Re: OT: Let's stop this "beating around the bush" bull***.

Matthew Winn wrote: 
On Sat, 30 Jul 2005 05:57:42 GMT, Bushwhacker <room@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:


Here's a question for those of you who frequent other newsgroups: Are any thriving, and if so, which ones?


I'm sure some of the porn groups are doing well.


No matter what human pastime is under discussion, the porn aspect of it does well.


I used to lurk on
alt.folklore.computers (but gave it up because of the bitchiness) and
that was always busy, and comp.text.tex is active too.  It's been a
while since I read alt.folklore.urban but that was always very busy;
so much so, in fact, that I stopped reading it because I didn't have
the time.


I guess that's a good sign, assuming most posts aren't just spreading urban legends.


 On the other hand uk.culture.arts.theatre is moribund: it
started out well enough but most theatre discussion eventually moved
to the international groups.


I have the feeling that Usenet may be becoming Uselessnet, largely because of blogs. Newsgroups served their purpose of forming global communities of posters with a common interest, but now that function seems to be better served by blogs. And the fewer posters to a group, the less information, and less reason for anyone to lurk. 


I think there is a belief among many people that the world wide web
_is_ the internet, so if something isn't on a website it doesn't get
noticed except by the more adventurous user.


No question. I'll bet the overwhelming majority of U.S. users consider the terms synonymous.


 This belief seems to be
stronger the further west of Greenwich you go: in the US many users


probably most

demand a web interface to everything -- web-based email, web-based
news, web-based chat -- while in the far east the web is seen just
one element of a global infrastructure.  And that means interest in
usenet is waning in the most internet-aware countries.  I don't see
that as a good thing.


I agree. But it's an uphill battle to increase awareness. Look, for instance, at the number of r.a.t.m'ers, reasonably sophisticated, who seem to know nothing about newsreader software -- and prefer to keep it that way.


I don't like blogs: most of them are run on the basis of "I'll say
whatever I want, and even if I condescend to provide some sort of
feedback facility I reserve the right to delete any response I
dislike".  Most of the blogs I've seen have been communities of mutual
back-slapping.



Good point. I read dailykos because it's great for keeping up with political news as seen by Democrats, but I rarely read many of the posts in a thread because they tend to start talking about each other rather than the issue. Also, Kos, unlike many bloggers, seems relatively ego-free. Too many bloggers, particularly political ones, think that running a blog makes them some sort of expert.


Web discussion boards are a little better, but not much.  None of them
are anywhere near as easy to use as usenet.  Most encourage the use of
nicknames and gimmicky pictures and discourage real identities, making
it difficult to see them as a place for serious dialogue.  Many make
a point of ranking contributors according to how often they post, a
practice which not only encourages contentless posting by those who
want to get their rank up, but which also discourages new posters: who
wants to be the guy with the lowest rank?  (There are several boards
I'd like to get involved in but the need to register and start at the
bottom is an insurmountable problem.  The only one I contribute to is
the WhatsOnStage board, which is open to anyone and has no ranking.)

More good observations. I've never understood that ranking business, either. More, as we see so often, doesn't equal better.

Usenet, on the other hand, offers no such discrimination: anyone can
jump right in the moment something interests them, and there's nothing
to mark a new poster's article as being any different from anyone
else's.



Thus I hope my pessimism about its future is wrong.


Live chat is worst of all, in that it automatically wipes out the
great advantage of the internet: that people from all over the world
can meet online.  With live chat only people in the same timezones can
meet.


I guess live chat is good for cybersex role-playing, but I don't see it as very valuable for anything else. In the mid-'90s, I went into a couple of AOL chat rooms to see what the attraction was, and found none. The silly talk ("Welcome. Have a drink.") seemed like a colossal waste of time.

I don't like instant messaging, either.


And perhaps worst of all, all these non-usenet methods are heavily
biased in favour of countries where people have always-on connections.
Someone in an area where the only access is via dialup and where phone
charges are high just can't afford to stay online for an hour a day.


That's another reason why people are leaving, or ignoring, usenet. In the U.S., broadband connections are predominant, so people are getting used to seeing their posts -- and subsequent replies -- appear relatively quickly.
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