Jeff Liebermann wrote:
Full disclosu I've been involved in usenet news since Bnews
running on Xenix 286 in the early 1980's when there were
only 16 newsgroups and everyone was incredibly polite.
I've also helped admin, moderate, and monitor
usenet news servers and groups,
a nightmare I never wish to repeat.

I figured something like that.
I was just tacking on some more ideas for the OP.

....and most folks don't pay much mind
to the nuances of Google Groups
--not even those who use it for daily Usenet access. 8-(

History of Usenet (according to Giganews):
http://www.giganews.com/usenet-history/

That's a useful once-over-lightly page
--certainly better than Wikipedia's page on Usenet
which gets deep really fast.