Re: A short visit 10 years later

In message
<news:1140178402.348780.34710@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> "gotved"
<gotved@xxxxxxxxxx> enriched us with:

OK guys, I can't figure out if this is just a matter of using the
right words or if I'm in deep trouble :)

Up until now, I've called the (re)presentation of rabt's activity
in google groups for 'the web based interface' - is that a
mistake?

That is probably a very accurate description.

Google, and before that Dejanews, has always been used as a common
archive of usenet postings, and has, as long as I recall (which,
admittedly isn't all that long in the big picture) had a web interface
for posting as well as reading, but there is no doubt that with the new
interface, there have been more people posting from Google Groups that
there were with the old.

The trend is not very pronounced in RABT, though, as this group is
dominated by a lot of more old-fashioned posters (such as myself). It
has been more pronounced, I think, in for instance alt.fan.harry-
potter.

Web-based (and mail-based, for that sake) interfaces have existed
longer than Google's G2/0.2 -- I believe that there's a goodly number
of posters using a web-based interface in some of the microsoft
groups.

I'm aware of the underlying usenet structure. My guess is,
however, that gg could be said to mirror the activity, even if
it's doing a bad job with qoutings and stuff.

From a usenet point of view, I'd say that Google's is just another
server (or set/net of servers) -- the Google newsserver acts, from a
usenet perspective, just as any other server. The differences are for
those subscribed -- they get an interface that is not made natively for
usenet (often giving the posters a bad reputation), and they get a
number of proprietary Google groups that are not propagated on usenet,
but where the difference is not always clear.

The thing I want to discuss is whether the gg interface makes the
group more accessible than on the 'secret' usenet, and how the
functions (links, archive search, profile hunting etc) might
influence the ongoing activity. Those functions are not in usenet,
right?

The troubles hit, if all of you are using the usenet rabt - then
I'm taking the looking glass picture as reality...! Any way to
tell the differences by, e.g., post characteristics?

Posts from Google Groups have message ID's ending "googlegroups.com".
All the posts from the new interface as the "User-Agent: G2/0.2" header
(the 0.2 may be a version number that is subject to change).

There are other headers that reveal the posts as being posted from
Google Groups. "X-Trace:" starts with "posting.google.com", "X-
Complaints-To:" refers to "groups-abuse@xxxxxxxxxx" and there is an
"Injection-Info" header that also refers to googlegroups.com.

An old-fashioned user-agent should be able to do searches on any
header, and should be able to tell you a lot of what you need.

At this point, I'm glad for any advise - thanks a lot for letting
me in on this!

I have an archive of most of the on-topic trafic in the Tolkien groups
since the beginning of 2004 in the format used by Xnews. There might be
some of the films-related stuff missing from the first year, and also
some of the political arguments and there won't be any spam. You are,
however, welcome to that archive if it can help you (as far as I know,
neither Google nor Microsoft's netscan allows you to look at user-
agents). It should be possible to assess the relative amount of posts
from Google Groups from that. The e-mail stated in the .sig is valid
(the From: header is not).

--
Troels Forchhammer
Valid e-mail is <t.forch(a)email.dk>

Giving in is no defeat.
Passing on is no retreat.
Selves are made to rise above.
You shall live in what you love.
- Piet Hein, /The Me Above the Me/
.

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