As you may (or may not) know, "Usenet" is not, strictly speaking, a part of the Internet, but a parallel network which can be accessed through the Internet. Usenet, itself, is composed of "Newsgroups," or topical forums which reside on mainframe computers, typically located at universities or govenment agencies around the world, and linked together to form the network. The names "Usenet" and "Newsgroups" are often used interchangeably but, in reality, are both misnomers; it would be more accurate to refer to this area as "public access e-mail" or "public-access bulletin boards" where people with interests in common post "mail" or "articles" for anyone else who has access to the group to read and reply to. There are at least 18,000 (and possibly more than 24,000) groups organized by topic. Unfortunately, direct access to this area requires a separate network server which CRISNY does not currently have the funds to support.
There are, however several other ways of accessing Usenet, either for free or for a fee independent of your CRISNY subscription, and what follows should be enough to get you started.
The Zippo News Service is a server which is located on the World Wide Web. There are three levels of membership:
To "subscribe" to a group, you must first locate it via the menu on the Zippo/Super Zippo homepage and then bookmark the URL in your browser, like any other site. To return to that group in the future, bypass the homepage by clicking on the selected newsgroup in your bookmark list and go there directly.
Zippo, Original Zippo, and Super Zippo allow you to post articles yourself, as well as read those posted by others.
There is another option, the "Public Access News Server," also known as the "Open NNTP Server" or the "Free News Server." Lists of these servers are available on the Web by using any popular search engine (Alta Vista, Yahoo, Lycos, etc.) and entering a search using any of those phrases. I've discovered, however, that most of these lists are very out of date with up to 90% of their addresses and specifications being incorrect.
Note: Everything written here is based on my use of Netscape and I assume that other browsers will work in much the same way. Consult your software manual or Help files for more exact information. You may find that "beta" or test versions do not always configure properly.
To install the "default news server," open the browser program. If you are using Netscape, go to the menu bar, select Options|Mail and News Preferences..., then choose Servers. At the bottom of the panel is a box labeled News (NNTP) Server. Type in the name of the default server. I recommend that you use news.uni-stuttgart.de. As the name suggests, it is located at the University of Stuttgart in Germany. It carries over 10,000 groups, but none of the "capdist." (local Albany, NY) groups. Downloads are very fast and articles are left on for about two weeks before they expire. You need to type news.uni-stuttgart.de in the box and click OK. In the future, if you discover another server you prefer, you can always return to this window and change the information.
Next, go back to the menu bar and select Window|Netscape News. This opens the news window, which looks very much like the e-mail window. In the upper left you will see a folder with the name you just entered. Click on the +|- box to the left of the folder to open it and when the browser connects with the host, a dialogue box appears that says something like "Before viewing all newsgroups, Netscape saves a copy of the newsgroup list... Proceed?" Click OK and be prepared to wait while a file of all newsgroups available on this server is downloaded to your hard drive. Depending on such factors as the number of groups the host provides, the configuration of your computer, current Internet traffic, the speed of your modem, etc., you will find that the download will take anywhere from a few seconds to an hour. [Note: The first time I connected to news.uni-stuttgart.de, I was using a 486-33DX with 4Mb of RAM and a 28.8 baud modem. It took about 40 minutes to download their list. After I upgraded the same computer to 32Mb of RAM, it took about 4 minutes to download the same file. Your results may vary accordingly.] You'll know the file is completely installed because a list of folders and documents similar to those found in your file manager or bookmarks will be displayed. Be patient and wait! If you don't, you'll only receive part of the list and starting over is a bit tricky--you'll have to locate the file/document containing the partial list in your operating system (look under Netscape\News in Windows' File Manager or Win 95's Explorer, the Netscape window in Mac, etc. for a file/document called news.rcg), delete it manually, return to your news program, and download the list all over again.
Each folder or document represents a newsgroup you can subscribe to. To do so, just click on the gray box to the right of the group, beneath the checkmark symbol. If a check appears, you have subscribed. To unsubscribe, click on the check to remove it.
After you have checked all of the groups you would like to read, close the top folder and then reopen it to see only the final list displayed. [By the way, groups appear in the order in which you checked them, not the order in which they are displayed.] You can add groups at anytime by either going to the menu bar and selecting Options|View All Newsgroups (which will redisplay the unabridged list) or selecting File|Add Newsgroup... and typing the name of the specific group in the box that appears.
Now, every time you open the news window and click open the folder of the default news host, the server will connect and download a tally of the articles posted to your groups. To read them, just click on the group; to read an article, click on its subject heading.
In addition to the default server, you may wish to add others. If you conduct a Web search for lists of free access servers as described above, you'll notice that many only carry special interest newsgroups. In fact they may carry as little as one or a dozen groups. For example, some servers only carry groups which relate to a particular language or culture (the three servers whose suffix is ".fi" only support groups from Finland) or profession (such as certain scientific disciplines) where multiple related newsgroups exist. Many of these are not carried on the default server which is why you may need to add supplemental ones. To do this, select File|Open News Host... and type in the name of the additional server. There is no limit to the number of servers you can have, but only one at a time can be open (connected).
Unfortunately, most public access news servers, including news.uni-stuttgart.de, are "read only" and do not allow you to post articles to them. The only way to find-out for sure is to try posting and see if it goes through. If you receive an immediate reply stating something like: "Sorry, Posting Not Allowed On This Server," then you have your answer. Otherwise, depending on the host and the way your article is routed, it can take from a few minutes to a couple of days before your message appears.
If you're looking for articles, Deja News, is a search engine which limits its function to searching newsgroups in Usenet using keywords which you type in. You can also search newsgroups through Alta Vista (a personal fave) by toggling the Search [the Web] box to: Search [Usenet] with the arrow on the right. Other good search engines which include Usenet options include Magellan, eXcite, Yahoo, Infoseek, and HotBot.
There is another alternative available which CRISNY subscriber Bob Rosenblum recommends: the Access Network BBS (Bulletin Board). To use it, you need a high quality communications software package, such as ProComm Plus. Web browsers, which are primarily designed to read documents written in Hyper-Text Mark-up Language (HTML), will not work! In Windows, the built-in Terminal or Hyper-Terminal programs are completely inadequate--I have no experience with Apple's programs.
In the Albany area, configure your dialer to call (518) 382-0855 and, after connecting, follow the directions. Initial usage is limited and Larry Miller, the sysop, requests that if you like the service, to please subscribe. The rate is about $35 per year for one hour of daily access, $45 for two hours. The BBS offers other services, including offline readers, as well.
Generally speaking, Zippo and Super Zippo are good, reliable services, but like any other Web site, their downloads are affected by the speed of your modem, the amount of traffic on the Internet, etc. The use of a password in Zippo's restricted "alt." groups, as well as all of Super Zippo, may be useful in limiting access by younger family members. However, the latter areas are not free and, depending on your frequency of usage, may or may not be worth the cost. I suggest that you subscribe for a month and judge for yourself. Also, the newsgroups you "subscribe" to (using the bookmark method) are not automatically displayed--you must go to them like any other web site. In addition, articles are displayed in the order of posting, rather than sorted by topic. In contrast, a news reader directly connected to a Usenet feed (rather than through the Web), will pre-sort related articles so that they may be read as a group. On the plus side, if you want to see or save a binary image, Zippo usually provides a separate link to the decoded jpeg or gif file, which eliminates the need for a separate decoding program.
On the other hand, the Free Access Servers really are cost free, are much easier to subscribe to, and display articles pre-sorted by topic within each newsgroup. The news.uni-stittgart.de server gives high-speed downloads which are much faster than either of the Zippos, but viewing binaries requires saving each one to a file and decoding them with a separate program, such as Wincode (available as freeware from -Snappy-, Inc.). In addition, their policies often change without warning. For example, I originally used the free access server called worak.kaist.ac.kr (maintained by the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology) as my default server. It hosted over 10,000 newsgroups and allowed posting. But one day I opened it up and discovered that most of the groups would not display. After this happened for a couple of days, I deleted the server and then reloaded it from scratch. To my surprise, it now only hosted about 50 groups, all of which related to Chinese or Korean culture! Also, the popular news.accessus.net originally carried many "alt." groups of a general (non-sexual) nature, but as of June, 1996, all of the "alt." newsgroups were dropped without explanation and, in August, access to the server was denied altogether.
Finally, for those who want more information about how the whole Usenet system works, I recommend subscribing to those groups which begin with the "news." prefix, such as "news.announce," "news.questions," and "news.answers," which are maintained by the committee which oversees this domain.
Good Luck! If you happen to find any other particularly good servers, please post them to either the CRISNY Usenet or Users Forums.
-Joseph Levy
Updated: 15. December. 1996