Is the new Google Groups fucking up the Usenet Groups?

[James Meyer]

I do electronic design for a living so I check this group both here at
home with "Agent" and at work with "Google". Recently I've noticed that I see a
lot of "Re: somethingorother" posts here at home without ever having seen the
original posts. That never happened before the "new" Google Groups started and
is annoyingly often now.

Has anybody else noticed this?

Jim "All for progress but hate change." Meyer

 

[Rich Webb]

On 30 Dec 2004 17:15:46 GMT, et472@FreeNet.Carleton.CA (Michael Black)
wrote:
[snip...snip...]

Google has
tried to set up an interface oriented towards their "groups", and they've not
made a good distinction between their "groups" and the newsgroups.

Which may be intentional. In the long run, wouldn't it be nice (for
Google) if ISPs dropped their local news servers as being too much
trouble since their users can "get the same stuff" for free from Google?

Think "targeted advertising."

--
Rich Webb Norfolk, VA

 

[JeffM]

One big mistake they've made is to allow for replies to old posts.
Michael Black

Agree, but we may argue about the cutoff interval.

Previously, if a message was older than a month,
there was no link to reply to the message.

I didn't find that to be true

(though there were some munged pages).
You may be thinking of Slashdot.

The new feature I like is that the Reply dialog
doesn't automatacially blockquote 286 lines of the previous post(s).
Zero lines, actually--though that has its downside as well
(as you have noted).

The new "feature" (bug??) that I like least is that
(though the Headers frame has each item numbered)
the items in the Body frame are not numbered.

 

[Active8]

On 31 Dec 2004 05:28:47 -0800, Mike wrote:

So much for email security.

--
Best Regards,
Mike

 

[Ian Stirling]

James Meyer <jmeyer@nowhere.net> wrote:

I do electronic design for a living so I check this group both here at
home with "Agent" and at work with "Google". Recently I've noticed that I see a
lot of "Re: somethingorother" posts here at home without ever having seen the
original posts. That never happened before the "new" Google Groups started and
is annoyingly often now.

Has anybody else noticed this?

Yes.
Your post has no References: header that lists the messages before it in
the thread, so it doesn't thread properly on many newsreaders.

 

[Active8]

On Fri, 31 Dec 2004 08:48:36 -0500, Active8 wrote:

On 31 Dec 2004 05:28:47 -0800, Mike wrote:

So much for email security.

But no spam in the account and it's been active since Sept when a
friend emailed me asking how I like it and the 1 Gig storage. He was
the one (or two) who told me about it, now that I see his msg.

We need a way to keep our gmail addys out of the group postings,
though. Luckily I'll be able to remove the post. You have to remove
it from the google archive with the "show options" link at the top
of you post and then you have to have an Identity set up on your
newsreader with the same gmail addy - unless you do it manually - to
cancel it from usenet.

I'm replying to myself (Mike) as Active8.

If you downloaded headers after about 11:30 AM EST and you see the
post by Mike that was replied to by Active8, let me know, I'll try
to cancel it again.

It's time to send negative feedback and positive suggestion.
--
Best Regards,
Mike

 

[Rich Grise]

On Thu, 30 Dec 2004 18:32:59 +0000, Rich Webb wrote:

On 30 Dec 2004 17:15:46 GMT, et472@FreeNet.Carleton.CA (Michael Black)
wrote:
[snip...snip...]
Google has
tried to set up an interface oriented towards their "groups", and they've not
made a good distinction between their "groups" and the newsgroups.

Which may be intentional. In the long run, wouldn't it be nice (for
Google) if ISPs dropped their local news servers as being too much
trouble since their users can "get the same stuff" for free from Google?

Think "targeted advertising."

So, assuming one had the software, which actually is not all that big of a
deal, how many gigabytes of disk and megabits of bandwidth would it
take to realistically field a news server?

Of course, funding would be a consideration, but that's a different
question.

Thanks,
Rich

 

[Rich Grise]

On Thu, 30 Dec 2004 23:01:09 -0800, John Miles wrote:
....

I sent the following to their feedback link at
http://groups-beta.google.com/support/bin/request.py not too long ago:
....

Here's Mine:
(This is a reply from google to an earlier bitch)
#####################################################################
Hi Rich,

Thank you for your feedback on Google Groups Beta. Your input is very
important to us. If, at any point, you'd like to provide us with
further
details, we encourage you to submit a 'Suggestion/Feature Request' at
http://groups-beta.google.com/support/bin/request.py. This allows us to
easily track which features are most important to Google Groups users.
After you click the 'Continue' button, you'll see a screen where you
can
tell us exactly what improvements you want us to make to Google Groups
Beta.

We really appreciate your assistance and your suggestions.

Regards,
The Google Team


Original Message Follows:
------------------------
From: Rich Grise <richgrise@yahoo.com>
Subject: google groups beta
Date: Wed, 22 Dec 2004 12:14:06 -0800 (PST)

It's AWFUL!

I've started using groups.google.co.uk.

The new beta format just plain stinks.

Please don't now also go ruin google.co.uk.

If possible, reject the beta as a terrible interface,
counterintuitive, much too web-script-kiddie-ish. It's
no good at all for doing an actual realistic search of
newsgroup articles.

If you want groups a la yahoo, call it google forums
or something, but PLEASE put groups.google.com back
the way it was.

Thanks,
Rich Grise
##############################################################

Cheers!
Rich
> --------------snip-------------

 

[Active8]

On 31 Dec 2004 14:30:21 -0800, Rich On Google wrote:

And I FUCKING HATE ARIAL!

what does that mean?
--
Best Regards,
Mike

 

[Active8]

Oh. *That* Arial. Yes I bitched about the text art and suggested at
least a <ASCII_ART> tag. I stressed that some people use this for
work and sometimes have to google from the hotel.
--
Best Regards,
Mike

 

[Rich Grise]

On Fri, 31 Dec 2004 18:44:22 -0500, Active8 wrote:

On 31 Dec 2004 14:30:21 -0800, Rich On Google wrote:

And I FUCKING HATE ARIAL!

what does that mean?

They use arial proportional font on their web site now. I much prefer
courier. I suppose I could look for an option, but I use it so seldom it's
not that big of a deal.

Cheers!
Rich

 

[Active8]

On Sat, 01 Jan 2005 04:26:59 GMT, Rich Grise wrote:

On Fri, 31 Dec 2004 18:44:22 -0500, Active8 wrote:

On 31 Dec 2004 14:30:21 -0800, Rich On Google wrote:

And I FUCKING HATE ARIAL!

what does that mean?

They use arial proportional font on their web site now. I much prefer
courier. I suppose I could look for an option, but I use it so seldom it's
not that big of a deal.

I sent 2 emails to them using the same links to the
feedback/suggestions page. One went to gmail support, I guess
because they're the ones that replied. The other generated the same
thing someone else posted. gmail support's reply starts with:
***
Thanks for contacting us. We aren't able to respond directly to
inquiries
submitted to this email address.
***

So there's no telling if group support got my first email.

I hope everyone submits their bitches so at least some of them get
through.

--
Best Regards,
Mike