Should there be a usenet newsgroup for ubuntu?

[Brunellus]

I love these forums.

But with the reformatting and downtimes lately, and the steady growth of the community, I have been wondering whether or not it might be a good idea for the ubuntu community to make a presence out on usenet.

As I see it, a newsgroup would have a few advantages:

It wouldn't need moderation. Decent newsreader programs like pan (in X) or slrn (CLI) have scorefiles, which would allow individual posters to filter out uninteresting or hostile traffic.

Usenet is distributed. Especially if we crack the "big" bits of the usenet hierarchy, like comp.*, the newsgroup would be less vulnerable to downtime.

Thanks to the potentially nefarious indexing and archiving of our friends at Google, all traffic is instantly archived.

Why even bother?

I'm guessing that some (even if it's a vanishingly small number) users here might actually prefer usenet over web forums. I understand that probably most users here have never actually used usenet, though.

Anyway, what do you think?

[Buffalo Soldier]

Never actually used usenet (yes, you read it right). But I don't see any problem with using one more medium for Ubuntu discussions :) So, yes I think it's a great idea.

[Horndog]

Ubunta on Usenet is a great idea. Would not be susceptible to DoS attacks either.

[SSTwinrova]

Hmmm....I'm torn on the idea. Yeah, I've used Usenet before, but I'd much rather go to a forum like this. Is there a vBulletin plugin that could monitor the newsgroup so that all posts could show up in a special forum (kinda like how the mailing lists are/were handled)? Granted, as you said it would probably be very few people, but fragmenting discussions up wouldn't really be beneficial...

[Brunellus]

usenet is infinitely expandable, almost. These forums are not. the effect I'm seeking wouldn't be fragmenting, but rather growing the community.

[briancurtin]

go ahead and start it up. there are plenty of people out there that would use it over this forum and such, im not one of them. i check that stuff out here and there but its not my main source of info, nor would i make it that.

[KiwiNZ]

The down time has been minimal . I dont think there is a web site out there that is free of down time.I believe we have very very littler in comparison to others I know.

The same goes with re-design and improvement .

[gatekeeper]

Hmmm....I'm torn on the idea. Yeah, I've used Usenet before, but I'd much rather go to a forum like this. Is there a vBulletin plugin that could monitor the newsgroup so that all posts could show up in a special forum (kinda like how the mailing lists are/were handled)? Granted, as you said it would probably be very few people, but fragmenting discussions up wouldn't really be beneficial...

You can use the rss feed.

[Brunellus]

The down time has been minimal . I dont think there is a web site out there that is free of down time.I believe we have very very littler in comparison to others I know.

The same goes with re-design and improvement .
The desire to have a newsgroup is not so that one can monitor the ng to the exclusion of these forums; I'd be thinking more as a supplement to the forums, in the same way that the various localized forums do.

Other distros have a significant usenet presence, both in the .comp.* hieararchy and in .alt.* --debian, slackware, and suse, for instance.

[Brunellus]

I'm going to bump this. or should I take the non-response as total lack of interest?

[oblio]

There's already an english-language newsgroup (+ 1 in French + 1 in Polish) :

alt.os.linux.ubuntu

Regards,

[rfruth]

There is no alt.os.linux.ubuntu from my ISP but there is alt.linux which is active and has a fair amount of Ubuntu talk on it.

[mips]

As I see it, a newsgroup would have a few advantages:

It wouldn't need moderation....

Anyway, what do you think?

And the censorship that happens here would be eliminated. If you want to say something about win32codecs or dvd backup etc you can have your say which is good. The rest of the world does not have to bow down to USA law.

So things that don't fit here would have a place on usenet.

[Master Shake]

I thought there was a newsgroup, but it turned out to be a google group...

[ubuntu-geek]

I found these in another post on the forums If someone wants to create an usenet group for ubuntu besides these I say go for it.

gmane.linux.ubuntu.devel.changes.breezy
gmane.linux.ubuntu.devel
gmane.linux.ubuntu.devel.kernel.bugs
alt.fr.os.ubuntu
gmane.linux.ubuntu.hardened.general
gmane.linux.ubuntu.doc
gmane.linux.ubuntu.user.italian
alt.pl.comp.os.linux.ubuntu
gmane.linux.ubuntu.user
gmane.linux.ubuntu.devel.kernel.general
gmane.linux.ubuntu.devel.kubuntu
gmane.linux.ubuntu.security.announce
gmane.linux.ubuntu.user.kubuntu
gmane.linux.ubuntu.sounder
alt.os.linux.ubuntu
alt.os.linux.ubuntu

[paul cooke]

Ubunta on Usenet is a great idea. Would not be susceptible to DoS attacks either.

obviously you've never seen a newsgroup that's undergoing a Sporge attack (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sporgery) then...

[Brunellus]

I found these in another post on the forums If someone wants to create an usenet group for ubuntu besides these I say go for it.

gmane.linux.ubuntu.devel.changes.breezy
gmane.linux.ubuntu.devel
gmane.linux.ubuntu.devel.kernel.bugs
alt.fr.os.ubuntu
gmane.linux.ubuntu.hardened.general
gmane.linux.ubuntu.doc
gmane.linux.ubuntu.user.italian
alt.pl.comp.os.linux.ubuntu
gmane.linux.ubuntu.user
gmane.linux.ubuntu.devel.kernel.general
gmane.linux.ubuntu.devel.kubuntu
gmane.linux.ubuntu.security.announce
gmane.linux.ubuntu.user.kubuntu
gmane.linux.ubuntu.sounder
alt.os.linux.ubuntu
alt.os.linux.ubuntu
Thanks ubuntu-geek. I'll have to check with my ISP's news-server; I'm not sure if a lot of these have propagated.

[imagine]

There *are* Ubuntu newsgroups, however there's not much traffic. The Ubuntu developers obviously prefer mailinglists.

And the censorship that happens here would be eliminated. If you want to say something about win32codecs or dvd backup etc you can have your say which is good. The rest of the world does not have to bow down to USA law.

So things that don't fit here would have a place on usenet.[++]

[Adnarim]

Is there now any english-speaking ubuntu newsgroup? I can wheter access alt.os.linux.ubuntu nor gmane.linux.ubuntu.user ?

[paul cooke]

I'd not bother... you already have these forums AND the mailing lists and IRC... and the wiki...

[jrusso2]

I don't understand alt.os.linux.ubuntu already exists and I have posted on it and read it frequently.

[andrew.46]

Hi,

Perhaps we have met on alt.os.linux.ubuntu:

I don't understand alt.os.linux.ubuntu already exists and I have posted on it and read it frequently.

I suspect that confusion will always exist because the group is not indexed by google. This can be a problem as many are not aware that it exists but is a benefit in that it is ignored by those idiots responsible for sporge attacks, peddling porno and flogging off cigarettes :-)

Andrew

[sloggerkhan]

One of my classes has a newsgroup and I like it a lot. I'd definately give an ubuntu newsgroup a try....
How do I know what provider I should be using?
Are there good free ones?