Jack Stein wrote:
,
Vincent wrote:

Usenet has changed considerably since the late 1980's... more
newsgroups, more content, larger files, etc... and most ISPs &
free resources do not want to invest in the equipment

Jack Stein said..
I'd bet byte for byte the equipment is far cheaper than it used
to
be. Heck, I'm sitting here with over 550 GIGS of hard drive
storage
myself,and I don't have millions of users paying $50/month for
service.
.
krw wrote:
I don't remember the numbers, but your 550GB drive is likely enough
for an hour's complete Usenet feed. The amount of data is truly
massive.

Well, in the 80's, my IBM PCxt cost $4000 and had a 10 MEGABYTE hard
drive, the biggest HD around. For less than a $1000 I have a PC
with
over 500 GIGABYTES in hard drive storage. I can tell you for sure,
Comcast can afford enough storage for WEEKS of usenet without
blinking
an eye. Heck, for FREE google stores years of usenet crap without
blinking an eye.

Actually it's for advertising revenue, not "for free", and they don't
store binaries.

Can your PC with 500 GIGABYTES in hard drive storage deliver up
binaries fast enough to satisfy a large number of simultaneous users?

I'm not aware of any newsgroup services charging $50 month, and
most of the services I'm familiar with are inexpensive.

One of mine is $8/mo and the other is (now, I've heard,) $16/yr.
It's not a big deal.

It's a big deal to the millions of people that get it free now via
Comcast. Most of those don't use it, and a lot less will use it if
they
have to pay even $1.00 for the service from a 3rd party.

Right. Usenet has always been a loser for the ISPs. It's not
really enough of their business to warrant the expense.

Probably true, but do you know how much Comcast will save by
dropping
the Binary ALT groups from their Giganews contract? Do you even
know
how much Comcast pays Giganews for there complete service? I don't
know
either, but I bet if just Verizon and Comcast dropped all newsgroup
services, most or ALL of the newsgroup providers would disappear.

Don't bet on it. USENET was around long before Verizon or Comcast.

While I hope it's not the case, I have a feeling that ISPs will
begin to discontinue their newsgroup services in light of the
decisions made by Roadrunner, Verizon, AT&T, etc.

They will, but as you point out, there are alternatives. I stopped
using my ISP's NNTP service about five years ago. A news
subscription is cheap and the service is much better than what I
got
with the ISPs.

As I just pointed out, when/if the major ISP's quit carrying
newsgroups
altogether, you can forgetaboutit, there will be no usenet worth
subscribing to, and your favorite independent news providers will be
history. As it stands today, Comcast still provides Giganews FREE
to
all subscribers, including all Binary groups. The fact Verizon
supposedly dropped all the binary groups needs to hurt Verizon, who
is
currently in major competition with Comcast. If no one complains,
and
no one switches ISP's as a result, then, my guess is Comcast will
likely
follow suit, and binary groups will be dead and gone. If they drop
newsgroups altogether, then newsgroups will be dead as Fidonet, as
will
most of the independent newsgroup providers like Giganews.

Why will the independents be dead?

--
--
--John
to email, dial "usenet" and validate
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)