• OT: Usenet growing

    From Ed Cryer@ed@somewhere.in.the.uk to alt.comp.os.windows-11 on Thu Aug 28 09:32:18 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.comp.os.windows-11

    I've heard it bandied around for years that Usenet is fading fast; just
    a few old-timers hanging in here.
    But look at these statistics; https://www.newsdemon.com/usenet-newsgroup-feed-size

    Someone has told me it's only spam on the increase.
    I belong to very few NGs, but in those there's a fair size of good,
    sensible questions and answers. Very noticeable in the Win10 and Win11 NGs. And, I suppose, Eternal-september has decent spam-filters; so I don't
    see the worst of it.

    The ironic thing is that if it is spam keeping the remaining
    news-servers going, then we happy few are beneficiaries.

    Ed
    --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From s|b@me@privacy.invalid to alt.comp.os.windows-11 on Thu Aug 28 14:01:50 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.comp.os.windows-11

    On Thu, 28 Aug 2025 09:32:18 +0100, Ed Cryer wrote:

    I've heard it bandied around for years that Usenet is fading fast; just
    a few old-timers hanging in here.
    But look at these statistics; https://www.newsdemon.com/usenet-newsgroup-feed-size

    Someone has told me it's only spam on the increase.

    That's not text; it's binaries.
    --
    s|b
    --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From Paul@nospam@needed.invalid to alt.comp.os.windows-11 on Thu Aug 28 08:47:57 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.comp.os.windows-11

    On Thu, 8/28/2025 4:32 AM, Ed Cryer wrote:
    I've heard it bandied around for years that Usenet is fading fast; just a few old-timers hanging in here.
    But look at these statistics; https://www.newsdemon.com/usenet-newsgroup-feed-size

    Someone has told me it's only spam on the increase.
    I belong to very few NGs, but in those there's a fair size of good, sensible questions and answers. Very noticeable in the Win10 and Win11 NGs.
    And, I suppose, Eternal-september has decent spam-filters; so I don't see the worst of it.

    The ironic thing is that if it is spam keeping the remaining news-servers going, then we happy few are beneficiaries.

    Ed

    There are commercial servers (Hollywood movies in binary groups),
    and then there are the text-only servers we use.

    The Newsdemon statistic quoted above, is traffic exchanged between
    commercial servers. When E-S asks for messages, it asks for the
    messages in the (low-volume) text groups. And that's basically,
    because the bandwidth on the server in the COLO, makes that sort
    of model feasible. That means 99.5% of what Newsdemon carries,
    E-S never sees and E-S never samples.

    There is one dude, who uploads the same 1TB of movies, every day.
    He does this, because TakeDownBots shoot down the messages every day.
    And he puts the movies back up.

    Now, let us compare his 1TB of posts, with your posts :-)
    The two of you, are kinda different users.

    Not a lot of thought goes into his posts. The posts are
    machine generated. But they're not spam, they're Piracy.

    Paul

    --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From Joerg Walther@joerg.walther@magenta.de to alt.comp.os.windows-11 on Thu Aug 28 15:38:47 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.comp.os.windows-11

    Paul wrote:

    There are commercial servers (Hollywood movies in binary groups),

    Exactly, and I guess volume is rising because I see a lot of movies in
    4k/HDR, which makes the files BIG.

    -jw-
    --
    And now for something completely different...
    --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From Alan K.@alan@invalid.com to alt.comp.os.windows-11 on Thu Aug 28 10:49:40 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.comp.os.windows-11

    On 8/28/25 9:38 AM, Joerg Walther wrote:
    Paul wrote:

    There are commercial servers (Hollywood movies in binary groups),

    Exactly, and I guess volume is rising because I see a lot of movies in 4k/HDR, which makes the files BIG.

    -jw-
    Which only makes things worse since binaries are part of the reason so many news servers
    died and/or so many binaries were dropped from servers. IIRC

    The next logical solution might be to kill news altogether? Do news servers serve any
    purpose? (bad play on words).
    --
    Linux Mint 22.1, Thunderbird 128.14.0esr, Mozilla Firefox 142.0
    Alan K.
    --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From joakim@joakim@sklaffkom.se (Joakim Melin) to alt.comp.os.windows-11 on Thu Aug 28 10:49:43 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.comp.os.windows-11

    The binary groups for distributing pirated tv shows and movies are
    certainly growing like crazy.
    --
    I like to keep a bottle of stimulant handy in case I see a snake, which I
    also keep handy.

    W. C. Fields

    --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From Peter Jason@pj@jostle.com to alt.comp.os.windows-11 on Fri Aug 29 09:22:04 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.comp.os.windows-11

    On Thu, 28 Aug 2025 10:49:43 +0200 (CEST), joakim@sklaffkom.se (Joakim
    Melin) wrote:

    The binary groups for distributing pirated tv shows and movies are
    certainly growing like crazy.

    Heavens! Can you direct me to these portals so that I might
    assiduously avoid them?
    --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From Bo Dacious@BoD@cio.us to alt.comp.os.windows-11 on Thu Aug 28 19:25:15 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.comp.os.windows-11

    On Fri, 29 Aug 2025 09:22:04 +1000, Peter Jason <pj@jostle.com> wrote:

    On Thu, 28 Aug 2025 10:49:43 +0200 (CEST), joakim@sklaffkom.se (Joakim
    Melin) wrote:

    The binary groups for distributing pirated tv shows and movies are >>certainly growing like crazy.

    Heavens! Can you direct me to these portals so that I might
    assiduously avoid them?

    USA FBI WARNING! Do not download headers from any alt.binaries.*
    newsgroup or you might violate copyright laws by obtaining ill-gotten
    files.
    --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From Joerg Walther@joerg.walther@magenta.de to alt.comp.os.windows-11 on Fri Aug 29 15:29:59 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.comp.os.windows-11

    Peter Jason wrote:

    The binary groups for distributing pirated tv shows and movies are >>certainly growing like crazy.

    Heavens! Can you direct me to these portals so that I might
    assiduously avoid them?

    I haven been an Easynews customer for 25+ years: easynews.com, global
    search for binaries (most competitors don't have anything that
    compares), $10/month.

    -jw-
    --
    And now for something completely different...
    --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From Joerg Walther@joerg.walther@magenta.de to alt.comp.os.windows-11 on Fri Aug 29 15:31:37 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.comp.os.windows-11

    Alan K. wrote:

    Exactly, and I guess volume is rising because I see a lot of movies in
    4k/HDR, which makes the files BIG.

    Which only makes things worse since binaries are part of the reason so many news servers
    died and/or so many binaries were dropped from servers. IIRC

    This is actually something that happened in the 90s, the market has consolidated and has been stable for at least 2 decades.

    -jw-
    --
    And now for something completely different...
    --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From s|b@me@privacy.invalid to alt.comp.os.windows-11 on Fri Aug 29 19:35:40 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.comp.os.windows-11

    On Fri, 29 Aug 2025 09:22:04 +1000, Peter Jason wrote:

    The binary groups for distributing pirated tv shows and movies are >certainly growing like crazy.

    Heavens! Can you direct me to these portals so that I might
    assiduously avoid them?

    /s
    --
    s|b
    --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From s|b@me@privacy.invalid to alt.comp.os.windows-11 on Fri Aug 29 19:38:57 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.comp.os.windows-11

    On Thu, 28 Aug 2025 19:25:15 -0700, Bo Dacious wrote:

    USA FBI WARNING! Do not download headers from any alt.binaries.*
    newsgroup or you might violate copyright laws by obtaining ill-gotten
    files.

    That's nonsense, right? AFAIK NZB files are used and the files
    themselves are broken up in parts and encrypted. In the past names were
    used, but now it looks like garbage. Unless you know what you're
    downloading there's no way to tell.
    --
    s|b
    --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From Bo Dacious@BoD@cio.us to alt.comp.os.windows-11 on Fri Aug 29 11:16:47 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.comp.os.windows-11

    On Fri, 29 Aug 2025 19:38:57 +0200, "s|b" <me@privacy.invalid> wrote:

    On Thu, 28 Aug 2025 19:25:15 -0700, Bo Dacious wrote:

    USA FBI WARNING! Do not download headers from any alt.binaries.*
    newsgroup or you might violate copyright laws by obtaining ill-gotten
    files.

    That's nonsense, right? AFAIK NZB files are used and the files
    themselves are broken up in parts and encrypted. In the past names were
    used, but now it looks like garbage. Unless you know what you're
    downloading there's no way to tell.

    That is true - downloading headers often results in 40 mixed character
    subject matter lines. I never bothered looking for the source of the
    stuff, I don't want to be on the customer list of some pirate content distributor.
    --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
  • From Joel W. Crump@joelcrump@gmail.com to alt.comp.os.windows-11 on Fri Aug 29 16:51:23 2025
    From Newsgroup: alt.comp.os.windows-11

    On 8/29/2025 2:16 PM, Bo Dacious wrote:
    On Fri, 29 Aug 2025 19:38:57 +0200, "s|b" <me@privacy.invalid> wrote:
    On Thu, 28 Aug 2025 19:25:15 -0700, Bo Dacious wrote:

    USA FBI WARNING! Do not download headers from any alt.binaries.*
    newsgroup or you might violate copyright laws by obtaining ill-gotten
    files.

    That's nonsense, right? AFAIK NZB files are used and the files
    themselves are broken up in parts and encrypted. In the past names were
    used, but now it looks like garbage. Unless you know what you're
    downloading there's no way to tell.

    That is true - downloading headers often results in 40 mixed character subject matter lines. I never bothered looking for the source of the
    stuff, I don't want to be on the customer list of some pirate content distributor.


    My view is that disregarding alt.binaries.* is the wise choice.
    --
    Joel W. Crump
    --- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2