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Hi;

I have just been informed that AOL is dropping support for newsgroups. Those
with BYOA can get it through their real ISP, but AOL DSL is my primary ISP.
They said that dialup customers won't get it.

This leads me to believe that setting up Outlook using nntp.aol.com is not
going to work, if it ever would have. It might not have, AOL seems to handle
newsgroups differently, for one you can't send a link to a message in their
viewer to anyone but an AOL member.

I really don't want to use Google, but now I wonder, even though my primary
logon is with AOL, this is AOL DSL powered by SBC. Whaddya think my odds are of
being able to use nntp.sbc.com, or net ?

What's more I want to figure out how to continue to post in my own name. For
better or worse I'm not a name changer. By that I mean those of you who are
familiar with me know my technical ability, but also my arrogance at times, and
my politically incorrect views.

Actually if I can do something other than go through Google or whatever I can
make the transition. AOLs reader sucks anyway, and of late has been way off
timing. Seems like the posts are not sorted in any particular order.

Mozilla has been mentioned, anyone know if it's any good ?

What are my best options here ? I gotta do something or I won't be here. I did
express my dismay to AOL that the highest priced end user ISP (or ICP) now
lacks a feature important to me. This is not likely to get me anywhere I
suspect because probably so few AOL users use Usenet.

Thanks in advance, and thanks for your time.

JURB (hopefully will stay JURB)

JURB6006 wrote:

What's more I want to figure out how to continue to post in my own name. For
better or worse I'm not a name changer. By that I mean those of you who are
familiar with me know my technical ability, but also my arrogance at times, and
my politically incorrect views.

I don't know how AOL behaves with third party news servers, but you
could try registering from *free* access to the news.individual.net
news server:
http://www.news.individual.net/index.html
and set up outlook, thunderbird or whatever.
You will require a valid email address to register, so of course you can
use the one you currently have.

I use this server for text groups because my own ISP's server is
somewhat unreliable.

Lee
--
Email address is valid, but is unlikely to be read.

But if you have SBC DSL get rid of the AOL part of it. SBC has the wire to
your house, will they do it w/o AOL. I thinks it's BS that they would think
about dropping the news groups!


"JURB6006" wrote in message
...
Hi;

I have just been informed that AOL is dropping support for newsgroups.
Those
with BYOA can get it through their real ISP, but AOL DSL is my primary
ISP.
They said that dialup customers won't get it.

This leads me to believe that setting up Outlook using nntp.aol.com is not
going to work, if it ever would have. It might not have, AOL seems to
handle
newsgroups differently, for one you can't send a link to a message in
their
viewer to anyone but an AOL member.

I really don't want to use Google, but now I wonder, even though my
primary
logon is with AOL, this is AOL DSL powered by SBC. Whaddya think my odds
are of
being able to use nntp.sbc.com, or net ?

What's more I want to figure out how to continue to post in my own name.
For
better or worse I'm not a name changer. By that I mean those of you who
are
familiar with me know my technical ability, but also my arrogance at
times, and
my politically incorrect views.

Actually if I can do something other than go through Google or whatever I
can
make the transition. AOLs reader sucks anyway, and of late has been way
off
timing. Seems like the posts are not sorted in any particular order.

Mozilla has been mentioned, anyone know if it's any good ?

What are my best options here ? I gotta do something or I won't be here. I
did
express my dismay to AOL that the highest priced end user ISP (or ICP) now
lacks a feature important to me. This is not likely to get me anywhere I
suspect because probably so few AOL users use Usenet.

Thanks in advance, and thanks for your time.

JURB (hopefully will stay JURB)

"JURB6006" wrote in message
...
Hi;

I have just been informed that AOL is dropping support for newsgroups.
Those
with BYOA can get it through their real ISP, but AOL DSL is my primary
ISP.
They said that dialup customers won't get it.

(snip extra stuff)

Thanks in advance, and thanks for your time.

JURB (hopefully will stay JURB)

I've just been informed that AOL intends to
discontinue their news group service for their
"dial-up" customers (which is a majority). This
little trick doesn't surprise me.

Maybe now is the time for AOL dial-up members
to get themselves a "real" ISP (Internet
Service Provider). There are many of them
out there which offer a much better service
than AOL. I highly recommend "Earthlink."
Be sure to check out and see what your area
has to offer for various ISP's. All of the
ISP's provide you with free software that is
self-installing, and extremely easy to use.

If you desire to stay with AOL (although, I
can't imagine why), then you'll have to get
a web-based news group provider. I know of
three of them:

1. EasyNews. Go to:

http://www.easynews.com

EasyNews charges $9.98 per month for 10
gigabytes of uploads/downloads. As much as
I upload, I don't even use 10 gigs per month.

2. SuperNews. Go to:

http://www.supernews.com

SuperNews has various monthly plans. Their
10 gigs a month plan is $10.95.

3. GigaNews. Go to:

http://www.giganews.com

GigaNews has three different plans. Their
10 gigs a month plan is $11.99.

Be sure to check them all out - I might have
forgotten something.

I'm using a text based news reader (tin) from my ISP. They happen to give
me a Linux shell. I subscribe to flashnewsgroups.com text only service
for about five bucks/month and that way, I can use threading and keep track
of what I've already read vs. using a web based newsreader (which don't tend
to have those functions). I can also rlogin to their server from anywhere
(even through firewalls) and read news. Works great. My GF has AOL and as
others have mentioned, they are a pretty bad ISP and tend to cater to the
technologically inept (my grandmother loves them). There are *so many* good
ISPs out there that I wonder why people continue w/AOL.

My ISP also dumped Usenet because out of over a thousand users, only
two read news via Usenet. It cost them about 200/month for their
service. However, they were nice about it and reduced my monthly fee
to compensate for my cost of the news service. I must say they have
earned my respect with that move.

barry

I agree with Lee, I have used http://www.news.individual.net/index.html for
a few years and have found them to be very reliable. They do not carry any
alt. newsgroups. I used to use them with Outlook Express when I had NetZero
dialup and it worked fine. As long as you have an internet connection it
will work.

And it is free!

--
Tony Marsillo
Nutmeg Repair
-----------------------------------------------------------------
"Lee" wrote in message
...
JURB6006 wrote:

What's more I want to figure out how to continue to post in my own name.
For
better or worse I'm not a name changer. By that I mean those of you who
are
familiar with me know my technical ability, but also my arrogance at
times, and
my politically incorrect views.

I don't know how AOL behaves with third party news servers, but you could
try registering from *free* access to the news.individual.net
news server:
http://www.news.individual.net/index.html
and set up outlook, thunderbird or whatever.
You will require a valid email address to register, so of course you can
use the one you currently have.

I use this server for text groups because my own ISP's server is somewhat
unreliable.

Lee
--
Email address is valid, but is unlikely to be read.

if you have SBC DSL get rid of the AOL part of it

Unfortunately AOL is my primary ISP. This might have to change.

JURB

I've just been informed that AOL intends to
discontinue their news group service for their
"dial-up" customers (which is a majority). This
little trick doesn't surprise me.

If AOL says you don't need newsgroups, then you don't need newsgroups.
End of discussion.

It's going to be kinda quiet around here though...

Actually, I believe SBC DSL is the best bargain for your dollar.
$26.95 per month for broadband internet access; I think AOL charges
almost that much for dial-up service

Alan Harriman

On 25 Jan 2005 22:35:20 GMT (JURB6006) wrote in Message
id: :

What are my best options here ?

http://www.individual.net/
Free.

I'd recommend http://www.forteinc.com/main/homepage.php for a newsreader,
if you don't wish to buy the full version, after 30 days it reverts to a
free version which doesn't support kill filtering.

Good luck!

I have SBC, but they have no timeframe when DSL will be put in my rural area.
AOL is only dropping it for dial up customers.

wbsearch posted:


I have SBC, but they have no timeframe when DSL will be put in my rural area.
AOL is only dropping it for dial up customers.


There is nothing in the AOL announcement that says they are dropping newsgroups
only for dialup customers. My access is via Comcast cable, and each time I
access one of the boards, I get the AOL service elimination message.

I only retained AOL for so long because their newsgroup access was so easy, but
other aspects of their service that were useful to me have already gone to hell
and this is the last straw. I wouldn't stay with AOL if they changed their
plan.

So in a week or so I will be ready to dump my AOL account and I'm glad to be
rid of them.

As for why are they dumping newsgroups..... I think it has something to do
with a deal they have with google. I'm glad I unloaded my shares in AOL a few
years ago.

Don

"Dbowey" wrote in message
...

I only retained AOL for so long because their newsgroup access was so
easy, but
other aspects of their service that were useful to me have already gone to
hell
and this is the last straw. I wouldn't stay with AOL if they changed
their
plan.

See also news:alt.free.newsservers
--
N

Dbowey ) writes:
wbsearch posted:


I have SBC, but they have no timeframe when DSL will be put in my rural area.
AOL is only dropping it for dial up customers.


There is nothing in the AOL announcement that says they are dropping newsgroups
only for dialup customers. My access is via Comcast cable, and each time I
access one of the boards, I get the AOL service elimination message.

I think AOL's words are misleading.

I read that message to mean that you won't get newsgroups from AOL. But since
some people access the internet through other means (broadband, or a really
cheap ISP that has local dial in but little more), and pay for AOL on top
of that, they are saying that you may not need AOL for newsgroups since
your ISP may supply them.

AOL won't be supplying newsgroups for people with high speed access, but
the high speed access supplier may supply newsgroups.

The bit about dial up is on the level of their line about how you can access
newsgroups with a newsreader. In fact, the newsreader won't help unless
you have access to a newsserver, be it a free one or one you pay for.

In both cases, the wording seems to try to keep AOL's importance high.
You don't need AOL, especially if you are dialing in somewhere else.
But in reality, if you've got internet access somewhere else, the only
reason you need AOL, especially now that the newsgroups are gone, is
for any AOL specific things (such as forums and chat rooms or whatever
they are called and assuming they continue).

But I don't think they want people to know that.

Michael

I only retained AOL for so long because their newsgroup access was so easy, but
other aspects of their service that were useful to me have already gone to hell
and this is the last straw. I wouldn't stay with AOL if they changed their
plan.

So in a week or so I will be ready to dump my AOL account and I'm glad to be
rid of them.

As for why are they dumping newsgroups..... I think it has something to do
with a deal they have with google. I'm glad I unloaded my shares in AOL a few
years ago.

Don

"Tony Marsillo" wrote:
I agree with Lee, I have used http://www.news.individual.net/index.html
for
a few years and have found them to be very reliable. They do not carry any
alt. newsgroups.

That is blatantly incorrect. They most certainly *do* carry the alt.*
hierarchy, although as a text-only news server, they obviously do not carry
any alt.binaries.* groups.

In case you haven't heard, most groups in the alt.* hierarchy are *not*
binary groups. And stop top-posting you twit.

Jon

A: Because it fouls the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?

A: Top-posting.
Q: What is the most annoying thing on usenet and in e-mail?