[Also posted to r.a.sf.w]

Starting tomorrow, Google will no longer support new Usenet content.
This is probably the last post I will make through GG.

What a long strange trip its been. I've been on Usenet since the early 80s.
At that time, though certainly some people kept private archives, most
regarded Usenet content as ephemeral as toilet paper - once it aged off
your server, it was gone.

Those were the days when the most popular external storage medium
was the 1.44 Mb floppy, and hard drives cost big bucks. As we all know,
storage now approaches free, and you buy it by the Terabyte. That changed
things.

In 1995, Dejanews started offering the first web-accessible, public archives.
I recall a certain amount of gnashing of teeth, since now people could
be confronted with things they'd said years before. How right they were!
It actually happened to me in a couple of job interviews.

In 2001, Google acquired the Dejanews archive. This was back in the
days when Google's slogan was 'Don't be evil', and for quite a long time
they were good stewards. But was time moved on, it wasn't kept up;
search was gradually enshittified, original headers and format
concealed, and gaps appeared in the archive.

More recently, complaints about spammers have been ignored, or
even worse, reportedly led to groups being dropped.

In the last month, rec.arts.sf.written, rec.arts.sf.fandom, and some
other groups have been made unusable via GG due to a spammer
who robo-posts Thai language spam at the rate of several new threads
a minute, completely burying any real content.

Google has done nothing, though its imminent shutdown of GG will
prevent it leaking to the rest of usenet.

Its the spammer, not the shut down, that drove me from GG to
eternal-september a few weeks ago rather than today.

GG has been very useful to me, since it could get through my
employer's firewall, unlike NNTP. Now I'm retired, and can use
NNTP again from home. I'll miss GG, even though I
easily concede that its interface has become terrible.

pt

On 2/21/24 4:52 PM, Peter Trei wrote:
> Google has done nothing, though its imminent shutdown of GG will
> prevent it leaking to the rest of usenet.

Google Groups isn't coming to an end. For years, the bulk of its
activity has been mailing lists, and those will continue. It just won't
be dumping spam on Usenet anymore.

--
Gary McGath http://www.mcgath.com

In article <ur6311$3ee20$1@dont-email.me>,
Gary McGath <garym@mcgath.com> wrote:
>On 2/21/24 4:52 PM, Peter Trei wrote:
>> Google has done nothing, though its imminent shutdown of GG will
>> prevent it leaking to the rest of usenet.
>
>Google Groups isn't coming to an end. For years, the bulk of its
>activity has been mailing lists, and those will continue. It just won't
>be dumping spam on Usenet anymore.
>

Maybe by 23:59:59 GMT 22-02-2024 .

>--
>Gary McGath http://www.mcgath.com
>

--
Member - Liberal International This is doctor@nk.ca Ici doctor@nk.ca
Yahweh, King & country!Never Satan President Republic!Beware AntiChrist rising!
Look at Psalms 14 and 53 on Atheism ; unsubscribe from Google Groups to be seen
What worth the power of law that won't stop lawlessness? -unknown

On Wednesday, February 21, 2024 at 9:57:43 PM UTC-5, The Doctor wrote:
> In article <ur6311$3ee20$1...@dont-email.me>,
> Gary McGath <ga...@mcgath.com> wrote:
> >On 2/21/24 4:52 PM, Peter Trei wrote:
> >> Google has done nothing, though its imminent shutdown of GG will
> >> prevent it leaking to the rest of usenet.
> >
> >Google Groups isn't coming to an end. For years, the bulk of its
> >activity has been mailing lists, and those will continue. It just won't
> >be dumping spam on Usenet anymore.
> >
> Maybe by 23:59:59 GMT 22-02-2024 .
> >--
> >Gary McGath http://www.mcgath.com
> >
> --
>

I think that as a California-based company, they
may use Pacific time as their standard.

It would still be in the 9 pm hour of the 21st there, right now.

--
Kevin R