Sorry to bother you folks with this, but after returning to Germany
after three years' absence, I've discovered that neither my old nor my
new ISP provide an nntp server through which I can access this
newsgroup with Outlook Express (or Mail). A search for an alternative
has been unsuccessful. Is Google really my only alternative?

Thanks for any advice.

Regards,

Mike Metcalf

michaelmetcalf@compuserve.com wrote:

I've been using news.aioe.org as the newsserver here since local isp
also dropped their access. Not greatest, but ok and the price is
right... :)

--

Hi Mike, and welcome back.

There are several alternatives. I personally consider google groups to
be about the worst of them. In addition to a horrible interface (which
encourages poor posting practices), it has other problems. In some other
newsgroups I subscribe to, I (and others in those groups) auto-kill
postings from google groups because the signal-to-noise ratio is just
too bad. Fortunately, I haven't had to resort to that in
comp.lang.fortran.

dpb wrote:

Googling finds a bunch of free and pay newsgroup servers. Here's a list.

http://www.disenter.com/

Gary Scott wrote:
...

I'd recommend That as well if you're in an area that has choice(s); not
so much if in (very) small markets where number of local suppliers is
quite limited... :(

--

On Aug 20, 11:05 am, nos...@see.signature (Richard Maine) wrote:
...

I haven't posted from google for more than six months, but
I usually use it when travelling since it's easier than
reconfiguring my computer for nntp access from another
ISP. In what way is this message "poor posting practice"?
It seems to work the same way as I remember.

Of course, since it's a web-based service, maybe it works
differently in different browsers. I suppose it might
even be unacceptable from, say, Netscape (which I haven't
tried in years).

--
J. Giles

jamesgiles@att.net att.net> wrote:

It isn't that I see. I didn't say google groups forces poor practices -
just that it encourages them. The two are not particularly close to the
same. I've not tried posting through google in ages that I can recall,
but I am assured by many other people that it:

1. Makes proper quoting/citation awkward. Obviously not impossible, as
you demonstrate, but awkward.

2. Likewise, it makes proper followup nonobvious. We have some pretty
regular and explicit demonstration of that in this newsgroup, where
there are one or two people (no point in names) who simply cannot ever
manage to figure it out through google in spite of multiple
explanations. I'm aware that you can, but we have proof by example that
some can't.

jamesgiles@att.net wrote:

On Wed, 20 Aug 2008 10:05:54 -0700, Richard Maine
wrote in <1ilyuas.bzxp8m15cmyqwN%%nospam@see.signature>:

Many people over here also use individual, and swear by it
(although their preferred payment method has drawn criticism lately).
Luckily I have my academic connections (although Brunel figures that since
I'm the only person to complain when their server goes down, I must be the
only person using it; they're trying to work out how I can access a JANET
server directly so they can stop their server).

Richard Maine wrote:
....