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Trying to find some life on the Usenet (2020)

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Re: Trying to find some life on the Usenet (2020)

#91

Post by SirMaster »

the_af wrote: post #86
jwr wrote: post #48

I don't think the OP actually used Usenet back in the day. The alt.* groups were always mostly a cesspool, there were very few usable ones past roughly 1995. The comp.* hierarchy was rather good and that's where the action was. I feel sorry that USENET is gone. The experience of using a good NNTP newsreader was way way better than the terrible phpBB forums that supplanted it. And the next generation of programmers si…

> So now we have to live with those "forums" Which forums do you mean? Every community I was part of has moved to facebook groups, Reddit or Discord. PhpBB has gone the way of the dodo (regrettably, since those were the "good old days" for me, since I never used usenet).

Well it’s a lot of XenForo now. But I go on AVSForums a lot and Linus tech tips forum and [H]ardforum, etc.

Re: Trying to find some life on the Usenet (2020)

#92

Post by TacticalCoder »

the_af wrote: post #86
jwr wrote: post #48

I don't think the OP actually used Usenet back in the day. The alt.* groups were always mostly a cesspool, there were very few usable ones past roughly 1995. The comp.* hierarchy was rather good and that's where the action was. I feel sorry that USENET is gone. The experience of using a good NNTP newsreader was way way better than the terrible phpBB forums that supplanted it. And the next generation of programmers si…

> So now we have to live with those "forums" Which forums do you mean? Every community I was part of has moved to facebook groups, Reddit or Discord. PhpBB has gone the way of the dodo (regrettably, since those were the "good old days" for me, since I never used usenet).

There are many forums for specific communities: specific car brands, sometimes even specific car models, watches, keyboards even (!), etc.

I'm on forums like these and they're doing totally fine. And if anything with the recent Reddit SNAFU the last thing users there want is for some central authority in SV to decide what they're allowed to talk about.

Re: Trying to find some life on the Usenet (2020)

#93

Post by Sharlin »

the_af wrote: post #86
jwr wrote: post #48

I don't think the OP actually used Usenet back in the day. The alt.* groups were always mostly a cesspool, there were very few usable ones past roughly 1995. The comp.* hierarchy was rather good and that's where the action was. I feel sorry that USENET is gone. The experience of using a good NNTP newsreader was way way better than the terrible phpBB forums that supplanted it. And the next generation of programmers si…

> So now we have to live with those "forums" Which forums do you mean? Every community I was part of has moved to facebook groups, Reddit or Discord. PhpBB has gone the way of the dodo (regrettably, since those were the "good old days" for me, since I never used usenet).

And the two big reasons to move to Reddit were (a) single interface and login and (b) threaded conversations. Which is to say, Reddit (well, Slashdot really) reinvented the things that Usenet had had but which had been lost in the migration to traditional web-based forums.

Re: Trying to find some life on the Usenet (2020)

#94

Post by denton-scratch »

Nursie wrote: post #13
hsjqllzlfkf wrote: post #2

This isn't trolling, genuine question from someone who joined the internet after Usenet was already gone: I keep seeing people wanting to build distributed this and distributed that. According to Wikipedia, usenet was already distributed. Why did it die? Edit: follow-up question, what about freenet? Are they the same thing? Are they different, compatible, implementations of the same protocol? Are they incompatible bu…

Freenet is very different, it's a free-speech oriented protocol/server which provides a way to publish anonymously/untraceably and have the network host arbitrary content in such a way as you aren't supposed to even be able to tell what data is stored on your own node. Effectively a censorship-resistant and deniable publishing model. I haven't looked into it for nearly two decades now, but when I did it was full of C…

> spammers realised they could flood it with their tripe for almost no cost

Usenet readers supported plonkfiles; spam management on usenet was easier on Usenet than with email. A GUI Usenet reader let you plonk someone with a single click. Granted, in those days, spammers were less resourceful...

Re: Trying to find some life on the Usenet (2020)

#95

Post by kmeisthax »

dsr_ wrote: post #79
darau1 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still stubbornly hope that one of these silicone valley boys will "invent" USENET, and package it up nicely for the masses. That'd be cool.

https://github.com/CyberShadow/DFeed README: DFeed is: an NNTP client a mailing list archive a forum-like web interface an ATOM aggregator an IRC bot

They should add in Matrix, Mastodon, and Lemmy support for good measure :P

Re: Trying to find some life on the Usenet (2020)

#96

Post by rglullis »

brettermeier wrote: post #72
PathfinderBot wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I just tried it. I created an account on a Lemmy instance. Now I also want to join other instances. But how to do it? I won't create an account for every instance, but I'm stuck now. Just like email, you do not need to create multiple accounts to talk to people from other servers, unless they have blocked one another. I am confused, I find it likely that HackerNews readers would know this. Perhaps you're making a p…

In my opinion it would help if useful instructions how to use such services won't look like an API documentation for developers. Your idea of having people in your family/friends that help everyone else with joining such communities is nice, but it also depends on some factors: - Do you know such people in your family? - Do you have a family/friends? - Do you want to waste their time with your needs, and how many peo…

The only intuitive interface is the nipple. Everything else is learned.

Now, it might be that the learning curve is steeper than the existing solutions, but think of all the things you had to learn while using reddit:

- what is a sub?

- What is the difference between posting a link, a text, an image?

- How does voting affect the front-page?

- What is Karma?

- What is a DM?

Now, think of things you'll probably have to learn to use Lemmy.

- what is an instance?

- What is a community?

- How do I find communities to follow?

- What is the difference between "local" and "all"?

Why is it that "the masses" managed to learn how to use reddit, but wouldn't be able to learn Lemmy?

Re: Trying to find some life on the Usenet (2020)

#97

Post by lscharen »

darau1 wrote: post #66
jwr wrote: post #48

I don't think the OP actually used Usenet back in the day. The alt.* groups were always mostly a cesspool, there were very few usable ones past roughly 1995. The comp.* hierarchy was rather good and that's where the action was. I feel sorry that USENET is gone. The experience of using a good NNTP newsreader was way way better than the terrible phpBB forums that supplanted it. And the next generation of programmers si…

I still stubbornly hope that one of these silicone valley boys will "invent" USENET, and package it up nicely for the masses. That'd be cool.

This guy just (like a few weeks ago) started to put together a decentralized newsgroup toolset based on the NNTP protocol.

https://dialup.cafe/@vga256/110609250159276517

Re: Trying to find some life on the Usenet (2020)

#98

Post by the_af »

TacticalCoder wrote: post #92
the_af wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So now we have to live with those "forums" Which forums do you mean? Every community I was part of has moved to facebook groups, Reddit or Discord. PhpBB has gone the way of the dodo (regrettably, since those were the "good old days" for me, since I never used usenet).

There are many forums for specific communities: specific car brands, sometimes even specific car models , watches, keyboards even (!), etc. I'm on forums like these and they're doing totally fine. And if anything with the recent Reddit SNAFU the last thing users there want is for some central authority in SV to decide what they're allowed to talk about.

Ah, interesting. To be clear, I also meant for specific communities: like for specific hobbies or tabletop games, or niche interests.

They've all abandoned forums and, regrettably, moved on to Facebook or Discord. I'll never understand why they choose Discord, a closed chat platform, for forum type discussions. At this point I feel like Quixote tilting at the wind mills.

Re: Trying to find some life on the Usenet (2020)

#99

Post by gray_charger »

Karrot_Kream wrote: post #45
glimshe wrote: post #31

First the BBSs, then Usenet... I think that one good thing from these services was the relatively high barrier of entry. Today, online services are all about low friction signup, which makes a lot of sense in the highly competitive Internet of 2023. But when computers were somewhat niche and you really had to figure out how to get things working, users were a lot more committed and thus the quality of discussions was…

> Interestingly, Hacker News has a fairly low barrier of entry and high quality discussions. Maybe because it's kind of ugly and scares away the average user expecting animated prompts and fancy style sheets. Ignoring the hellthreads, the technical content here is pretty mid these days. The last year has been rough on this site. It's like reading a combination of r/linux and r/rust, a sort of nuance free assertion of…

What forums, Matrix, and Discord are you a part of that have high quality discussion?

Re: Trying to find some life on the Usenet (2020)

#100

Post by the_af »

Sharlin wrote: post #93
the_af wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So now we have to live with those "forums" Which forums do you mean? Every community I was part of has moved to facebook groups, Reddit or Discord. PhpBB has gone the way of the dodo (regrettably, since those were the "good old days" for me, since I never used usenet).

And the two big reasons to move to Reddit were (a) single interface and login and (b) threaded conversations. Which is to say, Reddit (well, Slashdot really) reinvented the things that Usenet had had but which had been lost in the migration to traditional web-based forums.

Cool! I didn't know threaded conversations were a concept from usenet.

I do wonder though, why on earth are so many communities moving to facebook and Discord, the two platforms that are decidedly worse than either usenet or phpbb. Some have come to realize facebook was a mistake, but may be committing an even worse one by moving to Discord.

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