Re: ISP vs "newsgroup server provider": [was: Re: Question for Agent (and other news reader) users]

On Tue, 13 Dec 2005 20:21:33 -0000, "Mike Lyle"
<mike_lyle_uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

>Default User wrote:
>> Mike Lyle wrote:
>>
>>> Default User wrote:
>>> [...]
>>>> A service can be both an ISP and news server. Being an ISP
>doesn't
>>>> imply that they are a news server.
>>>
>>> I'm loth to disagree. But if we classically define the (or "the")
>>> Internet as a combination of www, email, and Usenet, then surely a
>>> provider which doesn't provide all three cannot be an Internet
>>> Service Provider. So, on that generally accepted definition, AOL
>>> isn't an ISP.
>>
>> Many people don't believe usenet to be part of the internet, but a
>> separate, allied network.
>>
>> Meaning has a way of shifting. I'd say that almost everyone asked
>> would identify AOL as an ISP, regardless of the lack of usenet
>access.
>
>Sure they would. I said I was loth to disagree with you, and then set
>out the terms on which I _would_ have to disagree. In my opinion, the
>lack of direct link to Usenet is one of the things which makes AOL a
>lame provider. Most users don't know that, and of those who do, many
>would disagree with me.
>>
>>> You may argue that being connected by way of AOL makes all three
>>> available, even though indirectly, and that AOL is therefore an
>ISP.
>>
>> Actually, you cannot get all three from AOL. AOL used to provide a
>> news server, they no longer do.
>
>That's what I thought I said was the basis of my argument: if you
>define the Internet in a traditional way, AOL doesn't provide it.
>>
>>> I would then suggest that having a British Telecom (or whichever)
>>> line makes all three Internet elements potentially available, but
>>> that in itself doesn't make BT an ISP. Some clever person may use
>his
>>> AOL connection to worm his way into a private network: that
>wouldn't
>>> make it reasonable to say that AOL "provided" access to that
>>> intranet.
>>
>> I'm not sure what you mean. AOL was news provider when they had a
>news
>> server. You can still access news from an AOL account, but must use
>a
>> third party server, such as giganews. I would say AOL was and is
>still
>> an ISP in spite of this. I would say giganews in NOT an ISP.
>
>And n.i.n. isn't an ISP, either; and it wouldn't claim to be. But AOL
>claims to be an ISP, even though it doesn't, strictly speaking,
>provide the Internet: it provides only a part of it, and it takes
>money from people (including me, as it happens: too lazy to change)
>for it. We're arguing past one another, not against!

I seem to remember that at one time, briefly, the initials ICP were in
use -- Internet Connection Provider.
--
Peter Duncanson
UK (posting from a.u.e)
.

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