I can't post to the rocksolid / novabbs server. Authentication is
rejected. Error 480 on both the clearnet and tor addresses. Admin does
not respond. No idea what is the problem.

Has the admin disabled posting via NNTP? Has the admin gone mysteriously
silent like AIOE and Mixmin?

Is anyone else having problems with authentication?

Anonymous wrote:
>
> I can't post to the rocksolid / novabbs server. Authentication is
> rejected. Error 480 on both the clearnet and tor addresses. Admin does
> not respond. No idea what is the problem.
>
> Has the admin disabled posting via NNTP? Has the admin gone mysteriously
> silent like AIOE and Mixmin?
>
> Is anyone else having problems with authentication?

Yes.
Use a different server.

On 3/4/23 02:41, William Stickers wrote:
> Anonymous wrote:
>>
>> I can't post to the rocksolid / novabbs server. Authentication is
>> rejected. Error 480 on both the clearnet and tor addresses. Admin does
>> not respond. No idea what is the problem.
>>
>> Has the admin disabled posting via NNTP? Has the admin gone mysteriously
>> silent like AIOE and Mixmin?
>>
>> Is anyone else having problems with authentication?
>
> Yes.
> Use a different server.

What is the source of your info? Something more than monosyllabic grunt
would be useful.

Why are all these NNTP admins and servers suddenly going offline and
incommunicado?

Every administrator who does not come forward and make a public
statement is hiding something, and is suspect of dishonesty. I am
getting close to bringing in some researchers to find out what is really
going on.

So, why is this all happening at once? Why is access to Usenet being cut
off? Why are the administrators being eerily silent about it?

Did someone post something that frightened the cyber Pope of Usenet?

Anonymous wrote:
>
> On 3/4/23 02:41, William Stickers wrote:
> > Anonymous wrote:
> >>
> >> I can't post to the rocksolid / novabbs server. Authentication is
> >> rejected. Error 480 on both the clearnet and tor addresses. Admin does
> >> not respond. No idea what is the problem.
> >>
> >> Has the admin disabled posting via NNTP? Has the admin gone mysteriously
> >> silent like AIOE and Mixmin?
> >>
> >> Is anyone else having problems with authentication?
> >
> > Yes.
> > Use a different server.
>
> What is the source of your info? Something more than monosyllabic grunt
> would be useful.
>
> Why are all these NNTP admins and servers suddenly going offline and
> incommunicado?
>
> Every administrator who does not come forward and make a public
> statement is hiding something, and is suspect of dishonesty. I am
> getting close to bringing in some researchers to find out what is really
> going on.
>
> So, why is this all happening at once? Why is access to Usenet being cut
> off? Why are the administrators being eerily silent about it?
>
> Did someone post something that frightened the cyber Pope of Usenet?

They all hate you, you freeloading ponce.
HTH.

Anonymous wrote:

> I can't post to the rocksolid / novabbs server. Authentication is
> rejected. Error 480 on both the clearnet and tor addresses. Admin does
> not respond. No idea what is the problem.

See my other reply to you.

> Has the admin disabled posting via NNTP? Has the admin gone mysteriously
> silent like AIOE and Mixmin?

Nntp not disabled. I don't know where other admins have gone, but I'm recovering
from a very major surgery after spending 2 months in hospital. I sleep more than
I type right now.

> Is anyone else having problems with authentication?

If people are, please let me know.

--
Retro Guy

On 04 Mar 2023, Anonymous <anonymous@anonymous.invalid> posted some
news:ttv32m$1al$1@news.cyber23.de:

> On 3/4/23 02:41, William Stickers wrote:
>> Anonymous wrote:
>>>
>>> I can't post to the rocksolid / novabbs server. Authentication is
>>> rejected. Error 480 on both the clearnet and tor addresses. Admin
>>> does not respond. No idea what is the problem.
>>>
>>> Has the admin disabled posting via NNTP? Has the admin gone
>>> mysteriously silent like AIOE and Mixmin?
>>>
>>> Is anyone else having problems with authentication?
>>
>> Yes.
>> Use a different server.
>
> What is the source of your info? Something more than monosyllabic
> grunt would be useful.
>
> Why are all these NNTP admins and servers suddenly going offline and
> incommunicado?

grunt whine jolly kone parking lot Lane Bryant returns

On 05/03/23 09:48, Retro Guy wrote:

>> Is anyone else having problems with authentication?
>
> If people are, please let me know.

Step 1 I received an authentication email which said the following.
From: RetroBBS Registration <admin@rocksolidbbs.com>
Subject: Confirmation code for rocksolidbbs.com
Reply-To: admin@rocksolidbbs.com
To: myemail@mail.com
A request to create an account on rocksolidbbs.com has been made using
myemail@server.com.
If you did not request this, please ignore and the request will fail.
This is your account creation code: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Note: replies to this email address are checked daily.

Step 2 I went to https://rocksolidbbs.com/common/register.php
to create the account.
Username: myemail
Email: myemail@mail.com
Password: MyPassword
Re-enter Password: MyPassword

Step 3 I set up my newsreader for
server:port = news.novabbs.org:119
username = myemail
password = MyPassword
That failed.
Posting article failed: Authentication failed; (news.novabbs.org) (Finished)

I switched it to news.novabbs.org:563. That failed also.
Posting article failed: Authentication failed; (news.novabbs.org) (Finished)

Guessing at rocksolidbbs.com:119 & rocksolidbbs.com:563. Both failed.
Posting article failed: Authentication failed; (rocksolidbbs.com) (Finished)

What is the correct server:port to set up a typical newsreader?
(Paganini doesn't carry the rocksolid hierarchy so it was removed.)
--
Peter Moylan

Time to trigger the right-wing snowflakes again. Melt, snowflakes, melt!
On Sat, 04 Mar 2023 03:32:54 -0600, Anonymous wrote:

> On 3/4/23 02:41, William Stickers wrote:
>> Anonymous wrote:
>>>
>>> I can't post to the rocksolid / novabbs server. Authentication is
>>> rejected. Error 480 on both the clearnet and tor addresses. Admin does
>>> not respond. No idea what is the problem.
>>>
>>> Has the admin disabled posting via NNTP? Has the admin gone mysteriously
>>> silent like AIOE and Mixmin?
>>>
>>> Is anyone else having problems with authentication?
>>
>> Yes.
>> Use a different server.
>
> What is the source of your info? Something more than monosyllabic grunt
> would be useful.
>
> Why are all these NNTP admins and servers suddenly going offline and
> incommunicado?
>
> Every administrator who does not come forward and make a public
> statement is hiding something, and is suspect of dishonesty. I am
> getting close to bringing in some researchers to find out what is really
> going on.
>
> So, why is this all happening at once? Why is access to Usenet being cut
> off? Why are the administrators being eerily silent about it?
>
> Did someone post something that frightened the cyber Pope of Usenet?

In the past, shit like this has usually been caused by crusading US
prosecutors (bizarrely, it's an *elected position* in that benighted
country, so they crusade and grandstand whenever they come up for
reelection).

--
FNVWe Nadegda

"By all means, compare these shitheads to Nazis. Again and again. I'm with
you." -- Mike Godwin, Aug 13, 2017, 8:03 PM
Checkmate admits that, for all intents and purposes, he carries a teddy
bear in public: <d6cnes.ket.17.19@news.alt.net>

Nadegda <nad318b404@gmail.invalid> wrote:

> In the past, shit like this has usually been caused by crusading US
> prosecutors (bizarrely, it's an *elected position* in that benighted
> country, so they crusade and grandstand whenever they come up for
> reelection).

The now disgraced Cuomo did that a few decades ago when he teamed up with
AT&T (who wanted to get rid of their NNTP servers) on kiddie porn charades.

Their goal was to accomplish nothing but gain political notoriety.

I tried posting to rocksolid and it said authentication failed even though
I was mailed the authentication credentials, so something is smells fishy.

Nadegda <nad318b404@gmail.invalid> wrote:
>>. . .

>In the past, shit like this has usually been caused by crusading US
>prosecutors (bizarrely, it's an *elected position* in that benighted
>country, so they crusade and grandstand whenever they come up for
>reelection).

That would be the now disgraced Andrew Cuomo and the alleged anti kiddie pr0n
crusade against News servers in New York, Paul, you blithering idiot,
and had nothing to do with taking down servers based in other countries.

It had nothing to do with text Usenet, Paul, you blithering idiot, but
the amount of internetwork bandwidth consumed by uploaders into binary
newsgroup. The ISP model of accepting massive uploading of binary
content and failing to charge the uploaders for the costly internetwork
bandwidth subsequently consumed made Usenet uneconomical.

Kidde pr0n was a phony issue but it was just the excuse that ISPs were
looking for to stop offering their own Usenet servers.

Gawd forbid they should have changed the pricing model as Usenet was not
consuming massive internetwork bandwidth as a plain text medium.

Cuomo's antics did not affect News servers elsewhere in the world
outside New York state. You are amazingly stupid, Paul.

On 2023-03-06, Adam H. Kerman <ahk@chinet.com> wrote:

[...]

> Kidde pr0n was a phony issue but it was just the excuse that ISPs were
> looking for to stop offering their own Usenet servers.

the precedent was set when BuffNET plead guilty to knowingly allowing
access to child porn on its Usenet service. it was informed of the child
porn on its system and refused to remove it. Elliot Spitzer was New
York State Governor at the time. it was the first time an ISP was held
accountable for having child porn on its system in the USA.

i remember this clearly because the first time i used USENET was with
BuffNET. the child porn was not a phony issue then nor is it a phony
issue now. however, BuffNET shutting down its USENET news server did
start the chain reaction of other ISPs shutting down theirs and using
child porn as the excuse.

--
SDF Public Access UNIX System - https://sdf.org

That which does not kill you makes you stranger.
-- Trevor Goodchild - AEon Flux

fos@sdf.org wrote:
>On 2023-03-06, Adam H. Kerman <ahk@chinet.com> wrote:

>[...]

>>Kidde pr0n was a phony issue but it was just the excuse that ISPs were
>>looking for to stop offering their own Usenet servers.

>the precedent was set when BuffNET plead guilty to knowingly allowing
>access to child porn on its Usenet service. it was informed of the child
>porn on its system and refused to remove it. Elliot Spitzer was New
>York State Governor at the time. it was the first time an ISP was held
>accountable for having child porn on its system in the USA.

I have no idea why you raise disgraced governor Spitzer. He and Cuomo
were political enemies. The kidde pr0n issue was entirely Cuomo's.

>i remember this clearly because the first time i used USENET was with
>BuffNET. the child porn was not a phony issue then nor is it a phony
>issue now. however, BuffNET shutting down its USENET news server did
>start the chain reaction of other ISPs shutting down theirs and using
>child porn as the excuse.

Who was expecting on line service providers to watch for illegal
content? How the hell did it fall entirely upon Usenet but not the Web
or any other medium of communication? Access to the Web was not dropped
by any ISP despite the kiddie pr0n issue.

If it's sent by First-Class Mail, the post office cannot look for
illegal content without a warrant although it took many years for certain
provisions of the Comstock Act to be found unconstitutional. The point is
that the carrier isn't supposed to look for illegal content. A publisher
is responsible for illegal content but administering a News server is
not publishing.

Yeah, everybody knew, especially given that specific groups were so
named. But Usenet servers were expected to take spam countermeasures and
kick off Usenet abusing Usenet through their servers, not look for
illegal content.

Those specific groups named in which illegal content was on topic could
have been removed. Problem solved. But all of Usenet was attacked for
sexually exploiting children.

You don't see that as a phony issue?

In any event, it's illegal because it's unseemly, not because it has
anything to do with prosecuting actual criminals who exploited children
sexually nor helping actual children in a timely manner. Unless the
photographer or videographer is caught within a short period of time from
having taken the images AND those very children are given social services
or psychological counseling in short order, no actual children are being
helped. The kiddie pr0n could be decades old but it's forever illegal,
even though cracking down on it prevent no child from being kidnapped or
held against his will to be sexually exploited in future.

"Adam H. Kerman" <ahk@chinet.com> wrote:

> How the hell did it fall entirely upon Usenet but not the Web
> or any other medium of communication? Access to the Web was not dropped
> by any ISP despite the kiddie pr0n issue.

I think the reason that the now disgraced Cuomo was successful in his
kiddie porn politicization of Usenet was simply that people are stupid.

Most people are so stupid they'll believe anything you tell them to.
So the now disgraced Cuomo told them he knew all about the problem and he
had a simple solution to the problem that everyone could understand.

Even stupid people could understand the now disgraced Cuomo's solution.

At that time, only the technical people knew what Usenet was.
And they knew what you know but technical competence is not something the
public had then or even now (when you look at the dark web for example).

The cheap political trick worked also because AT&T wanted it to work.

As for Spitzer, his disgrace was from something else altogether, but both
of them were duplicitous lying politicians who lied for a living.

On 3/6/23 17:22, badgolferman wrote:
> I think the reason that the now disgraced Cuomo was successful in his
> kiddie porn politicization of Usenet was simply that people are stupid.
>
> Most people are so stupid they'll believe anything you tell them to.

There's an invisible virus floating around that will kill us all. Nobody
can see the virus. But it does exist because we detected anti-body in a
magical petri dish full of phlegm. That proves what we say. You should
believe it. We're experts!

If you wear rubber gloves and a face diaper and stand six feet apart
you'll be safe from the invisible phlegm monster.

And if you close down your business and go live in a cardboard box
you'll be safe from the invisible phlegm monster.

And if you get this jab of this experimental witch's brew you'll be
safe. If you don't get the jab we'll take your tenderling children and
put them in a foster care trafficking system. Then your tenderlings will
be safe and get to explore their tender gender. Our foster mammies and
foster daddies will make sure of that.

Wait. If you get a half dozen more booster jabs then you'll be safe. But
we might take your children and explore their gender anyway, just to be
safe.

If you don't do what we tell you you're a Nazi super-spreader trying to
kill us all. Be obedient so we all can be safe. Explore your child's
gender so that gender can be safe.

We are starting a war. Our troops will get to explore the gender of all
the women and children in the foreign land. Now you'll be safe. The
boiling frog exercises with the face diapers and social distancing and
tender gender have nothing to do with conditioning you to obediently
accept the war and tender gender operations. That's just conspiracy
theory from evil Nazis who want to kill six trillion Jews. Worry about
the virus. Don't worry about the war that we planned years ahead of the
virus. If you ask questions you won't be safe (from the tender gender
militia).

You can get penetrated by our needles or we'll penetrate your children
with much tender gender exploration. Believe what we tell you. Or go to
jail and get your tender gender explored by Tyrone and Leroy. There you
will be safe.

--

Tender Gender
Keeping you and your tenderlings 'safe' from invisible phlegm monsters

Time to trigger the right-wing snowflakes again. Melt, snowflakes, melt!
On Mon, 06 Mar 2023 17:37:22 +0000, Adam H. Kerman wrote:

> Nadegda <nad318b404@gmail.invalid> wrote:
>
>>>. . .
>
>>In the past, shit like this has usually been caused by crusading US
>>prosecutors (bizarrely, it's an *elected position* in that benighted
>>country, so they crusade and grandstand whenever they come up for
>>reelection).
>
> That would be the now disgraced Andrew Cuomo and the alleged anti kiddie pr0n
> crusade against News servers in New York, Paul, you blithering idiot,
> and had nothing to do with taking down servers based in other countries.
>
> It had nothing to do with text Usenet, Paul, you blithering idiot, but
> the amount of internetwork bandwidth consumed by uploaders into binary
> newsgroup. The ISP model of accepting massive uploading of binary
> content and failing to charge the uploaders for the costly internetwork
> bandwidth subsequently consumed made Usenet uneconomical.
>
> Kidde pr0n was a phony issue but it was just the excuse that ISPs were
> looking for to stop offering their own Usenet servers.
>
> Gawd forbid they should have changed the pricing model as Usenet was not
> consuming massive internetwork bandwidth as a plain text medium.
>
> Cuomo's antics did not affect News servers elsewhere in the world
> outside New York state. You are amazingly stupid, Paul.

Who the hell is Paul, kooky?

Also: if binary Usenet is as uneconomical as you claim, why are block
accounts available for only a few cents per gigabyte?

You *really* need to change your handle to "Adam H. Dunning-Krueger".

<snicker>

--
FNVWe Nadegda

"By all means, compare these shitheads to Nazis. Again and again. I'm with
you." -- Mike Godwin, Aug 13, 2017, 8:03 PM
Checkmate admits that, for all intents and purposes, he carries a teddy
bear in public: <d6cnes.ket.17.19@news.alt.net>

Time to trigger the right-wing snowflakes again. Melt, snowflakes, melt!
On Mon, 06 Mar 2023 23:22:11 +0000, badgolferman wrote:

> "Adam H. Kerman" <ahk@chinet.com> wrote:
>
>> How the hell did it fall entirely upon Usenet but not the Web
>> or any other medium of communication? Access to the Web was not dropped
>> by any ISP despite the kiddie pr0n issue.
>
> I think the reason that the now disgraced Cuomo was successful in his
> kiddie porn politicization of Usenet was simply that people are stupid.
>
> Most people are so stupid they'll believe anything you tell them to.

And sadly, recent events (see also: Trump, ivermectin, UV suppositories,
hydroxychloroquine...) make it clear that nothing whatsoever has improved
in the US since Cuomo's day. Or P. T. Barnum's, for that matter. (And did
you know that Barnum was a Nazi sympathizer?)

--
FNVWe Nadegda

"By all means, compare these shitheads to Nazis. Again and again. I'm with
you." -- Mike Godwin, Aug 13, 2017, 8:03 PM
Checkmate admits that, for all intents and purposes, he carries a teddy
bear in public: <d6cnes.ket.17.19@news.alt.net>

Time to trigger the right-wing snowflakes again. Melt, snowflakes, melt!
On Mon, 06 Mar 2023 20:19:45 -0600, Tender Gender wrote:

> On 3/6/23 17:22, badgolferman wrote:
>> I think the reason that the now disgraced Cuomo was successful in his
>> kiddie porn politicization of Usenet was simply that people are stupid.
>>
>> Most people are so stupid they'll believe anything you tell them to.
>
> There's an invisible virus floating around that will kill us all. Nobody
> can see the virus. But it does exist because we detected anti-body in a
> magical petri dish full of phlegm. That proves what we say. You should
> believe it. We're experts!
>
> If you wear rubber gloves and a face diaper and stand six feet apart
> you'll be safe from the invisible phlegm monster.
>
> And if you close down your business and go live in a cardboard box
> you'll be safe from the invisible phlegm monster.
>
> And if you get this jab of this experimental witch's brew you'll be
> safe. If you don't get the jab we'll take your tenderling children and
> put them in a foster care trafficking system. Then your tenderlings will
> be safe and get to explore their tender gender. Our foster mammies and
> foster daddies will make sure of that.
>
> Wait. If you get a half dozen more booster jabs then you'll be safe. But
> we might take your children and explore their gender anyway, just to be
> safe.
>
> If you don't do what we tell you you're a Nazi super-spreader trying to
> kill us all. Be obedient so we all can be safe. Explore your child's
> gender so that gender can be safe.
>
> We are starting a war. Our troops will get to explore the gender of all
> the women and children in the foreign land. Now you'll be safe. The
> boiling frog exercises with the face diapers and social distancing and
> tender gender have nothing to do with conditioning you to obediently
> accept the war and tender gender operations. That's just conspiracy
> theory from evil Nazis who want to kill six trillion Jews. Worry about
> the virus. Don't worry about the war that we planned years ahead of the
> virus. If you ask questions you won't be safe (from the tender gender
> militia).
>
> You can get penetrated by our needles or we'll penetrate your children
> with much tender gender exploration. Believe what we tell you. Or go to
> jail and get your tender gender explored by Tyrone and Leroy. There you
> will be safe.

Neither your rather creepy fetish nor your racism are topical in this
newsgroup, or appropriate to exhibit in public, kook.

--
FNVWe Nadegda

"By all means, compare these shitheads to Nazis. Again and again. I'm with
you." -- Mike Godwin, Aug 13, 2017, 8:03 PM
Checkmate admits that, for all intents and purposes, he carries a teddy
bear in public: <d6cnes.ket.17.19@news.alt.net>

On 3/6/23 23:24, Nadegda wrote:
> Time to trigger the right-wing snowflakes again. Melt, snowflakes, melt!
> On Mon, 06 Mar 2023 23:22:11 +0000, badgolferman wrote:
>
>> "Adam H. Kerman" <ahk@chinet.com> wrote:
>>
>>> How the hell did it fall entirely upon Usenet but not the Web
>>> or any other medium of communication? Access to the Web was not dropped
>>> by any ISP despite the kiddie pr0n issue.
>>
>> I think the reason that the now disgraced Cuomo was successful in his
>> kiddie porn politicization of Usenet was simply that people are stupid.
>>
>> Most people are so stupid they'll believe anything you tell them to.
>
> And sadly, recent events (see also: Trump, ivermectin, UV suppositories,
> hydroxychloroquine...) make it clear that nothing whatsoever has improved
> in the US since Cuomo's day. Or P. T. Barnum's, for that matter. (And did
> you know that Barnum was a Nazi sympathizer?)

You're a Fauci sympathizer. What's the difference, Dr. Mengele?

--

Branch Covidian
holy jabbers

On 2023-03-06, Adam H. Kerman <ahk@chinet.com> wrote:
> fos@sdf.org wrote:
>>On 2023-03-06, Adam H. Kerman <ahk@chinet.com> wrote:

>>[...]

>>>Kidde pr0n was a phony issue but it was just the excuse that ISPs were
>>>looking for to stop offering their own Usenet servers.

>>the precedent was set when BuffNET plead guilty to knowingly allowing
>>access to child porn on its Usenet service. it was informed of the child
>>porn on its system and refused to remove it. Elliot Spitzer was New
>>York State Governor at the time. it was the first time an ISP was held
>>accountable for having child porn on its system in the USA.

> I have no idea why you raise disgraced governor Spitzer. He and Cuomo
> were political enemies. The kidde pr0n issue was entirely Cuomo's.

i was mistaken, Spitzer was AG at the time, not Governor. i liked both
Spitzer and Cuomo as Governors. Hochul too, she'll get my vote again if
she runs for another term. thankfully as long as i'm here i don't need to
concern myself with shitstains such as DeSantis or Abbott from third world
places wrecking the State.

>>i remember this clearly because the first time i used USENET was with
>>BuffNET. the child porn was not a phony issue then nor is it a phony
>>issue now. however, BuffNET shutting down its USENET news server did
>>start the chain reaction of other ISPs shutting down theirs and using
>>child porn as the excuse.

> Who was expecting on line service providers to watch for illegal
> content? How the hell did it fall entirely upon Usenet but not the Web
> or any other medium of communication? Access to the Web was not dropped
> by any ISP despite the kiddie pr0n issue.

ISPs were and are still expected to take down illegal content from their
systems when notified about it. BuffNET made a choice not to and was
prosecuted for it.

> If it's sent by First-Class Mail, the post office cannot look for
> illegal content without a warrant although it took many years for certain
> provisions of the Comstock Act to be found unconstitutional. The point is
> that the carrier isn't supposed to look for illegal content. A publisher
> is responsible for illegal content but administering a News server is
> not publishing.

your understanding of the law contradicts the law itself.

> Yeah, everybody knew, especially given that specific groups were so
> named. But Usenet servers were expected to take spam countermeasures and
> kick off Usenet abusing Usenet through their servers, not look for
> illegal content.

again, BuffNET was INFORMED of the legal content and chose to not take
it down.

> Those specific groups named in which illegal content was on topic could
> have been removed. Problem solved. But all of Usenet was attacked for
> sexually exploiting children.

you seem to see the diminishment of Usenet services by ISPs as a result
of a crusade against child porn.

i think it had far more to do with broadband allowing for increased
volume of bandwidth thus network, hardware, and administrative costs of
hosting news servers significantly went up and fast and the child porn
issue was merely a convenient excuse of ISPs to shut them down and
save money.

> You don't see that as a phony issue?

No.

> In any event, it's illegal because it's unseemly, not because it has
> anything to do with prosecuting actual criminals who exploited children
> sexually nor helping actual children in a timely manner. Unless the
> photographer or videographer is caught within a short period of time from
> having taken the images AND those very children are given social services
> or psychological counseling in short order, no actual children are being
> helped. The kiddie pr0n could be decades old but it's forever illegal,
> even though cracking down on it prevent no child from being kidnapped or
> held against his will to be sexually exploited in future.

prosecuting it should act as a deterrent for others to not do it. i have
no idea how well that works. what i do know is a couple people personally
who within the last few years were sentenced to most of the rest of their
lives in prison for sexually abusing children ages in single digits.
they were caught sharing videos via private messaging on social media.
the oldest of the children is mentally scarred for life. the youngest
may not remember it when they get older. it's far from a victimless
crime. afaic (imo) every video and photo that is shared increases the
chances of the people viewing them acting out their fantasies in real
life.

--
SDF Public Access UNIX System - https://sdf.org

That which does not kill you makes you stranger.
-- Trevor Goodchild - AEon Flux

Nadegda <nad318b404@gmail.invalid> wrote:

>>> How the hell did it fall entirely upon Usenet but not the Web
>>> or any other medium of communication? Access to the Web was not dropped
>>> by any ISP despite the kiddie pr0n issue.
>>
>> I think the reason that the now disgraced Cuomo was successful in his
>> kiddie porn politicization of Usenet was simply that people are stupid.
>>
>> Most people are so stupid they'll believe anything you tell them to.
>
> And sadly, recent events (see also: Trump, ivermectin, UV suppositories,
> hydroxychloroquine...) make it clear that nothing whatsoever has improved
> in the US since Cuomo's day. Or P. T. Barnum's, for that matter. (And did
> you know that Barnum was a Nazi sympathizer?)

Democracy depends on an informed constituency, where I won't disagree with
most of what you say (I'm not sure about Nazi's but a lot of people way
back when, e.g., Lindburgh for one, didn't know what we now know of them).

Trump (as a Republican) was as much a liar as his lawyers were (e.g.,
Giuliani) but Cuomo & Spitzer (as Democrats) were just as indiscreet.

Back to Usenet, I didn't use the free newsreaders in the days of AT&T cable
because they gave you the NNTP server settings along with the POP3/IMAP4.

While I'm sure free (usually referred to as "open") news servers existed
since the dawn of Internet time, when did free news servers come of age?

Specifically, in light of AT&T dropping Usenet en masse (I received their
letter telling me that it was all for the kids - can you believe that!), is
that when the free news servers started becoming part of the main stream?

BTW, I've never seen a free news server list that contained even the ones I
know of offhand, which makes me want to ask for a "real" free newsserver
listing which includes not only eternal september, mixmin, dizum, paganini,
netfront, neodome, solani, etc. but which includes new ones like rocksolid.

Have you?

Nadegda <nad318b404@gmail.invalid> wrote:
>On Mon, 06 Mar 2023 23:22:11 +0000, badgolferman wrote:
>> Adam H. Kerman" <ahk@chinet.com> wrote:

>>>How the hell did it fall entirely upon Usenet but not the Web
>>>or any other medium of communication? Access to the Web was not dropped
>>>by any ISP despite the kiddie pr0n issue.

>>I think the reason that the now disgraced Cuomo was successful in his
>>kiddie porn politicization of Usenet was simply that people are stupid.

>>Most people are so stupid they'll believe anything you tell them to.

>And sadly, . . .

Poor Paul put on a sockpuppet without a brain and is unable to contribute
to the discussion and attempts to force a topic change. This unlaundered
sockpuppet's filth and enormous holes have been exposed and there's no
way to save it. Toss this one, Paul.

<fos@sdf.org> wrote:

> you seem to see the diminishment of Usenet services by ISPs as a result
> of a crusade against child porn.

Did you receive the letter that AT&T sent to all its cable customers
when they killed their NNTP servers? I did. I received that letter.

It was bullshit. Pure political bullshit. Stupid people believed it.
Oh, AT&T. They care so much for the kiddies. They're saving them.

They "teamed up" with the NY sleazebag Cuomo trying to make a name for
himself as "a good guy with simple solutions" to very complex problems.

If you ask me why they teamed up with that NY sleazebag Cuomo, I suspect
you already know that answer based on what you wrote below, in fact.

> i think it had far more to do with broadband allowing for increased
> volume of bandwidth thus network, hardware, and administrative costs of
> hosting news servers significantly went up and fast and the child porn
> issue was merely a convenient excuse of ISPs to shut them down and
> save money.

I agree. You could actually tell, in those days, how little they supported
NNTP servers because their instructions came with POP3/IMAP4 setup
instructions, but you had to call and go up a few support levels to get
their NNTP server setups.

I'm not an employee of a cable company but I suspect they inherited the
NNTP setup just as they inherited the POP3/IMAP4 setup, and they weren't
expecting the explosion in NNTP data, particularly I guess in binaries.

I don't actually know much about their business model, but what I did know
at the time was that dropping _all_ of Usenet was too simple of a solution.

>> You don't see that as a phony issue?
>
> No.

Whenever you see a politician (or a company, as in the case of AT&T),
propose a too-simple solution to a rather complex problem, there's a good
chance there's a _lot_ more to the issue than they are pretending it to be.

You can use Prohibition, as one (currently non-contentious) example, but
let's not stray too far into politics since the topic is free news servers.

I can't get Rocksolid to work even though they gave me credentials.
I tried every news server setting proposed so far in this newsgroup.
rocksolidbbs.com:119
rocksolidbbs.com:563
news.novabbs.org:119
news.novabbs.org:563

None work for me.
(login/password supplied by <admin@rocksolidbbs.com> RetroBBS Registration)

Do any of those server:port combinations work at all for you?

fos@sdf.org wrote:
>On 2023-03-06, Adam H. Kerman <ahk@chinet.com> wrote:
>>fos@sdf.org wrote:
>>>On 2023-03-06, Adam H. Kerman <ahk@chinet.com> wrote:

>>>[...]

>>>>Kidde pr0n was a phony issue but it was just the excuse that ISPs were
>>>>looking for to stop offering their own Usenet servers.

>>>the precedent was set when BuffNET plead guilty to knowingly allowing
>>>access to child porn on its Usenet service. it was informed of the child
>>>porn on its system and refused to remove it. Elliot Spitzer was New
>>>York State Governor at the time. it was the first time an ISP was held
>>>accountable for having child porn on its system in the USA.

>>I have no idea why you raise disgraced governor Spitzer. He and Cuomo
>>were political enemies. The kidde pr0n issue was entirely Cuomo's.

>i was mistaken, Spitzer was AG at the time, not Governor.

Oh my gawd. Cuomo was A.G. This was Cuomo's issue, never Spitzer's.

>. . .

>>>i remember this clearly because the first time i used USENET was with
>>>BuffNET. the child porn was not a phony issue then nor is it a phony
>>>issue now. however, BuffNET shutting down its USENET news server did
>>>start the chain reaction of other ISPs shutting down theirs and using
>>>child porn as the excuse.

>>Who was expecting on line service providers to watch for illegal
>>content? How the hell did it fall entirely upon Usenet but not the Web
>>or any other medium of communication? Access to the Web was not dropped
>>by any ISP despite the kiddie pr0n issue.

>ISPs were and are still expected to take down illegal content from their
>systems when notified about it. BuffNET made a choice not to and was
>prosecuted for it.

You failed to answer the question. There's significant illegal content
on the Web and other media of communication including kiddie pr0n. Did
we take down the voice telephone network because it's used to plot crimes?

Either way, the ISP carries internetwork traffic from other networks to
its subscribers in any medium of communication. Now answer the question
about why you defend Usenet having been singled out for special treatment.

>>If it's sent by First-Class Mail, the post office cannot look for
>>illegal content without a warrant although it took many years for certain
>>provisions of the Comstock Act to be found unconstitutional. The point is
>>that the carrier isn't supposed to look for illegal content. A publisher
>>is responsible for illegal content but administering a News server is
>>not publishing.

>your understanding of the law contradicts the law itself.

Well, that's a cheap shot. Clearly you understand nothing as you haven't
made an explicit statement about a carrier being required to look for
illegal content before delivering it to its subscribers.

>>Yeah, everybody knew, especially given that specific groups were so
>>named. But Usenet servers were expected to take spam countermeasures and
>>kick off Usenet abusing Usenet through their servers, not look for
>>illegal content.

>again, BuffNET was INFORMED of the legal content and chose to not take
>it down.

It wasn't their content. They weren't the publisher of the content. They
were part of the network that carried the content. It's no different
than any other communication network.

Again, they knew about illegal content on other media of communication
and were not required to do anything about it. Why is Usenet different
than the Web?

Put yourself on the record here and explain your position, or just drop
out.

>>Those specific groups named in which illegal content was on topic could
>>have been removed. Problem solved. But all of Usenet was attacked for
>>sexually exploiting children.

>you seem to see the diminishment of Usenet services by ISPs as a result
>of a crusade against child porn.

Don't do strawman bullshit because you can't make an argument.

My position is that Usenet was attacked per the kiddie pr0n issue and
ISPs used that as an excuse to take down their News servers. I've said
this repeatedly. The Usenet model ISPs were using was NOT to charge the
massive uploaders of binary content for the resulting cost of internetwork
bandwidth, which was extremely high. Rather than changing their pricing
model to link expenses and subscriber fees, they simply took down their
Usenet servers.

If you don't agree, argue against my actual position without falsely
stating my position. If you suck at arguing, drop out of the thread.

>i think it had far more to do with broadband allowing for increased
>volume of bandwidth thus network, hardware, and administrative costs of
>hosting news servers significantly went up and fast and the child porn
>issue was merely a convenient excuse of ISPs to shut them down and
>save money.

>>You don't see that as a phony issue?

>No.

You just contradicted yourself one paragraph back.

>>In any event, it's illegal because it's unseemly, not because it has
>>anything to do with prosecuting actual criminals who exploited children
>>sexually nor helping actual children in a timely manner. Unless the
>>photographer or videographer is caught within a short period of time from
>>having taken the images AND those very children are given social services
>>or psychological counseling in short order, no actual children are being
>>helped. The kiddie pr0n could be decades old but it's forever illegal,
>>even though cracking down on it prevent no child from being kidnapped or
>>held against his will to be sexually exploited in future.

>prosecuting it should act as a deterrent for others to not do it.

You've got your fingers in your ears because you cannot argue.

The photographers and videographers and those holding children against
their will and those sexually exploiting children are almost NEVER
prosecuted. Possession of the illegal content is what's prosecuted
because it's easy but it doesn't protect children and it doesn't arrest
and prosecute those who perpetrated crimes against children, especially
when the content was produced decades ago.

Now address that point directly.

>i have
>no idea how well that works. what i do know is a couple people personally
>who within the last few years were sentenced to most of the rest of their
>lives in prison for sexually abusing children ages in single digits.
>they were caught sharing videos via private messaging on social media.
>the oldest of the children is mentally scarred for life. the youngest
>may not remember it when they get older.

If the actual abuser got caught, great! It's absurdly rare,
unfortunately.

According to your logic, every owner of every host that routed that
traffic has potential criminal liability.

>it's far from a victimless crime.

Now you're just being an asshole. No one said exploitation of children
or holding children against their will is a victimless crime. Quite the
opposite. Those children were indeed victims.

What I keep saying is that making possession of photographs and videos
illegal forever does not save children and does not result in
proseuction of those who committed the exploitation or abuse or the
kidnapping especially if the material is very old. It's simply easy to
prosecute.

>afaic (imo) every video and photo that is shared increases the
>chances of the people viewing them acting out their fantasies in real
>life.

Yeah. All those women who read Harlequin romances and fantasize about
being kidnapped and then swept away by torrid sex with a pirate who
overcomes their sexual timidity actually want to be dragged into an
alley and raped when they are tired in the evening and are just trying
to get back to their dorm room at college or their apartment in the
city.

Or the readers of novels about serial killers are doing so to psyche
themselves up to murder a random stranger.

You're not a psychologist but you play a very bad one on Usenet.

Nadegda <nad318b404@gmail.invalid> wrote:
>On Mon, 06 Mar 2023 17:37:22 +0000, Adam H. Kerman wrote:
>>Nadegda <nad318b404@gmail.invalid> wrote:

>>>>. . .

>>>In the past, shit like this has usually been caused by crusading US
>>>prosecutors (bizarrely, it's an *elected position* in that benighted
>>>country, so they crusade and grandstand whenever they come up for
>>>reelection).

>>That would be the now disgraced Andrew Cuomo and the alleged anti kiddie pr0n
>>crusade against News servers in New York, Paul, you blithering idiot,
>>and had nothing to do with taking down servers based in other countries.

>>It had nothing to do with text Usenet, Paul, you blithering idiot, but
>>the amount of internetwork bandwidth consumed by uploaders into binary
>>newsgroup. The ISP model of accepting massive uploading of binary
>>content and failing to charge the uploaders for the costly internetwork
>>bandwidth subsequently consumed made Usenet uneconomical.

>>Kidde pr0n was a phony issue but it was just the excuse that ISPs were
>>looking for to stop offering their own Usenet servers.

>>Gawd forbid they should have changed the pricing model as Usenet was not
>>consuming massive internetwork bandwidth as a plain text medium.

>>Cuomo's antics did not affect News servers elsewhere in the world
>>outside New York state. You are amazingly stupid, Paul.

>Who the hell is Paul, kooky?

You are, Paul.

hi seamus

Also, don't you have me kill filed?

>Also: if binary Usenet is as uneconomical as you claim, why are block
>accounts available for only a few cents per gigabyte?

That would be a different pricing model, duh.

>You *really* need to change your handle to "Adam H. Dunning-Krueger".

><snicker>

Geshuntite

You've breathed in way too much lint from your holey, filthy unlaundered
socks, Paul.

On 2023-03-07, badgolferman <REMOVETHISbadgolferman@gmail.com> wrote:
><fos@sdf.org> wrote:

>> you seem to see the diminishment of Usenet services by ISPs as a result
>> of a crusade against child porn.

> Did you receive the letter that AT&T sent to all its cable customers
> when they killed their NNTP servers? I did. I received that letter.

i never had AT&T internet service, only their phone service. i live in a
rural area and had a regional long distance calling plan. i was able to
call the Buffalo area for the cost of local phone calls. i used it to
dial up BuffNET. unknown to me AT&T moved the boundary of the calling
plan and i got whacked for a HUGE phone bill. in those days Unix shell
accounts with Usenet, email, a tilde website, etc, was standard service.
i left BuffNET and used a local ISP closer to me for dialup due to AT&T.
i got less for my money but it was what it was. they did have Unix shell
accounts and everything that went with it. that was right around the time
BuffNET was getting whacked for the child porn stuff. i was furious with
AT&T for a long time.

then broadband (Roadrunner / Time Warner) came to the area and i dumped
dialup. no shell accounts but at the time they still had Usenet service.
i was downloading binaries from Usenet during those days and started
seeing groups i was downloading from disappearing from the service. i
got a letter or an email from Roadrunner they were stopping Usenet
service but i don't recall them making any excuses. it just was.

i started using DejaNews but quickly discovered that really sucked. i
remember Google buying it then fucking it up completely. i used TerraNews
for a while, it was free, then it started becoming unreliable. after
that i paid for and stuck with commercial services. Altopia. Usenetserver.
Supernews. Giganews. i know Altopia is gone, don't know about the others.
now i'm a paying member of SDF (see my .sig) and use the service
available on it. if that ever goes tits up i'll start paying for a
commercial service again.

> It was bullshit. Pure political bullshit. Stupid people believed it.
> Oh, AT&T. They care so much for the kiddies. They're saving them.

> They "teamed up" with the NY sleazebag Cuomo trying to make a name for
> himself as "a good guy with simple solutions" to very complex problems.

of course they did. that what politicians do, they play politics. in this
case it negatively affected something you and many other people enjoy.

how about one of the latest controversies? these imbeciles are talking
about banning gas stoves because, you know, the children can't breathe.
these morons are reacting to whatever is trending on social media these
days. they are not smart at all and neither are most of their
constituents. they do know how to stir up shit for profit and power.
most aren't qualified for nor do they even care about governing.

>> i think it had far more to do with broadband allowing for increased
>> volume of bandwidth thus network, hardware, and administrative costs of
>> hosting news servers significantly went up and fast and the child porn
>> issue was merely a convenient excuse of ISPs to shut them down and
>> save money.

> I agree. You could actually tell, in those days, how little they supported
> NNTP servers because their instructions came with POP3/IMAP4 setup
> instructions, but you had to call and go up a few support levels to get
> their NNTP server setups.

> I'm not an employee of a cable company but I suspect they inherited the
> NNTP setup just as they inherited the POP3/IMAP4 setup, and they weren't
> expecting the explosion in NNTP data, particularly I guess in binaries.

ISPs are in business to sell service to the masses. even back then more
people knew about Gopher and Archie than knew about Usenet newsgroups.
providing Usenet service which was traditionally once part of an account
with an ISP became unprofitable.

the politics and child porn was a convenient excuse to dump the service
mostly unquestioned.

> I can't get Rocksolid to work even though they gave me credentials.
> I tried every news server setting proposed so far in this newsgroup.
> rocksolidbbs.com:119
> rocksolidbbs.com:563
> news.novabbs.org:119
> news.novabbs.org:563

> None work for me.
> (login/password supplied by <admin@rocksolidbbs.com> RetroBBS Registration)

> Do any of those server:port combinations work at all for you?

i do not have login credentials for Rocksolid. i can however, telnet to
both addresses on port 119 and list newsgroups. so something is amiss
with authentication. what that is, i don't know.

------------------------------
fos@ma:~$ telnet rocksolidbbs.com nntp
Trying 74.207.234.125...
Connected to rocksolidbbs.com.
Escape character is '^]'.
200 RetroBBS News (Synchronet 3.19c-Linux NNTP Service 1.133)
list
215 list of newsgroups follows
Local.General 180 1 n
Local.RetroBBS_Discussion 12 1 n
DOVE-Net.Advertisements 2323 1252 n
DOVE-Net.Debate 9691 8635 n
DOVE-Net.Entertainment 35055 33951 n
DOVE-Net.Firearms 1028 29 n
DOVE-Net.General 25028 23976 n
DOVE-Net.HAM_Radio 4456 3446 n
DOVE-Net.Hardware_Software_Help 2292 1275 n
DOVE-Net.Hobbies 948 1 n
DOVE-Net.Internet 3529 2491 n
DOVE-Net.Pro-Audio 16750 16543 n
DOVE-Net.Programming 764 1 n
DOVE-Net.Religion 6496 6361 n
DOVE-Net.Sports 504 1 n
DOVE-Net.Synchronet_Announcements 106 1 n
DOVE-Net.Synchronet_Discussion 46770 45689 n
DOVE-Net.Synchronet_Baja 154 1 n
DOVE-Net.Synchronet_Programming 12716 11700 n
DOVE-Net.Synchronet_JavaScript 1438 400 n
DOVE-Net.Unix 902 1 n
rocksolid.shared.announce 308 1 n
rocksolid.test.test 328 1 n
rocksolid.shared.encryption 165 1 n
rocksolid.shared.entertainment 285 1 n
rocksolid.shared.freenet 107 1 n
rocksolid.shared.general 680 1 n
rocksolid.shared.hacking 561 2 n
rocksolid.shared.helpdesk 334 1 n
rocksolid.shared.i2p 629 1 n
rocksolid.shared.linux 307 1 n
rocksolid.shared.news 528 1 n
rocksolid.nodes 487 1 n
rocksolid.nodes.announce 423 1 n
rocksolid.nodes.help 233 1 n
rocksolid.shared.offtopic 629 1 n
rocksolid.programming 357 1 n
rocksolid.shared.rocksolid 43 1 n
rocksolid.shared.security 387 1 n
rocksolid.social 201 1 n
rocksolid.spam 460 1 n
rocksolid.shared.test 4053 1902 n
rocksolid.shared.tor 318 1 n
..
quit
205 closing connection - goodbye!
Connection closed by foreign host.

--
SDF Public Access UNIX System - https://sdf.org

That which does not kill you makes you stranger.
-- Trevor Goodchild - AEon Flux