Copyright Demands Push Largest European Usenet Provider Permanently Offline

First time accepted submitter jonathan1979 writes "Dutch anti-piracy authority BREIN has caused the largest European usenet provider, News-Service.com, to immediately terminate its services as they felt they could not live up to the court order served earlier."

Comments

power

[Nembi]

It always surprises me how much power Brein has. Brein isn't mandated by anyone. It's not "the" authority, it's a self proclaimed authority. They don't work for the government, it's a foundation.

Re:power

[Stellian]

They are founded by right-holders and have an arsenal of favorable laws. No surprise they can get results.

Re:power

[nepka]

BREIN didn't have any power, courts did. And they went there and got results, just like you do in a civilized country.

Re:power

[Anonymous Coward]

And then they will be China's lapdogs...

Oh shit, does this mean that they're going to eat us then?

Re:power

[rtfa-troll]

This power is not coming from Brein themselves. This is based on a court decision. Simply put they have managed to persuade the court that the law is on their side and the law and copyright legislation is providing the power needed.

This is obviously an extreme restraint on freedom of speech. The Usenet data is widely and simply available. There is no way to provide an open communication service whilst guaranteeing that nobody using it puts up copyrighted material. On the other hand there are simple technical measures that BREIN could take, such as providing cancels for all of the posts that they claim copyright over and there are simple legal measures they could take to make using those measures reasonable such as guaranteeing to take over the legal liability of the Usenet providers for any mistakes BREIN make (including libel compensation for anyone who's post they incorrectly cancel). The only reason BREIN doesn't want to do this is that they do not want to take on the costs which their demands would cause. The law should tell the court to tell them to stuff off.

The only solution to this is political. Even if the appeal succeeds the very fact that this judgement could happen at all is going to chill free speech. I hope nobody from the Netherlands will be posting here complaining if they haven't already at least sent a message to their Members of Parliament.

Re:power

[nepka]

It's not a free speech matter. Just take a look at Binverse and Usenext sites. All they do is advertise download speeds, binaries, "user uploaded content" and blazing fast downloads. It's clear to everyone what files those are and what users will be looking for. Sadly, that is the state of Usenet now. It's just warez. You would had have a good point in the 90's, but now it's just a scheme from Usenet companies to profit from such material. They know that without warez they would not have subscribers.

Re:power

[nepka]

Oh and just as a note, they could still just carry all the other groups. In fact they could carry all groups, but just block binaries. They already have that system in place as they save text posts longer than binaries. This would satisfy BREIN's wishes. Of course, Usenet providers know that they will lose all their pirating customers if they did that, so they decided to just wrap it up and go home (after a good long profitable run).

Re:power

[CAPSLOCK2000]

I hope nobody from the Netherlands will be posting here complaining if they haven't already at least sent a message to their Members of Parliament.

The Pirate Party is not in the Dutch Parliament yet, so that may be harder.

Re:power

[Hentes]

If they prosecuted the ones uploading the content, thus committing the crime, you would be right. But holding storage/service providers liable is an attack against free communication.

Re:power

[Nembi]

And several got there by using illegal methods.

Re:power

[Nembi]

the word "times" is missing there...

Re:power

[Arlet]

If 99% of the "free communication" consists of pirated material, it makes sense to hold the storage/service providers liable.

Re:power

[AmiMoJo]

That would be hilarious if you hadn't confused China with Korea.

Reminds me of Team America. Koreans can say the 'L' sound, it is the Japanese who find it hard.

Re:power

[Anonymous Coward]

BREIN got a court to remove it.

Re:power

[SuricouRaven]

There is no difference between text and binaries to usenet - binaries are just yencoded as text. It's only a convention that binaries be posted in the alt.binaries groups. If those groups were closed down, you'd see binaries appear in the discussion groups.

Re:power

[Arlet]

It's relatively easy to block binaries in the discussion groups, though.

Re:power

[houghi]

There is no difference between text and binaries to usenet - binaries are just yencoded as text.

So there IS a difference.
So it would be easy to detect and thus blocked. Also many groups do not want binaries in their groups and users have been known to get removed.

Does this mean there will never ever be somone posting illegal material? No, it would not.

Re:power

[mcgrew]

If that's the case, why aren't liquor companies liable for drunk drivers? Why aren't gunsmiths liable for murders?

Re:power

[TheDarkMaster]

Shutdown Brein instead.

Re:power

[nepka]

And another why: why aren't I, as a software engineer, entitled to getting royalties every time someone uses something with my code in it? It's creative work, it's copyrighted work, so why don't I get paid every time like musicians?

What? It's entirely possible. Just license your code that way.

Re:power

[Arlet]

Are you suggesting 99% of all liquor is consumed by drunk drivers ? If so, I'd like to see your references. If not, your analogy doesn't make sense.

Re:power

[Just Brew It!]

Also many groups do not want binaries in their groups and users have been known to get removed.

How do you remove a user from a distributed system with no central point of control? You might be able to get their upstream provider to cut them off, but they can just find another one pretty easily.

Re:power

[houghi]

Or perhaps there is an issue with it being illegal in the first place.

Re:power

[Dunbal]

Are YOU suggesting that a recording artist is more seriously harmed by casual downloading than a single person maimed for life by a drunk driver?

Re:power

[blackest_k]

The Netherlands seems to have changed from peaceful easy going to extremely right ring.
From banning products to banning religious practices.

Hal-ah and Kosher meat is soon to be banned from production in the Netherlands, which seems very much an attack on the Muslim and Jewish communities. Strangely importing of frozen Hal-ah meat is not an issue. Hal-ah meat is of extremely high quality due to the stringent rules of what is fit to be eaten and you don't need to be Jewish or Muslim to appreciate that.

It's such a far cry from the freedom loving Dutch people who were the most welcoming and friendly that you would find in Europe. Sad to see the about turn

Re:power

[Arlet]

No. What's your point ?

Re:power

[Fnord666]

There is no difference between text and binaries to usenet - binaries are just yencoded as text. It's only a convention that binaries be posted in the alt.binaries groups. If those groups were closed down, you'd see binaries appear in the discussion groups.

It is straightforward to pattern match encoded binaries and automatically cancel those posts via cancelmoose.

Re:power

[Anonymous Coward]

1) The word is "Halal". I don't know where you got this "Hal-ah" shit, but it behooves you to at least know the word for what you're talking about before you start mouthing off.

2) Animal rights > Your right to buy what you misguidedly believe is "extremely high quality". The end.

How the fuck did this ever get modded up to +2?

Re:power

[Luckyo]

Afaik they both find it hard, because they use the same alphabet, and it has same character for "L" and "R" sound in latin alphabet.

Re:power

[Luckyo]

You're splitting hairs here. Unless you want to start parsing every post for "is this a real world in any of world's languages, or potential typo, or misspelling of any world in any of the world's languages or is it a binary encoded as text", as far as any system is concerned there is no difference.

Re:power

[turbidostato]

"Are you suggesting 99% of all liquor is consumed by drunk drivers ?"

No. He is suggesting 99% of drunk drivers bought it to liquor companies and that 100% of murderers using guns bought it from a gun-producing company.

Which certainly is a good analogy with regards of NNTP and copyright-infringent content (which, by the way, is *not* copyright-infringent content at least on some EU countris, ACTA notwithstanding).

Re:power

[misexistentialist]

That's all every single ISP advertises too. Guess the internet is just a sad scheme to generate profit since the 90's.

Re:power

[Luckyo]

Halal meat isn't higher quality - it's usually lower quality in the West. The myth of it being "higher quality" comes from dark ages, when slaughtering animal without letting the blood drain out of it would cause blood remaining in the body to spoil extremely quickly (as blood is a very fertile soil for bacteria growth). Halal meat, while considered religious was actually started as a tradition for more healthy way of draining blood from the animal to get meat that was healthier to eat due to lower bacterial content.

Thing is, modern slaughtering techniques extract blood much more efficiently then slitting animal's throat and letting it drain while its heart still beats. As a result, just like halal meat being better quality then dark ages western meat, it's worse quality then modern industrially slaughtered meat. If you hear otherwise, know that you're talking to uninformed person or a liar with a (religious) axe to grind.

Re:power

[Luckyo]

+2 is what you get to all your posts by default when you're have excellent carma and not posting as AC. Like me for example.

Re:power

[Arlet]

Not splitting hairs at all. Despite what you may think, it's pretty easy to make a filter that detects binary content, and it doesn't involve checking all the world's dictionaries.

Some simple rules and patterns will do fine.

Re:power

[Arlet]

He is suggesting 99% of drunk drivers bought it to liquor companies

Which isn't true, since a lot of drunk drivers get cheap beer from the super market, or get drunk at a bar.

Even if it were true, it's not all that relevant. You should look at how much of the business of liquor stores doesn't result in drunk driving. You'll find that it's quite a bit, so shutting down liquor stores would harm quite a few legitimate and responsible users of alcoholic beverages.

On the other hand, there's a barely anyone using Usenet binary groups for legitimate purposes, and the few people who do can easily move to a HTTP/FTP server or host a torrent.

Re:power

[kesuki]

google groups shows you as being wrong http://groups.google.com/groups/dir?hl=en?hl=en& if i recall correctly google groups doesn't allow you to download binaries.
sure your newsfeed might be relegated to binaries, but the google one is quite diverse and has many languages, and plenty of content.

Re:power

[CRCulver]

I don't know about Muslims, but observant Jews have made it clear that they don't accept historical conjectures like "pork was banned because trichinosis was a danger" as a reason to give up the kosher rules. Dietary prescriptions are a spiritual matter, not just the possible result of ancient hygienic norms.

Re:power

[SuricouRaven]

Reduce character set to 32 - that's 26 letters, plus a handful of numbers and punctuation. Insert spaces at random. Apply capitalisation as grammar appropriate. You're encoding at a little under five bits per byte, so the overhead is a lot worse than yenc, but your binaries would look almost exactly like text to a computer. It'd just lead to months of an arms race, as pirates devise better ways to hide their data.

Re:power

[vadim_t]

The religions practice part of it should be entirely ignored.

The question should be settled entirely on empirical grounds: Does Halal meat production pass the standards of quality, hygiene, and reduction of suffering? All meat production must be held according to the same standards.

If Halal meat complies with the minimum requirements, then it should be allowed. If not, it should be banned. Religion should at no point come into it.

Re:power

[kesuki]

fairly easy indeed, post one of 100 is real easy to detect... unless you manually generate the encoded text the newsreader/uploader itself tags the content in the headers.

Re:power

[HavenBastion]

and i suppose that's a good thing because noone ever has a need to post LEGAL binaries on usenet?!

Re:power

[Arlet]

If you make your message look exactly like regular text, how is your target audience going to find all the parts ?

And, if you want to encode a 700 MB CD, how are you going to post thousands of little messages in a short time without getting kicked off the server ?

Re:power

[kesuki]

perhaps.
corruption is nasty.
laws that breed corruption is worse.

Re:power

[nepka]

And what would that reason be? Is there some reason why you cannot upload it elsewhere or host it?

You would have a good argument if there actually would be large amount of legit binaries on Usenet. Frankly, 99.99% of it is pirated material and sadly that changes things. Especially when everyone knows you pay those Usenet binary companies for the sole reason of getting warez.

Re:power

[bzipitidoo]

Makes sense? No it doesn't. You talk as if it's obvious that piracy is immoral and unethical. Other than the hypothetical harm from lost sales, piracy does no harm. The supposed harm is not the fault of piracy, it is the fault of antiquated, obsolete, and plain wrong ideas of how artists should be compensated. Sharing should never have been criminalized. It's impossible to force society and nature to treat information as if it were material. It isn't. Anytime anyone calls copyright infringement "stealing", they are making this fundamental error. Difficult to have a reasoned discussion of the real problems until people stop listening to the intellectual property extremists, stop agreeing to pretend the universe works differently than it obviously does.

Once it's admitted that sharing is good, then we see all this talk of it being reasonable to silence mere messengers is wrong. Ought to be able to see that regardless. "Shoot the messenger" is a classic mistake still commonly made today.

Re:power

[Arlet]

Makes sense? No it doesn't. You talk as if it's obvious that piracy is immoral and unethical

Your, mine, or the judge's opinion on piracy don't matter in this case. The judge simply follows the written law and precedents, and the court's decision makes perfect sense in that context. If you want to argue that the law is wrong, take it up with politicians.

Re:power

[Kjella]

By all means, have your religious diets. I'm also not going to complain about you being a vegetarian, vegan, nondrinker, diabetic, having food allergies or whatever else diet you're on. If you'll do the same as I eat my pork and drink my beer. Now of course I'd be interested if there was a medical reason I shouldn't eat something or it should be prepared a special way, so it's worth exploring if there's a purpose behind it. But apart from that, I'm not going to limit what I will eat to please some religious sensibilities.

Re:power

[MightyMartian]

Since almost all binaries are binhex encoded (may still be a few uuencoded files out there) it's trivially easy to filter binary data from Usenet.

Re:power

[Anonymous Coward]

no one gives a shit about your spirituality. This is about public health.

Re:power

[Tomato42]

or host a torrent.

As if MAFIAA (or whatever its local version is called) doesn't consider all torrent traffic "infringing".

Re:power

[belmolis]

That is a dubious ex post facto rationalization for the rules of halal slaughter. Actually, they probably have the same origin as the Jewish rules of shehita, and in neither case are they due to the belief that a carcass drained of blood spoils less quickly than otherwise. Judaism has a fairly clear taboo on blood, which underlies both the rules governing slaughter and the rules surrounding menstruation. Islam appears either to have continued ancient Semitic taboos of the same sort or to have adopted them from Judaism. (It's hard to say because we don't know very much about pre-Islamic Arab life.)

Re:power

[cOldhandle]

pfff banning killing animals in prolonged, painful ways for magic rituals - those right wing fascists!

Re:power

[darthdavid]

Actually neither uses an alphabet per-se. The Chinese use ideograms, with the Japanese using the same set of ideograms (usually with the same or at-least a similar) meaning attached but (obviously) to represent a Japanese word instead of a Chinese one. The Japanese also use two syllabaries (that are basically the equivalent of cursive and printing except that one is generally used for normal writing and the other is used to write out SFX and foreign words (usually badly mangling them in the process because as a syllabary there's no way to express consonant sounds without an attached vowel).

The Koreans us a Featural Alphabet where consonants and vowels are put together in blocks to form syllables and those syllable blocks are put together into words but they have just as much trouble with R & L as the Chinese and Japanese because all three languages treat R&L as the same phoneme so the first time native speakers of any of those languages have to differentiate between the sounds is when they pick up a language that does.

Re:power

[turbidostato]

"On the other hand, there's a barely anyone using Usenet binary groups for legitimate purposes"

Yes, and I certainly would support closing the alt.binary hierarchy (or at least not pressing for its maintenance): not only NNTP never was a good tool to support binary files but there are much better tools really oriented from the ground up to that today.

It's only that they are closing service to *all* groups, not only alt.binary.

Re:power

[Zontar The Mindless]

Untrue, at least for Mandarin, in which /l/ and /r/ are separate and distinct phonemes.

Re:power

[Luckyo]

Of course. A person with "religious axe to grind" will claim that these are orders from God (Allah or whatever name you choose to assign to your flying spaghetti monster).

That doesn't remove the facts that most of religious commandments were actually "improve society" laws in the day and age they were given. Islam makes a great example of this: five commandments and sharia were ground breaking in many ways when they were issued. Let me give you a concrete example: human rights. Back then, women had none. They were property of their men (fathers, brothers, husbands, even sons when they came of age). If a ten women went to court against one man in Europe during Dark Ages, they would lose.

Not so under sharia. It values women as less then men, but assigns a strict value, meaning that when the threshold of "x women for every man" is overcome, judge will be forced BY LAW to take women's testimony over man's.

The reason we view these laws as massively conservative now is because society has long moved on, and now they are indeed on the conservative end of the political and legal spectrum. But this doesn't remove the merit of them once being a major progressive driver of society.

Re:power

[rrohbeck]

But there are several free usenet providers for text only groups so there's no business model.

Re:power

[X0563511]

Was there someone else witness to it? One of the nasty effects of Alcohol is that it makes you think MORE of yourself, while retarding your motor skills. You think you're doing fine, meanwhile any observers would note otherwise.

Re:power

[AmonTheMetalhead]

The Chinese eat just about anything

Re:power

[AmonTheMetalhead]

The fact that the average judge can't grasp technology aids them a lot too. The judge probably thinks policing their service is feasible.

Re:power

[tehcyder]

Once it's admitted that sharing is good

Yes, in a non-capitalist society.

But in a capitalist society based on the cash nexus, why should you expect some people to give their work away for free just because it can be copied?

Re:power

[Pigskin-Referee]

Oh, sort of like Opera only they influence the USSREC, ahem EC into making ridiculous ruling solely based on Opera's desires.

Re:power

[_Shad0w_]

Someone from a trusted top tier server sends out cancel messages for their posts and/or configures the server to filter their posts, so they don't filter down stream from them. It's not that much different to blithely accepting creates, really.

At least as far as I can remember. It's been a long time since I looked at how usenet worked.

Re:power

[bzipitidoo]

Are you saying that any other way of compensating artists is somehow not capitalist? That's another common and wrong argument. Or did it not occur to you that there could be other ways to compensate artists? Or you don't believe any other way can possibly work? Well, I've got news for you: copyright isn't working. Copyright extremists suffer from such narrow thinking.

We should not try to treat information with the same laws, customs, and expectations that apply to material goods. We cannot force information to be scarce, as goods are, and we shouldn't try. Our efforts to do so have been a huge waste of resources, not to mention good will. Information and goods are fundamentally different from each other. Yes, both are valuable. But one is easy to copy, and the other is not. Surely we are not too stupid to handle more than one kind of concept, even in the face of efforts by cunning, self-interested parties to confuse us on these points? You know the saying: to a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Even the narrow world view of "this for that" is broader than material goods, as it values services and favors as well as goods.

Re:power

[modecx]

Thing is, modern slaughtering techniques extract blood much more efficiently then slitting animal's throat and letting it drain while its heart still beats.

Modern slaughter techniques often still involve letting the heart pump blood out of the jugular and carotid arteries, but the animal's brain is incapacitated/destroyed with a pneumatic captive bolt device beforehand.

According to halal and Kashrut, however, the animal must be conscious at the point it's bleed out. If it's not conscious, it's effectively dead... And since Islam also forbids the eating of carrion, that's unacceptable to them. A silly line to draw, if you ask me, but that's what their faith says.

Re:power

[KingBenny]

i think there's only one solution to this, for everyone to stop buying dvd's blurays and cds until bully organisations like this are forced to step down, or just a global agreement to not pay any fines inflicted because of them

I'll defer to the bard on this one

[AngryDeuce]

The more you tighten your grip, BREIN, the more star systems will slip through your fingers...

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[Dogtanian]

The more you tighten your grip, BREIN, the more star systems will slip through your fingers...

Why are people always using that quote? Aside from the fact it doesn't fit very well here, does anyone remember what happened after Leia said originally?

I'm not a big Star Wars fan, and even *I* know that it didn't end well...

Leia: The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers.

Tarkin: Not after we demonstrate the power of this station. In a way, you have determined the choice of the planet that will be destroyed first. Since you are reluctant to provide us with the location of the Rebel base, I have chosen to test this station's destructive power on your home planet of Alderaan.

        Leia: [shocked] No! Alderaan is peaceful. We have no weapons. You can't possibly--

        Tarkin: You would prefer another target? A military target?! Then name the system! [stepping closer to Leia and pinning her against Darth Vader] I grow tired of asking this, so it will be the last time. Where is the Rebel base?

        Leia: [looks at Alderaan for a moment, then, resigned] Dantooine. They're on Dantooine.

        Tarkin: There. You see, Lord Vader? She can be reasonable. Continue with the operation. You may fire when ready.

        Leia: [panicked] What?!

        Tarkin: You're far too trusting. Dantooine is too remote to make an effective demonstration, but don't worry. We will deal with your rebel friends soon enough.

        Leia: No.

        [The Death Star destroys Alderaan]

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[Dunbal]

Fast forward a little more, and the Death Star is destroyed, and a few sequels later, the Empire loses the war. Your point was?

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[macraig]

You're a cliched idiot. USENET is a centralized distribution system; how do you propose we form a Rebel Alliance that will recreate that centralized infrastructure without repeating the same series of events? There won't be any of your slippage until the evil BREINish Emperor is out of the way.

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[Dogtanian]

Fast forward a little more, and the Death Star is destroyed, and a few sequels later, the Empire loses the war. Your point was?

My point was that Leia's self-assured bravado was pretty much subverted straight away. And most of the time I see it used here, it does tend to come across as a stock geeky wish-fulfilling incantation, especially as it doesn't normally say anything particularly insightful or predictive in the context in which it's used(!)

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[macraig]

BitTorrent is not USENET. And you've overlooked that the SAME THING happens to it as well: the death of Mininova, etc. You'll next claim that encrypted BitTorrent is the solution, to which The Powers That Be will respond that if you're encrypting peer-to-peer traffic - and they packet-sniff so they know that it is - then you must be a guilty Infringer... and the courts will agree and Strike you down and confiscate your precious HTPC and iPhone.

Deal with the Evil Overlords head-on, or STFU.

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[king neckbeard]

Again, by the end of the film, Tarkin is dead, and the Death Star is destroyed. The party it didn't END well for was Tarkin, Leia got the short end of the stick in the short run, which is kind of standard fare. The captor attacking the captured when the captured taunts him with the uncomfortable truth of their inevitable failure is a pretty common response, but that doesn't change the fact that the hero almost always does what was claimed by the captured and the captor is usually dead or imprisoned. I will admit it is overused, but so is the stupidity of the music recording and film industries that makes themselves line up with the evil empire cliche.

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[king neckbeard]

Trackerless torrents pretty much have it covered, although even having different trackers presents decentralization. However, even with usenet, that isn't the case. Usenet isn't centralized. News-service.com is. Other usenet providers are still up.

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[Cylix]

I'll fetch him. BREIN? Huh. I can get RIAA! We'll have a nightmare with MPAA, have a surprise party for SCO, Monsanto can do the catering, and then we'll have christening for Lodsys! All I have to do is snap my fingers and they'll be here. They're lining up to get here, and do you know why Jack? Should I tell you why? Hmm? Because here, in this world, the bad guys can win!

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[macraig]

USENET servers are a centralized *paradigm*. Sure, DHT decentralizes BitTorrent, but where ya gonna find out about a torrent in the first place except some centralized resource? Word of mouth? Not likely. Some random forum or blog post? How ya gonna find that post except through some centralized system like Google? Damned middlemen! Can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em....

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[nitehawk214]

Fast forward a little more, and the Death Star is destroyed, and a few sequels later, the Empire loses the war. Your point was?

My point was that Leia's self-assured bravado was pretty much subverted straight away. And most of the time I see it used here, it does tend to come across as a stock geeky wish-fulfilling incantation, especially as it doesn't normally say anything particularly insightful or predictive in the context in which it's used(!)

Also, Leia was lying, the rebel base wasn't on Dantooine. I don't know where this takes the analogy now.

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[dkf]

I will admit it is overused

Of course it is; it's a basic plotline, and they're all done to death. Have been for centuries. But you don't deal with stories (or plays, or musicals, or movies, or ...) for the basic plot, you're there for the details. "It's not what you do, but the way that you do it."

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[Cylix]

"Never go against a Sicilian when death is on the line?"

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[TangoMargarine]

Millions (billions?) of people died as a direct result of a bit of stubbornness. But yeah, they eventually won the war, so everything was fine, right?

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[tehcyder]

If you have replaced Shakespeare withf George Lucas as "the bard", there's relly very little hope for you.

Re:I'll defer to the bard on this one

[king neckbeard]

Search engines, either specialized or generalized are going to be the primary way of finding it. I wouldn't consider this a centralized source unless it is for some reason only available on one search engine. You can find torrents on google, bing, yahoo, duckduckgo, probably even dogpile, askjeeves, or such.

Re:Well done

[rudy_wayne]

Let's admit it, nowadays Usenet is just another warez distribution network.

Except for a few diehard nerds everyone switched to online forums long ago.

Usenet has always been a Warez distribution network. Now however, it's 99% viruses disguised as warez.

It's sad how USENET has changed

[Anonymous Coward]

If USENET were what it used to be, I would be sad about this. But it's just a scheme for companies like this to charge access to pirated goods while claiming that the responsibility lies elsewhere. If people still had useful discussions, I would feel differently but all that's left is the pirated materials.

Re:It's sad how USENET has changed

[houghi]

There are plenty of free non-binaries servers out there where you can still do discussions. Unfortunately many people prefer discussing things one many different sites instead of having the discussions grouped and easy to follow.

So forums have taken over.

Re:It's sad how USENET has changed

[unixisc]

I hated Usenet when it existed, given that except for moderated newsgroups, the signal/noise ratio was really low. It's a lot better now given that people just go to their favorite websites and post there, and the owners take them more seriously. I'm glad that it's devolved to the point that some ISPs are pulling it, and it won't be a loss when it's gone. And that's not even counting all the porn that'll be gone w/ it.

Re:It's sad how USENET has changed

[misexistentialist]

Why aren't you blaming the hard drive companies? Everything was better when people only had 1.44 MB of storage!

Re:It's sad how USENET has changed

[dkf]

If people still had useful discussions, I would feel differently but all that's left is the pirated materials.

You were subscribed to the wrong groups. There are still useful ones out there, with ordinary discussions happening just as they used to a decade or more ago.

Re:It's sad how USENET has changed

[FridayBob]

You're probably right about the pirated content, but it's not right either for the courts to be allowed to order parts of the Internet to simply be shut down every time the entertainment industry claims that it is being used for copyright infringement and starts making unreasonable demands. Sure, Usenet isn't what it used to be, but nothing on the Internet is the same way is was ten years ago. But Usenet is still there (at least, it was last time I looked), it still works the same way and it's still useful. It's time for our politicians to start protecting consumer interests, recognize that the demands of the entertainment industry are unreasonable before they end up shutting down the rest of Internet as well, and also face up to the fact that most copyright infringement could be prevented if only the entertainment industry were willing to change its business model and allow for on-demand access to content via the Internet for a reasonable fee.

Re:It's sad how USENET has changed

[Arlet]

You were subscribed to the wrong groups

You can't blame people for only subscribing to the groups they find interesting.

Re:It's sad how USENET has changed

[Tomato42]

Should have visited usenet before the Eternal September...

Re:It's sad how USENET has changed

[dkf]

You can't blame people for only subscribing to the groups they find interesting.

I don't blame them for their interests; that would invite people to blame me for mine. I blame them for not defending against spammers and other scum. I blame them for going off to other venues (e.g., blogs with promotion by tweet). I blame them for not caring enough to make the world a better place.

And anyway, I was merely reporting that the traditions of USENET continue strongly in some communities.

practically doesn't mean what it used to

[sgt scrub]

It requires NSE to finding a way to identify and delete all copyrighted files from its servers, which is practically impossible.

practically impossible?!? If a human compared every file being uploaded, and already on, just one server to a list of copyrighted material they still wouldn't be able to effect the files munged onto the server from other servers. Everyone involved knew this from the start. Encrypted P2P is the only way to go.

Re:practically doesn't mean what it used to

[macraig]

And the instant you encrypt that traffic you're presumed guilty and treated like a criminal. There's no "workaround" here; we have to confront the evil overlords head-on. The revolution is at least 50 years overdue.

Re:practically doesn't mean what it used to

[sgt scrub]

And the instant you encrypt that traffic you're presumed guilty and treated like a criminal.

I would think you would get rate shaped but only by ISP's that are also media companies. eg WarnerBro's Cable. Those ISP's should be boycotted anyways, IMHO. However, there is no way in hell the mafia could take you to court for file sharing without proving what copyrighted files you supposedly shared.

Re:practically doesn't mean what it used to

[sangreal66]

Warner Bros. doesn't have anything to do with Time Warner Cable. They sold it off a few years ago

Re:practically doesn't mean what it used to

[sgt scrub]

The capitol investors no longer own majority interest in Time, Warner Bros Studios, or Time Warner Cable? Evidence proves otherwise. ie. It is still run by cartoon characters.

Re:This can be rephrased:

[FaxeTheCat]

Lets just say that I do not think your comment reflect on the real world. The only people I know who (still) use USENET (one person) use it for downloading copyrighted material. Actually, a number of years ago he said that he was surprised that all the copyright people went after torrent sites when all the good stuff was on USENET...

Re:Well done

[Dogtanian]

Let's admit it, nowadays Usenet is just another warez distribution network. Except for a few diehard nerds everyone switched to online forums long ago.

Usenet has always been a Warez distribution network.

Well, yeah, it's had the binaries for a *long* time, but I'm pretty sure the OP was also implying that once upon a time this wasn't its primary purpose. The first thing I ever used on the Internet- circa 1993- was Usenet newsgroups via a text-based newsreader (before the web *really* took off and a while before I ever used a browser).

Back then it *was*- along with Internet-based BBSs- still a major part of online discussions. Nowadays... well, yeah, it *is* "just another warez distribution network". I still use it for its original purpose occasionally, but a lot of the groups are pretty overrun with spam and useless, and even MS no longer support their former moderated newsgroups.

Sort of like the BSA

[tgd]

In the US, the BSA is the same way ... its a pseudo-legal extortion outfit.

Of course, that's the norm in the US for a lot of organizations. The "Better Business Bureau" is another classic example. Commercial extortion was an area Yelp was trying to get into for a long time, too.

Re:Sort of like the BSA

[mcgrew]

Despite their best efforts, the BSA promotes open-source software.

In 2000, the Business Software Alliance conducted a raid and subsequent audit at the San Luis Obispo, Calif.-based company that turned up a few dozen unlicensed copies of programs. Ball settled for $65,000, plus $35,000 in legal fees. But by then, the BSA, a trade group that helps enforce copyrights and licensing provisions for major business software makers, had put the company on the evening news and featured it in regional ads warning other businesses to monitor their software licenses.

Humiliated by the experience, Ball told his IT department he wanted Microsoft products out of his business within six months. "I said, 'I don't care if we have to buy 10,000 abacuses,'" recalled Ball, who recently addressed the LinuxWorld trade show. "We won't do business with someone who treats us poorly."

Ball's IT crew settled on a potpourri of open-source software--Red Hat's version of Linux, the OpenOffice office suite, Mozilla's Web browser--plus a few proprietary applications that couldn't be duplicated by open source. Ball, whose father, Ernie, founded the company, says the transition was a breeze, and since then he's been happy to extol the virtues of open-source software to anyone who asks. He spoke with CNET News.com about his experience.

Re:Sort of like the BSA

[tgd]

So extortion is okay, as long as it serves your personal political or social agenda?

Interesting ...

Re:Sort of like the BSA

[Nembi]

We have the BSA in the Netherlands too.

Re:Sort of like the BSA

[mcgrew]

No, it's not, but it's good to see something good come from something bad. Ball stood up to bullies, that's a good thing. Exposing the bullies as extortionists is also a good thing.

A better thing would be for the BSA to disappear and its leaders jailed.

Re:Usenet is still around

[SuricouRaven]

Anon needs the script kiddies. At best they can be trained up to become competant hackers... and if not, they serve as an army of highly visible targets to hide behind.

Re:The only way to win.

[SuricouRaven]

They work only if you can get enough customers to join in to have a serious impact. Despite the constant claims of hollywood that internet piracy is killing their industry, they are still churning out a series of blockbusters every year that rake in the cash with ease.

Re:The only way to win.

[hairyfeet]

No they don't and here is why: You manage to get enough people to boycott (not easy since their goals are now the complete control of the channels so you can't hear or see anything but pre-packaged crap) to seriously hurt their bottom line and what will happen?

They will blame their losses on piracy, walk into the halls of power with a nice PPT that shows conclusively that "If we made X that year than logically we should have made X+Y by now so it HAS to be the pirates!" and then after handing out the customary bribes they WILL get ever more draconian laws and copyright extensions!

You see this is like "too big to fail' which is "heads I win, tails you lose" as they have long since figured out how to game the system so ANY action results in increased power and profits for them! Hell if you were to cause enough damage they'd just have a "piracy tax" added to every single HDD, flash drive, anything that can hold a scrap of data, and pick the money straight out of your pockets!

You have to give them credit, its a great scam. there is literally not a single answer you can give that won't give them more money and power! You copy their content you're a pirate, you don't copy but don't buy you're a pirate, you don't copy and DO buy you're not giving them the year over year gains their PPT says they should be so you must be a pirate! It is like xkcd only every road leads to " we get more money and/or power" for the megacorps. like I said, pretty slick scam.

It's the correct response

[gstrickler]

News-Service.com responded correct. If they're going to make laws/rulings that make it impractical, just completely do away with the service and let the users, politicians, rights abusers and courts work it out. If it pisses of enough users, the politicians will get involved. But News-Service.com doesn't have to spend a ton of money (and raise prices) to stay out of trouble. And of course, the rights holders will be inconvenienced by this in ways they haven't even thought of yet.

Re:It's the correct response

[HiThere]

Not sure about that. Usenet isn't a big part of the net anymore...well, it doesn't seem to be an important part. They may well be able to do this without being inconvenienced.

OTOH, it's a clear indication that communications need to be non-centralized. That which is centralized is relatively easy to corrupt or destroy. Mesh networks would seem to be indicated, but also mesh services to run on those networks. Ideally *all* centralized services would be replaced.

Usenet is a dinosaur

[Just Brew It!]

Sad as it may be, this was probably inevitable. I was pretty active on Usenet back in the day (1990s), and look back on that time with a fair bit of nostalgia; but I don't use it any more. Technology has moved on, and Usenet is an anachronism. The last couple of times I poked my nose into the groups I used to frequent, they were full of spam with very little (if any) worthwhile discussion taking place. The poor S/N ratio makes it pretty much unusable.

Usenet's primary purpose these days seems to be the distribution of spam and illicit copyrighted content. I've wondered how long it would be able to continue flying "under the radar" when many of the other popular file sharing services were getting hammered by the **AA and their henchmen.

While Usenet is essentially a distributed system, users still require an upstream provider, and these providers are quite vulnerable to legal pressure. It looks like Usenet's day of reckoning may be at hand; the incoming asteroid is on a collision course.

RIP Usenet.

Re:Usenet is a dinosaur

[turbidostato]

"Technology has moved on, and Usenet is an anachronism."

So, please, can you explain to me what's the better technology that arose that made NNTP an anachronism? Because I honestly say I don't know the current technology that is better than NNTP doing its stuff on technical grounds.

Re:Usenet is a dinosaur

[marcello_dl]

> Technology has moved on, and Usenet is an anachronism.

As a distributed content provider subdivided by categories, usenet was better than most centralized systems we have today. It doesn't matter if they are implemented in the cloud: if fb throws you out, who cares how many redundant servers they have.

Usenet did leave people with too much freedom, so alternatives who removed such control creeped in. Now we are at the stage of megaupload and company that is replacing bittorrent that is replacing p2p. See an involution? You become the dumb terminal again.

Re:Usenet is a dinosaur

[misexistentialist]

vulnerable to legal pressure

What really is obsolete is "law" when corporate entities can achieve their aims by using quasi-legal (i.e. illegal) means. They and their agents thus put all their property and lives outside the protection of society...

Re:Usenet is a dinosaur

[Just Brew It!]

For most people, web-based services are a better medium for online discussions.

NNTP was never a particularly good protocol for distributing large binaries; it is unreliable, and places unreasonable storage demands on the NNTP hosting providers, which in turn leads to short retention times for binaries. It was just that all of the alternatives that existed 20 years ago were worse! Modern P2P protocols fill that role now, and do a better job.

Re:Usenet is a dinosaur

[Just Brew It!]

Well, someone should come up with a P2P protocol to do something similar (discussion threads organized by topic), without needing an upstream provider (other than a bare Internet connection). Essentially a BitTorrent version of NNTP.

Re:Usenet is a dinosaur

[Just Brew It!]

Oh, I didn't say it wasn't a significant event. I just don't think Usenet is particularly practical any more, for a number of reasons. We probably need a replacement that is truly P2P (to the end user), instead of being sort-of-P2P (just between the established NNTP providers).

Re:Usenet is a dinosaur

[Just Brew It!]

I'm not defending the corporate entities that backed this. But the fact that their motives and methods are questionable still does not change the fact that Usenet is much less important today than it was 10-15 years ago. Pretty much all of the legitimate use cases for Usenet -- and most of the illegitimate ones as well! -- have already been supplanted by other technologies.

Re:Usenet is a dinosaur

[Mandrel]

For most people, web-based services are a better medium for online discussions.

For people who are usually a long way from servers that host Web-based forums, USENET was so much faster to move from message to message because it accesses a copy at the local ISP. These days, with faster local and international connections, and AJAX UIs, the difference has lessened.

USNET's other advantages are a single UI rather than thousands of different Web-BBs, and a single searchable archive of all your posts.

Re:Usenet is a dinosaur

[turbidostato]

"For most people, web-based services are a better medium for online discussions."

It is not. It only seems that way at first glance. On the part of the user/consumer is has a slightly higher entry effort than a forum because in the latter you see on the spot what's happening at the price of much lower usability*1 and control *forever* -a pity, but quite a common trend. On the side of the producer/site owner, it allows easier control and add revenue by positioning non-solicited info along the messages. No one of them are technical advantages and even less so advantages for the end user.

"NNTP was never a particularly good protocol for distributing large binaries"

True, nor it was meant for that. Binaries were always an after-thought and side-stepping on the main feature: hierarchically organized decentralized-controlled discussion forums.

*1 Horrid nesting, difficult to follow long threads, inability to score, tag, selectively retain, etc. client side...

Re:Usenet is a dinosaur

[turbidostato]

"USNET's other advantages are a single UI "

Not only a single UI but the specific UI that suits my needs/preferences, which doesn't need to be the same that fits others.

"and a single searchable archive of all your posts."

And local retention if I want to and exactly the way I want to, and the ability to score messages by the criteria better fits me, and a logical and common hierarchy to find/subscribe to info...

I honestly believe that the only way to say that web-based service is a better tool for on-line discussion is not knowing about the alternatives.

Re:Usenet is a dinosaur

[dkf]

Pretty much all of the legitimate use cases for Usenet -- and most of the illegitimate ones as well! -- have already been supplanted by other technologies.

I do not know or care about the illegal uses, but legal uses are still out there. (I'm thinking of a very specific one, but its identity is really immaterial to this discussion.) Though it would be technically possible to use some other method (e.g., a web forum) that's not where the community is; they're using USENET in the way it was intended, and it works superbly now that the bandwidth problems that used to plague it have been resolved. I admit that for a while I was using Google Groups as the interface, but I don't any more; their interface was poor (by comparison with a specialist client like Moz Thunderbird) and their service wasn't too hot either, especially when it came to spam. That's what you get for trying to "web forum"-ize USENET.

Re:Usenet is a dinosaur

[turbidostato]

"So says the guy posting on slashdot..."

Posting on forums is a social trend. I never doubted that web sites won the fight about this years ago, but that was not my point, my point is that NNTP is technically vastly superior to its web-based lessen brothers. Slashdot is a perfect case for this:
* Try to follow a thread with more than five/six indentantion levels.
* Try to track cites within messages.
* Try to follow on a story once it left the front page.
* Try to do advanced message scoring -heck try to do anything that was not in the mind of the site owners.
* Try to retain messages/threads that specially interest you.

Mind you, some things aforementioned are somehow doable on Slashdot, only at great pain, but are basically trivial with a NNTP client.

"The real problem is that is the perception."

Of course it is. That's why I said that NNTP is better *on technical grounds*.

Re:Usenet is a dinosaur

[Spugglefink]

The poor S/N ratio makes it pretty much unusable.

That's it in a nutshell. The technology was superior in many ways to the alternatives, but the alternatives I migrated to over the years all have one thing in common: they dramatically reduce the amount of garbage present in the signal.

The last time I fired up a newsreader, my old haunts were completely clogged up with binaries posted in the wrong place, spam, and trolls trolling trolls. There were almost no real posters left. It's a shame, because I've maintained several life-long friendships with people I met on Usenet back in the day, and I've never formed relationships like that with anyone since, on these various mailing lists and web forums and whatnot. Nothing close.

Look I will go along

[koan]

If you give me a web site that I can go to, browse through movies and TV shows to find what I want without ads and I will give you $0.25 for TV, and $1.00 for movies to download, otherwise fuck straight off.

I can remember a time when the television personality would apologize for the "word from our sponsor" then quickly get back to the show, now each show is 1/3 ads (and often the show is an ad) and they scream at you, literally scream at you.

Re:Well done

[Cheech Wizard]

I was in the BBS world in the early 1980's. There were *many* "warez" sites back then (not to mention p0rn BBSes). Only difference was the files were going across phone lines (albeit slowly). Nothing has *really* changed since the 1980's. It's like the "War Against Drugs": They can have all the armies they want and fight forever, but it won't go away (at least in my lifetime which, considering I'm in my 60's, will admittedly be relatively short). Heck - I know people who have been running "private" FTP sites since the mid-1990's who still make a pretty good living off of their "business" (not to mention US federal and state income tax free). There are lots of them out there if you look, and you really don't have to look very hard. Even IRC has hundreds of channels you can "trade" files on. Personally I'm a bit past "pirating" files, but I know a heck of a lot of people that are into "trading" (aka "sharing") files of all sorts. I haven't used IRC, newsgroups, torrents or any of that stuff in years, but that's just me. I burned out on that stuff a long time ago. The only 2 effective efforts to eliminate something (that I am aware of) were: 1. Eliminated the production of methaqualone (aka "Quaaludes" or " 'Ludes") world wide, and 2. Stopping satellite program "theft" from Dish Network and DirectTV.

Spiritual Israel

[tepples]

If the law of Moses is a spiritual matter to observant Jews, then why isn't the fulfillment of the prophecies of Isaiah around 30 C.E. also a spiritual matter?

Re:Spiritual Israel

[belmolis]

Because Jews are not of the view that those prophecies were fulfilled, and for that matter, do not agree with Christians as to what the prophecies mean.

Re:Spiritual Israel

[betterunixthanunix]

Probably because we do not believe that Jesus fulfilled any prophecies, and to be honest I have my doubts that the Jesus described in the New Testament ever actually existed. It would be as if I asked you why you do not believe any of the hundreds of apocryphal books that were not canonized by the early Church.

Re:Spiritual Israel

[lister king of smeg]

well as for his existence that is an accepted fact even among most atheists and most everyone in the archaeological community, in fact there is more contemporary documentation of his existence than there is for plato yet no one questions his existence. if you need an example of such documentation look up Josephus an ancient non-christian non-jewish roman historian. admittedly i am not talking about his deity only the existence of a man named Jesus from Nazareth executed by the roman ect. his deity is still debated and up to you to deside.

Re:Spiritual Israel

[dunkelfalke]

From what I remember, one very important condition of a messiah is bringing peace on earth, and frankly that did not happen.

Reduction of suffering

[tepples]

"Reduction of suffering" can be twisted into an excuse to ban anything. How about requiring vegetarianism by requiring a reduction of suffering to zero? If not, is there an objective measure of how much suffering is OK?

Re:Reduction of suffering

[vadim_t]

"Reduction of suffering" can be twisted into an excuse to ban anything. How about requiring vegetarianism by requiring a reduction of suffering to zero?

That, however, should not be twisted into an excuse to keep the same bad practices. If it's clear that we can do better, then we should.

If not, is there an objective measure of how much suffering is OK?

I would say that as little as possible, and bleeding to death by having the neck slashed sounds very painful.

Long term I hope for it to be eliminated entirely, by switching by growing the meat itself. Some progress already has been made in that direction.

Re:Reduction of suffering

[belmolis]

This is a misconception. When properly done, slashing the neck results in immediate loss of consciousness due to the drop in blood pressure in the brain. Death follows within seconds. Proper kosher slaughter is not a matter of slowly sawing away at the neck like you see in videos of Muslim terrorists murdering hostages. I have myself had to kill a crippled deer with a knife, which was a little harder and less efficient since it was only a relatively small hunting knife. Nonetheless, as soon as the carotid arteries were cut the deer's head dropped and struggling ceased.

Re:Reduction of suffering

[vadim_t]

That disagrees with accounts that suggest that beheading (which is a lot faster than you can manage with a knife) doesn't always result in immediate loss of consciousness.

Also, a good deal of the muscles that move the head seem to be positioned in such a way that they are probably severed when the neck is slashed. There may not be much struggling possible at that point.

And like I said, religion has absolutely no place in this. The decision should be undertaken exclusively based on research, and not on respect for old traditions. The last research I heard of suggests that clots form quite often, an arteries constrict to try to attempt to slow the flow, so unconsciousness doesn't always follow immediately.

Re:Reduction of suffering

[tehcyder]

That disagrees with accounts that suggest that beheading (which is a lot faster than you can manage with a knife) doesn't always result in immediate loss of consciousness.

You're not exactly relying on first hand experience for these accounts though, are you?

Re:Reduction of suffering

[vadim_t]

How would that help any? Supposing I was willing and able to go chop heads off animals for the sake of experimentation, unless the result of that was a peer reviewed article, I don't think it'd be particularly trustworthy. I can say whatever I want in a comment after all.

eMule

[tepples]

where ya gonna find out about a torrent in the first place

Trackers are decentralized in BitTorrent with DHT. Both trackers and search are decentralized in eMule's protocol.

managed to persuade

[nurb432]

Don't you mean 'paid off enough of the legislature'?

Re:This can be rephrased:

[91degrees]

I concur. I know 3 people (plus myself) who use usenet for and we only use it for the binaries groups. If the big usenet providers are shut down I will be a bit disappointed

There's really not a lot of incentive to use them when we have various discussion websites which offer pretty much the same functionality but have useful features such as user comment ranking, and anti-spam mechanisms.

But not for you,

[westlake]

When we stop trying to acquire their product, we will win. Boycotts do work.

The boycott merely shifts production to other --- less volitile --- markets.

Blue Sky, Disney/Pixar and Dreamworks are in no danger whatever. They produce a timeless family-oriented product to the highest of technical and creative standards.

Now and again one of their products may falter in its initial theatrical release, but find its audience a generation or two later. MGM's "Wizard of Oz" didn't have a solid anchorage until the introduction of color television in the fifties.

But the geek may be more trouble than he is worth.

He'll get a slice of the franchise comic book flick --- more Star Trek, another version of The Batman, a new James Bond, somewhere down the road.

But original production without an established fan base?

There are easier ways to make a living.

Hunting

[betterunixthanunix]

Funny how hunting is not banned:

http://southholland.angloinfo.com/countries/holland/hunting.asp

Have you ever shot a living thing? It is not exactly a pain-free way to kill an animal, and I can assure you that hunted meat is not up to the hygiene standards of halal, kosher, or industrial slaughter. I seriously doubt that bans on kosher or halal meat are about health more than about making life hard for Jews and especially Muslims (given what I know of the politics of Holland and that fact that observant Muslims will eat kosher meat if halal meat is unavailable). I would accept the health argument if rather than ban the meat, they government simply refused to certify its safety (but still left open the option of buying it).

Re:Hunting

[vadim_t]

Have you ever shot a living thing?

I have not, and I hope it stays that way. The only reason why I would contemplate it is in self-defense. But then that's unlikely to happen since I have no guns, no permit to use one, and no interest in obtaining it.

It is not exactly a pain-free way to kill an animal, and I can assure you that hunted meat is not up to the hygiene standards of halal, kosher, or industrial slaughter.

So? That one wrong is being committed doesn't mean that other wrongs are fine too.

I'm in favour of banning hunting as well.

I seriously doubt that bans on kosher or halal meat are about health more than about making life hard for Jews and especially Muslims (given what I know of the politics of Holland and that fact that observant Muslims will eat kosher meat if halal meat is unavailable). I would accept the health argument if rather than ban the meat, they government simply refused to certify its safety (but still left open the option of buying it).

It's not about the health, it's about the welfare of the animals. I oppose it solely on the grounds that it's inhumane. I don't care who does it and for what reason, and I repeat that religion absolutely has no place in this decision.

Re:Hunting

[blackest_k]

The Netherlands will still allow the import of frozen halal or kosher meat. Which seems to suggest you are correct, it is about making life harder for jews and muslims.

Re:Well done

[yahwotqa]

Thank god there is olduse.net. All discussion, no binaries, no spam. :)

Re:Well done

[Dogtanian]

True- as I acknowledged, the binaries groups have been around for ages- certainly back when I started using it circa 1993, and I assume quite a while before that.

Point I was making is that back then- as implied by the OP- binaries were far from Usenet's only purpose, and people *did* actually use it as one of the main methods for conducting discussions on the net.

I still occasionally made non-binaries-related posts to Usenet until recently, but I'm under no illusion that this aspect is anything but a very pale shadow of its former self, and that for the vast majority of net users, newsgroups are really just a method of accessing "warez" content nowadays.

As for what you said, yeah, I think that the "trading" thing and the acquisition of warez for the sake of it is one of those things that probably appeals to people less as they get older. I also find it hard to relate to (e.g.) my colleagues talking about downloading massive video files because I'm really not that much into television and even less into films- I wouldn't bother watching most of that stuff even if they were showing it free on TV- probably a reflection of my tastes as much as an age thing, though.

What do Usenet providers do

[Old Wolf]

I thought Google took over Usenet years ago (this isn't a troll - I have been using Google's interface no trouble for a long time now)

Re:What do Usenet providers do

[brinkie]

Google acquired DejaNews in 2001, which was basically an archive of usenet posts. It gives you access to Usenet and several other groups, but there is no such thing as the Google monopoly to Usenet. ;) AFAIK there are no binaries in Google Groups.