Printable View
Today Comcast made good on their threat to drop *all* newsgroups.
They referred their customers to giganews, which had been providing
the service up till now. Problem is, giganews wants 8 bucks a month
for their lowest level.
Found a post from Blinky the Shark, recommending Motzarella.
Signed up, and got back in no time (had to manually purge the
Knode indexes because the message numbers weren't the same as giganews')
And best of all, it's free.
Thanks, Blinky.
On 2008-10-28, Bill Pfeifer <billpfeifer@hotmail.com> wrote:[color=blue]
> Today Comcast made good on their threat to drop *all* newsgroups.
> They referred their customers to giganews, which had been providing
> the service up till now. Problem is, giganews wants 8 bucks a month
> for their lowest level.
>
> Found a post from Blinky the Shark, recommending Motzarella.
> Signed up, and got back in no time (had to manually purge the
> Knode indexes because the message numbers weren't the same as giganews')
> And best of all, it's free.
>
> Thanks, Blinky.[/color]
I hope all customers of those ISPs reducing their services will petition
for and get a reduction in the fees the ISPs charge. Comcast clearly
recognise that $8 a month is a suitable amount ...
--
-- ^^^^^^^^^^
-- Whiskers
-- ~~~~~~~~~~
On 2008-10-28, Whiskers <catwheezel@operamail.com> wrote:[color=blue]
> On 2008-10-28, Bill Pfeifer <billpfeifer@hotmail.com> wrote:[color=green]
>> Today Comcast made good on their threat to drop *all* newsgroups.
>> They referred their customers to giganews, which had been providing
>> the service up till now. Problem is, giganews wants 8 bucks a month
>> for their lowest level.
>>
>> Found a post from Blinky the Shark, recommending Motzarella.
>> Signed up, and got back in no time (had to manually purge the
>> Knode indexes because the message numbers weren't the same as giganews')
>> And best of all, it's free.
>>
>> Thanks, Blinky.[/color]
>
> I hope all customers of those ISPs reducing their services will petition
> for and get a reduction in the fees the ISPs charge. Comcast clearly
> recognise that $8 a month is a suitable amount ...[/color]
When Verizon figuratively burned down the library, I
switched to news.individual.net for US$16.03 for a year. So
far, the service has been very good.
In my case, I had a Verizon cell phone and had already been
thinking about switching to TracFone. Verizon's act of
figurative arson pushed the button. I figure that drop will
cost Verizon nearly $500 per year in lost revenue and will
save me around $350 per year even after paying for
news.individual.net. (When I canceled the cell phone, I
made sure as many people as possible at Verizon knew the
reason I was canceling.)
--
Robert Riches
[email]spamtrap42@verizon.net[/email]
(Yes, that is one of my email addresses.)
On 2008-10-29, Robert Riches <spamtrap42@verizon.net> wrote:[color=blue]
> On 2008-10-28, Whiskers <catwheezel@operamail.com> wrote:[color=green]
>> On 2008-10-28, Bill Pfeifer <billpfeifer@hotmail.com> wrote:[color=darkred]
>>> Today Comcast made good on their threat to drop *all* newsgroups.
>>> They referred their customers to giganews, which had been providing
>>> the service up till now. Problem is, giganews wants 8 bucks a month
>>> for their lowest level.
>>>
>>> Found a post from Blinky the Shark, recommending Motzarella.
>>> Signed up, and got back in no time (had to manually purge the
>>> Knode indexes because the message numbers weren't the same as giganews')
>>> And best of all, it's free.
>>>
>>> Thanks, Blinky.[/color]
>>
>> I hope all customers of those ISPs reducing their services will petition
>> for and get a reduction in the fees the ISPs charge. Comcast clearly
>> recognise that $8 a month is a suitable amount ...[/color]
>
> When Verizon figuratively burned down the library, I
> switched to news.individual.net for US$16.03 for a year. So
> far, the service has been very good.
>
> In my case, I had a Verizon cell phone and had already been
> thinking about switching to TracFone. Verizon's act of
> figurative arson pushed the button. I figure that drop will
> cost Verizon nearly $500 per year in lost revenue and will
> save me around $350 per year even after paying for
> news.individual.net. (When I canceled the cell phone, I
> made sure as many people as possible at Verizon knew the
> reason I was canceling.)[/color]
I'm not in the USA, but I get the impression that some people don't have
the luxury of choice when it comes to ISPs.
I've been using Individual.net since they were free and called cis.dfn.de
(or was it dfn.cis.de?) and have always been pleased with the service.
--
-- ^^^^^^^^^^
-- Whiskers
-- ~~~~~~~~~~
On Mon, 27 Oct 2008 22:13:20 -0700, Bill Pfeifer wrote:
[color=blue]
> Today Comcast made good on their threat to drop *all* newsgroups. They
> referred their customers to giganews, which had been providing the
> service up till now. Problem is, giganews wants 8 bucks a month for
> their lowest level.
>
> Found a post from Blinky the Shark, recommending Motzarella. Signed up,
> and got back in no time (had to manually purge the Knode indexes because
> the message numbers weren't the same as giganews') And best of all, it's
> free.
>
> Thanks, Blinky.[/color]
Whatever floats your boat. I've been using news.individual.net for a
couple of years at a cost of one euro per month. No complaints.
On Wed, 29 Oct 2008, in the Usenet newsgroup alt.os.linux.mandriva, in article
<slrnggggck.bbl.catwheezel@ID-107770.user.individual.net>, Whiskers wrote:
[color=blue]
>Robert Riches <spamtrap42@verizon.net> wrote:[/color]
[color=blue][color=green]
>> Whiskers <catwheezel@operamail.com> wrote:[/color][/color]
[color=blue][color=green][color=darkred]
>>> I hope all customers of those ISPs reducing their services will
>>> petition for and get a reduction in the fees the ISPs charge.
>>> Comcast clearly recognise that $8 a month is a suitable amount ...[/color][/color][/color]
Depends - in a number of jurisdictions, the rates are set/influenced
by a government entity, such as the state "Public Utility Commission"
(which oversees such services as electrical, gas, telephone, and
cable services).
[color=blue][color=green]
>> When Verizon figuratively burned down the library, I
>> switched to news.individual.net for US$16.03 for a year. So
>> far, the service has been very good.[/color][/color]
Though in fairness, NIN doesn't carry as many newsgroups as giganews.
For 99.9 percent of the people, that's probably meaningless, as the
"extra" groups are probably not of interest/use.
[compton ~]$ wc -l newsrc
109170 newsrc
[compton ~]$ sed -n '/=== cut/,/=== cut/p' big.8.list.* | grep -vc '==='
2291
[compton ~]$ grep -Ec '^(comp|humanities|misc|news|rec|sci|soc|talk)\.'
newsrc
4696
[compton ~]$ grep -c linux newsrc
1160
[compton ~]$ grep -c linux big.8.list.*
17
[compton ~]$
EXPLANATION: Giganews carries 109170 groups. There are 2291 groups in
the "official" list (posted monthly to news.announce.newgroups,
news.groups, and news.lists.misc - also at
[url]http://www.big-8.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=faqs:big-8_list[/url]), but giganews
carries 4696 of those 2291 groups (ahhh, right). They carry 1160 groups
that include the word 'linux' in the name, but only 17 of those are in
'comp.os.linux.*' area of the big-eight list. Is that a big deal?
Only if the group[s] you want to read aren't in the server you choose.
And on the other hand, NIN has _substantially_ less spam.
[color=blue][color=green]
>> In my case, I had a Verizon cell phone and had already been
>> thinking about switching to TracFone. Verizon's act of
>> figurative arson pushed the button. I figure that drop will
>> cost Verizon nearly $500 per year in lost revenue and will
>> save me around $350 per year even after paying for
>> news.individual.net. (When I canceled the cell phone, I
>> made sure as many people as possible at Verizon knew the
>> reason I was canceling.)[/color][/color]
If you are using TracFone, pay attention to the spam^H^H^H^Htext messages
that they send out - there are usually offers that double the airtime
for minimal or no extra cost.
[color=blue]
>I'm not in the USA, but I get the impression that some people don't
>have the luxury of choice when it comes to ISPs.[/color]
They have choice - the question is whether the choices are useful.
[url]http://www.business.com/directory/internet_and_online/internet_service_[/url]
providers_isp/isps_by_country/
(that's all one line with no spaces) is one example of a listing
service. For example, I have a choice of two "last mile" providers
(the providers who own the wires that actually reach my house) in
the local cable TV provider (Cox) and telephone company (QWest) in
addition to satellite and wireless links. On cable, I'm stuck with the
last mile provider (as with satellite and wireless), but DSL can be
provided by over fifty different ISPs over those wires.
Old guy
ray wrote:
[color=blue]
> On Mon, 27 Oct 2008 22:13:20 -0700, Bill Pfeifer wrote:
>[color=green]
>> Today Comcast made good on their threat to drop *all* newsgroups. They
>> referred their customers to giganews, which had been providing the
>> service up till now. Problem is, giganews wants 8 bucks a month for
>> their lowest level.
>>
>> Found a post from Blinky the Shark, recommending Motzarella. Signed up,
>> and got back in no time (had to manually purge the Knode indexes because
>> the message numbers weren't the same as giganews') And best of all, it's
>> free.
>>
>> Thanks, Blinky.[/color]
>
> Whatever floats your boat. I've been using news.individual.net for a
> couple of years at a cost of one euro per month. No complaints.[/color]
As has Blinky (well, cheaper, at 10 euros per 12-month year), and before
that he used it when it was free.
--
Blinky
Killing all posts from Google Groups
The Usenet Improvement Project: [url]http://improve-usenet.org[/url]
Need a new news feed? [url]http://blinkynet.net/comp/newfeed.html[/url]