Usenet Binaries Newsgroups?

[stralis440]

Originally Posted by 27cows

but I still maintain my Easynews account, simply because their web browsing facility is the bollocks and unique, even after all these years.

Absolutely. I don`t get huge amounts from usenet compared to years gone by, but as you say, anything I do want can be searched for so easily with the global search it`s a dream and worth keaping hold of the account for that alone.

[UncleRemus]

Where Usenet still shines is in music. The .mp3 groups are very active and contain lots of interesting stuff. In particular, the "decade" groups for the 50's, 60's, 70's etc have some posters that share their awesome record collections. You can find stuff there that you'll never find anywhere else.

Usenet is the place to find rare and obscure tracks, bootlegs, live shows. There is a lot of life left in Usenet, in spite of the spam.

BTW, Microplanet Gravity has always been a better newsreader than Agent. They were developed and released around the same time, and Gravity was clearly better, but somehow FreeAgent got all the attention. Kinda like the VHS vs Beta wars, the inferior program won.

Usenet takes a bit of effort, but it's worth it.

[Harry Horndog]

I'm still using, LOL, but it's harder to find stuff than it used to be. It's hard to tell whether it's because the groups are keeping "under the radar" as someone said earlier, or because the stuff just ain't there anymore.

As a Mac user I used to swear by Thoth, but when the developer quit updating it and it never really made the transition to OS X I eventually, reluctantly, had to abandon it. But once Unison got up to speed I've never looked back. Those Panic folks really know how to develop software--everything they put out is fun to use!

Like most everybody else I had to switch to a premium server owing to the total lack of support by the providers. I used to use "free trials" from the others, but now I'm an unlimited Giganews guy. Retention there is over 14 months!

Someone said it was great for Movies and TV and that's quite true. Although I can get the latest British TV programs with torrents, I always check first for a posting on Usenet 'cause the download is direct and fast. Others have mentioned how slow and frustrating web-based downloading is, and that is of course the perspective of Usenet users--'cause everything else is slow as a bear in comparison. But only Usenet users know that!

For searching I've found Newzleech to be a superb way to customize my own NZBs. But Newzleech lost their servers a few weeks back and now say it will be at least 'til the New Year before they're back online. So I just went over to Newzbin which someone earlier in the thread said was what he used, and found out it's some kind of "members-only" thing and can't even join! So until Newzleech is back up and running I'm at a loss as to how to search across newsgroups en masse.

Only users of Usenet are probably even bothering to read this thread, so it still remains something of a secret except to oldtimers like ourselves. It may not be as robust a sharing arena as it once was but it has the advantage of being "under the radar". Like insects if there's a world file-sharing calamity I wouldn't be surprised to see Usenet still standing in the end.

Request:
If anyone is a member of Newzbin and can help me out by offering me an invitation, please pm me. When I try to register there I get this message:

Please accept our apologies, but an invitation from a current member is required in order to register. If you have been sent an invitation, please use the link located in the email.

[deepsepia]

Originally Posted by Harry Horndog

Only users of Usenet are probably even bothering to read this thread, so it still remains something of a secret except to oldtimers like ourselves. It may not be as robust a sharing arena as it once was but it has the advantage of being "under the radar". Like insects if there's a world file-sharing calamity I wouldn't be surprised to see Usenet still standing in the end.

The first rule of Usenet: Don't talk about Usenet!

There are many interesting tricks that go on. One would be to post large files to groups with completely obscure names . . . you have to get the index pointers from another place.

In a way, this development resembles the evolution of the genome . . . important "information" is tucked away, safely, and even though there's tons of junk, if you have the "key" that junk is ignored.

[Zortag]

NZBs have opened up all kinds of interesting ways to post to the Usenet, since an NZB is just a text file (an XML file), and entire "path to a message" is in the file, it is trivial to actually combine many NZB files into a single NZB, and be able to download something that has been split-up and posted across multiple news groups, even into the "legit" newsgroups. It take only a bit more effort on the poster's part, but it keeps the traffic down on the main group, and thus avoids the undesirable attention of the spammers. It easily allows for a posting to be for public or private consumption, all you need to pass around is the NZB file, and if you don't have the NZB you'll never know how many pieces there are or where they are; and the downloader needs to know nothing, just have an NZB-aware news downloader.

There are all kinds of interesting things going on in the usenet, and more of it becoming hidden right before your very eyes. Not everything you see as obvious spam is spam at all, it's just hiding right out in the open where no one will think to look.

[njdreamer]

Originally Posted by Harry Horndog

For searching I've found Newzleech to be a superb way to customize my own NZBs. But Newzleech lost their servers a few weeks back and now say it will be at least 'til the New Year before they're back online. So I just went over to Newzbin which someone earlier in the thread said was what he used, and found out it's some kind of "members-only" thing and can't even join! So until Newzleech is back up and running I'm at a loss as to how to search across newsgroups en masse.

As Zortag mentioned, NZBs are the way to go.
Newzleech was/is good but while it's down, here's a few alternatives:

For general usenet searching, http://binsearch.info/ is a great resource

http://nzbmatrix.com/ is more organized and also a great site

For adult material http://nzbxxx.com/ is new and adding nzb's quickly
Also try http://www.kleverig.nl/ Lots of good stuff on there.

[Ace1965]

I've had an EasyNews account for about a year now and it's been pretty good. I see that a lot of the stuff is repeated several times throughout usenet. The same pictures will be renamed dozens of times. I've got several binaries (if that's what they are called) saved in my favorites.

[Xxphd]

Originally Posted by Ace1965

I've got several binaries (if that's what they are called) saved in my favorites.

binary groups

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usenet

[gmcbee]

Originally Posted by zorin

Have used Forte Inc's Agent in the past and was happy with it until I found newsbin which downloads binaries much faster than Agent.
It also allows you to sort your selected downloads on date/time so you can download the oldest posting first, something not possible in Agent ...

For those interested, you can do this with Agent by setting the message sort to reverse date in the message pane, then retrieving. Click the date column in the message pane, or right click the group and select Sort... > Date...> Oldest Message First

[Jism Jim]

Originally Posted by lovegod

Never quite figured out usenet and these news groups..
are they all pay sites ?
or is my basic problem AOL ?

They're not sites. clicking on the link Xxphd provided would have taught you that.

or try this link.