Re: You Can Use the Internet the Old-School Unixy Way With Shell Accounts

On 2025-04-12, Ethan Carter <[email protected]> wrote:
> Borax Man <[email protected]> writes:
>
>> ["Followup-To:" header set to alt.culture.usenet.]
>> On 2025-03-22, yeti <[email protected]> wrote:
>>> [email protected] (Paul W. Schleck) wrote:
>>>
>>>> "One reason to sign up for a shell account is that shell providers
>>>> often have friendly user communities.
>>>
>>> (*) Most neighbours I have in pubnixens are just silent, but the few
>>> that are not are worth staying.
>>>
>>
>> I signed up to one or two, and that was my experience.  The *idea* was
>> cool, but no one was really there.  The fundamental problem, I think, is
>> its not a real community.  Its people who want to use a particular
>> technology, but don't share any other interest.  It's like starting a
>> group for people who like to meet in community centres.  Once you're
>> there, then what?  You've already achieved your goal?  The Gemini
>> community had the same problem.  They just liked the idea of using
>> Gemini.  That doesn't make what you have to say more interesting.
>>
>> It was basically, at least to me, people who liked to use a particular
>> means to an ends, but actually had no ends.  I do understand that the
>> communication format does matter (part of the appeal of Usenet to me),
>> but you need more than a shared desire to use the same format.  At least
>> on Usenet, you can find others with similar interests.
>
> This makes perfect sense and matches my experience as well.  That's why
> I think that smaller communities should also peer USENET groups---the
> ones that the smaller community cares about.  (It would be useful
> already even if the peering is read-only.)  Let's say you have a small
> NNTP community with a few of your friends.  You set up an NNTP server
> for your local private groups---secrets you guys share.  Now you have a
> small world (your community) and a big world (the USENET).  If your
> small NNTP server also lets all of you watch the USENET, that makes your
> small community more interesting because now you check the USENET from
> it: so you don't miss any articles that eventually come in your small
> community.  You know what I mean?
>
> Because one of the problems of small communities is precisely
> that---nothing happens there.  So importing a tiny piece of the big
> community would help to keep the small one engaging.
>
> Even though I use the super Gnus NNTP client, I don't know how to post
> the same article to groups on different servers---that would be useful
> to share the same post on the big community and also give a chance to my
> small community to discuss it too (separately).
>
> Also, when I see an interesting article on the USENET, sometimes I would
> reply to follow it up on my small community, for an internal discussion.
> It's not easy to do that with my super NNTP client.  I must copy the
> article, compose a new one on the small community, paste it and still
> add my comment... It's not convenient.
>
> I think the USENET is a great source of things to discuss, but I don't
> always want to discuss it on the USENET itself.
>

This makes sense to me.  Have your own private group, sure, but link it
with the wider world.  Essentially, a Usenet subset which is of interest
to that group, plus additional groups which are local only.

I've discussed such ideas with a friend, who used Usenet a bit, but was
more interested in technology which took you "off grid".  I first
thought of BBS's with a private 'net like fsxNet or fidoNet, but NNTP
seemed to fit the bill much better.  I still marvel at how people seem
to overlook existing solutions.

Is super Gnus an EMACS client?  Thats the only Gnus that I know of.

> [* snip *]