Discussion of newsserver

[Mark Carter]

Given that news.individual.net is going to charge, I am mooting the idea
(not necessarily that seriously) of setting up a newsserver. The
simplest thing to set up would be a private server which anyone could
join. Much trickier would be trying to mirror alt.comp.freeware.*.

My worries generally lie along the lines of popularity (or lack
thereof), spam, and administrative burden.

Comments?

 

[Karen]

Given that news.individual.net is going to charge, I am mooting the idea
(not necessarily that seriously) of setting up a newsserver. The
simplest thing to set up would be a private server which anyone could
join. Much trickier would be trying to mirror alt.comp.freeware.*.

My worries generally lie along the lines of popularity (or lack
thereof), spam, and administrative burden.

Comments?

==============================
Build it and they will come - if it's FREE! How and where do I sign
up?

Karen....

 

[Mark Carter]

==============================
Build it and they will come - if it's FREE!

The intention is that it'll be free (with the single exception of me,
who'll be ponying up for the whole thing).

Cost constraints means that it wont be a replacement for individual.net
(sorry), but I would like to try to mirror alt.comp.freeware.*.

Like I say, though, mirroring is likely to be way more complicated than
rolling my own set of newsgroups, so that'd be something for down the
line, rather than being something that'd be offered straight off the bat.

 

[Susan Bugher]

The intention is that it'll be free (with the single exception of me,
who'll be ponying up for the whole thing).

Cost constraints means that it wont be a replacement for individual.net
(sorry), but I would like to try to mirror alt.comp.freeware.*.

Like I say, though, mirroring is likely to be way more complicated than
rolling my own set of newsgroups, so that'd be something for down the
line, rather than being something that'd be offered straight off the bat.

It would be great to have a free ACF newsgroup newsserver. I just
removed the info about news.individual net from the PL2005 CD web page.
It might be especially helpful to alt.comp.freeware.games - as
that group is *not* carried by many ISPs.

Susan

 

[Roger Johansson]

Cost constraints means that it wont be a replacement for individual.net
(sorry), but I would like to try to mirror alt.comp.freeware.*.

Like I say, though, mirroring is likely to be way more complicated than
rolling my own set of newsgroups, so that'd be something for down the
line, rather than being something that'd be offered straight off the
bat.

It is not so complicated. You need to run a newsserver program 24 hours a
day, and be available to the users.

You shouldn't have any trouble getting a newsfeed from some usenet
server. It said in the rules for individual.net that you can set up feeds
to other people, and post their articles, if you only follow some simple
rules. Most newsservers have this kind of rule system, so you are allowed
to leech off their server to allow a local net to have the same access to
usenet as more directly connected participants.
Read the rules and talk to the staff at a few newsservers.

If you limit yourself to acf it shouldn't be any problem, a couple of
hundred readers at the most, a hundred posted messages per day, or so.

 

[Mark Carter]

It is not so complicated. You need to run a newsserver program 24 hours a
day, and be available to the users.

I had played around with Linux a few weeks ago, and set up my own web
server from home. It worked through my VPN, and everything. I would have
been quite eager to make a newsserver available on this basis, but
realised that it really wouldn't be practical or safe enough for me to
do it 24/7. Today, though, I read about Virtual Dedicated Servers, and
found one that might be OK; and this seems a much more realistic
solution. This introduces a cost issue, but it's not prohibitive, and
with sufficient positive encouragement, I could be tempted to go for it.

Bandwidth is 5GB pm, so I wouldn't be able do things like make the PL CD
available. There might be scope to satisfy some other suggestion, though.

You shouldn't have any trouble getting a newsfeed from some usenet
server. It said in the rules for individual.net that you can set up feeds
to other people, and post their articles, if you only follow some simple
rules. Most newsservers have this kind of rule system, so you are allowed
to leech off their server to allow a local net to have the same access to
usenet as more directly connected participants.
Read the rules and talk to the staff at a few newsservers.

Thanks. I wasn't aware of that. This is something I could investigate.

If you limit yourself to acf it shouldn't be any problem, a couple of
hundred readers at the most, a hundred posted messages per day, or so.

I'll also try to serve the subgroups, including acfg, as Susan
requested. This would still be low volume, so I could possibly set up a
few extra newsgroups. I could return the favour to Ceg, for example.

 

[Mike Dee]

It would be great to have a free ACF newsgroup newsserver. I just
removed the info about news.individual net from the PL2005 CD web
page.
It might be especially helpful to alt.comp.freeware.games -
:as
that group is *not* carried by many ISPs.

aioe.org <http://news.aioe.org/>
news.x-privat.org <http://www.x-privat.org/international.php>
news.sunsite.dk <http://news.sunsite.dk/>

Are 3 free newsservers that I've come across since news of NIN reached
me, and all 3 carry the alt.comp.freeware heirarchy.

aioe.org requires no user name or password or sign-up, you can try it
out for yourself right away without even going to their website - not
much working at the website (I think aioe.org is very new). It is
limited to 25 posts per day per IP address to discourage spammers and
flooders and up to 10 cross-posts (9 too many IMHO). Text only, and no
binaries or HTML posts. Slow compared to NIN, but so far, reliable
(I've been using it for about a week). Also carries 5000 more groups
than NIN. No limits on reading articles.

news.x-privat.org requires sign-up which does contain some liberal
interpretation (Italian to English) to decipher for native English
speaking users. But once you get enrolled it works really great, I got
signed up yesterday and am posting this via x-privat. It's very fast, I
like it.

There is a form to sign to the effect giving them the right to use you
details as they see fit. They say that they won't spam you, but if they
ever change their minds...

You can sign up with a throw-away hotmail account, so it's not too big
a deal here.

news.sunsite.dk requires registration but is much easier to setup for
us poor English speaking folks and there are no spam clauses to worry
about. Like NIN, sunsite is university based. It carries far less
groups than NIN but it does carry the alt.comp.freeware heirarchy.

 

[Susan Bugher]

aioe.org <http://news.aioe.org/>
news.x-privat.org <http://www.x-privat.org/international.php>
news.sunsite.dk <http://news.sunsite.dk/>

Are 3 free newsservers that I've come across since news of NIN reached
me, and all 3 carry the alt.comp.freeware heirarchy.

Thank you Mike.

You inspired me to create a new page in the wiki:

http://www.markcarter.me.uk/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?FreeNewsservers

I listed the names and URLs for the three servers you mention in your
post - am hoping you and others will add notes and info to the wiki page.

Susan

 

[Karen]

aioe.org <http://news.aioe.org/>

I can't get beyond the main page with this one. ???

news.x-privat.org <http://www.x-privat.org/international.php>
news.sunsite.dk <http://news.sunsite.dk/>

Are 3 free newsservers that I've come across since news of NIN reached
me, and all 3 carry the alt.comp.freeware heirarchy.

aioe.org requires no user name or password or sign-up, you can try it
out for yourself right away without even going to their website - not
much working at the website (I think aioe.org is very new).

Nothing works there as of right now.

It is

limited to 25 posts per day per IP address to discourage spammers and
flooders and up to 10 cross-posts (9 too many IMHO). Text only, and no
binaries or HTML posts. Slow compared to NIN, but so far, reliable
(I've been using it for about a week). Also carries 5000 more groups
than NIN. No limits on reading articles.

Since the site doesn't work were do we get the information to add them as a
news server?

news.x-privat.org requires sign-up which does contain some liberal
interpretation (Italian to English) to decipher for native English
speaking users. But once you get enrolled it works really great, I got
signed up yesterday and am posting this via x-privat. It's very fast, I
like it.

I do too! They're too good to be FREE. They'll probably start
charging soon.

There is a form to sign to the effect giving them the right to use you
details as they see fit. They say that they won't spam you, but if they
ever change their minds...
You can sign up with a throw-away hotmail account, so it's not too big
a deal here.

news.sunsite.dk requires registration but is much easier to setup for
us poor English speaking folks and there are no spam clauses to worry
about. Like NIN, sunsite is university based. It carries far less
groups than NIN but it does carry the alt.comp.freeware heirarchy.

Thanks...

Karen....

 

[Mike Andrade]

Since the site doesn't work were do we get the information to add
them as a news server?

News server: news.aioe.org
Port: 119

No need to log in. It works fine.

 

[=?ISO-8859-1?Q?=BBQ=AB?=]

Thanks. I wasn't aware of that. This is something I could
investigate.

From <http://news.individual.net/faq.php>,

1.8 I operate my own newsserver.
Can I get a regular feed from you?

Sorry, but we don't establish new peerings for the time being.

But probably you could find someone willing to do it.

 

[Roger Johansson]

From <http://news.individual.net/faq.php>,

1.8 I operate my own newsserver.
Can I get a regular feed from you?

Sorry, but we don't establish new peerings for the time being.

When I read the rules, a few years ago, they allowed it, but they didn't
call it a "regular newsfeed". Maybe they are changing all the rules at
individual.net right now, or I read another section.

Anyhow, in the non-commercial part of usenet it is common to allow
subsystems as long as they do not allow spammers to take over.

Technically you need no more than a single news account, like we all have
at some newsserver. If you have a family you should be allowed to let the
family members post each under his/her own name. And from that there is a
small step to allow friends and others to use the same account. So it is
not so easy to check if a certain account is used by just one person or
many.

That is one of the reasons why subgroups have always been allowed,
because it is nearly impossible to disallow it to begin with.
Another reason is that it takes some load off the other newsservers, when
local users can read from the local newsserver.

 

[Karen]

News server: news.aioe.org
Port: 119

No need to log in. It works fine.

==================
Thanks I just added them!

Karen....

 

[Mark Carter]

aioe.org <http://news.aioe.org/>
news.x-privat.org <http://www.x-privat.org/international.php>
news.sunsite.dk <http://news.sunsite.dk/>

Rats. I can't connect to any of them. I've had this problem before, and
I think I worked out that it's to do with my ISP (Plusnet, UK)
blanket-blocking the relevant port. If I ask them nicely, they may
unblock it. Other people may experience the same difficulty.

I think that, given Mike's alternative offerings, there would be little
point in my original idea of mirroring acf.

 

[Mike Dee]

Thank you Mike.

You inspired me to create a new page in the wiki:

http://www.markcarter.me.uk/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?FreeNewsservers

I listed the names and URLs for the three servers you mention in
your post - am hoping you and others will add notes and info to
the wiki page.

Thank you, Susan.
I've never written to wiki before so I hope I haven't wrecked it

With regards to aioe.org; if one wishes to use the services
available there [at this point in time], then one should simply set
up their newsclient to do so, without going to their web site.

Read my posts to aioe.org's helpdesk and I think you will understand
why:

<http://news.aioe.org/web/thread.php?group=aioe.helpdesk.english>

Begin with the post "Registration help?" and then Aioe's response.

Best regards

 

[Susan Bugher]

Thank you, Susan.
I've never written to wiki before so I hope I haven't wrecked it

Looking good Mike. I'll confess that I just muddle on through, check
the preview to see if the changes look okay, revise if necessary. . .

What I learned last night. . .

Links don't work properly (at least here using Mozilla) when they are
enclosed in brackets - you may want to revise this:

<http://news.aioe.org/web/thread.php?group=aioe.helpdesk.english>

Susan

 

[Bill Day]

News server: news.aioe.org
Port: 119

No need to log in. It works fine.

I read this in NIN, changed to AOIE, and posted this after cheching
several other groups I sometimes read. It worked fine, and was just as
fast as NIN
So far, so good. Let's see how they react when word gets around and
they get heavier traffic...*grin*

 

[Bill Day]

I read this in NIN, changed to AOIE, and posted this after cheching
several other groups I sometimes read. It worked fine, and was just as
fast as NIN
So far, so good. Let's see how they react when word gets around and
they get heavier traffic...*grin*

well, scratch that!----I just tried to refresh listings to read my
own post, and AOIE gave me "connection refused" message. I guess I
will mess with the registration sites...

 

[Mike Andrade]

well, scratch that!----I just tried to refresh listings to read
my
own post, and AOIE gave me "connection refused" message. I guess I
will mess with the registration sites...

That's a bit disconcerting. I'm posting from aoie now and will put it
through a few tests.

 

[Mike Dee]

That's a bit disconcerting. I'm posting from aoie now and will
put it through a few tests.

I have not had any connection issues since using aioe.org and am always
[so far] greeted with a welcoming
"200 aioe.org InterNetNews NNRP server INN 2.4.2 ready (posting ok)."
Whenever I log in.

Although free and requiring no pass or username, aioe will not tolerate
abuse so has a limit of 25 posts per day per IP and a limit of 10 x-
posts to discourage spammers and flooders. No limits on reading. There
must be some other issue as to why Bill Day has problems getting in and
my guess is it must be client side.