Re: What happened to this grooup?

"Neb Okla" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> "Kevin Johnston" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> >
> > "Neb Okla" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > > People abandoned the public newsgroup for a private site.
> > >
> > > Personally, I think it's a pain having to approve every newsgroup post.
> >
> > This is one advantage of using the web to access it; if you're logged in
> > no approval is required.  The web interface is actually one of the
> > nicest discussion group interfaces I've encountered.
> 
> I've seen much better (for example):
> http://support.microsoft.com/newsgroups/default.aspx?NewsGroup=microsoft.publi
> c.windows.inetexplorer.ie6_outlookexpress&SLCID=US&ICP=GSS3&sd=GN&id=fh;en-us;
> newsgroups

Group-level threaded display is certainly the first thing I would add to 
Lugnet if I could.

However, no offense, but, are you kidding?  I played with this for a few 
minutes and was not impressed at all.  I didn't see any way to display 
the entire contents (bodies) of a thread all at once on one page.  Tell 
me if I missed something.  This is something that not even my favorite 
NNTP clients can do.  (Granted there are only a couple decent ones on 
the Mac.)

I find the display options on Lugnet are top-notch.  I can look at 
messages, whether in groups or threads, by title, by extract, or long 
lists of full bodies.  The extract stuff strips out quoted material, so 
I get a better extract than, say, on Google.  (Though I like Google's 
side-by-side thread display.)

Compare against this:

Display of 50 latest messsage to lugnet.general, by title:
<http://news.lugnet.com/general/?n=*,-50&v=c>

(This is the URL-style I use to check my favorite groups on Lugnet.  I 
wish this were readily visible on the site to newcomers, I don't find 
the default newsgroup display very useful.)


Same, by extract:
<http://news.lugnet.com/general/?n=*,-50&v=b>

(notice elision of quoted text and URLs)


Same, in toto:
<http://news.lugnet.com/general/?n=*,-50&v=a>


Entire thread display:
<http://news.lugnet.com/general/?n=44118&t=i&v=a>

Same, in brief:
<http://news.lugnet.com/general/?n=44118&t=i&v=b>


Single message display from the above thread, with extracts from the 
parent, and all children:

<http://news.lugnet.com/general/?n=44118>

I *wish* my NNTP client was this cool.


> And even that example isn't as flexible as the NNTP standard which at the
> very least allows access to a variety of news readers, along with a more
> responsive interface, and the ability to respond to posts offline.

Which Lugnet supports.  Does any other community website do that?  It's 
certainly very uncommon.


> > > They do have it divided out nicely by category, but much as with 
> > > Usenet at large, people simply crosspost everywhere all the time.
> > >
> > > So it really just moves discussions out of the public domain.
> >
> > Al least it is fully archived, unlike most web forums.  The entire
> > message database since inception is accessible.
> 
> rec.toys.lego is also fully archived by several sources (most notably Google
> Groups (which was once DejaNews).
> 
> Lugnet's archive could only possibly go back as far as (could it be 6 years
> ago tomorrow?) this post:
> http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&selm=65idtp%24ftq%
> 241%40darla.visi.com
> 
> The Google archive goes back as far as 1/10/1994.  It includes 110,000
> messages that aren't in the Lugnet archive.
> 
> I guess it depends on your definition of "fully archived".

I thought it was pretty clear from context that I meant Lugnet itself is 
archived, esp. since I said "unlike most web forums."  Most web forums, 
esp. those centered on something like a hobby, eventually expire the 
vast majority of the posted messages.

I don't like the privatization of public discussion very much either 
(though it has its pluses, notably content control), but Lugnet is one 
of the premiere examples out there.

Kevin