On 8/31/23 11:53 AM, Rich wrote:
> Marco Moock <mo01@posteo.de> wrote:
>> Am 31.08.2023 um 09:35:39 Uhr schrieb The Real Bev:
>>
>>> On 8/31/23 7:38 AM, rdh wrote:
>>> > On 8/30/23 17:47, Retrograde wrote:
>>> >> Most young people will be turned off that it involves text, not
>>> >> images. That's fine with me. They can gather elsewhere.
>>> >
>>> > The lack of moderation is probably more of a turnoff for younger
>>> > folks. A lot of them just don't have a tolerance for spam.
>>>
>>> I rarely see spam;
>>
>> There are groups like comp.lang.c that are currently flooded with spam.
>
> Also sci.crypt -- flooded with hundreds of google groups sourced spams
> daily.
>
> Although a killfile rule that kills anything posted from google groups
> does clean that mess up.

I'd forgotten about that. The former mozilla groups killed those posts
automatically, and I haven't thought about it since the mozilla dumped
them.

alt.comp.software.firefox and ...thunderbird are alive, but don't seem
to have been hit badly.

--
Cheers, Bev
"Let them eat shit."
-- Marcel Antoinette, Marie's little-known brother

On 8/31/23 12:33 PM, Rich wrote:
> Anton Shepelev <anton.txt@gmail.moc> wrote:
>> Marco Moock:
>>
>>> There are groups like comp.lang.c that are currently
>>> flooded with spam.
>>
>> Yeah, sometimes I would log into Google, open a SPAM-ridden newsgroup
>> and report messages from vairous spammers via their interface. Never
>> seemed to help. Perhaps Google encourage SPAM in Usenet in order to
>> kill it?
>
> Google's "report spam" interface seems to go nowhere (other than hiding
> the "last X" you so marked from your view in their web interface.

So far it's worked pretty well. What you DON'T want to do is "...and
unsubscribe" because you'll be flooded with acknowledgments :-(

> But it did not seem that they went to any team that did anything with
> the reports to cut off the spammers using google's interface to inject
> that spam.

As long as *I* don't see it or have to delete it I don't care.
Apparently some people LIKE to get it :-( Probably the same lonely
people who hold up lines at the supermarket chatting with the helpless
checkers.

--
Cheers, Bev
"Let them eat shit."
-- Marcel Antoinette, Marie's little-known brother

On 8/31/23 12:53 PM, rdh wrote:
> On 8/31/23 11:43, The Real Bev wrote:
>> <snip>
>>
>> Bravo, kid!  I find it terrifying that so many people are just fine with
>> censorship as long as it makes everything 'nicer'.
>>
>> It may be noted that I am in my third Nextdoor jail sentence.  They're
>> even worse than Facebook, but since the local fishwraps (both analog and
>> digital) are worthless it's the only practical source of actual LOCAL
>> news available.  What's scary is that those people are NOT kids.
>>
>> Hell in a handbasket.
>
> I feel like you guys aren't engaging in good-faith conversation here.
> There's a gulf of difference between censorship, and basic moderation to
> keep the bots from spamming us with offers for pills or what-the-hell ever.
>
> Killfiles/filters are great, but they only work after the fact.
>
> BTW: If you want a space to get out your opinions, why not try handing
> out fliers on a street corner? Nobody can censor you if you're
> self-publishing.

Heh.

--
Cheers, Bev
"If God had wanted us to use the metric system,
Jesus would have had 10 apostles."
- Jesse Helms

On 8/31/23 2:23 PM, Sn!pe wrote:

> IMO Google's real motive is to kill Usenet because they can't monetise
> advertising on it. It has always this way ever since they set up their
> ersatz "Google Groups" and made a gateway into real Usenet.
>
> Great damage was done done to Usenet resources when Google borged
> DejaNews and ruined that very valuable, 99% complete, and easily
> searched Usenet archive.

I really had hope when google took it over that it would eventually be
searchable back to Day 1. Big disappointment. I finally found my first
post in 1994, but it wasn't easy and I'm not sure I could do it again.

> In my view there is not now and never has been much of value contributed
> to Usenet by Google.

Nothing at all.

--
Cheers, Bev
"If God had wanted us to use the metric system,
Jesus would have had 10 apostles."
- Jesse Helms

The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> wrote:
[...]
> > Great damage was done done to Usenet resources when Google borged
> > DejaNews and ruined that very valuable, 99% complete, and easily
> > searched Usenet archive.
>
> I really had hope when google took it over that it would eventually be
> searchable back to Day 1. Big disappointment. I finally found my first
> post in 1994, but it wasn't easy and I'm not sure I could do it again.

Yes, exactly the same for me. Actually, I'm quite glad about that;
my debut posts were utterly, toe-curlingly, naïve and embarrassing.
[red face, foot shuffle]

--
^Ï^. – Sn!pe – <https://youtu.be/_kqytf31a8E>

My pet rock Gordon just is.

On 8/31/23 4:31 PM, Sn!pe wrote:
> The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> wrote:
> [...]
>> > Great damage was done done to Usenet resources when Google borged
>> > DejaNews and ruined that very valuable, 99% complete, and easily
>> > searched Usenet archive.
>>
>> I really had hope when google took it over that it would eventually be
>> searchable back to Day 1. Big disappointment. I finally found my first
>> post in 1994, but it wasn't easy and I'm not sure I could do it again.
>
> Yes, exactly the same for me. Actually, I'm quite glad about that;
> my debut posts were utterly, toe-curlingly, naïve and embarrassing.
> [red face, foot shuffle]

Probably not!

Sometimes I find one of my old posts and wish I were still that clever
and funny :-(

--
Cheers, Bev
"If God had wanted us to use the metric system,
Jesus would have had 10 apostles."
- Jesse Helms

rdh <rdh@tilde.institute> wrote:
> On 8/30/23 17:47, Retrograde wrote:
>> Most young people will be turned off that it involves text, not
>> images. That's fine with me. They can gather elsewhere.
>
> The lack of moderation is probably more of a turnoff for younger folks.
> A lot of them just don't have a tolerance for spam.

Most spam, I say 99%, comes from gmail.com, you can kill all
posts from *.gmail.com and most spam will be gone.

I am starting to think of doing that, but there are a small
percentages of post that were informative. So for now, I
just kill emails I see had sent the spam.

John McCue <jmccue@fuzzball.jmcunx.com> wrote:

> rdh <rdh@tilde.institute> wrote:
> > On 8/30/23 17:47, Retrograde wrote:
> >> Most young people will be turned off that it involves text, not
> >> images. That's fine with me. They can gather elsewhere.
> >
> > The lack of moderation is probably more of a turnoff for younger folks.
> > A lot of them just don't have a tolerance for spam.
> >
>
> Most spam, I say 99%, comes from gmail.com, you can kill all
> posts from *.gmail.com and most spam will be gone.
>
> I am starting to think of doing that, but there are a small
> percentages of post that were informative. So for now, I
> just kill emails I see had sent the spam.
>

When spam originating on Google gets too annoying, I killfile
on "User-Agent: G2/1.0" and whitelist the worthwhile posters.
You might miss some the first time they post but, if they are
interesting enough, somebody else will respond to them and
you can pick them up from there for your whitelist.

--
^Ï^. – Sn!pe – <https://youtu.be/_kqytf31a8E>

My pet rock Gordon just is.

John McCue <jmccue@fuzzball.jmcunx.com> wrote:

<snip>
>
> I am starting to think of doing that, but there are a small
> percentages of post that were informative. So for now, I
> just kill emails I see had sent the spam.

Replying to myself, Dan Purgert and Anton Shepelev had a
better method of filtering Google Groups by using one of
these:

Message-ID: .*googlegroups.*$
User-Agent: G2/.*$

Thanks and off to edit my killfile :)

Sn!pe <snipeco.2@gmail.com> wrote:
> John McCue <jmccue@fuzzball.jmcunx.com> wrote:
<snip>
> When spam originating on Google gets too annoying, I killfile
> on "User-Agent: G2/1.0" and whitelist the worthwhile posters.
> You might miss some the first time they post but, if they are
> interesting enough, somebody else will respond to them and
> you can pick them up from there for your whitelist.

Thanks, I must have been responding when you were posting :)

Am 31.08.2023 schrieb rdh <rdh@tilde.institute>:

> BTW: If you want a space to get out your opinions, why not try
> handing out fliers on a street corner? Nobody can censor you if
> you're self-publishing.

Because political forums and newsgroups exist and are the right place
to discuss these topics.

Am 31.08.2023 schrieb The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com>:

> alt.comp.software.firefox and ...thunderbird are alive, but don't
> seem to have been hit badly.

They don't exist on Google groups because Google doesn't care about
control messages anymore. Either Google can't administer it anymore or
doesn't want.

The positive side:
No spammer can use it for these groups. :-)

Am 31.08.2023 schrieb snipeco.2@gmail.com (Sn!pe):

> Marco Moock <mo01@posteo.de> wrote:
>
> > Am 31.08.2023 um 22:26:55 Uhr schrieb Anton Shepelev:
> >
> > > Marco Moock:
> > >
> > > > There are groups like comp.lang.c that are currently
> > > > flooded with spam.
> > >
> > > Yeah, sometimes I would log into Google, open a SPAM-ridden
> > > newsgroup and report messages from vairous spammers via
> > > their interface. Never seemed to help. Perhaps Google
> > > encourage SPAM in Usenet in order to kill it?
> > >
> >
> > Google does give a fuck about abuse of their services at all.
> > They don't care about spam via Gmail too and don't care
> > about abuse mail, even if ISPs send them.
> >
>
> IMO Google's real motive is to kill Usenet because they can't monetise
> advertising on it.

They could place ads inside of Google groups, like they do for their
search engine, YouTube, etc..

> In my view there is not now and never has been much of value
> contributed to Usenet by Google.

I can agree. There are people who use it for legitimate posts, but 90%
is spam or troll/bullshit.

Marco Moock <mo01@posteo.de> wrote:

> Am 31.08.2023 schrieb snipeco.2@gmail.com (Sn!pe):
>
> > Marco Moock <mo01@posteo.de> wrote:
> >
> > > Am 31.08.2023 um 22:26:55 Uhr schrieb Anton Shepelev:
> > >
> > > > Marco Moock:
> > > >
> > > > > There are groups like comp.lang.c that are currently
> > > > > flooded with spam.
> > > >
> > > > Yeah, sometimes I would log into Google, open a SPAM-ridden
> > > > newsgroup and report messages from vairous spammers via
> > > > their interface. Never seemed to help. Perhaps Google
> > > > encourage SPAM in Usenet in order to kill it?
> > > >
> > >
> > > Google does give a fuck about abuse of their services at all.
> > > They don't care about spam via Gmail too and don't care
> > > about abuse mail, even if ISPs send them.
> > >
> >
> > IMO Google's real motive is to kill Usenet because they can't monetise
> > advertising on it.
> >
>
> They could place ads inside of Google groups, like they do for their
> search engine, YouTube, etc..
>

Google Groups are not Usenet, even though they may have the same
(purloined) names and be gatewayed to and from real Usenet. Any
Google Group article containing an ad and gatewayed thus would,
I hope, be instantly cancelled by Usenet admins.

>
> > In my view there is not now and never has been much of value
> > contributed to Usenet by Google.
>
> I can agree. There are people who use it for legitimate posts, but 90%
> is spam or troll/bullshit.

--
^Ï^. – Sn!pe – <https://youtu.be/_kqytf31a8E>

My pet rock Gordon just is.

On 2023-08-31, Sn!pe wrote:
> The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> wrote:
> [...]
>> > Great damage was done done to Usenet resources when Google borged
>> > DejaNews and ruined that very valuable, 99% complete, and easily
>> > searched Usenet archive.
>>
>> I really had hope when google took it over that it would eventually be
>> searchable back to Day 1. Big disappointment. I finally found my first
>> post in 1994, but it wasn't easy and I'm not sure I could do it again.
>
> Yes, exactly the same for me. Actually, I'm quite glad about that;
> my debut posts were utterly, toe-curlingly, naïve and embarrassing.

And your current posts aren't? ;)

--
|_|O|_|
|_|_|O| Github: https://github.com/dpurgert
|O|O|O| PGP: DDAB 23FB 19FA 7D85 1CC1 E067 6D65 70E5 4CE7 2860

On 2023-09-01, John McCue wrote:
> rdh <rdh@tilde.institute> wrote:
>> On 8/30/23 17:47, Retrograde wrote:
>>> Most young people will be turned off that it involves text, not
>>> images. That's fine with me. They can gather elsewhere.
>>
>> The lack of moderation is probably more of a turnoff for younger folks.
>> A lot of them just don't have a tolerance for spam.
>
> Most spam, I say 99%, comes from gmail.com, you can kill all
> posts from *.gmail.com and most spam will be gone.

There are a few people who have gmail addresses who aren't spammers (but
they're caught in my -100 dragnet for "google is untrustworthy" first).

*so far* they haven't posted from googlegroups, so ...

--
|_|O|_|
|_|_|O| Github: https://github.com/dpurgert
|O|O|O| PGP: DDAB 23FB 19FA 7D85 1CC1 E067 6D65 70E5 4CE7 2860

Am 01.09.2023 schrieb snipeco.2@gmail.com (Sn!pe):

> Google Groups are not Usenet, even though they may have the same
> (purloined) names and be gatewayed to and from real Usenet. Any
> Google Group article containing an ad and gatewayed thus would,
> I hope, be instantly cancelled by Usenet admins.

Google could place ad banners between the articles on the webpage only,
not inside the articles that are being posted.
Narkive.com does the same.

Dan Purgert <dan@djph.net> wrote:

> On 2023-08-31, Sn!pe wrote:
> > The Real Bev <bashley101@gmail.com> wrote:
> > [...]
> >> > Great damage was done done to Usenet resources when Google borged
> >> > DejaNews and ruined that very valuable, 99% complete, and easily
> >> > searched Usenet archive.
> >>
> >> I really had hope when google took it over that it would eventually be
> >> searchable back to Day 1. Big disappointment. I finally found my first
> >> post in 1994, but it wasn't easy and I'm not sure I could do it again.
> >
> > Yes, exactly the same for me. Actually, I'm quite glad about that;
> > my debut posts were utterly, toe-curlingly, naïve and embarrassing.
>
> And your current posts aren't? ;)

Hah ! ≈:o)

--
^Ï^. – Sn!pe – <https://youtu.be/_kqytf31a8E>

My pet rock Gordon just is.

Marco Moock <mo01@posteo.de> wrote:

> Am 01.09.2023 schrieb snipeco.2@gmail.com (Sn!pe):
>
> > Google Groups are not Usenet, even though they may have the same
> > (purloined) names and be gatewayed to and from real Usenet. Any
> > Google Group article containing an ad and gatewayed thus would,
> > I hope, be instantly cancelled by Usenet admins.
> >
>
> Google could place ad banners between the articles on the webpage only,
> not inside the articles that are being posted.
> Narkive.com does the same.
>

I wouldn't know; I don't see ads on the web unless I must to make
some aspect of the webpage work. Besides, I definitely don't read
Usenet on Google!

--
^Ï^. – Sn!pe – <https://youtu.be/_kqytf31a8E>

My pet rock Gordon just is.

Am 01.09.2023 schrieb snipeco.2@gmail.com (Sn!pe):

> I wouldn't know; I don't see ads on the web unless I must to make
> some aspect of the webpage work. Besides, I definitely don't read
> Usenet on Google!

Many people don't have ad blockers, especially on mobile devices.
They will see the ads on narkive.com.
They aren't that annoying, there are much more annoying ads on some
websites.

On Fri, 1 Sep 2023 08:43:43 +0200
Marco Moock <mo01@posteo.de> wrote:
> Am 31.08.2023 schrieb snipeco.2@gmail.com (Sn!pe):
> > IMO Google's real motive is to kill Usenet because they can't monetise
> > advertising on it.
>
> They could place ads inside of Google groups, like they do for their
> search engine, YouTube, etc..

They used to do that years ago. In fact I remember ads for Jane Street
Capital on comp.lang.scheme .On one side of the screen there was the group
content and on the other the ads. They were non intrusive , reasonably
relevant (Jane Street Capital weren't looking for Scheme programmers but they
use OCaml so they were trying to get the attention of people interested in
functional programming) and kind of interesting like the example I gave. I
have no idea why Google stopped that. Since they already had the code to place
the ads , why stop using it even if they weren't getting many hits ?

> > In my view there is not now and never has been much of value
> > contributed to Usenet by Google.

I don't know how much counts as "much" but I learned of usenet through
googlegroups and for the first few years I was reading and posting through
googlegroups. Even now , for reading a very old thread , googlegroups works
well enough even with a text based browser. I've seen many valuable posters
post through googlegroups. Example

From: Thomas Dickey <dickey@his.com>
Newsgroups: comp.terminals
Subject: Re: ncurses on gnome-terminal
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 2009 16:18:50 -0700 (PDT)
Organization: http://groups.google.com
Lines: 19
Message-ID: <2b50bc12-ce7d-499a-a7e9-55202f6da0c4@p28g2000vbn.googlegroups.com>

Many at present on comp.lang.fortran .On the other hand I've had a look at
sci.crypt since it was mentioned and that's unreadable without a googlegroups
filter.

> I can agree. There are people who use it for legitimate posts, but 90%
> is spam or troll/bullshit.

--
vlaho.ninja/prog

On Thu, 31 Aug 2023 22:07:55 +0100
snipeco.2@gmail.com (Sn!pe) wrote:
> rdh <rdh@tilde.institute> wrote:
>
> > BTW: If you want a space to get out your opinions, why not try handing
> > out fliers on a street corner? Nobody can censor you if you're
> > self-publishing.
>
> Troll.

Yes , this has been my assessment too after I read
<rO1IM.556679$qnnb.491804@fx11.iad> and some of the subsequent posts
including the one you are quoting.

Marco Moock <mo01@posteo.de> wrote:

> Am 01.09.2023 schrieb snipeco.2@gmail.com (Sn!pe):
>
> > I wouldn't know; I don't see ads on the web unless I must to make
> > some aspect of the webpage work. Besides, I definitely don't read
> > Usenet on Google!
> >
>
> Many people don't have ad blockers, especially on mobile devices.
> They will see the ads on narkive.com.
> They aren't that annoying, there are much more annoying ads on some
> websites.
>

My VPN service (PIA) offers ad, tracker and malware blocking for
all browsers on both desktop and handheld machines. Also, Safari
(Apple's browser app) has good built-in blocking protection; I run
no other blocking extensions here.

--
^Ï^. – Sn!pe – <https://youtu.be/_kqytf31a8E>

My pet rock Gordon just is.

Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Fri, 1 Sep 2023 08:43:43 +0200
> Marco Moock <mo01@posteo.de> wrote:
> > Am 31.08.2023 schrieb snipeco.2@gmail.com (Sn!pe):
> > > IMO Google's real motive is to kill Usenet because they can't monetise
> > > advertising on it.
> >
> > They could place ads inside of Google groups, like they do for their
> > search engine, YouTube, etc..
>
> They used to do that years ago. In fact I remember ads for Jane Street
> Capital on comp.lang.scheme .On one side of the screen there was the group
> content and on the other the ads. They were non intrusive , reasonably
> relevant (Jane Street Capital weren't looking for Scheme programmers but they
> use OCaml so they were trying to get the attention of people interested in
> functional programming) and kind of interesting like the example I gave. I
> have no idea why Google stopped that. Since they already had the code to place
> the ads , why stop using it even if they weren't getting many hits ?
>
> > > In my view there is not now and never has been much of value
> > > contributed to Usenet by Google.
>
> I don't know how much counts as "much" but I learned of usenet through
> googlegroups and for the first few years I was reading and posting through
> googlegroups. Even now , for reading a very old thread , googlegroups works
> well enough even with a text based browser. I've seen many valuable posters
> post through googlegroups. Example
>
> From: Thomas Dickey <dickey@his.com>
> Newsgroups: comp.terminals
> Subject: Re: ncurses on gnome-terminal
> Date: Thu, 30 Jul 2009 16:18:50 -0700 (PDT)
> Organization: http://groups.google.com
> Lines: 19
> Message-ID: <2b50bc12-ce7d-499a-a7e9-55202f6da0c4@p28g2000vbn.googlegroups.com>
>
> Many at present on comp.lang.fortran .On the other hand I've had a look at
> sci.crypt since it was mentioned and that's unreadable without a googlegroups
> filter.
>

YMMV, obvs.

> >
> > I can agree. There are people who use it for legitimate posts, but 90%
> > is spam or troll/bullshit.

--
^Ï^. – Sn!pe – <https://youtu.be/_kqytf31a8E>

My pet rock Gordon just is.

Spiros Bousbouras <spibou@gmail.com> wrote:
> I've seen many valuable posters
> post through googlegroups. Example

Another one :

From: geo <gmarsaglia@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: sci.math,comp.lang.c,comp.lang.fortran
Subject: 64-bit KISS RNGs
Date: Sat, 28 Feb 2009 04:30:48 -0800 (PST)
Organization: http://groups.google.com
Lines: 196
Message-ID: <d0d9069e-cfff-4520-a0fe-96715b25852d@j8g2000yql.googlegroups.com>

or http://al.howardknight.net/?ID=140887926500 .

..That's George Marsaglia i.e. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Marsaglia .I have
used the PRNG described in that post several times in my own code.

> From: Thomas Dickey <dickey@his.com>
> Newsgroups: comp.terminals
> Subject: Re: ncurses on gnome-terminal
> Date: Thu, 30 Jul 2009 16:18:50 -0700 (PDT)
> Organization: http://groups.google.com
> Lines: 19
> Message-ID: <2b50bc12-ce7d-499a-a7e9-55202f6da0c4@p28g2000vbn.googlegroups.com>
>
> Many at present on comp.lang.fortran .

The advice given earlier in the thread , namely filter googlegroups as a
default and have a whitelist , seems the best approach. One hopes that a
valuable post which came through googlegroups will generate at least one
reply not posted through googlegroups so one will get to see that and
follow the references. But it's not guaranteed and it is possible that
one will have the replier in their killfile on other grounds.

By the way , comp.lang.forth also has several genuine posters post through
googlegroups.

--
There are so many people coming out that they're not even gay , they're
trendsexual.
John Waters