Alternatives to Yahoo! Groups?

smagruder asks: "Yahoo! Groups is driving this group owner crazy. Even if I could put with their intrusive (pop-up, interstitial, embedded-in-text) advertisements (and I'd rather not), YGroups has been experiencing a major serious bug over the past several months that they are continuing to ignore--that is, posted messages are sometimes not getting added to the group archive. Thus, many owners are considering moving their groups elsewhere, but where? Is it possible to replicate YGroup's features using currently available open source software, or is there another free service alternative?"

Comments

before there were goups...

[josepha48]

there were message boards.

Yes there probably are open source alternatives. Try some of these:

http://freshmeat.net/search/?q=message+board&sec ti on=projects

Also try searching sourceforge.net. The problem that you may find is not the software, but the hardware. You'll have to set up your own server.

Lycos still runs groups

[R2.0]

and they're free. A lot of Excite Groups refugees went there. Can't speak to the group owner experience, but as a user it's fine.

Cross Link

[4of12]

My sympathies.

I've subscribed to some yahoo groups mailing lists that had some good, interesting information posted to it [linux-dell-laptops comes to mind].

In retrospect, it would have been nicer if that information were available on Usenet, as it was meant for that purpose.

Maybe someone can start a Usenet group (or use an existing one that is appropriate) and serve as a bridge between the two groups, relaying messages?

Along the same lines, I've always appreciated folks that subscribe to useful groups (linux-atm, for example) and maintain a public archive that is viewable and searchable over the web, such as what you can find at MARC. I give MARC credit for this.

There are definitely levels of public service and it's nice to see people contributing to making that knowledge available for the long term.

Re:The Original Group Discussion Protocol

[Anonymous Coward]

nntp lacks ability to keep messages from being delivered to those not in the group, every message is publicly available.

Re:Just use USENET

[EricLivingston]

I disagree. Usenet certainly does replicate one key feature of these "group" sites (Yahoo, Lycos, etc), which is the messaging, but there are a few other features that make the group sites better for true group communications, such as:

1. Shared calendar - nice for keeping track of upcoming events and such
2. Images/Documents folders - very nice for storing static content that shouldn't "cycle off" a typical message list, or be lost in hundreds of messages. Having lasting-value documents mixed in with highly perishable messages is a pain in the neck I've found.
3. Private membership - or even just knowing who's a member: difficult to do with Usenet

Yahoo groups, anyway, also has shared links, group polls, and even a "database" function, whereby one can, I gather, create tables and populate data fields in the group context, though I've never used it.

So, certainly for some groups, Usenet would be fine if all they want is messaging. But for other groups these additional features are valuable and unavailable from Usenet (as far as I know).

Host yourself

[redcliffe]

Get a DSL account, use dyndns to handle DNS, and then run apache on a Linux box. You should be able to hook together a good combo of Gallery, phpwebsite, etc to run your group.

Use Opera [6.01] to preclude the ads...

[ivi]

We don't see ad's while using Yahoo! eGroups

Just set Opera's tri-state "show images" toggle
to "don't show 'em"

Any browser windows opened from one with that
setting -inherits- that setting (fr ver 6.0x)

We've been hit by Yahoo!'s non-posting glitches,
but haven't got a workaround or alternative...

We'll be reading for others' ideas here...

Re:Use Opera [6.01] to preclude the ads...

[rasjani]

You might not see images with this method but tell me, how do you disable "splashscreen" type adds.

Splashscreens are now quite common in the messageboards there. When you are in messagelist and you hit the link to read a message, you get to another page with huge add and second link to the actual real message. Its *F*R*U*S*T*R*A*T*I*N*G

Re:Use Opera [6.01] to preclude the ads...

[Tackhead]

> You might not see images with this method but tell me, how do you disable "splashscreen" type adds.

What's this "Javascript" thing? Why should I enable it again?

Oh, and something about a "Flash" DLL. I deleted that a few years ago and didn't notice anything bad happening, so I guess I didn't need it either.

The only weird thing is that people walk by my cube and after watching me surf for a minute or two, they keep asking me how I block all the ads that have been added to news sites over the past year. They look all puzzled when I say "What popups? I haven't seen a popup (Javashit) or shoshkele (those flash things that drip goo all over the page you're trying to read) in 3 years."

Re:Use Opera [6.01] to preclude the ads...

[rasjani]

With "splashscreens" i didnt mean anything done with javascript nor flash/shockwave. When you hit a legit link in yahoo messageboards, sometimes you get to an another page with full text + image advertisement and another link to forward to the place you really wanted to go.

Havent really checked how those adds are done but most likely they are somekind of session/redirection combinations and thus, kinda pain in the arse to filter *totally*

Don't Get Me Wrong

[smagruder]

I submitted this article, but I'd like everyone to know that I actually give YGroups (formerly EGroups, formerly OneList) a lot of credit in helping me build a large, increasingly potent group for EJB developers. I really like the general design of YGroups and the control it gives to the owner/moderator. And yes, I like that the group is web-based but also works like an e-mail list. I want all these qualities in an alternative.

YGroups was a very promising place to place discussion groups, but the service has gotten too buggy and too ad-happy. And Yahoo makes it exceedingly hard to provide feedback, and when one finds a way to send feedback, it gets ignored.

Thanks in advance for any cool ideas.

Best regards,
Steve

Re:Don't Get Me Wrong

[RGRistroph]

The problem with Yahoo is that it is trying to make money doing something (providing communications) that has such a razor thin margin, and people willing to provide it for free, out of love for the particular community.

I think yahoo is going to slowly go downhill. They started charging to ftp files to geocities pages. They will start charging to access your email through pop on April 24th. Slowly it will get more and more ad-ridden, and filled with fees and annoyances, until it is dead. It was great while it lasted though, and I obviously still use it (look at my email address) and I'm a member of several groups.

sdf.lonestar.org may add mailing list capabilities to one of it's service levels. For group owners willing to pay, it may end up being the way to go. I'm in the midst of migrating my email and web page over there now.

The mailing list delivery mechanism is can be run from a home cable modem machine (pending harassment over the TOS and AUP, of course) but you are likely to get a lot of bellyaching if you go offline for a while. On the other hand a web-accessible archive can go offline for a while and not generate hate mail, death threats, and accusations that you are hijacking the internet or something.

I like the format of the archives produced by mailman, which is at http://www.list.org/

That doesn't inspire confidence

[Cro Magnon]

It seems to me that Yahoo Groups got buggier now that they want to charge for POP3 access. That sure doesn't make me want to spring for the 20/30 bucks per year. They'll probably foul it up anyway!

Peer-to-peer Slashdot-like system

[extrasolar]

Any such thing?

Exacly what i did...

[josquint]

I used phpnuke. Slash-like, runs on any server capable of mysql and php.. VERY easy to install and administer. I use tzo.com's dymanic dns service myself... although dyndns is cheaper :) i just forgot about it when i set it up(i'm a previous tzo customer.. so i knew about that one from a few years ago)

i tried slascode, but couldnt get the mod_perl to work quite right... and found php nuke much more admin friendly

my group is at linuxdistro.tzo.com right now, soon it will be just linuxdistro.com...

Re:Exacly what i did...

[budgenator]

I am using postnuke on our website and I agree that it's certainly able to give yahoo groups a run for it money. What I can't figure out is why the postnuke developer's forum is hosted in yahoo groups; it not like they are picky about membership or anything.

Re:Just use USENET

[Louis_Wu]

Take a deep breath, and look at MSN Communities, they have users, mail lists, calendars, archival places, chat rooms, and some more stuff. You have to deal with MSN EULAs and the like, but that's what you have to deal with when you are using a free service.

Re:Freelists

[/dev/trash]

I know of John. We were on a Computer list that was originally independent then went to onelist and then after a bunch of screw ups on Yahoo's part the list owner switched to freelists.

They've been around awhile. They don't do a wide array of lists so I assume they are small to midsize. Drop them an email at staff@freelists.org or weez@freelists.org (John) I am sure they'll answer all your questions.

Re:Freelists

[/dev/trash]

Oh and if the service by free lists is not for you they do run listar which can be found at Listar

Re:Just use USENET

[bmasel]

MSN just shut down their stoner communities, for "advocacy of illegal acts."

topica == free

[madHomer]

Topica runs groups for free. I actually prefer them over yahoo because they have a "one click" unsubscription URL at the bottom of each email.

CommunityZero.com is a good alternative

[jutulen]

I recommend CommunityZero they're a Canadian outfit that has a much more polished free community suite that's free. Great administration tools.