Rogers and Usenet

[Walter Dnes]

On Wed, Nov 16, 2005 at 09:57:32PM -0800, Ian Zimmerman wrote
> 
> Today in the newspaper, I read that Rogers is dropping Usenet service.
> I am on Rogers.
> 
> I have been using the mailing list gateways where I can for months now,
> but some newsgroups don't have them.  For the few of those that I find
> interesting, I now use news2mail:
> 
> http://www.news2mail.com
> 
> That doesn't give you posting privileges, but use can use 
> mail2news for that (finger mail2news-Df8sxST2xYZMuWfdjsoA/w at public.gmane.org).
> 
> I hope this helps someone.
> 
> Overall, the picture is gloomy; if Micro$oft doesn't kill the Net as we
> know it, the big ISPs will.

  Unfortunately, usenet is used by a small percentage of users.  That
small percentage of users has a high correlation with
linux-using-geeks-who-know-more-than-Rogers-2nd-level-helpdesk-staff.
Wanting usenet is as much of a "geek alert flag" as wanting to run
servers.  Rogers (and Sympatico for that matter) want to be AOL-north.
They want the cloobies, the bottom 95%.  That's their target market.
And besides which, why would Rogers and Sympatico want people to
download music and porn for free from the net... when they could
download music and porn and pay Rogers and Sympatico for the privilege?

  The following is going to sound like like a commercial, but I'm just a
happy customer.  Astraweb News http://news.astraweb.com has multiple
service plans.  Since I do only a little binaries downloading, I prefer
the "pay-by-download" plan.  I paid US$25 for 65 gigabytes on October
1st, 2004.  Here's my current status...

        Username:       xxxxxxxxxxx
    Your Account:       Pay-by-Download
  Account Status:       Active
Bytes Downloaded:       5,524,061,275 bytes (5.52 GB)
  Downloads Left:       59,475,938,725 bytes (59.48 GB)

  I get to use it in little chunks.  There is no monthly minimum charge.
I'm still working on my initial US$25 purchase over a year ago.  Ever
since FreeNet became payNet, I've switched all my usage to Astraweb.  My
usenet use has tapered off considerably, which is why I still have so
much left.

  I can connect on ports: 119, 23, 1818 or 8080

  The pay-by-download plan allows 4 simultaneous connections.

-- 
Walter Dnes <waltdnes-SLHPyeZ9y/tg9hUCZPvPmw at public.gmane.org> In linux /sbin/init is Job #1
My musings on technology and security at http://tech_sec.blog.ca
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