Is it me or is aus.electronics dying?

[Dennis]

It seems over many years that aus.electronics is carking it.

Apart from active input from Don McK, Dave LJ, its really quiet.

PA seems to have morphed into |-|erc and Sylvia seems to be channeling Rod
Speed.

Whatever became of Bob Wilson?

 

[Phil Allison]

"Dennis"

It seems over many years that aus.electronics is carking it.

Apart from active input from Don McK, Dave LJ, its really quiet.

** Nearly all usenet groups have faded or died in the last couple of years.

The main reasons are masses of spam and an army of brain dead trolls that
ruin intelligent discussion for everyone else.

The existence of Google Groups is responsible for most of both problems.


..... Phil

 

[Grant]

On Wed, 28 Jul 2010 09:18:25 +0800, "Dennis" <invalid@nowhere.com> wrote:

It seems over many years that aus.electronics is carking it.

Apart from active input from Don McK, Dave LJ, its really quiet.

PA seems to have morphed into |-|erc and Sylvia seems to be channeling Rod
Speed.

Whatever became of Bob Wilson?

Usenet is dying due to lack of interest, it seems. Google did major
harm by not bothering to improve their crappy web interface, and the
newbies don't seem to have much of a clue what this place is?

And the spammers.

Always the total wackos and idiots here, I think many just give up
and go over to web to fora where the idiots get banned, or something?

Is general conversion between people disappearing?

I've accessing usenet in various forms since '91, much has changed
over the years.

Rejoined a.e only recently, it's a lot less active than it was a
decade ago.

Grant.

 

[Grant]

On Wed, 28 Jul 2010 12:02:55 +1000, "Phil Allison" <phil_a@tpg.com.au> wrote:

"Dennis"

It seems over many years that aus.electronics is carking it.

Apart from active input from Don McK, Dave LJ, its really quiet.


** Nearly all usenet groups have faded or died in the last couple of years.

The main reasons are masses of spam and an army of brain dead trolls that
ruin intelligent discussion for everyone else.

The existence of Google Groups is responsible for most of both problems.

Agree with you there. Are there any web based places taking up the
slack? I only rejoined electronics groups recently.

Grant.

.... Phil

 

[Mr.T]

"Grant" <omg@grrr.id.au> wrote in message
news:v96v469q0rs3tei8f5qfsqm5lo9v937old@4ax.com...

Usenet is dying due to lack of interest, it seems. Google did major
harm by not bothering to improve their crappy web interface, and the
newbies don't seem to have much of a clue what this place is?

They don't even know it exists, Twitter has taken it's place for the new
generation.

Always the total wackos and idiots here, I think many just give up
and go over to web to fora where the idiots get banned, or something?

Is general conversion between people disappearing?

IF you consider Usenet and similar to be "conversation", then it's actually
increasing due to Twitter being FAR more popular than usenet ever was.
Not to mention email and SMS are more poular now than letter writing ever
was.
But IF you mean face to face conversation, then that's probably dropped
markedly.

I've accessing usenet in various forms since '91, much has changed
over the years.

Rejoined a.e only recently, it's a lot less active than it was a
decade ago.

As are all newsgroups, but Twitter, MySpace, Blogs, YouTube, and a hundred
other on-line fora are FAR more active.

MrT.

 

[kreed]

On Jul 28, 11:18 am, "Dennis" <inva...@nowhere.com> wrote:

It seems over many years that aus.electronics is carking it.

Apart from active input from Don McK, Dave LJ, its really quiet.

PA seems to have morphed into |-|erc and Sylvia seems to be channeling Rod
Speed.

Whatever became of Bob Wilson?

http://groups.google.com.au/group/aus.electronics/about

Archive

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov
Dec
1992 1
1994 1 3 6 9 4
1995 8 7 46 14 20 12 35 36 89 24 140 146
1996 210 291 183 211 238 240 215 243 289 249 321 194
1997 321 263 392 292 451 268 306 297 636 486 421 463
1998 508 418 462 365 487 501 563 504 508 479 504 409
1999 621 676 650 560 712 533 661 877 500 780 736 673
2000 801 692 747 691 1069 895 821 1029 857 1112 1056 914
2001 1276 1136 1345 1833 2384 1568 2388 2236 1580 1639 1504
1546
2002 2326 1542 2182 1862 1697 1583 1543 1740 1204 1514 1326
1699
2003 1516 1499 1430 1854 1299 1281 1157 1550 1637 1295 1102
804
2004 1313 848 868 1136 1010 772 702 626 540 601 709 854
2005 1383 772 1341 825 828 918 1062 824 759 1035 964 1197
2006 653 694 665 545 964 639 539 431 634 436 549 646
2007 493 997 1174 1479 1342 537 598 530 492 510 320 319
2008 498 591 631 507 813 590 349 1060 487 564 489 419
2009 978 550 1087 636 631 826 1115 395 572 904 474 411
2010 647 436 502 660 326 373 330


IF this works for you - it will demonstrate (based on monthly numbers
of posts) that you are correct. I have been noticing this trend for
the past year or so.
Seems that the group hit an all-time peak about mid 2001 and continued
to do ok during 2002-03 (depending on which month you look at) and has
declined ever since.

I have been on here since around the time that Electronics Australia
collapsed, (defecating the short lived out EAT as it died) and it has
overall been a pretty good and knowledgeable group to be in, its very
very sad to see it dropping like this. Learned a lot from it over the
years too.

According to some posters on other groups, in the US major ISP's
started dropping usenet access a couple of years back based on the
excuse of "child porn" but more likely to cut costs from maintaining
something that has reducing user base with the continuing take up of
Facebook, Twit ter, Google groups etc also happening. For serious
subject discussions, I don't think these are anywhere near as good as
usenet personally.


It isn't just Aus Electronics, most Usenet based groups that I have
been reading or posting on have dropped significantly with posts,
and/or getting filled up with crap
(not necessarily spam, but more ignorant or stupid posts, usually from
those that don't want to listen to / fight with those who know - who
then get sick of it and slowly stop being involved )


The top all time posters (that I can recognise from the mangled email
addys) seem to be Phil Allison, Don McKenzie, Rod Speed, & Trevor
Wilson, from the look of the table below

 

[kreed]

On Jul 28, 12:47 pm, Grant <o...@grrr.id.au> wrote:

On Wed, 28 Jul 2010 09:18:25 +0800, "Dennis" <inva...@nowhere.com> wrote:

It seems over many years that aus.electronics is carking it.

Apart from active input from Don McK, Dave LJ, its really quiet.

PA seems to have morphed into |-|erc and Sylvia seems to be channeling Rod
Speed.

Whatever became of Bob Wilson?

Usenet is dying due to lack of interest, it seems.  Google did major
harm by not bothering to improve their crappy web interface, and the
newbies don't seem to have much of a clue what this place is?

And the spammers.

Always the total wackos and idiots here, I think many just give up
and go over to web to fora where the idiots get banned, or something?

Is general conversion between people disappearing?

In the real world it is - without a doubt. Most people these days
seem very dull and unable to hold much of an interesting convo - like
they used to be able to. The other problem is that most I know in the
real world who have ability in anything seem to have less time for
socialising, from taking on more work, due to shortage of others who
will or can do it (and not just in tech stuff either). As a result you
dont seem to catch up that often.

A lot that you see when out and about will be texting on their mobiles
rather than talking - especially young people. Probably sit for ages
on Facebook etc rather than talk when at home too. In the virtual
world, they probably talk many times more than in the real world.

I've accessing usenet in various forms since '91, much has changed
over the years.

You are not wrong with that one. I do miss the good ol' days I must
admit.
It was exciting and new back then.


Also, witness the slow death of newspapers and mainstream media. (not
that its undeserved given the low quality and high quantity of
propaganda and biased stories, not to mention horrid yank programs
that are aimed at people with a mental age of 13 or so.)

I would suggest that radio probably still does ok, as you tend to
listen to it in the car when driving, and often in workplaces and home
as "background company".

Rejoined a.e only recently, it's a lot less active than it was a
decade ago.

Welcome back !


> Grant.

 

[Andy Wood]

kreed <kenreed1999@gmail.com> wrote:

.. . .

A lot that you see when out and about will be texting on their mobiles
rather than talking - especially young people.

Earlier this year it was widely reported that American teenagers are
sending over 100 text messages per day. At the rate I am going, it is
quite likely I will not send that number in my lifetime.

http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/online_mobile/under-aged-texting-usage-and-actual-cost/



Andy Wood
woodag@trap.ozemail.com.au

 

[Swanny]

On 28/07/2010 11:18 AM, Dennis wrote:

It seems over many years that aus.electronics is carking it.

Apart from active input from Don McK, Dave LJ, its really quiet.

PA seems to have morphed into |-|erc and Sylvia seems to be channeling Rod
Speed.

Whatever became of Bob Wilson?

It's a bit like a bakelite phone with a curly cord!

 

[Ross Herbert]

On Wed, 28 Jul 2010 12:49:18 +1000, Grant <omg@grrr.id.au> wrote:

:On Wed, 28 Jul 2010 12:02:55 +1000, "Phil Allison" <phil_a@tpg.com.au> wrote:
:
:>
:>"Dennis"
:>>
:>> It seems over many years that aus.electronics is carking it.
:>>
:>> Apart from active input from Don McK, Dave LJ, its really quiet.
:>
:>
:>** Nearly all usenet groups have faded or died in the last couple of years.
:>
:>The main reasons are masses of spam and an army of brain dead trolls that
:>ruin intelligent discussion for everyone else.
:>
:>The existence of Google Groups is responsible for most of both problems.
:
:Agree with you there. Are there any web based places taking up the
:slack? I only rejoined electronics groups recently.
:
:Grant.
:>
:>
:>.... Phil
:>

I find that a well designed kill filter for Forte Agent works wonders

for example;

message-id:
{\$ec3e2dad\@news\.usenetmonster\.com}|{\$586e9bf6\@usenetnow\.com}|{\.googlegroups\.com}

You can remove the usenetmonster and the @usenetnow ones if you only want to
eliminate all messages emanating from googlegroups.

 

[David L. Jones]

kreed wrote:

On Jul 28, 11:18 am, "Dennis" <inva...@nowhere.com> wrote:
It seems over many years that aus.electronics is carking it.

Apart from active input from Don McK, Dave LJ, its really quiet.

PA seems to have morphed into |-|erc and Sylvia seems to be
channeling Rod Speed.

Whatever became of Bob Wilson?

http://groups.google.com.au/group/aus.electronics/about

Archive

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov
Dec
1992 1
1994 1 3 6 9 4
1995 8 7 46 14 20 12 35 36 89 24 140 146
1996 210 291 183 211 238 240 215 243 289 249 321 194
1997 321 263 392 292 451 268 306 297 636 486 421 463
1998 508 418 462 365 487 501 563 504 508 479 504 409
1999 621 676 650 560 712 533 661 877 500 780 736 673
2000 801 692 747 691 1069 895 821 1029 857 1112 1056 914
2001 1276 1136 1345 1833 2384 1568 2388 2236 1580 1639 1504
1546
2002 2326 1542 2182 1862 1697 1583 1543 1740 1204 1514 1326
1699
2003 1516 1499 1430 1854 1299 1281 1157 1550 1637 1295 1102
804
2004 1313 848 868 1136 1010 772 702 626 540 601 709 854
2005 1383 772 1341 825 828 918 1062 824 759 1035 964 1197
2006 653 694 665 545 964 639 539 431 634 436 549 646
2007 493 997 1174 1479 1342 537 598 530 492 510 320 319
2008 498 591 631 507 813 590 349 1060 487 564 489 419
2009 978 550 1087 636 631 826 1115 395 572 904 474 411
2010 647 436 502 660 326 373 330


IF this works for you - it will demonstrate (based on monthly numbers
of posts) that you are correct. I have been noticing this trend for
the past year or so.
Seems that the group hit an all-time peak about mid 2001 and continued
to do ok during 2002-03 (depending on which month you look at) and has
declined ever since.

I have been on here since around the time that Electronics Australia
collapsed, (defecating the short lived out EAT as it died) and it has
overall been a pretty good and knowledgeable group to be in, its very
very sad to see it dropping like this. Learned a lot from it over the
years too.

According to some posters on other groups, in the US major ISP's
started dropping usenet access a couple of years back based on the
excuse of "child porn" but more likely to cut costs from maintaining
something that has reducing user base with the continuing take up of
Facebook, Twit ter, Google groups etc also happening. For serious
subject discussions, I don't think these are anywhere near as good as
usenet personally.


It isn't just Aus Electronics, most Usenet based groups that I have
been reading or posting on have dropped significantly with posts,
and/or getting filled up with crap
(not necessarily spam, but more ignorant or stupid posts, usually from
those that don't want to listen to / fight with those who know - who
then get sick of it and slowly stop being involved )


The top all time posters (that I can recognise from the mangled email
addys) seem to be Phil Allison, Don McKenzie, Rod Speed, & Trevor
Wilson, from the look of the table below

I'm the third highest poster behind Phil & Rod, using two email addresses:
altzone@gmail.com and my old dljones@ozemail.com.au
Yes, I agree with most, the group is dying off, that's just a natural
consequence of the general decline of Usenet groups to other medium.
I got a new machine at work and couldn't even remember which usenet server I
used to set up my viewer! That's how little I use usenet these days.

Heck, even my EEVblog forum gets a ton more activity than this group now:
http://www.eevblog.com/forum/index.php?action=stats
Average of 42 posts per day, 6 new members sign up per day, etc
Right now there are 13 users actively viewing the forum, but it's been as
high as 223.

Dave.
--
---------------------------------------------
Check out my Electronics Engineering Video Blog & Podcast:
http://www.eevblog.com

 

[Mr.T]

"kreed" <kenreed1999@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:b7449f2f-d635-45a6-888e-835894608574@f20g2000pro.googlegroups.com...

The top all time posters (that I can recognise from the mangled email
addys) seem to be Phil Allison, Don McKenzie, Rod Speed, & Trevor
Wilson,

Yep, but that would be top in *number* of posts only!
(with apologies to Don McKenzie for him being included with the others)

MrT.

 

[Mr.T]

"David L. Jones" <altzone@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:lqn4o.46332$f_3.44788@newsfe17.iad...

The top all time posters (that I can recognise from the mangled email
addys) seem to be Phil Allison, Don McKenzie, Rod Speed, & Trevor
Wilson, from the look of the table below

I'm the third highest poster behind Phil & Rod, using two email addresses:
altzone@gmail.com and my old dljones@ozemail.com.au
Yes, I agree with most, the group is dying off, that's just a natural
consequence of the general decline of Usenet groups to other medium.

The fact that Phil and Rod are the top posters surely didn't help much
either!

MrT.

 

[Mr.T]

"kreed" <kenreed1999@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:998ae6aa-8ee7-465e-b249-b5d58340f96b@p22g2000pre.googlegroups.com...

I would suggest that radio probably still does ok, as you tend to
listen to it in the car when driving, and often in workplaces and home
as "background company".

In general I think you would be wrong there too with MP3 players being so
ubiquitous. I for one listen to radio VERY rarely these days, and younger
people do even less so IME.
MTV drives record sales (MP3 downloads) now not radio, and how many
intelligent people can stand the dribble on talk back radio I wonder?

MrT.

 

[Mr.T]

"Andy Wood" <woodag@trap.ozemail.com.au> wrote in message
news:78GdnYIKncvRN83RnZ2dnUVZ_o-dnZ2d@westnet.com.au...

Earlier this year it was widely reported that American teenagers are
sending over 100 text messages per day.

Astonishing isn't it, but that's what happens when you send a few characters
at a time rather than a 10 minute phone call I guess. My bet is those 100
SMS are to only a handful of different people, NOT 100 different people.

At the rate I am going, it is
quite likely I will not send that number in my lifetime.

But how many usenet posts, emails, phone calls etc? It's simply a choice of
technologies.

MrT.

 

[terryc]

On Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:39:14 +1000, David L. Jones wrote:

I
got a new machine at work and couldn't even remember which usenet server
I used to set up my viewer! That's how little I use usenet these days.

Naah, just shows ho reliable usenet is that you don't need to keep
reconfiguring it all the time.

 

[Grant]

On Thu, 29 Jul 2010 20:03:32 -0700 (PDT), kreed <kenreed1999@gmail.com> wrote:

On Jul 30, 10:42 am, "Mr.T" <MrT@home> wrote:
"kreed" <kenreed1...@gmail.com> wrote in message

news:998ae6aa-8ee7-465e-b249-b5d58340f96b@p22g2000pre.googlegroups.com...

I would suggest that radio probably still does ok, as you tend to
listen to it in the car when driving, and often in workplaces and home
as "background company".

In general I think you would be wrong there too with MP3 players being so
ubiquitous. I for one listen to radio VERY rarely these days, and younger
people do even less so IME.
MTV drives record sales (MP3 downloads) now not radio, and how many
intelligent people can stand the dribble on talk back radio I wonder?

MrT.


You are probably very right on that too, while I don't have the
facility in my car, most cars over the last couple of years are being
advertised as being
"ipod compatible" or at very least will play MP3 CD's, or have a line
level input.

The reason I probably didn't think of that is that I don't own a
portable MP3 player and do have the radio on when driving around.


A lot of modern music is getting so bad - Im starting to prefer
silence (IE: Im getting too old

ABC Classic FM? What I listen to most of the time in the car, or
Radio National on AM if I'm too far away from FM stations.

Grant.

 

[Mr.T]

"Grant" <omg@grrr.id.au> wrote in message
news:s2m456drvvnp8g6cbesjonm0lem5q7fbj5@4ax.com...

ABC Classic FM? What I listen to most of the time in the car,

Personally I never listen to classical music in the car or on an MP3 player.
For classical it MUST be live, on my HiFi system, or nothing, but each to
their own I guess.

MrT.

 

[kreed]

On Jul 30, 10:42 am, "Mr.T" <MrT@home> wrote:

"kreed" <kenreed1...@gmail.com> wrote in message

news:998ae6aa-8ee7-465e-b249-b5d58340f96b@p22g2000pre.googlegroups.com...

I would suggest that radio probably still does ok, as you tend to
listen to it in the car when driving, and often in workplaces and home
as "background company".

In general I think you would be wrong there too with MP3 players being so
ubiquitous. I for one listen to radio VERY rarely these days, and younger
people do even less so IME.
MTV drives record sales (MP3 downloads) now not radio, and how many
intelligent people can stand the dribble on talk back radio I wonder?

MrT.

You are probably very right on that too, while I don't have the
facility in my car, most cars over the last couple of years are being
advertised as being
"ipod compatible" or at very least will play MP3 CD's, or have a line
level input.

The reason I probably didn't think of that is that I don't own a
portable MP3 player and do have the radio on when driving around.


A lot of modern music is getting so bad - Im starting to prefer
silence (IE: Im getting too old

 

[kreed]

On Jul 30, 8:39 am, "David L. Jones" <altz...@gmail.com> wrote:

kreed wrote:
On Jul 28, 11:18 am, "Dennis" <inva...@nowhere.com> wrote:
It seems over many years that aus.electronics is carking it.

Apart from active input from Don McK, Dave LJ, its really quiet.

PA seems to have morphed into |-|erc and Sylvia seems to be
channeling Rod Speed.

Whatever became of Bob Wilson?

http://groups.google.com.au/group/aus.electronics/about

Archive

  Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov
Dec
1992                     1
1994           1      3  6  9  4
1995 8  7  46 14 20 12 35 36 89 24 140 146
1996 210 291 183 211 238 240 215 243 289 249 321 194
1997 321 263 392 292 451 268 306 297 636 486 421 463
1998 508 418 462 365 487 501 563 504 508 479 504 409
1999 621 676 650 560 712 533 661 877 500 780 736 673
2000 801 692 747 691 1069 895 821 1029 857 1112 1056 914
2001 1276 1136 1345 1833 2384 1568 2388 2236 1580 1639 1504
1546
2002 2326 1542 2182 1862 1697 1583 1543 1740 1204 1514 1326
1699
2003 1516 1499 1430 1854 1299 1281 1157 1550 1637 1295 1102
804
2004 1313 848 868 1136 1010 772 702 626 540 601 709 854
2005 1383 772 1341 825 828 918 1062 824 759 1035 964 1197
2006 653 694 665 545 964 639 539 431 634 436 549 646
2007 493 997 1174 1479 1342 537 598 530 492 510 320 319
2008 498 591 631 507 813 590 349 1060 487 564 489 419
2009 978 550 1087 636 631 826 1115 395 572 904 474 411
2010 647 436 502 660 326 373 330

IF this works for you - it will demonstrate (based on monthly numbers
of posts) that you are correct. I have been noticing this trend for
the past year or so.
Seems that the group hit an all-time peak about mid 2001 and continued
to do ok during 2002-03 (depending on which month you look at) and has
declined ever since.

I have been on here since around the time that Electronics Australia
collapsed, (defecating the short lived out EAT as it died) and it has
overall been a pretty good and knowledgeable group to be in, its very
very sad to see it dropping like this. Learned a lot from it over the
years too.

According to some posters on other groups, in the US major ISP's
started dropping usenet access a couple of years back based on the
excuse of "child porn" but more likely to cut costs from maintaining
something that has reducing user base with the continuing take up of
Facebook, Twit ter, Google groups etc also happening. For serious
subject discussions, I don't think these are anywhere near as good as
usenet personally.

It isn't just Aus Electronics, most Usenet based groups that I have
been reading or posting on have dropped significantly with posts,
and/or getting filled up with crap
(not necessarily spam, but more ignorant or stupid posts, usually from
those that don't want to listen to / fight with those who know - who
then get sick of it and slowly stop being involved )

The top all time posters (that I can recognise from the mangled email
addys) seem to be Phil Allison, Don McKenzie, Rod Speed, & Trevor
Wilson, from the look of the table below

I'm the third highest poster behind Phil & Rod, using two email addresses:
altz...@gmail.com and my old dljo...@ozemail.com.au

My apologies to you, (and to any others I missed) - I only posted the
few mangled email addys that I could recognise from the list.
All (non-spam) contributions over the years are greatly appreciated.

Yes, I agree with most, the group is dying off, that's just a natural
consequence of the general decline of Usenet groups to other medium.
I got a new machine at work and couldn't even remember which usenet server I
used to set up my viewer! That's how little I use usenet these days.

Heck, even my EEVblog forum gets a ton more activity than this group now:http://www.eevblog.com/forum/index.php?action=stats
Average of 42 posts per day, 6 new members sign up per day, etc
Right now there are 13 users actively viewing the forum, but it's been as
high as 223.

Dave.
--
---------------------------------------------
Check out my Electronics Engineering Video Blog & Podcast:http://www.eevblog.com