't. All three that I use -

news.sunsite.dk, news.eternal-september.org, and nntp.aioe.org - carry

them. The admin of eternal-september was explicitly asked, and replied

he has no intention of honoring M$'s rmgroup commands. Which server do

you use that doesn't carry them?

 

[Paul]

El Kot wrote:

> milt wrote:

>> On 5/5/2010 8:44 PM, El Kot wrote:

>>>

>>> No they're not. They got started on M$ servers, but now they are all

>>> over the place. Pulling the plug of the M$ servers will stop just these

>>> servers, and nothing else. The groups will live on.

>>>

>>

>> No, the groups will die because they started out on the microsoft

>> servers.

>

> Nonsense. Will a river stop flowing, if you cut off the spring? Of

> course not, and it will be the same here.

>

>

> > What other servers carry these groups? None that I can think of.

>

> I can't think of one that doesn't. All three that I use -

> news.sunsite.dk, news.eternal-september.org, and nntp.aioe.org - carry

> them. The admin of eternal-september was explicitly asked, and replied

> he has no intention of honoring M$'s rmgroup commands. Which server do

> you use that doesn't carry them?



These are some of the responses from "Ray Banana", who runs eternal-september.org.

This is from the "eternal-september.support" group on his server, in a

thread entitled "Question about the Microsoft groups" 5/5/2010 11:15 PM.



*******



"Indeed. If Microsoft sends a syntactically correct and properly signed

control message, I will certainly honour it."



*******



"Sorry, I was just being sarcastic.



Microsoft has never bothered to issue control messages for its

microsoft.* groups and I assume they will just switch off their servers

and leave the mess behind that they have been inflicting on Usenet for

more than fifteen years. Right now, there are 1772 microsoft.public.*

groups on E-S and many of them are empty or just filled with spam.



As Microsoft will not create new "official" groups or remove obsolete

groups on its own servers anymore, Julièn Élie will consequentially stop

issuing "virtual" checkgroups control messages for the microsoft.*

hierarchy and hence it's in the sole discretion of each NSP to decide which

microsoft.* groups, if any, they are going to carry after Microsoft will

finally FOAD Usenet-wise, which will inevitably lead to inconsistent

group lists and will definitely not improve the usability of this

hierarchy. It would take enormous efforts to restructure the namespace,

cut back the proliferations of Microsoft's naming conventions and make

it Usenet compliant, so I doubt this can be achieved without a

maintainer. With all this in mind, I would suggest to abandon the

microsoft.* mess as FUBAR and create a set of newsgroups within and in

accordance with the rules of the existing and established hierarchies."



*******



"> When Julièn Élie issues rmgroup control articles, will

> eternal-september honour them?



Given the current settings of E-S's control.ctl, no."



*******



So that gives a somewhat prioritized approach to what will happen.



1) If Microsoft issues the control messages, the microsoft.* will be

removed from newsservers honoring those control messages.



2) If the proxy agent Julièn Élie issues the messages, then

discretion will play a part in the decision.



3) Given the hierarchy is a mess, and no one will be maintaining it,

the existing groups could continue to function as they currently

do. If someone wanted to add microsoft.public.windows7.* to the

hierarchy, there might not be any mechanism to do that in an

organized fashion.



So if Microsoft issued the control messages, then the groups would disappear.

(Their opinion would carry a stronger weight.)



Otherwise, it's like a car without a steering wheel. It'll just continue

driving, all over the countryside. Yehaa!



HTH,

Paul

 

[Tim Slattery]

milt wrote:



>No, the groups will die because they started out on the microsoft

>servers. What other servers carry these groups? None that I can think of.



Zillions of other servers carry these groups. Eternal September

(www.eternal-september.org) carries all or nearly all. These all carry

some or all:



AIOE http://news.aioe.org/

Albasani http://albasani.net/index.html.en

CNNTP http://www.cnntp.org/cnntp - cnntp.org

ETT http://news.ett.com.ua/

http://www.eternal-september.org/

Tornevall http://news.tornevall.net/

Usenet4all http://www.usenet4all.se (blocks all posts from Google)

(Just send an e-mail to registration@usenet4all.se you will be

e-mailed your account information)



http://www.eternal-september.org/

newsadmin@datemas.de (send e-mail with 5-8 password)

http://aioe.org

http://freenews.maxbaud.net/

http://freenews.maxbaud.net/faq.html

http://www.news.x-privat.org

http://www.x-privat.org/international.php

http://cust.readfreenews.net/ (for posting access)

http://www.news.readfreenews.net

http://www.readfreenews.net

news.readfreenews.net

http://www.newzbot.com/

http://ecalame.tripod.com/free.html Sorry, but the page or the file

that you're looking for is not here.

http://www.newsservers.net/

http://www.yottanews.com (free.yottanews.com)



And ISP newsgroup servers - those that remain - usually carry the

ms.p.* hierarchy.







--

Tim Slattery

Slattery_T@bls.gov

http://members.cox.net/slatteryt